just notion #4

There is a language

This language is imbedded

It is imbedded in my emotions

What I feel
It is not spoken
And it is not written


-


When I allow my emotions
To have equal validity to reason
And knowledge
When I allow them to be
As fully present as possible
The language reveals itself to me


-


I’ve spent much of my life
Denying my emotions
Not allowing myself to feel
What I needed to be feeling in the moment
Therefore I have lost
Much of the guidance the language would have delivered


-


This is the language of God
Not anyone’s God
But the true force that moves the cosmos
Man creates religions
To meet his organizational and security needs
These structures are of no concern to God


-


How do I know this?
I don’t
I feel this
Dare I say it?
What God is saying to me is
“It is all still good, do not be afraid”

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Jeff thinking stuff

just notion #3

Climbing up from my soul

I came to a place

Where my fire met the sky

Here

Where the heat was not so great

I knew

The flame might die

And I would be vulnerable

To the living

And yet

In that moment

That vulnerability

I met living at its most vibrant

I drew last breath

And let go

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I do not write to share meaning but to explore it. These are words I put together, but I don't know what they mean. That's okay.

Jeff thunked dis

Lost Myself

All the pictures on the wall are about you, not beyond you. When we look at images of any kind, art, advertising, television, we are looking at reflections of our collective living. It is why we began with cave paintings that reflected back to us moments of glory, ceremony or mundane life. These images serve to hold or even define our reality and give us our individual as well as collective sense of self. Today the images on the walls of our cave come in Hi-Def with surround sound. I think we are seeing our selves almost too clearly and are now hypnotized by this alternate (and fabricated) reality.

Not all images give you clear feeling
Photo title "decay"



Now all this thinking came to me with the ending of the ABC series “Lost”. Here was a show whose title referred more to the condition of the viewer than the show. The show's mission was to leave you more and more confused each week, and it achieved that. I have heard from a number of people who think the show ended without wrapping up loose ends and making it crystal clear what was going on. I think this is a metaphor for life. How often when a life comes to an end is everything in perfect order?

Are you here or always looking beyond?

Photo title "pretending to be alone"




If I look at the TVshow "LOST" as I might a cave painting, it’s asking me many questions.
Am I aware, truly aware, of the life I am in? Are there “hatches” I need to open or keep closed with in myself? Am I spending all my moments counting down and then resetting just to count down again? Am I trying to hard to fix everything? How do I know when to let go? And is my obsession with where I am going getting in the way of being where I am? I could go on and on but I plan to walk away from this Hi-Def cave painting happy with the questions it has left with me, about myself, not the plot.
Just let it go.
Please note this blogger is still watching TV on a non-digital set. One day I'll go Hi-Def. For now I just pretend.

Jeff off the island

Just Notion # 2

Lines

Are a language
Speaking to me
Be over there
Move through here
Duck under this
Twist around that
You have come to someplace
Stay here and be
Or break through the line
And attempt
To be free

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Cool video made with lines seen under a microscope
 http://www.youtube.com/user/infinity2infinity

Jeff in line

Back In Control & just notion #1

A few posts back, I claimed I was out of control and that I had started a new blog site. Well I have come to the realization that I do not have time in my life to manage two blogs. I will be shutting down my "Just Notions" blog and bringing the idea back to this site. From time to time, I will post a "just notions" post. These are random thoughts that come to me during the day or when I am asleep or both. So I'll start today with one of the posts from the now defunct "just notions" sight. As with all my work it will come with an image.
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just notion #1

I do not need to defend the existence of God

Because I am a madman

You see
God talks to me
You talk to me
And I do not dispute your existence
I hear God in the breath
That comes from your mouth
And crashes into my face
It says
I don’t care if you believe
In me
The idea of God needing to be worshiped
Is a human misconception
I hear God say
In the sound of your foot steps
Moving away
You are not here to obsess over my existence
You are here to be alive
In the sound of the door closing
God adds
Be that
Alive
You are a gift given to a moment
Believe in that

_______________________

The title I gave this on the old site was "be that"
Jeff Thinking

Random Acts of Light

This image came to be, by me photographing bright lights at night. I talked about this in my post of February 1st, 2010. To achieve the look of this  image I applied a filter that reduces the amount of color levels. You are only seeing about eight colors. I then used the smear tool on the lines to create the flame effect.

As it is with everything I like to do, this is mostly play. I guess you could call it practicing a skill if you need to, but if you are constantly being surprised by the efforts you make, it just feels more like play.

In this bizarre image that also started as lights at night, I dropped out color and then put it back in by layering other photos over the black and white image. I find these images fascinating and some what disturbing at the same time. It's like an alien landscape.

 I like to put myself into my work. Here I turned one of these random light pictures to a monochromatic blue and then tattooed my self. The key here is play! Playing with any medium you have will allow you to discover directions you may not have been aware of.                   

Jeff acting random                          

                                         Click on picktures to see full size

Picture Painting

Here's one of my mixed medium works. This was an attempt to paint with photos. I took four photos from my favorite meadow in Wisconsin and printed them out in a large format (the over all work is 20"). I then cut out of MDF (a wood substitute) the organic looking frame and painted it flat black. I then sliced up my photos and arranged them in to the frame. It is not easy to cut up big beautiful pictures, you need to have some kind of vision.

So much of the time when I am looking for a photo subject I am seeing pattern and texture. For example in this work you can see two panels with fine green and gold lines. That's tall grass just starting to turn gold. It was such a great looking texture with the late day sun shining on it, so I snapped a picture of it with out thought of how I'd use it. Thanks again to digital photography for setting us free and not having to worry about picture count.

As soon as I can find time and a vision (oh I have a few) I will do this again. This again gets back to my ideas of connectedness. I love to think in terms of things being woven together, it's like looking at the universe. It just feels right. Okay I'm spacing out. Grove on people!

Jeff Gone man!

Not sure which way it goes?

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Check out this amazing street artist I came across on You Tube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uad17d5hR5s

More Digital Doings

Now I'm not sure what the rules are in the photography world, I am hoping there are none, but because I am really a carpenter with a camera I can do whatever I want. So I use filters to enhance my photos. Not every shot turns out that great, but with a little color tweaking and a filter or two, you can make a flat picture jump. If you are taking digital pictures and not playing with all the computer gadgets to enhance your photos, you are missing out. There are real complicated programs that will take you years to master, but there are also easy programs as well. So get your pictures out of your camera and into the computer and play. Just make sure you always back up your originals. That way you can use the same picture again and again and make it different every time. Have fun!

Click on the pictures to make them larger.

Here is a link to a review of 11 free editors http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/pixelbasedwin/tp/freephotoedw.htm

Jeff tweaking