Are You Free?
Written By Dante.
Copright (c) April 2009.
As We Vote
I live a country where race covertly continues to be a determinant of ones success and status,despite the seeds of reconcilation and restitution being sown daily by accepting and embracing one another without the race factor,our combine effort to annihilate racial discrimination and preference, cynicism and polarity of minds,it is unfathomable for many not to belong to the winning team of ubuntu.
The lack of good role models in the black communities from which kids and youths can emulate through the journey of self discovery,identity and self actualisation.Now the question in my black mind is this:why did the adult white American elect a black man Barack Obama,to lead their country to say? Im sensing a paradym shift from the old into embracing the new and that which is possible and real,extrating the external variables of colour which still lingers in our minds in SA.
Is it true that in SA black parent would rather alienate their kids from culture and identity in favour of white schools as they believe that their kids mental capacity and intelligence are properly evaluated,now my question is:what is the synopsis for that mindset?
Yes it is true that most white educator are better qualified than blacks dew to skew resources allocation from past regime,agreed but now my question is what has democracy done for us in this instance under the ANC,yes the policies are great but the implementation is sordid and a facad after 15 years of our rainbow nation,what now and where do we go from here?
It would be a serious travesty to underestimate years of physical and mental entrenchment of both segregation and apartheid which cannot be erased within 15 years.I personally think its time we move on beyond race and colour,vote for what is right with a conscience of non predijuce but putting South Africa first for our future generation.
Racism is a stale news,let embrace one another and enact that dream of a rainbow nation where South Africa belongs to all that lives in it.We need genuine leaders as role models especially within the black community to be publicised and black history rewritten.
Sadly this is not the case.Only shallow and spineless sycophants - those with a serious thirst for material gain are publicised.It took leaders like Steve Biko to want to reverse the mental effect of apartheid,can ANC-COPE-DA and the rest of the parties carry this mantle on their shoulders as we vote on 22 April?Can JZ take us to the promise land.As we vote,think about the good of the nation and make the rite decision.
Written By Dante.
Copright (c) April 2009.
Simplify Your Focus
Henry David Thoreau shouted “Simplify. Simplify. Simplify” in his breathtakingly good book “Walden”. Nice point. One of the primary reasons that people and organizations fail to get to greatness is that they try to be too many things to too many people. I'll use the Confucius quote I often use here: “Man who chases two rabbits catches neither.”
The most successful human beings are wildly focused. They have a very clear picture of what it is they want to create by the time they reach the end of their lives and then they have the discipline (and courage) to stick to their knitting – saying “no” to everything that is not mission critical.
So my gentle suggestion to you is to simplify your life. Strip away all that is unimportant – these are the things keeping you from getting to your dreams. And then once you do your clean up, focus, focus, focus. You'll be surprised how good you will then get at being great.
''Remember life is a skill...It's takes practice to perfect a skill but its takes focused to make you good at it"
Stay Focused & Keep Practicsing Life.
Written By Dante.
Copright (c) April 2009.
Love Has No Opossite.
Written By Dante.
Copright (c) April 2009.
Get Lifted Within
The problem with humanity is deeply rooted in the mind itself or let me say,our misidentification with mind.So where is the proof for this Greater Reality beyond the confines of our minds you ask.Here is an analogy:A battery of scientist can get together and tell you about all the scientific proof for the fact that bananas are bitter.But all you have to do is taste one.once,to realize that there is this whole other aspect to bananas.Ultimately,proof lies not in the intellectual arguements of the minds eye or common sence,but in being in touch in some way by the sacred within and without.You are bigger than your mind,what it can conceal or limits you to do...Journey within the possibility of a higher power,a creator,an eternal being,a sacred entity,the universe,nature, whatever your spiritual affilliation or identity is,there is more to your life than you can ever imagine.Get lifted in this moment in time.
Written By Dante.
Copright (c) April 2009.
Man or Woman?
One of the great differences between a man and a woman is rooted in this:
Man had a position with God before he had a relationship with another human being.
