writings

Life | Nature | Philosophy as my muse, I ponder and reflect, and words come out.

Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Sugar in the Roots

Photo Credit Delphina Raven

Monica Meadows, Purcell Mountains, BC, Canada

October 2020

She who is incapable of

Compassionately leaving you

In order to selfishly keep your sugar well dry,

She who keeps your rooted in toxic swamp

Is your affirmation what she thinks of you

Worth measured by what you could do for her

But never mind what she giveth you

For that is not her concern or job

Apathetic that she is

She’s incapable of compassion for you

Nor could you possibly hope to

Extend self-compassion to yourself

That tool called compassion

Becomes a one-way street

Anything that is one-directional

Doesn’t return to bring you

Back to life in the Spring

Rejuvenated

And alive

She who helps you

Return your sugar from the leaves

Into the roots through the trunks

By helping you shed the vampires

Bring nourishment to your weary

Soul

With the living soil

In a teamwork between

Soul and soil

Making beautiful synchronized symphony

When spring comes

Your aliveness is

Renewed

New life is breathed into your branches

Where tender beautiful leaves grow

More beautiful and resilient

Than ever before

Such is real love

That only the emotionally

Psychologically

And mentally

Mature

Naturally

Can bring each other alive

Throughout all four seasons

Perhaps this is why school starts in September

Where sugar returning to the roots

For nourishment

Under the white blanket of cold

The seemingly dead landscape

Sets the stage for the year

Choose carefully

Who

And how

Your cherished

Characters

Values

And virtues

Are being used

This is the time of the year

To set the stage

To make the change

How will you choose

Now that you’ve been

Given yet another chance

Of another

Autumn

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Discomfort of Aloneness

Social media has, instead of bringing people together, brought us the following:

It has made us into keyboard Warriors with a cause and in the process of that, our social and debate skills, if there were any to begin with regarding the matter. That devolution of social and debate skills have now spilled out of cyberspace into in-person interactions in real life.

We are wired to look for purpose. It seems as if social media has become a chief source and resource of a sense of purpose. However, to effect real change, it has to come from the individual rather than riding under the umbrella or mob groupthink, enacted in real life with congruence amongst thoughts, emotions, attitudes, and behaviours, but only in alliance with actual, impartial, solid facts and irrefutable evidence, not assumptions backed by cherry-picked, manipulated, misrepresented, misinterpreted, and manufactured “facts” and “evidence” that fit the dogmatic narrative. Anytime an important decision is to be made, such as doing the right or moral thing, it has to come from our logical, rational brain and reasons, carefully thought-out, not driven and governed by feelings or rationalization, and finally put to the test of actual debates. Emotions and feelings are like signal lights to turn your attention to it. Egos and expectations or how you want the result of the truth-seeking debate to be would be best checked out before entering the debate room.

It has also divided us as well as accentuated our real aloneness and loneliness. The loneliness and discomfort of aloneness or solitude has pushed some into seeking a place of belonging into alliance and conformity. However, there seems to be a confusion between a sense of belonging—being accepted as who you are as an individual—and moulding yourself to fit into a group, even if you may be a square trying to fit into a group of round pegs. This maladaptation of fitting into a group at the expense of forgoing or replacing your individual, personal, sovereign identity with a group identity has a high price tag that extends far beyond the individual and the particular group, but out into the society at large. Authenticity is of paramount importance and that is one of our fundamental personal responsibilities to ourselves and to our communities.

Photo by Delphina Raven at Tobin Island, Muskoka Lakes, Ontario, Aug 2016

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Heart of Gold

Heart of gold doesn’t have that Midas’ touch, not in real life. It is but a tool that can be used and manipulated, gaslit and shamed into a disastrous aftermath under the guise of “good intentions” or “moral goodness”. Like donating to a charity, wouldn’t it be wise to be discerning and do some investigation first that the charity is indeed legit and is not corrupted under a façade of “moral goodness”?

The feel-good feeling of “having done the deed of kindness or compassion” could very well have been just a cowardly act of virtue-signalling, whereas actually having done good via courageous honesty and facing the painful truth requires that one faces the fear and converts it into courage to overcome it.

The latter is the heart of gold, not the former. It is not that easy because it requires having to come face-to-face with the depth of darkness of one’s own abyss, understand, and confront that, before one knows that one has control over that, to not allow that darkness to cross the threshold into the ”good”, for that threshold is extremely thin. In fact, the etymology of the word ”courage” means heart, from French.

