Inspiration for a Lifetime

A little more than a year ago, a friend of mine told me about her kid. I mentioned her in one of my posts on barefoot walking A PhD in philosophy, this lady does some intriguing studies on biomechanics, myofascial release as well as engaging in various aspects of natural health and foraging wild plants. The way she described her son, reminded me a lot of myself, specially when I was a kid. When I met him, I was intrigued by his energy and enthusiasm and surprised because he looked so much like me when I was a kid, except for the nose. Which mine took a couple of hits in my sparring training and broke once. He couldn't focus on anything for too long and kept getting super excited about details. If something would captivate his interest although, he could really get immersed and delve into various aspects that made up a skill or a craft. When guided he's a fast learner and only needed to be shown something once and got a the hang of it right away. With the world so big to a young man like him, it yet seemed to feel so small with that much of enthusiasm and ease. It felt like nothing was impossible with so much power to explore this whole universe around him. I could relate so much.

On a sunny day, I took him to paint at close to a river where it was legal to paint on walls and gave him a little workshop on fill ins and outlines. Another activity where he again exhibited the skill of independence and practical application as well as wanting to do things his own way. At every step, I thought that it was me who is learning instead of him.

^{Sony NEX VG-10 and a 50mm 1.8 Lens}

About a week later during a cold winter day with gray skies I met up with a friend to paint.
I went to paint a piece at -5 degrees for a collage collaboration with Hive account@shimozurdo. He really is someone on hive that I regularly talk to, chat and wish I could hang out with and paint one day. In real live the guy is also such a humble character who doesn't just inspire me with his art. He is a application developer, a father and one of the people who make me love our communities here.

As Hive account@shimozurdo lives in Mexico and he painted a dragon coming out of a portal. I wanted to paint Rane (the red shinobi ^{character in my story}), who meets with shimo's dragon. I had a really hard time with the cold as I suffer of a peripheral neuropathy and the cold in winters can strongly inhibit my muscular functions. After my body bailed on me, I basically withstood and finished using my left hand for the white and blue colors. My hand swollen in pain, with heavy breathing any dizziness I almost vomited but bit my way thru it anyways. I wasn't too happy with the outcome but sent it anyways. Hive account@shimozurdo made a collage immediately. Kindly note that the beneficiaries of this post are split three ways with your support.

^{he added an elephant canvas I did using spray paint a few years ago}

After leaving the wall that day, I passed a cultural youth center, which is also home to many dancers who practice breaking and dancing to some seriously great music, that can't stop a guy like me moving to warm myself back up. After an hour drenched in sweat, I realised how much I missed the dancing and that I had almost entirely quit dancing apart from some random visits to clubs or concerts since 2010. I would train regularly in Mumbai, India with some of the first Indian breakers occasionally. Since I was gonna get visited by two dancers representing India at two major events who are teachers at Hive account@quest-skool, it all gave me additional dance fever for this period during the DPC Jam.

Of course I had to revisit the wall to take a picture for the #hive-127039. A Hip Hop community on hive one can subscribe to, that reblogs Hip Hop related posts for elaborated music, poetry and vocalism, Graffiti and visuals, dance and martial arts, plant based food and olfactory sensing, science and consciousness.

A little while later Hive account@shimozurdo even made a post about where he painted mehere, where he made a portrait of me. I gotta admit that I was really moved. I mean when did anyone decide to make a portrait of you last? Specially when it's someone's talent you really believe in.

I wanted to share that image again here with a link to the post in case you missed it.

^{He is wearing some awesome vivo barefoot shoes}

Me and the little ninja bro ended up hanging out a couple of times. He was over at my studio and made an instrumental using some hardware synths. We started training breaking at the local dance studio and we went painting twice. He seemed to enjoy painting a lot and felt so inspired to make music. He would send me music he made on his desktop and even his phone or tablet using apps. The sentiments that came from him, was simply that the impossible is untried. Full of the power to manifest what he envisions. For a minute it really made me stop and think. So unconditioned, uncontaminated and inspiring, this kid would spark inspiration in me with his ingenuity, that remade me feel like he showed me something many of us forget when we grow up. At the age of ten, this kid really surprised me with the motion of his lines and feeling for dimension on paper and a great auditory sense. I could feel the movement within the stillness of the images he created as well as his excitement for gaming and science.