Woman was birthed in relationship.
We see today that men are positional and women are relational.
Men are concerned about power and status for more than women.
Men loves titles.
Women are concerned about their relationship: their children, their spouses, their friends.
When men get together, they ask one another, “What do you do for living?” In the course of the conversation, they expect to find out what position another man holds in his company.
When women get together they ask, “Are you married? Do you have children?” In the course of their conversation, they pull out pictures of their family members and give details about everyone of them.
Man first job was naming.
Woman first job is love, care and have a relationship.
In all fairness life is about love and love is about relationship and relationship is about giving and giving is about selflessness and selflessness is about sacrifice and sacrifice is about dying to self and dying to self is about living..
Until we start functioning in par in all facets of our lives in these dimensions we will not and never experience the reality of what we are as human beings,our relationships with self and others will lack fulfillments and satisfaction, the empty void will keep creeping up because of that lack of understanding of self...
Lastly I have realise that ''When you see me you will know you" In essence, I meant when you can come to the place of seeing yourself in your partner, accept, embrace and love what you see without being distasteful,dissappointed or disgusted then you are at the helm of experiencing the fullness of what you were made to be as one entity.The whole concept of a help meet in the original agenda of creation become clearer and sensible.
Then you cannot abuse you, so you will not abuse your partner, You can hurt you, so definitely you will not hurt your partner, You can cheat on yourself so obviously you will not cheat on your partner, You cannot raise your hands or beat yourself up so it is suffice to say you will not do the same to your partner because you see yourself as a replica and a refilection of yourself in them.
Keep discovering the reality of who you are as you evolve daily to the fullness of your being as man and as woman...
Written By Dante.
Copright (c) April 2009.
Who Are You?
In retrospect, I am in high hopes that despite the glitches and setbacks you are still striving hard with wisdom encompassing your decisions as you strive for the lasting fulfillment of your goals, dreams and desires for 2009.
In the catchment of my minds eyes I asked these questions and I am still finding answers to them but reiterating it you will be great as we all work towards making all our heart desires a reality in 2009.
Now think through these moments in your quiet spaces, where you are open, naked and honest to yourself: Are you in touch with where you are in your life right now as in all aspect of your entity as being? How you feel? Can you accept your own progress? Have you faced your faults, and your great assets? One of the most important questions you can ask yourself is this: Where am I in my life?
Humans or people if you will like get into trouble when they don’t know where they are in life. Some people are in one stage of their lives acting as if they are in another, the truth is you can fool others but you can’t fool yourself. Some have entered into marriage, motherhood, fatherhood, relationships and therefore have certain responsibilities, but they are still living as if they are boys and girls playing in the park.
Even if you don’t tell anyone atleast tell yourself where you are in life! When we hide, we turn phony. We act out a charade. We put on a “face” and participate in our own masquerade. Only two things are worse than being phony with other people: being phony with yourself and being phony with God, the universe, its all depends on your spirituality and what you identify with.
If you haven’t faced up to who you are and what you have done, you will find it very, very difficult to enter into the next level of your life in aspect even in your relationship with the creator. Furthermore, you will find it difficult to relate to others.
If you are feeling lonely and deprived, in all likelihood you are emotionally intimidated by other people. You can’t open yourself up and give them hug or pay them a compliment or look them in the eyes with compassion because you are afraid they may look inside your heart and see the real you. Why are you afraid? Because you haven’t looked there lately and you are, afraid of what you might find if you do!
Until you face your flaws and failures- openly admit them to yourself and accept the fact that you aren’t perfect-you’ll never be able to allow other people to know, much less accept, your imperfections. If you aren’t open to that kind of sharing you will feel forever cut off from self, estranged, isolated, lonely, deprived and alienated from others.
In conclusion, many of us spend a lot of energy asking about other men and women around us, “where are they?”
What does he/she have that I don’t have to get that kind of man or woman, that kind of car or home, that kind of job or salary, that kind of authority, power and influence and the list goes on.
