“You have to realize and own your power. You are the author of your own life. You are your sense of security. You are what keeps you going. Never give your power away.” ~#MarioCampanaro ©
“You become a warrior of the light once you realize the darkness was your path to it.”~#MarioCampanaro ©
“Every circumstance you meet with resistance is an opportunistic mirror reflecting a path of discovery towards the breakthrough you have been seeking.” ~#MarioCampanaro ©
“May you see the light in the dark. And may you see the truth over all untruths. May anything that disturbs your peace dissolve. And may all that has invaded your well-being, be your greatest inspiration to your own self realization.”~#MarioCampanaro ©
“No one ever said it was going to be easy. There are going to be seasons of strife and struggle. But it is from those accumulated moments that will come your greatest inspirations.”~#MarioCampanaro ©
As long as I can remember, I have always been intensely passionate about observing and trying to discern what motivates us to make the choices we do in regards to the outcomes we consciously or unconsciously desire.
Though taking in world this way may not make me the life of the party at all times (lol) , it definitely keeps me extremely present with the company I keep.
Humanity fascinates me.
What we do, how we interact, how we listen or not, how we respond or not, even our own silence triggers me to understand and apply it all to Life and Art.
I always want to know what’s behind the social mask because the false concept of what the social mask represents is blatantly obvious.
Yet what I witness over and over is that damn thing called ‘fear’.
It’s not the kind of fear as if a tornado is about to swirl in stimulating the sympathetic nervous system.
It is that invisible internal omnipresent fear that is always whispering to us in the back of our mind.
It’s a fear of reality.
Imagine that!
A fear of reality…of everyday Life as it actually is in this here and Now present moment.
And then that fear expands to other parts of our Life like the Exxon oil spill corroding our perception of ourSelf and the world we live in.
So in turn, we begin to experience a fear of connection between one another and our environment.
Then we develop a fear of compassion and kindness because it now feels foreign and creates all these ‘what-ifs’ that accompany the ‘risk’ of opening our heart to others.
So then we begin to hide our authentic Self exacerbating a fear of vulnerability for being seen and judged beyond a filtered ‘it’s all ok’ existence.
YUP, WE GET A FEAR OF WHO WE TRULY ARE BEHIND THE MASK.
And so to costume our fear we adjust our behavior and our connections to avoid being seen or effected in a profound way.
A human way.
The one thing that has remained constant in everything I have observed is that we all yearn for our experience to be witnessed and validated.
This connects all of us.
But we go on validating our filtered lives as if our own Life is our own avatar never getting to reveal our true essence.
The thing that astounds me the most is when all cover-up is dropped and things get real, I can see people start to breathe deeper.
It is like this heavy burdensome weight has been lifted.
I can see their eyes shine brighter.
I can hear their voices vibrate stronger.
And most of all, I can see them happier and experiencing a new found peace.
Not so much because something has been lost.
But because something real has been found.
Art asks of us to show up in all our grit and glory.
Ironically this is exactly what happens towards the end of our life.
So if we know this is part of the inevitable journey, why not start our BEing right now rather than waiting.
What are we hiding and why?
Is it truly worth the work it takes to hide our authentic Self for the sake of an idea of how we think we are suppose to appear?
I don’t think so…
I can promise you everything you are behind what you think you have to be is far more interesting than you have ever admitted.
We are living in trying times.
Many may want to deny this fact, but it is my opinion that those who do are simply sleepwalking.
Everywhere we turn we are being faced with issues that threaten the core of our wellbeing.
Our environment is in a complete shambles.
We see Mother nature crying out as its beautiful creatures are withering away into devastating numbers or are now just a memory.
Reefs are dying, glaciers are melting, and the air has the bitter scent of industrial waste floating around in it.
Our food is now a product of test tubes in which we need to be more careful of its poisons rather than trust its nutrition.
And where there is accessibility to healthy eating, we need to take out a loan to afford the costs.
And then there is us as a collective.
Men, women, and little tiny children are being tortured and killed right in front of our eyes.
Our priorities have shifted.
We have become obsessed with fortune, fame, competition, power, and divisiveness than we have of what is best for us as inhabitants of this world that has been gifted to us.
I mean, there is a little red button of hate available for pressing at any moment should we get so pissed off that we decide to obliterate everything.
That is how far we have gone.
Things have to change.
