Do Not Go With The Flow. Be

To Each His Own Way And His Own Prayer. God Does Not Take Us At Our Word. He Looks Deep Into Our Hearts. It Is Not The Ceremonies Or Rituals That Make A Difference, But Whether Our Hearts Are Sufficiently Pure Or Not.

Ways Of Loving From A Distance, Mating Without Even Touching-amor Platonicus! The Ladder Of Love One Is Expected To Climb Higher And Higher, Elating The Self And The Other. Plato Clearly Regards Any Actual Physical Contact As Corrupt And Ignoble Because He Thinks The True Goal Of Eros Is Beauty. Is There No Beauty In Sex? Not According To Plato. He Is After `more Sublime Pursuits.' But If You Ask Me, I Think Plato's Problem, Like Those Of Many Others, Was That He Never Got Splendidly Laid.

I Like To Borrow A Metaphor From The Great Poet And Mystic Rumi Who Talks About Living Like A Drawing Compass. One Leg Of The Compass Is Static. It Is Fixed And Rooted In A Certain Spot. Meanwhile, The Other Leg Draws A Huge Wide Circle Around The First One, Constantly Moving. Just Like That, One Part Of My Writing Is Based In Istanbul. It Has Strong Local Roots. Yet At The Same Time The Other Part Travels The Whole Wide World, Feeling Connected To Several Cities, Cultures, And Peoples.

Father, I Am From A Different Egg Than Your Other Children. Think Of Me As A Duckling Raised By Hens. I Am Not A Domestic Bird Destined To Spend His Life In A Chicken Coop. The Water That Scares You Rejuvenates Me. For Unlike You I Can Swim, And Swim I Shall. The Ocean Is My Homeland. If You Are With Me, Come To The Ocean. If Not, Stop Interfering With Me And Go Back To The Chicken Coop.

We Cannot Abandon This Rabbit Hole For Fear Of A Traumatic Encounter With Our Own Culture.