These are all variation of asking, where are you at? The answer to that question leads to dead end. It result to jealousy, competition, hatred, distrust, and suspicion… all of which are toxic energies that you don’t need and in nutshell, they are murderous attitude infiltrate you from reaching the next level of your life.
Instead ask yourself,”Where am I at?” That’s the question that can lead to life. That’s the question that will lead you and give you the ability to get close to other people and to true fulfillment and satisfaction in life. Face yourself today … Where ARE you in 2009?
Written By Dante.
Copright © March 2009
God's Calendar
Have you ever stopped to think about who you are and how you got to be who you are? Have you wondered how it is that you got through all the things you have been through? Have you ever thoroughly considered your own life?
So many of us are busy looking at their problems, their needs, their areas of weakness- that they fail to see the big picture of their own lives and the ironic part is no one can see for you other than you yourself. They don’t have an awareness of where they are in their lives, primarily because they don’t have a clear picture of where they have been.
There’s a reason that you are who you are. But there’s an even greater purpose for your life. You may be who you are, but you are not yet who you will be. God has a bigger and better things ahead for you.
Where are you on God’s agenda? Do you know? Most of us don’t know what day it is on “God’s calendar.” The challenge is for us to be aware of that moment when its comes. Being ALIVE is the first requirement for being available and for as long as you are alive, a miracle is possible because everyday you live is a miracle.
Written By Dante.
Copright © March 2009
It's About You So Take Charge
Oh, the word sound good and rings true. The excuse, however, is lame. The reason the word ring true is because we all have a degree of dysfunction in our lives. The reason for the lameness of the excuse is this: we are all from dysfunctional families. Every family has an element of dysfunction to it, so if any person is able to rise above dysfunction, then all people are to rise above dysfunction.
You must face the reality every day that some of your problems stem from the fact that there is somebody who doesn’t like your success. Is it any wonder that the minor skirmishes we face in the daily battles our personal lives come from the same root of jealousy?
Your attitude today is something that is totally under your control. You choose. You choose whether you will be prejudiced, angry, hateful, bitter, resentful.It is in your power to make a decision about what you will think and how you will act. Don’t blame your actions on your dysfunctional family. The fact is if you don’t like you circumstances or situation you can change it.
Whatever is oppressing you – be it people, habits, addictions.circumstances – whoever or whatever your slave master happens to be – you are mightier than the thing that is oppressing you!
Written By Dante.
Copright © March 2009
In Search For You
Written By Dante.
Copright © Febuary 2009
Before You Say I Do.
Written By Dante.
Copright © Febuary 2009
Sex on a First Dante
Written By Dante.
Copright © Febuary2009
BaSix For Happiness
Written By Dante.
Copright © Febuary 2009
What is Moral & What's Not
Written By Dante.
Copright © Febuary 2009
The Art of Release
Written By Dante.
Copright © Febuary 2009
My Cry To My Generation
One of the greatest deceptions in our society is the notion that men are hurting over women. There are exceptions, but you find that we are not grieving over our mothers or our wives. No, we miss our fathers. It is from them that we most often draw our strength, our weakness, our pleasure and our unbearable pain. Somebody has stolen our heroes.
Absentee fathers and deadbeat dads have littered this nation with confused sons and angry husbands. Millions of bitter and abandoned young males are growing into men without mentors. How can we expect them to touch hurts and needs in others like real men when their own deep hurts have been healed?
This void of longing and brokenness in the men of my and this generation has spawned a raging flood of conflicts, promiscuity, perversion and domestic violence. Broken and hurting sons are asking their fathers for a deposit of true manhood, but their fathers are bankrupt-no one has made a real deposit in them!
It is painful to admire someone who isn’t there. A one-sided love affair is never fulfilling. Empty arms do not offer a heartwarming, reassuring hug. Empty arms only reflects the emptiness of a son who took the risk to open himself up, only to be rejected and discarded on the abandoned porch of a broken home.
