Winter's Spark

Andrew Tipton

Let go of what you leave behind

Let go of what you leave behind. 

Take nothing with you, except what is consistent with the integrity

of your sovereignty.  

Andrew Tipton

Holding Hands on the Way to Places

Noticing the edges in between moments lately.   So many magnificent forgotten fragments...   I adore the nature of ourselves when we are alone and sincere and in the middle of these deep unscripted transitions.       Life is not merely a series of Instagram shots...  it is not one social status update after another.    There is so much happening in between our "special" moments...  while we're on the way to places.   While we're just being ourselves -  before intention or awareness take root. 
The morning,  beams of warm early light through faded curtains.   Warm blankets tangled around a gentle kiss.   Coffee cups.   Reading surf magazines in our underwear.   Reciting dreams while the fragrance of incense fills the room. 
Later.  Holding your hand as we wander down avenues and corridors of Chattanooga.   Fingers interlaced.  Conversation.   The reflections of us in store windows on mighty streets,  the way we glow, the strut and natural integrity of us. 
I feel close to these moments lately.   I feel a kinship and reverence. 
Life is fascinating even when we aren't looking... even in the corners of ordinary.   
On the way somewhere.
It makes you want to pay attention.

Andrew Tipton

The Sacredness of Profound & Quiet Moments

Andrew Tipton

Love is My Animal

Love is an ocean on another planet.

Love seeps into the deepest creases of your being and illuminates them, reveals them, before the world.

Love has no regard for your own perception of self.   It dismays our sensibilities and dismantles the structures of our understanding. 

Love is your sanctuary.

Love is the envelopment of your mind and heart, the desires and dreams of your most sacred and essential self. 

Love is mutual disintegration, two dissolving into one magnificent mystery. 







Andrew Tipton

The River

Andrew Tipton

Defend Your Day & Be Like Water

The wind is roaring outside.
The sky is a grey and foggy mess.
The thick green trees on the mountain are swaying in one unified motion. 
Soft rain from Caribbean Hurricanes.
I'm sitting sideways in my chair in the corner of the upstairs loft..   watching drops cling to the window. 
Sipping a cup of Columbian coffee from my favorite mug -  the one with waves etched into it. 

There is this metaphor I have been contemplating this morning..  one of the deep secrets to alchemy -  "be like water" that I love and recite to myself.   Maybe its the rain that has it solidly on my mind.    The foundation of Taoism /  Possibly.  The idea of being malleable, open, fluid - ever moving and evolving.   Taking the shape of our path.      I believe this so intimately,  I believe it is a necessary pursuit, if we intend to be at peace, generous and in-destructible.   Being like water...  is to live a day that is open to change, open to a new purpose.. open towards a deeper version of goodness that perhaps we never imagined and maybe never saw coming.     Its the obedience to a higher understanding that supersedes our "idea" of how a day is supposed to go.  "Be like water" is a call to be limitless and continually re-routed - never so set on course that we break or shatter upon obstacles.   Its loosening our grasp on purpose..  allowing a day to go sideways and still be grounded in perfection.      Its a damn powerful way to live.

I am also considering another idea,  "defending our day".  The thought of acknowledging and pursuing a specific purpose  - with a relentless and incorruptible sturdiness.    I think this is also such a powerful way to live.   To have vision, to survey our morning and to feel an overwhelming intention and personal conviction towards creation..   that is so deep and beautiful.   To write a book, to build treehouses, to construct music, to love on a deeper level.     I am realizing that men with purpose and a vision for themselves (which they reflect onto their world), are of utmost importance.   And rare.  Men who fight and struggle to attain the realization of their inner spark and electric dreams...  these are the men who shape the destiny of reality. 
I find that its often the slightest, most unimpressive obstacles that move us aside from our intention..   the daily efforts of living and breathing sometimes steal our sovereignty away.   It is not the shattering crush of a single problem that keeps us from firmly, supremely achieving our purpose..  but rather the small and soft edges of a day that quietly and excusably exhausts our time and sharpness.    Our tolerance for "purposeless" - for the trivial -  its our persistent accommodation for gentle distraction that erodes our magic.       We could spend lifetimes repairing and navigating the ordinariness that exists day-to-day.    I believe often men are devoured by the common life... they forget their trueness.    We must defend our purpose..   we must defend the integrity of our day.   We must not lose our ferocity among life's clutter.    