Real love stems from courage. Cowardice and conformity is diametrically opposed to courage, love, and compassion. Courage is also the cure for cowardice and conformity, before real love and compassion can be reached.

The reality is, and there is no shortcut for it—it is an individual’s personal work, to examine one’s own life to make it worth living.

Photo Credit Delphina Raven © 2022

Paul Lake and Gibraltar Rock, Kamloops, BC, Canada

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

I Don’t Want to be a Reminder

I don’t want to be a reminder
Or memory
Of the former glory
Of your lover

To give that memory
Sustenance
And aliveness
Of what is no longer

In real life

I am me
My life that
Made me
Uniquely me

No matter how much
Similarities
That reminds you of your 
Former flame 

I am me
My life that 
Made me
Uniquely me

In all of its
Aliveness
Sustenance
Glory

And of course
Shadows

In real life 

Love me
For who I am
Uniquely me
In real life

As I breathe
And live
In this vessel that is me
In this life

I am not your memory
Or your reminder
Of the lost glory
That is your former flame

Love me
For who I am
Uniquely me
In real life

I am me
My life that 
Made me
Uniquely me

In real life 

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

A Drop of Tear

Sometimes a drop of tear
Contains much sorrow
Instead of a River
Of tears

Bravery and courage 
As sail and oar

Reading the wind
And the waves
With a heavy heart
And burdened mind

Keeping the eye 
On the goal
Brushing away tears of
Obstruction

Keeping the little raft
Afloat
Adjusting the sail
To reach the destination

Across what is really
A River of sorrow
Revealed only in
A drop of tear

Photo credit: Delphina Raven, Shediac Bridge, New Brunswick, August 2012

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Autonomy vs. Indoctrination

Feral Drifter, Uninterrupted


Photo by Delphina Raven near Kootenay Lake, British Columbia, Canada

“I think my deepest criticism of the educational system…is that it’s all based upon a distrust of the student. Don't trust him to follow his own leads; guide him; tell him what to do; tell him what he should think; tell him what he should learn. Consequently at the very age when he should be developing adult characteristics of choice and decision making, when he should be trusted on some of those things, trusted to make mistakes and to learn from those mistakes, he is, instead, regimented and shoved into a curriculum, whether it fits him or not.”

~ Carl Rogers

Indoctrinating a child with religion or ideology and call it teaching is not educating or facilitating. It is brainwashing.


Telling someone what and how to think, feel, choose, act, decide is to take away autonomy to grow into a human being. Obedience is not a character to strive for. It robs the person of personal power to understand how to use that power—when it is used for good and when it can destroy. When that is not understood, the obedient and conforming individual won’t learn what it means to be responsible for oneself or for others, but only know to scapegoat or be scapegoated.

Be intimate with your shadows, understand that the veil that separate the “good” and “evil” is very thin indeed, when anchored by a strong and deep knowing of your “Self” that has been within your control, it will allow you to have self-control and self-regulation to have no need or desire to power over and control others and to not allow yourself be powered over via manipulation by others. This agency of an empowered Self becomes an empathetic force in a humane humanity. Those who desire to wield power and control over others, telling and programming them on what and how to think, feel, act, decide, and choose, have an inverse relationship to the degree of self-control and personal power. (Definition of “personal power” here is borrowed from Phil Nuernberger, PhD: it means having power over yourself, not over others.)

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

My Name Is…

Nature’s Fetus Photo by Delphina Raven near Kootenay Lake, British Columbia, Canada

Nature’s Fetus
Photo by Delphina Raven near Kootenay Lake, British Columbia, Canada

Listen to my song, my rhythm
Understand me

Instead of writing over me
With your superiority-led script
And your funny ideas and ethics-less experiments
Of “what could possibly go wrong”
To subvert and control me
Making me into what you want me to be

Use fear all your want
It won’t work on me
For I am Mother Nature
I only respond to forces and stresses
Imposed upon me
I am indifferent

I offer you
A song
To guide you
To grow you
To connect you
With everything that is on
Planet Earth

Try with all your might
To overwrite my script
Your narcissistic superiority
Will draw you
An army of narcissists
To do your bid

I am not your conquest
I am not for you to exploit and control
I am the hand that feeds
And nourishes you

Destroy me if you wish
But you will not have me again
For I am too complex
Too intricate
Yet also so simple
If you would only listen