Our young men have grown weary of playing sports before empty bleachers. As toddlers, they carefully colored pictures and proudly brought them home, but Dad wasn’t there to admire their work and reward them with a father’s priceless praise. Now, at the end of their hope and childhood, they have thrown away their coloring books. They have angrily punctured their footballs and bought guns. They have grown tired of dancing to haunting melody of manhood alone now they are abusers and rapist.
Our young men are dying in anger and pain, wondering ‘’What did I do to drive my daddy away?”. A father is an image of a young man’s destiny. A living testimony of what time may bring to pass. Dad is our first definition of masculinity. His absence leaves us desperately looking for someone else to “ fill in the blanks” If the church, the mosque, your spiritual affiliation does not do it, the gangs and drugs lords, pornographers and the gay community will do it. Empty sons will always look for someone or something to fill in the blanks left by the father who isn’t there.
Well – tailored dark suits and vibrant silk ties cannot drape the gaping void of the empty blanks on the broken heart of men. Even the most voluptuous of fast-paced and lace-clad women cannot console the anguish of masculine tears blocked and cries muffled. Broken men try to masked their hurts behind empty emblems of success, but hidden behind those frail facades are screaming hearts bound in a forced silence. They all share a common thread of desperate need, a familiar hollowness that traces their broken places and the jagged edges of nearly emasculated men.
A crimson river drips unchecked from the wounded hearts and hidden places of modern men. We hide behind our masquerades and attempt acts of chivalry, then like little boys, we brag about sex, though we have never known true love. We long for a tender touch, but are afraid of tenderness. We want to be strong enough to be leaned on, yet tender enough to relate to the pain of others. Can the wounded heal the hurting?
Written By Dante.
Copright © Febuary 2009
The Re-Birth
I am re-birthing peace, its echoes in the mountains of our hearts as love shines in our suffering faces of yesterday’s struggles. Hope that we once thirst for is now walking hand in hand with you and me. Time and tides strolls by, the emergence of love that is structured in our diversities is intertwined in the uniqueness of who we are. So who am I to say he or she is black or white, when the beams that turns into light seams is all that we need to erase the darkness of yesterday's pain. You make me smile with hope for tomorrow because in my womb love is being rebirth.
I am looking back into yesterday, lurking that one sad story that we were once told, sorrowful tales that makes me gasp with rage for the oppressor of my mind and culture, stories of empathy and sympathy diluted in coarse symmetry, stories, now glorified in the eyes of our fore fathers, stories that releases strides for the emancipation of our generation, stories that ignites the fire of redemption from mental slavery, stories of lost tales being rebirth.
The melody is fierce but the sound is familiar to my ears, the fire is lit up as we gather around the fireplace with our dancing sticks and regalia, the drums rolling as we clap and dance our way into trance to a place where the mind, body and soul meets, forgiving one another in victory of a war where there is no winners or losers because we are all victims of the same fatality and the spoils of war. Embracing one another, relegating the pains and sufferings we inflicted in each other, the heart of selflessness is anchoring our steps into rebirthing reconciliation.
I am not mad at you as I stand tall amongst my peers, in tolerance of one another as the Bantu souls that unites our diversities leads us to place of togetherness and one love. Some say I am mad, others says this is impossible but I am saying, I am the change that I want to see in world, so what are you saying...?
Written By Dante.
Copright © January 2009
The Epistle of You & Me Part 1
Clustered in the mist of fused confusion, in the naked space of where the non existence of my fears resides to the place beyond the reality of my mind. I stand from a distance looking at the world between the shallow and polarized minds of society. I laugh at the buffoonery of your fake smile, it makes me wonder why the deception, when we eat and sleep together in the same tent. Why the envy when all that I have is the replica and produce of my hard work and talent. Why the arrogance when pride comes before a fall. It’s astonishing to sometimes see the foolishness of the mind at the same time the wisdom is enlightening.
I have grown from a boy to a man, its seems like yesterday or the day before, all the bling, bling and big toys I yearn for as a young lad I am now fed up with, I am still empty on the inside, a deep void and aches lingers on in my soul, as it dawns on me that the simple things in life is all that matters and that happiness is a state of mind and it does not lie of your possessions and fat bank account. Happiness has to come from within me, in other to achieve that, I have to start doing me…. Wow!