Water moves around obstacles, and accepts an alternative path towards goodness.  
But we must also remember ourselves.. our intention.  we should not surrender our purpose for the sake of normalcy.    


thoughts. 



Andrew Tipton

Always

Do not disintegrate among the rough stumble of ordinary men,
Remain honorable,
Live with dignity and presence,
Respect life
Respect intelligence and the inner drive,
Obey your sovereignty.  
Love.







Andrew Tipton

Disordinary Beautiful

Lessons From The Mountains

Heather held my hand,  walking beside me on the trail back to our campsite.  Her warm fingers traced the inside of my palm..  gently grasping.    The stars were gleaming over our heads, the blackness beyond them infinite and deep.     We paused in the darkness, both staring up into the sky.  Our quiet breathes leaving trails of vapor.  The Rocky Mountains soaring up behind us.   Our backpacks motionless hanging from our shoulders.   We stood together, alone.   The world and everything within its reaches was somewhere else..  somewhere distant and far away.   In this instant it was just us.   Our animal.   Love... or something beyond love.    There are times when the description of what's happening isn't enough really... when it doesn't describe what is actually there.    I realize that I want this..    I want the definitions and limitations of my heart to disintegrate.  I want the idea of love to disintegrate..   leaving space for what's possible.   In the absence of definition and description... everything is waiting for us.    Un-named, unreconciled, and bewilderingly vast.     I want to know life on this level.    A life with intent.. yet lacking a script.  

  I feel the soft fingertips of my lover clasped in my hands - and I smile in the blackness.     

Andrew Tipton






     

Argentina on Motorcycles

Journal thoughts -  revelations on discomfort, definition and a malleable identity.  

  I am planning a motorcycle trip through Argentina.  I want to find an old motorcycle in Buenos Aries, and ride it down through the valleys of Patagonia.   Traverse the outer reaches of South American civilization, mountains and obscurity.    Taking a small backpack, a sturdy camera, and leather journal.     A trip that is not refined or rooted in certainty..   driven simply by the clarity of the heart.  Open-ended.     I don't want to rely on comfort, I don't want to rely on safety.    I want to be pressed into a different shape.   I want to expose new identities of myself  - sheering back the definition and the idea of me.   Not a new version of myself..  but a larger version.  

I believe that experiences that cause us to be uncertain..  that challenge us,  that are neither easy nor inviting..   these are the sort of adventures we should be participating in.     Every time I encounter a adventure that is beyond my scope and my comfort level...  I move into an identity that I did not previously comprehend or know.   I am larger.    My mind, my heart and my self take up more space.  

I believe we are constantly either assigning ourselves a singular new identity,  or defending the identity that we have built for ourselves.    I see very few people who are clear and confident being "identity-less"  -   not to say that they do not know themselves..   but in the way that they have not grafted themselves into a specific identity.    

 I believe It is the routine of our self-driven identity that chokes us out.  

It is the obedience to our own monument that restricts our "becoming".

We are whatever we've decided that we are.   We fit the role,  we obey the context of that description.

And that description often leaves no room for another identity.  

When we uphold our own identity..   we no longer have to be uncomfortable,  we no longer are pressed and molded by ideas or struggles that we perceive as needless or contrary to our identity.    When we say, "here I am" -  "this is my identity"..  we take ourselves out of the vast, wild, bewilderment of becoming great.    We stop learning and start "describing" ourselves in regards to who we believe we should be.