Listen, Listen
To my song
Simply listen
And listen closely

Your inner song is the same
No matter how hard you try
To overwrite that
Because you think I’m not good enough

My name is Mother Nature

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Mirror Mirror on the Wall

Photo by Delphina Raven Christina Lake, BC, Canada Feb 2021

Mirror Mirror on the Wall

When someone is brave and trusting you enough to hold up a mirror in front of you

When you refuse to look at it, you're being dishonest with yourself

When you shatter it by shaming that person, something else happens

When you cast aside prejudices and assumptions, and take a look at it, no matter how painful that might be, you gain new perspectives and understanding of you yourself and things/people around you

You enter the lucid space of silence

Mirror Mirror on the Wall

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Daily Practice Love and Kindness (with Truth) as the Highest Priority

Driftwood
by Delphina Raven, Balfour, BC, Canada

Always be disciplined in practising Love and Kindness (with Truth) as the highest priority in daily life. Practise it well and it becomes a disciplined practice that won’t betray you, no matter how right and justified you feel or even in actuality, when you are having the biggest struggle in life, or what seems to be the biggest obstacle in life.

Wisdom is when an insight has been experienced and understood with a hefty dose of humility, from different angles and the same ones, repeatedly, after enduring all the pains and regrets, after painfully shedding that mask or ego that shielded you for so long from the inner ugliness from others and yourself. It is not reading someone else’s insights or wisdom, no matter how invaluable and valid. It’s an organic and experiential knowledge that no one can give you. You must walk the path yourself.

Neither one is transferrable or teachable.

We’ve been conditioned through school and society (build on the same hierarchy model smothered in rewards and punishments, points gained and lost, winners and losers) that accomplishments and achievements are destinations and a competition. However, lessons in curriculum and in life, if learnt by experience, then it’s real knowledge; if learnt by memory and scores, then it’s superficial learning. Only the former leads to wisdom, insights, and foresights that are the stepping stones—not necessarily in a vertical hierarchy pyramid steps, but laterally as well, very much like the reruns landscape with hills and valleys above and below sea level—to live life fully and meaningfully for oneself and for others. It doesn’t follow a prescribed timeline like school curriculum. The more competition is ingrained, the shallower the learning; once this mindset is removed and replaced by the mindset of excellence practice based on discipline, then the knowledge is much much deeper and easier to retrieve when life strikes you with a hard and blinding blow.

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Hearth is Home with the Heart

If your hearth isn't where your heart is
then no matter how big and glamorous
or simple and minimal

There is no home
where your heart can sing, grow,
be free and speak the truth

But instead becomes a prison
that place you settle in and call it your home
where your songs of love and life
are stifled and saddened

That's no way of living
if you can't feel free
and alive

Tree Roots in Creek, Guelph, Ontario, Canada  Photo by Delphina Raven

Tree Roots in Creek, Guelph, Ontario, Canada
Photo by Delphina Raven

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Listen Deeply, Turn Fear in Prudence

Photo taken by Delphina Raven, Guelph Conservation, Guelph, Ontario, Canada in Feb 2017

Photo taken by Delphina Raven, Guelph Conservation, Guelph, Ontario, Canada in Feb 2017

One of the epiphanies when my relationship ended was this. Only by holding myself accountable can I examine my contribution to any outcome. No one is ever free of faults when something falls apart.

The more adversities and disagreements there are in any kind of relationship, the more we latch onto our ego and self-righteousness for outward defence, and the less we are capable of listening, especially this kind of deep listening, hearing behind/beyond the written/verbal message, of the other, as well as of our own. Yes, the message behind our self-righteousness is actually different. When self-righteousness dissolves, self-pity and victimhood mindset give way to compassion for ourselves and others.

Awareness of the underlying dynamics becomes clear, and our inner work deepens, which improves deep listening skills while turning fear into prudence and self-regulation, leading to healthy boundary setting and respect for others and ourselves, and thus relationships with unique people.

Oftentimes it has to do with needs that aren’t being heard, on ALL sides. Self-righteousness often makes us deaf. But not mute, unfortunately, when need be.