Listen and ponder upon this… Society, would you give you permission to be who you are without categorizing what you see? Must I live up to some image that you created for me to conform to? Can you accept the fact that I am a combination of many different types of dysfunctions bound together within one house?
Isn’t it amazing how brokenness in one area in our lives can rob us of rightful success and imprison us in a valley of regrets, a silent place where no one can hear our pain or ease our sorrow? I could have been… I should have been… He must have been... She must have been.... I thought he was the man for me... I thought she was the woman for me...What non-sense space to be in...Gather you loins pick up them pieces and start again its not too late... I say to myself.....
This is the reality; some thing won’t go away completely. They just won’t disappear. Therefore, I am proud to say-to-say that even our failures are successes! They represent the miracle that you and I survived! Considering what we had to work with, though it looks like failure to us, we survived and our survival has been our success.
“Your position can overcome your condition”! But every time we have to silence our conditions because of our positions, our hidden wounds and problems begins to fester. We become angry and throw away everything we have.
In desperation, we make permanent decisions about temporary circumstances-circumstance
My spirituality has anchored me to the place of self-realisation and purpose. Lately I now understand that my purpose is of essence than my profession or any man or woman. Life is more meaningful and short because now I appreciate the simple and little things that life offers me daily, the privilege to wake every day, the opportunity to have a job and for the fact that my body function as a unit is amazing. In all of this, I am still breathing in the mist of the human rat race.
Gratitude to all that I am and have, has released me to be free to pursue my purpose. Life is intriguing and unfair but the ability to rise up and face it everyday is all that you have in making a difference and being who you want to be. I am smiling because when I look back, I ask this question. Does it really worth it?
Written By Dante.
Copright © Janurary 2009
The Epistle of You & Me Part 2
The wounds of my best friends have pierced my soul and I am filled with naked emotions. I ponder under the stars as this thoughts keeps vamping in my head for attention..'' We often strongly condemn others for the very thing we are most guilty of ourselves''....That’s the title deed of hypocrisy which we are all culprits in some way or the other...
Fortunately enough I have realized that anytime we have no goals, it is easy for others to impose on us their ideas of who we are and are not, and of what we should and should not be doing. Manipulation is a result of purposelessness. Ironically anytime we don’t know and understand our purpose, or who we are created to be, we become vulnerable to manipulation of self and by others...
Now this is the most freaking part as I sit on my patio overlooking my garden with the cold breeze blowing and the freshness of natures scent from the green bushveld grass seducing my mind, then out of the blues came these questions...Who are you really? Who are you when no body is looking? That is the real you. Who you are when all the camouflage is off, when you don’t have an ego to defend, when you have nothing to prove at the office? Who are you when you are not concerned about who is driving the nicest car, who owns the biggest house or who makes the best business decisions? Who are you aside from all the limitations in life? Sigh...The questions continued...
Haven't you ever wondered why you are still here on planet earth? Why did you make it through everything you made it through? Do you really think it’s because you were that slick, or that gifted, or that smart, or that cool. You owe to yourself to wrestle until you find out who you are!
It is difficult to handle the pressure and stress of being everyone's hero all the time, to act like a man or a woman when you feel like a boy or a girl inside. It is perplexing to comfort other people when you wish there were someone who would comfort you. I guess there has to be a place where we can go and there is no need to impress anyone, a place where we are not expected to be super humans if by any chance that exist.
As the day come to a close and my mind begins to retire into chaste and slumber....Its dawns on me that sometimes we invest our self in our pain and forget to nurture the things that can make us grow beyond our challenges...As I close my eyes under the night stars, deep within me I am still soul searching for answers to the questions.
In closing this note....We all have questions unanswered in our lives and it is of importance that we find our way to that space where we can indulge in dialog with self and find our own truth and answers...
Written By Dante.
Copright © Janurary 2009