It is no longer effective to speak about light, love, and unity without being active.
We are throwing out these words but rarely are we living them.
They have become more of a costume than they have a piece of our own flesh.
These words have become a commercial for selling ideas, books, memberships, websites, and creating so called famous gurus rather than using their active form as medicinal purposes for our global society.
As a collective, we need to start to scrutinize very carefully where we are and what we are doing that is contributing to the enormous amount of strife that is occurring throughout the world.
Each and everyone of us must take responsibility for changing this frightening dynamic that we are faced with on a daily basis.
We must look at our own thought patterns and behaviors and be willing to become aware of where we may have been taught incorrectly and be willing to make those changes for the benefit of all of us.
This is not easy and it takes many growing pains as our ego deconstructs and we start to see truths that have been hidden to us by unconsciousness.
But we have no choice.
Everything is riding on this shift.
It is our responsibility to become that which we are fighting for rather than mirroring that which we are against.
We need to connect, converse, and be present in ways greater than that which we perceive as adversity.
We need to practice connection, compassion, understanding, and kindness; not just share the idea.
As a species that has been blessed with such beautiful intelligence, we need to use it for our expansion and not our destruction.
It is up to us, the human race (and if you are reading this, that includes you) to keep our minds, hearts, and spirits open to mend our brokenness and recalibrate for a beautiful tomorrow.
We can no longer just speak words of change and transformation.
We have to BECOME them.
Each and everyone of us must BE the lighthouse in this storm.
It is so easy for us to go through our everyday life sleepwalking.
We become part of the herd.
We listen, believe, and become reactionary to what’s shown and said.
We get lost in the illusions that smother us into submission.
Our defenses go up and we unconsciously are in attack mode.
We can feel this all around us.
We see it every day on the news and throughout the world.
There’s so much anger, rage, hatred, deception,… the list goes on.
We’ve become too comfortable with all the darkness.
It doesn’t make sense.
It’s backwards.
We’ve become more fearful of love, then it’s actual opposite.
We’re scared to show it, we’re scared to say it, and even scared to receive it.
We’re so afraid that the vulnerability that comes with love will destroy us, when in reality it’s the only thing that strengthens us and build us up as a humanity.
So with all the political and social unrest that’s going on in the world, there must be a wake up call as a collective humanity that is greater, louder, and more powerful than this unthinkable unrest.
We need to get back to what’s real and true.
The signs are all around us.
We’re not the sum of what we’re told, and we’re definitely not the accumulation of everything we are taught.
We’re more than that.
Love is who we are, it’s what we’re made of, and it’s where we come from. Anything opposite of that, is a labyrinth of illusion.
It’s deception at the most basic level.
When really considered, EVERYTHING we do in life has love at the core level.
Every action we take somehow someway is about love.
Either getting it or not getting it. Either giving it or not giving it.
Whether it’s receiving it or giving it, it’s all about love.
LOVE is who we are.
It always has and always will be.
Fact check that as a REAL political statement!
We never really understand the saying “the dark before the storm” unless we allow ourself to bear witness to experiencing what that really means.
I think the best answer I can give up to this point is that for everything good and true, the opposite exists as an illusion (for truth cannot be in flux and is at the center of all things good, whole, and complete.).
This is not so much a choice but more so a reminder that somewhere/somehow there has been some dreamt detour from what is good and true and, boy/girl, some growth is about to happen!
But for that growth to happen, there MUST be a stimulus that initiates the dive into discovering truth for oneSelf rather than it being doctrinated by another’s interpretation of it .
Very often, or I should say most likely, this knocks on our life’s door as some type of strife or intense obstacle.
When this so called opposite is dreamt up and therefore “experienced”, there is a sleepwalk away from truth and this temporary season is the series of learning lessons that bring us to that inevitable waking moment.
This can be a long painful journey and it takes a lot of work, patience, self nuturing, self guidance, and intuition.
But without fail these growing pains strengthen our inner constitution and complete our connection to who we are and where we come from.
Yes it hurts.
It hurts so bad that it’s good.
The more difficult the journey, the stronger we become.
So when that dark hour sneaks in, it is worthy to greet it with gentle gratitude as it is holding our hand and walking us straight to our own awakening.
There is no escape and fear is fruitless.
But our glorious metamorphosis is inevitable as long as we are willing to believe that the truth will indeed set us free.
