litdark News

Hope

Mark Barber

What is hope and where is hope found?

We tend to trust even expect future events that are similar to past events. The more proof we have that we have that things will not change, the more we expect in a familiar future. We are creatures of statistics. The more samples, the more we believe the trend will continue. I expect there to be another spring.
What about hope of something that we have not personally witnessed. We have records and other individual’s witness that certain actions yield certain results. Here we come into trust of the individual or the record. We still almost fully rely on our personal experiences. We find it difficult to trust another’s witness when it varies in the least degree from our interpretation. Trust can overcome. Is there anyone you trust more than yourself?
The final form of hope comes into play when we attempt to trigger a result from an action that we have never taken, and has limited or no comparisons in-which can judge an outcome. True pioneers of the unknown take bravery and skill to be successful. In most situations one of the previous forms apply, but there are those wonderful moments when we can truly step out into hope and reap the rewards.

Why do we need hope and when is hope needed?

Every choice has a result. Every action has an opposite reaction. We must have hope that the reaction we are seeking will result from our action. If we do not have hope we do not, do. We are passive when in doubt. We do not tempt reactions. This means that all actions stem from hope. We are processors of what we have seen, what we are experiencing, and what we expect.
In matters of force the reaction is equal. In matters of choice, a divergence of path may be subtle, but its results long lasting. A baseball thrown in deep space will continue on its path until acted upon by a new force. We naturally do not tempt reactions, and thus maintain the same path.
We are sentient, sensitive, agents unto ourselves, only acting for a reaction. If we hope to have reaction, we must have action. Weather automatic and trusted or new and risky, we must always act.

Those who have the shortest distance to go, are in the biggest hurry.

Mark Barber

Those who have the shortest distance to go, are in the biggest hurry.

Why is that? You would think as we the individual has less distance to travel that we would know that we are not far off and not hurry to and fro. We do hurry though. We isolate ourselves from all others except to the extent to put ourself in an advantage to be in the best lane, or be ahead during a elimination of lanes.

I must assume that we schedule ourselves and put ourselves in a mind-set where traveling is a burden and must pass as quickly as possible. Sometimes, only when we travel large distances do we accept the fact that a journey is unavoidable and take the pace at a more leisurely rate.

It seems even fewer and further between that we ever truly enjoy the trip itself. Do we notice the land on which we are traveling on or above? Do we truly notice those that are traveling in a parallel path? Do we ever ignore our time-table or are we always on a restricted schedule.It is very rare that we as a people travel not for the destination but for the mere journey itself. I think this is very sad indeed.

Think of the pleasure you have had arriving at a destination after a long car-ride or flight. You may be sore from sitting to long. You may be hungry, thirsty or sleep deprived. There is joy in knowing that you have reached your destination.

Now let’s think of this not in distance but time itself. Think of the joy you have had when Christmas morning has arrived. It was a long wait which has left you mentally sore. Hungry and thirsty for other concerns of the mind as you have been overly focused on this one event. And I know for myself mentally and physically sleep deprived.

Both these examples lead to a emotional and physical letdown. For the distance traveler time is required to get over the drive or flight and it takes time to become active again. For the time-traveler there is a letdown that the event has occurred, and we were so focused on the one event, we did not nourish our minds with a well-balanced diet of concerns, hopes and expectations.

Knowing that we have similar concerns with time and distance travel, let’s consider this moment in time and space. You have an opportunity to notice your surroundings. You may see that others are on a similar path. You have made choices that have placed you in a situation where you have a restrictive schedule or personal freedom. This moment and this place are for you. No one else shares it exactly the same as you do. You have your personal insight and a point-of-view unique to any other. I hope this makes us all realize how precious our position is. We have a power no one else has. To chose this moment. To alter our path to the next. To enjoy or stress or ignore and become desensitized.

Let us now return and place ourselves back into the position of the distance traveler and consider the joy we have when our goal is reached an the journey is over. Think of that pleasure. Why must that enjoyment be reserved for the end of the journey. Why can it not be part of every mile of our path? Why can we not plan and take pleasure in every part of our path? What must we do personally to allow ourselves to wake up from the stupor and desensitization we find ourselves in from mile to mile, moment to moment. How do we take a journey and turn it into a experience?

