Author Archives: Raven

I've never desired followers. If anything, I've only wanted to create leaders, to imbue individuals with the power and ideas to take control of their lives, change their destinies and, perhaps, change the world. But though my desire to create … Continue reading →

I hear it all the time on the news and on the talk shows. Where are all the heroes? Where are all of the role models? Where are the people for our sons and daughters to look up to? Where … Continue reading →

There are those among us who are born with a gift, a gift that lets them see the world in the way few mortals ever could, in a way that eyes alone can never begin to comprehend. These people, these … Continue reading →

What is it about the written word that draws us to it? What is it that makes so many of us, myself included, dedicate our entire lives to understanding it, to honing it, to refining it like never before. Why … Continue reading →

As human beings, we're born with two pieces of knowledge that no other animal on the planet possesses, that we are going to die at some point and that our lives are supposed to fill some kind of higher purpose. … Continue reading →

Sometimes in life we find ourselves so busy with our day-to-day existences that we, as people, forget what the larger picture is really about. We get so enwrapped in getting by and surviving that we forget the reasons we fight … Continue reading →

The mind is a weapon. Like any weapon known to man, with great skill, training and preparation it can be a formidable tool of attack or defense, an invaluable ally in times of conflict. However, also like any other weapon, … Continue reading →

We all claim to love freedom. When carried on the lips of the patriotic, the democratic and the lovers of liberty, freedom is the greatest thing on the planet. It is the alpha and the omega of the human existence … Continue reading →

Everyone seems to wonder why artists of all types always seem to be a little bit out there, a little bit crazy or a little bit beyond the fringe of society. Artists, writers and musicians have a long track record … Continue reading →

Many years ago, on the day of atonement, towns would hold ceremonies in which they would place all of their sins into a single goat and then cast it out in the desert, presumably to die of thirst or starvation, … Continue reading →

It's on the lips of the heartbroken and downtrodden, it's in the poetry of the cheated-on and the abandoned and it's in the hearts of the abused an trampled, those four little words, "Love is a lie!" But love is … Continue reading →

They say that man is a creature of two worlds, the world of the living and the world of the dreaming. In the world of the living, we are all simply people, people roaming the planet doing jobs, paying bills … Continue reading →

I have a news headline for you: We're all dead. That's right officially, as of today, we are all deceased. In fact, truth be told we were dead yesterday, we were just as dead the day before and even before … Continue reading →

For many of us, when we find happiness, we are quick to learn that in society there is a hierarchy of happiness, an arbitrary order that places some forms of self-fulfillment as being greater than others. Where the world calls … Continue reading →

When whoever uttered the words, "We always hurt the ones we love," spoke that truism, they probably had no idea exactly how right they were and continue to be. For hearts are fragile things, weak and soft they're easily broken, … Continue reading →

Questions will always be more powerful than statements. Questions will always linger longer than declarations. But most importantly, questions will always change the world long after their answers have been forgotten. Because a questions, a good one at least, does … Continue reading →

The quickest road to mediocrity is to quit dreaming. Because the moment you stop dreaming is the moment you stop reaching for something more, the moment you stop growing and the moment you stop excelling. A dream, as passive as … Continue reading →

Time never stops, it never slows down, it never takes a breath. Life goes on. Just because we're fond of sayings like "The day the earth stood still" or "Time froze for a second" doesn't mean they're true. Just ask … Continue reading →

Have you ever imagined that there was another world just beyond your doorstep. Another universe just outside our own. A place where what we now consider impossible becomes possible, a place where what is now just fantasy becomes reality? A … Continue reading →

Nothing that I have done up to now has brought me any closer to discovering what I want out of life, much less any closer to achieving it. I can't begin to count the days I've spent wondering the desert … Continue reading →

Sometimes I forget why I bother existing in this world. When I look around me, I see nothing but sheep being led to the slaughter, souls being destroyed by vicious shepherds and enough suffering to fill a million masochistic novels. … Continue reading →

As I stare over the plain of humanity, I see a populace filled to the brim with idiots, buffoons and sheep. There is no safe haven for people like me, no place to go to get away from the idiocy … Continue reading →

There was a time in which men wore suits of metal to protect themselves when going into battle. At another point, various cultures in Africa fought their battles in the nude seeking a more divine form of protection. In much … Continue reading →

I don't know what it is that draws me to the night. All I know is that my soul seems to come alive when the sun goes down and my mind opens up the most during the blackest of nights. … Continue reading →

We live in a commercial world my friends. We’re told what's valuable, like we don't know what's important. Like children we can no longer tell what’s necessary and what’s just nice to have. Needs are now created and seldom met, … Continue reading →