But I believe these struggles... the ones that have no context in the description of our self,    those are the ones that will benefit us the most.      

Continual relearning...  undermining that response to cling and become a thing... an idea..  a particular persona.    Someone we can affirm - someone that our external world can affirm.   

Take adventures to places that frighten your identity.  

  Literally, metaphorically, emotionally.    

Do it.   

Andrew Tipton

The Clarity of Motion

Travel and adventure dissolves the habit of a scripted vision for life
When you are awake,  in awe, uncomfortable, challenged..  the plot and direction of your story becomes stretched, unthreaded, and permeable.    You realize that every destination, every town, every mountain, has its own identity - and we become those identities if we stay.

I believe that remaining in one place,  no matter our intentions or desire for greatness...  begins to erode our clarity and objective reflection.   Motion is essential for determining, re-examining, and reclaiming our purpose.  

Motion gives us an impressive and vast perspective..  our choices, our conclusions..   they are not refined or fixed on the open road...  you have a sense that all is near and all is fathomable.     

Motion is the author of perpetual conviction.  

It is the compass of the soul. 

Andrew Tipton

A Physical Kiss is Nothing Without It.

Let yourself feel the world that is already consuming you.
There is no escape from this existence.  This is the way, this is the full experience - do no be afraid of what is offered - the universe conspired to offer this to you, it created the emotion, it created affection and the feeling of sovereignty.
Why would you be afraid of this?   Why would you fear the endless open, bad-assness of this?
We are born with a cock... with a thrust.. with an eruption..  with the urge to take over to dominate / decimate the people around us, and we are often so timid of this urge.
Why?    Why do we fear our abilities?   We are made of the most glorious elements - human elements.    There is animal - and there is human.  transcendence - I realized today, that there is a complete lack of concern for the ordinary skills of men.  Seriously!   Women are neither impressed nor intrigued by the ordinary rules of maintenance or creation.   They feel this way, because they know!   They know... Heather knows...  that there is so much greatness buried inside, and ordinary actions do not drive her.  They do not bring her alive.    They will not suffice.
Women, the female vision and experience should be a compass for our actions, a reference for the quality of our behavior.   We should not be proud of ordinary actions, we should not offer ordinary action for love!!!    Ordinary action is worthless in love.    The feminine heart seeks, "awe" to be held in a state of bewilderment and revelation.    What a way to see the world!   What a quality to expect from your lover!    
We must persist.   Call attention to the deep and magical abilities that abide beneath our surface.  Be relentless.     Do what needs to be done...  do the chores and duties of manhood..  conquer the ordinary and straightforward..   but do not linger there.   Do not offer ordinary accomplishments to women...  do not offer ordinariness to love!     Love expects more, love requires more to be fulfilled!!
And do not fear!   Do not be afraid of reaching out beyond these ordinary things...  into the depths of what you can be.   There is greatness there.   Listen to me... its there... inexhaustible and fierce.
Do not fear.
act, be unpredictable, brave and consuming.  
Obey your sovereignty.
Let yourself feel the world that is already consuming you.   Inhale it.. without courtesy or pleasantry.. and exhale the same.
I say again,
Obey your sovereignty.





Andrew Tipton

Don't Be Afraid to Be Wrong

Don't be afraid to be wrong.
Don't be afraid to concede to a greater truth and be humbled...  and then grow, evolve, and overtake the limitations of your previous self.    And repeat this process again and again.   Always letting your grasp of truth and understanding remain loose and unclenched.
   Do not be threatened by knowledge..  do not be threatened by a thought or a voice that undermines your practice or challenges your way of life.
Listen.  Totally listen.  With a clear and open mind.
Being wrong isn't about you.   It isn't an affront to your identity or your intelligence.
Don't defend impoverished beliefs.
Sovereignty is learned and is never completed.




Andrew Tipton

Remember Why You Came

Andrew Tipton