Just as each of us have a unique perspective, the answers are unique for each of us. I believe a good exercise would be to take a journey for the pure pleasure of taking the journey. You do not even need a definitive destination. Let us also do so within our time. Allow ourselves open blocks of constructive time without a goal or destination that will have us clamoring for the end, but allow us to enjoy the here and now. Be creative and useful, but allow the activity to have an open end to avoid any deadlines or pressures. Remember this is your time. Here and now in your unique perspective.

Remember that time and space are simply your perception of external matter and energy. As we each perceive these external forces we have the choice on how to act and react. It is within each of us to awake from our stupor and empower ourselves within the moment. Act, don’t react. And the next mile on your path will also bring you an edifying experience.

litdark

Mark Barber

Why: Why is always a good place to start. For some time I have known that I need a repository for things I have learned which have been of value for me personally. If you want something done, it must first be started. And so it begins. litdark is the incarnation of my desire to record positive information. I am inherently selfish and foremost litdark is for myself and for those close to me. I would like to think that it will become worthwhile to others, but only time will tell.

What: litdark will contain technical information. It will also contain ideas as singletons or as collections or as trains of thought. litdark will contain journal type entries. litdark will have posts which are only for reference. My goal is that litdark will have only uplifting or positive entries. litdark will be full of improper grammar and spelling. (live with it, I won’t know or care)

I love symbols. I learn visually. I love and am fascinated by light in all its forms.

lit (verb) : A past tense and a past participle of light.
verb: Implies action.
past participle: Has happened.

litdark:

Light in darkness.
Understanding.
Freedom and escape from doubt or ignorance.
Wisdom from knowledge and knowledge from exercising wisdom.
Inspiration and revelation.
Worth within paradigm.
Truth in every perspective.
Light and truth with multiple parts as a pure whole.
Visible light, and hope in the unseen.
Being a reflector, not a void.

“Prepare them that they may shine forth in darkness. "
Ether 3:4

Updating from Leopard 10.5 to Snow Leopard, 10.6 in regards to Ruby on Rails.

Mark Barber

Updating from Leopard 10.5 to Snow Leopard, 10.6 in regards to Ruby on Rails.

What I had to do to make it work.

I had to reinstall the following technologies:

Rails
Mongrel
ImageMagick
rmagick

Misc Issues:

“truncate” function stopped working, and I was able to remove it from my source.

Major Issues:

ImageMagick and rmagick stopped working all together.

I updated ImageMagick and the rmagick ruby gem multiple times. After each attempt to update there was still the outstanding problem of “no decode delegate for this image format”.

The explanation of this error can be found here http://rmagick.rubyforge.org/install-faq.html#delegate. I ran the command “convert -list configure” and it stated that I did have the delegate’s for the images that were failing.

After hours of work I found this article which did indeed fix my problem. http://www.gregbenedict.com/2009/08/29/fixing-ruby-gems-mysql-and-passenger-phusion-on-snow-leopard-10-6/

This is the pertinent portion of the article, which shows the steps that corrected my issue.

{{{
Update 2: ImageMagick and RMagick
So the upgrade toasts Mac Ports and ImageMagick.
Yep, blow it all away. It’s too much of a pain.

rm -rf /opt/local

Now download Mac Ports for Snow Leopard and install.
You might want to go eat or get a beer for this next step. Then again, maybe not. You have a faster OS now! Nope, you still need that beer.

sudo port install libxml2 
sudo port install ImageMagick 
sudo gem install rmagick
}}}

I installed port via the dmg install found here

I also had an additional issue of a second install of ImageMacick in my path. I had installed this second copy while attempting to fix the “no decode delegate for this image format” error. I had to also remove this second copy so the /opt/local version would be the active/used version in my path.

Birth

Mark

Today is the birth of LitDark. May it grow into something of value.

I’ll just have to keep it off the stimulants.