When we went for dance practice, walking around the block, I was asked a total of 14 times or more by various people if he was my son. That kinda made me feel really proud. I noticed that he didn't like that, because he already has a really cool dad. I kinda started to call em bro, but it was as if we smiled at each other and that just happened. I guess his mom gets annoyed by two kids running around the house when i'm over.

The fact that this kid takes things into his own hands, likes independence and takes charge of the power to learn things by himself, makes him excel at almost everything. Various graphic design softwares, a strong interest for science and a great sense for aesthetics partially gave me the feeling I was hanging out with much more than just some kid. This kid has skill and great potential.

I learned a strong lesson of being unconditioned, trying out and exploring new ideas without vocational associations of a particular calling. It made me revisit music I did 15-20 years ago, when I was still untainted and used to key map samples, change pitches and discover things that I thought at that time no one could come up with.

The lesson of meeting this kid taught me even more later. It reminded me of all the artists I liked from the 80s in those rare funk vinyls that I used to buy, because they were hard to come by in the mid 90s. That's because the masses were accustomed to acoustic instruments and only few really liked those rare disco tracks that everyone likes today from the beginning and end of the 80s. One could say that a lot of the music that came out back then was innovative and happened because some machines would get spooky hardware errors with which many strange arpeggiator sounds and glitches created were sounds they went with it. No wonder some of the hardware instruments and the music from that time would only sell at premiums as rare and limited edition 10 years later and are known as original vintage modules and vinyl today. At the time most people probably found it strange.

Maybe some of you out there are doing something your friends find strange? They might even suggest you to do it differently. What the masses like or what sells might be a trend because of marketing, but it does not always mean that it's innovative. I think children who just do because they feel and tune into something, is a child that many loose within themselves, when they're imposed with the standard status quo concepts as a norm.

Just a week ago I was hanging out with Hive account@needapencil, who was working on a Graphic. Being a Graphic designer, I asked if it was actually the standard way. I got a no. It was funny to me, because there are always multiple ways do something and some dogmatic Graphic designers would label some approaches as illegal and against all aesthetics. Surely that will have a reason. At the same time I believe that room for exploration and trial and error can give so much insight about other approaches? At the same time I feel it's important to have an opinion from someone whose actually good at something and learned it in a professional structure with fundamentals and basics, before expanding into the infinite realm of possible creative and vascular growth.

Source

Taking a dump the standard way

What truly fascinates me was that growing up going to India every couple of months on vacations with parents, I never really liked these Indian toilets, because one had to squat to take a dump. Visiting my two friends, they had a squat piece on top of their toilet seat, simply because it a healthier option to take a dump like that. It surely better for your rectum to squat. A lot of problems that people get with their backs, come from excessive relief on their lower spines due to the invention of the seat. Going back to squats regularly can help anyone cope with the inevitability of back problems arising from wearing bricks on your feet with stiff soles and landing on your heels.

Now days Indian toilets are changing to western ones...

That being said, there are several amazing revelations that came to me just by visiting this amazing family that I love sharing with the natural medicine folk. Really liked the idea of communal living and being around a kid that just grows up so natural and organic. He really made me to connect to my inner child even more. I don't know if that's a really good thing in our time and age and I don't know how long I can still get away with that ;)

Last but not least I really wanted to mention someone else here. Hive account@nowargraffitis

A bee from Berlin, This dude is such an awesome artist and a really good friend. He invited me to his home twice and is someone who will save on food if he could rather get his hands on a tube of acrylic paint instead. I have so much delight just thinking about him. I wish we lived in a time where such people would get funded to simply do what they want because it's people like him who inspire so many others.

After a visit and knowing that what really makes this new web for me, are the communities and the people, I'm someone who really likes to meet these amazing, one of a kind individuals we have on here. Hive account@nowargraffitis styled the four letters of my legal graffiti name, aka the name of my shinobi style comic who is actually a kung fu style 'yanje' rather than anything resembling something strictly Japanese.

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