Andrew Tipton

Brenen

my nephew's name is Brenen.
Every time I look at him I am captivated. He has these tiny baby hands, and these incredible blue eyes that are wide and eager. I love the way he stumbles when he tries to walk.. and his laughter. ..if you could hear him laugh. His laughter melts everything inside of me.
When I laugh it is complicated... but when Brenen laughs,.. its the most genuine, truthful thing I have ever heard.
I watch him experience life for the first time.. and I start to remember just how spectacular this all is.
How simple. How purely awesome.




Andrew Tipton

The Life November

Our bodies are gifts.
May we always live with abandon and eager fascination.
May we always take time to worship the day.

Andrew Tipton

Hypnotic Revival

This month started with 14 nights of deep black dreams.
I took myself away from comfortable for just two weeks to see what would happen.. without any expectation, without any good reasons.
It is astonishing what can become if we let ourselves journey to places without answers.
What I found on day 15 of this month.. was my own mortality.
Waking up that morning, I lay there, cold, aching, awake, dreaming - my eyes closed,.. Considering choice. My choice.

Often, I find myself clinging to rigidity.. like an old solider, believing that if have invested time and effort into an idea, or an pursuit.. I must resolutely uphold it. That firmness is breaking apart.. I'm realizing that my ideas are not me; just because I have been committed to doing things a certain way.. doesn't mean I have to continue doing them that way. I am free to change - free to uncover a different side.. and to pursue it at any time.
We are not tethered to circumstance.. not tied to a lifestyle, or an attitude.
Our lives are like ice cubes.. whose cold resolution can melt away in a moment.
ASK: What do I want?


I am beginning to experience life through reborn eyes.
To see an answer as merely one of a thousand answers;
To see truth as a perspective.
I own choice. That is enough to take my breath away tonight.



Andrew Tipton

Dreamer

In the gymnasium yesterday.. I overheard this dialog between two athletes.

American Soccer Player - "Hey Rene, I see you're working out a lot.. is the coach making you? Or are you training now so you'll be ready for the next season? I don't think we're even supposed to be exercising today.."

(Rene) Foreign Soccer Player- "No. I do it for me."

.... I love that answer.
It respects the idea that we are both the beginning and end of our energy.
Got me thinking.
If someone stopped me during the day.. and asked me, "Who are you living for right now?" Would my answer be me?
I wish to live blind to the expectations of others.

I am the dreamer and I am the dream.
I am my reason and my excuse.

Andrew Tipton

What do you want?

We always have the choice to become a different self.
ALWAYS. no matter how much we have invested, no matter how much is on the line.. we can walk away at any time. We can chose to be done.. we can say it: "I'm done." and move towards something else - or nothing else.
This is motion. This is the evolution of a soul. To allow ourselves the freedom to change our minds.
What do you want?




Andrew Tipton

Shifting Into 3rd

Took Trent out yesterday morning, and we parked in a wide open field as the sunshine started to top the trees.. the colors of Autumn swimming through falling leaves.
I have this incredible tea I bought from a organic vendor in Maine.. its Green Tea with specs of fruit-peel mixed in. Oranges & pomegranate. Really good stuff.. makes you feel like you own Jerusalem.
I turned on the propane, and brewed us both up a fresh cup.. we stood there watching and feeling life come around. The sunlight warming up our arms.. the tea warming up our thoughts.
We were there. Holding that morning up in our own hands like a sacrifice - ours to give; ours to embrace.

Its hard to be ready for motion always. Hard to want it, to welcome it with a firm grasp and a genuine smile. Yesterday feels like a good reason to never let go of a season.. but I know better. We were born to move.

We were children, eager and unknowing.. and then we shift.
We became men, hungry with the weight of the world on our shoulders.. and then we shift.
We learned that the world has always been ours... and now we shift.
Placing everything we have on the table - prepared to lose it and become the expression of life's next revelation.

I think green tea is the official drink of shifting.
May we always be thirsty.





Andrew Tipton