"You don't need to do that, what you have is good enough," they say. I disagree. Our society is all about the bare minimum, just getting by. I, on the other hand, am about excelling, going one step further and … Continue reading →

In the three and a half years I have been running this site, I have done a lot of hypothesizing about the untimely deaths of many men and women: the cause, apathy. But the fact remains, there are those among … Continue reading →

Look around you real fast. Odds are unless someone printed this out for you, you’re reading these words on a computer screen somewhere. Odds are you’re sitting in a room with other electronic gizmos and gadgets. Odds are you’re surrounded … Continue reading →

In my life, I have had the pleasure of encountering a great many paradoxes. The list of things that I have seen and heard of that are true, but simply should not, is a long and winding list. I've seen … Continue reading →

Are we simply living to die, or are we dying to live? That is the question. Life itself is but a limbo, a transition between the trauma of birth and the trauma of death. But within that transition is a … Continue reading →

People like to think that I'm just bitter, that the scowl I carry upon my lips is a sign of some general disgust that I hold for the world. But those who know me best, know me better. They know … Continue reading →

It's been said that money makes the world go around, it's been said that money is the root of all evil, it's also been said that money isn't important unless you don't have it and it's even been said that … Continue reading →

It's hard for me to watch television anymore. I know that it's all about overpaid actors, million-dollar sets and carefully crafted storylines. I know that no matter how real the show may look or how true to life it might … Continue reading →

Wouldn't it be great to be a king? To sit upon a golden throne and command the subjects with a mighty fist. Wouldn't it be great to rule a country? To be a God among men, to be one of … Continue reading →

It's only natural, for the human mind, in it's infinite quest to make things simple, to try to reduce complex and intricate problems into black and white issues. But the truth remains, as hard as it is to swallow that … Continue reading →

There was once a child who went for a long walk down a busy beach. That child must have walked for miles because he passed stirngs of sea-side shops, a huge amusement park, a dozen or so lemonade stands and … Continue reading →

The uncertainty of it all is maddening. The stepping from a dense forest in which all was dark and heavy and walking into a long flowing plain with rolling hills and a thick morning fog coating the ground, hiding the … Continue reading →

There is an old adage about a blind man groping in the darkness for a light switch that simply isn't there. It's how the answers we seek are typically no answers at all. How the way we attack a problem … Continue reading →

What do we have if not ourselves? Of all the people on the planet the only person we are each obligated to spend the rest of our lives with is indeed ourselves. While others may die or leave unexpectedly, we … Continue reading →

It amazes me how the world works. I've often stared in awe at how society rewards it's members. People who toil mercilessly and break their backs in hard jobs are barely able to survive while stockbrokers, who have lifted nothing … Continue reading →

As one walks around the streets of any large city in any country of the world, it becomes obvious that people are going to great lengths to blend in with those around them. It's as if nature's laws of hiding … Continue reading →

How many tragedies have occurred because people were simply following the law? How many people are dead because the law couldn't protect them? How many times will the words, "I was just following orders" or "I was doing everything by … Continue reading →

It's been said that the key to perfection is imperfection and that is very much the truth. The only thing that is perfect on this planet is life and life itself is riddled with mistakes, hills, valleys, times of joy … Continue reading →

There was once a small sparrow whose goal was to drain the ocean. He would fly over the great sea, scoop up a beak full of water and dump it many miles inland. He would fly back and forthing taking … Continue reading →

It must truly be wonderful to be a bird. The freedom to go wherever, do whatever and be whoever, whenever you please must be an incredible thrill. I often wonder how much birds really understand about our rat-race lives. How … Continue reading →

It's popular in our world to say that someone is on the cutting edge of this or that, someone is at the forefront of this movement or that one or that someone or something is groundbreaking in some way. Where … Continue reading →

(Note: on the date 5-5-2000 a unique planetary alignment will occur causing all of the other planets to be on the opposite side of the sun to the earth. Many doomsayers are calling this the end of the world.) The … Continue reading →

You and I are connected already. I wrote this piece and you've read it so we share a connection. We also share a connection with all the people who have read this work. We share a connection with the countless … Continue reading →

Time is perhaps the strangest element in our world. No one can touch it, you can't see it, hold it or hear it but yet it controls every aspect of our lives. We have no ability to tame it, though … Continue reading →

I pity those who don't play chess. It's a game that's centuries old but as timeless as a good love poem. It's a game of intellect and emotion, strategy and tactics, offense and defense and of speed and patience. But … Continue reading →