Design is in the makeup of everything, offering an experience.  There is a construct to its success which can be broken down into our senses.

I have been creating spaces and stimulating experiences for a long while now, I love the influence of sensory design. I did my thesis on the importance of maintenance for the mechanized man; the case study was a large advertising building in London, which I lived across from for the first 1.5 years of living in London. I would watch these people through the windows burning the midnight oil, and as I awoke in the morning I would see them again in new outfits at it again. I thought about their lives and moments in between work; where did they live, did they have a car – the tube stopped running at 11pm so were they all bussing and if so how long did that take?? So I proposed that there should be skyPODS on top of the building where they could go reboot, recharge and establish balance. Each skyPOD was for a different purpose, all of which tied into the specific needs of humans and in this case within the advertising industry itself. I did this through a series of design choices, mainly based around senses.

As I am freshly back from renewing my bond with my spirit I realize that much like my approach with design is my approach in obtaining and maintaining happiness.. In essence I am designing my happiness. There are rules for engagement in any design contract and the structure of those is based upon the end user and their experience. At the core of this standard, is happiness. This is what I identified early in my education and what I have been esoterically implementing throughout my career. It is only now that I see the importance of bringing that process forward and exemplifying it as a natural structure from which many could build from, literally and figuratively.

Of course happiness is subjective, and working in a more intimate setting where there are only a few end users can be vastly different from appealing to the masses. However there are a certain set of principals which can be applicable in both scenarios:

1. Meeting basic biological needs from an environment.

Air, water, light, temperature, nourishment, comfort, ergonomics, health/ body

2. Meeting the requirements for emotional well being.

Mind, spirituality, laughter, inspiration, freedom, bliss, LOVE

 3. Establishing and Enabling desires and goals

4. Allowing room to grow and change

5. Creating balance between function and form

It is through these categories that a design can be configured; whether designing a product, a space, an experience or our own happiness. Most importantly is that design seeks solutions, and solutions are the windows and eventually doors leading from depression.

Gone are the days when we ask for permission, it’s time to claim your own sacred place where there are no rules, governors nor limitations. This is where everything begins and ends: from within. There is no politician, governing agency or religion that has any control over that sacred place. It is a place where fear reveals truth and love is omnipresent.  In this space we can sit quietly and engage with our higher selves, where we can ask and answer without borders, where we can envision, dream, wish, weep and uncover our deepest desires. That space exists in us all, all of the time. That is where the answers are. The only prerequisite is that we believe.

What are you sitting on? What is made from? How did it end up beneath your cheeks? Everything has a storyline; the Aboriginals have carried song lines for thousands of years which are passed down to each generation always being added onto. What is yours? Where do you come from, where are you now, who are you today?

What do you allow into your body? Everything is energy; static or dynamic it emits a frequency, and these frequencies add up to billions of numbers that dance in and around us at all times. If we have the ability to search the internet or send an email then we have the same ability to select a frequency and emit a frequency.  What do you want from this day, how are you fueling those desires, are you endorsing your dreams with every decision you make? From the time we wake up each blessed day we have many opportunities to endorse our dreams, from the thoughts we choose to let into our heads to the water we use to cleanse with, the products we put on our body, the food we put into our body, the clothes we wrap ourselves with, these all effect / infect our frequencies.  We are blessed to live in a time when we not only have choices but we have the right to choose what we please.

There are many groups of people who loathe self-empowerment and they dare to coax larger groups into trusting them and then confuse perception through a variety of methods which render people feeling out of control or having no control. It is through these bountiful choices that we have somehow forgotten what we are really choosing. These groups of people have no control over any of us so long as we can regain our consciousness and start making choices that best serve our souls purpose.

Take deodorant for example firstly there exists the choice not to smell; but why do we smell, and furthermore shouldn’t that be a gauge as to what is happening on the inside – so before we rush to cover it up why not understand it first? Then there is the plethora of options in seeking the right cover up smell, or even eliminate the sweat all together. There is a reason we sweat, it’s the collected toxicity in the body which needs to come out, what we eat and how much water we drink will help dictate the smell it carries. Toxicity can come from a host of places, completely out of our control, like the chemtrails striped across the sky, and if that toxicity doesn’t come out it can build into a much bigger problem. What is in that stick that you stick in your pit? Why is it bestowed the honor of living with you daily? There are countless diseases related to ingredients that are used in deodorant, and it is your choice whether or not you want to insert that frequency into your life.  If we can choose the amount of toxins that infect us isn’t it a no brainer? I like to think of toxins as hurdles and if I limit the amount of hurdles I have to clear in a day then I can reserve my energy for the goal: living the dream.

Ask questions, engage with each other, help one another.  We all have such brilliant and unique gifts which we can share with one another, but in order to realize those we have to remove the crud that is built up in and around us, call it spiritual smegma, unrealized potential, detached attachment. Take the reins back into your hands, ground yourself, find that sacred space, and if we are lucky we might just save this planet together.

Frank

Last night I had a dream of a place in Iowa where people abandon furniture on the side of a road. I was doing a cross country  road trip with my partner and spotted  dozens of brass beds, dressers and such just laying beside the road. I begged him to stop and I got out of the car to poke around. There was a man sleeping amongst the rubbish and he kept yelling at me to ‘go home’ there was also another man, who happened to be walking by and he said, ‘dont listen to him’ and since this man was in a police uniform I decided to continue to look around. I spotted a house just behind the mounds of furniture, it was an old victorian looking home, very run down. I noticed a woman get out of her car and walk over to the pile, she too expressed intrigue and amazement. I kept thinking to myself how can I get this stuff out of here – we dont have enough room in our car. I could overhear this woman saying the things which I was thinking, all surrounding coveting this new found treasure. I eventually morphed into this woman, yet still apart from her I followed her. She bought the house, basically sunk every last penny that she owned into it and moved in. She used the furniture that was scattered about to furnish her house. In fact people continued to leave  furniture roadside, almost daily, which were actually really charming pieces – not at all dilapidated.

In this small town there were politics behind the furniture, regarding who could have it and what was done with it. Although this was never outright discussed it was inferred energetically. Since she was an outsider she didnt do much with the furniture as it collected, she just managed to move it from the road and store it somewhere on the property which seemed to be accepted by the locals. She made friends with many other women in the town who would come over and tell her their stories. They always had a constant theme, which was how they had each been decieved by a man or cheated out of money, there were specific amounts, one that stands out was $17,000. During one of these visits the woman heard an old song playing in the distance, outside. She was listening to a womans’ story but the song got louder, it was something from the 1940’s. She went to the front door, opened it and there was an old radio on the porch playing the music, as she walked onto the porch she saw dozens of old radios abandoned, they were the size of a juke box but in varrying species of wood and in really great condition. It was a magical moment, becuase not only was it a rare and beautiful site it was also symbolllic that the town had accepted her into their hearts. As she walked outside through the radios she saw the homeless man sitting in a car with the door ajar, he was cleaned up, shaven and yelling something to her about the radios, I dont remember what this was. Someone else butted in and told him to stop yelling, that he was drunk. The last scene before I awoke, was looking from the street side up toward the house at all of the radios and thinking, finally I have arrived, no more money worries, no more politics, I am accepted.

The symbollism in this dream is pretty profound, in many ways it represents self acceptance and finally allowing success to unfold.  I have arrived, its time to dance to the beautiful music of life.

Frank