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Spirit’s Voice

Serenity and quietude
Nourishing our spirits
Silencing the endless mind chatter
Teaching us

To truly listen
Deeply

Photo taken by Delphina Raven at Snoqualmie Pass, WA, USA, in Dec 2016

Photo taken by Delphina Raven at Snoqualmie Pass, WA, USA, in Dec 2016

Smoke-streaked hair
From the campfire
Mountain air
Filling the lungs

Serenity and quietude
Nourishing our spirits
Silencing the endless mind chatter
Teaching us

To truly listen
Deeply
To the spirit’s voice
Within us
And the Earth

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Discomfort of Aloneness

Photo Credit Delphina Raven, at Tobin Island, Muskoka Lakes, Ontario, Canada, Aug 2016

Photo Credit Delphina Raven, at Tobin Island, Muskoka Lakes, Ontario, Canada, Aug 2016

Social media has, instead of bringing people together, brought us the following:

It has made us into keyboard Warriors with a cause and in the process of that, our social and debate skills, if there were any to begin with regarding the matter. That devolvement of social and debate skills have now spilled out of cyberspace into in-person interactions in real life. 

We are wired to look for purpose. It seems as if social media has become a chief source and resource of a sense of purpose. However, to effect real change, it has to come from the individual rather than riding under the umbrella or mob groupthink, enacted in real life with congruence amongst thoughts, emotions, attitudes, and behaviours, but only in alliance with actual, impartial, solid facts and evidence, not assumptions backed by cherry-picked, manipulated, misrepresented, misinterpreted, and manufactured “facts” and “evidence”. Anytime an important decision is to be made, such as doing the right or moral thing, it has to come from our logical, rational brain and reasons, carefully thought-out, not driven and governed by feelings or rationalization, and finally put to the test of actual debates. Emotions and feelings are like signal lights to turn your attention to it. Egos and expectations or how you want the result of the truth-seeking debate to be would be best checked out before entering the debate room. 

It has also divided us as well as accentuated our real aloneness and loneliness. The loneliness and discomfort of aloneness or solitude has pushed some into seeking a place of belonging into alliance and conformity. However, there seems to be a confusion between a sense of belonging—being accepted as who you are as an individual—and moulding yourself to fit into a group, even if you may be a square trying to fit into a group of round pegs. This maladaptation of fitting into a group at the expense of forgoing or replacing your individual, personal, sovereign identity with a group identity has a high price tag that extends far beyond the individual and the particular group, but out into the society at large. Authenticity is of paramount importance and that is one of our fundamental personal responsibilities to ourselves and to our communities. 

Read More
Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Real Power

Dig deep
And there you recognize
That fiery strength
Merge it with raw courage
That has always existed
An oft-ignored gift inside yourself

Indian Paintbrush, Grand Mesa, CO, USA, Aug 2017 Photo by Delphina Raven

Indian Paintbrush, Grand Mesa, CO, USA, Aug 2017
Photo by Delphina Raven

Real power 
Comes from 
Breaking through barriers
Not asking for handouts

It makes you harder 
And yet softer too
Because you understand
What it takes
And how much inspirational power
It has

Adversity won’t stop you
Not when the fight is worth it
And it is imperative 
For the whole of all of us

Forward progress
Comes from forward momentum
In spite of life’s
Challenges and adversities
And because of life’s
Intricate beauty 

Difficulties are essentially
Growth opportunities
An innate drive
To be an optimal version of who you are

It needs not
More add-ons
But stripping away of
Nonessential baggage
Expectations
Fancy adornments

Dig deep
And there you recognize
That fiery strength
Merge it with raw courage
That has always existed
An oft-ignored gift inside yourself

No need for more
For you have everything you need

Be self-disciplined
Have self-control
Let experiences become foresight
No matter how painful

Become responsible for yourself
Compassion and understanding
Flow through
For all

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Impermanence & Interconnectedness

Impermanence captured.
Rhythm of Shadow
As time goes by.
Perspectives of near and far
And everything in between.

Photo by Delphina Raven, at Unaweep Tabeguache Scenic Byway, Whitewater, CO, USA (October 2018)

Photo by Delphina Raven, at Unaweep Tabeguache Scenic Byway, Whitewater, CO, USA (October 2018)

Impermanence & Interconnectedness

Impermanence captured
Rhythm of Shadow
As time goes by
Perspectives of near and far
And everything in between
Contrast of lush green
And bone dry ground
Some rock surfaces are
Etched
And some are
Smoothened
Over time
All
Integrated
All Interconnected

Poem written on Dec 1, 2017

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Dare to be vulnerable

Stand alone if you must

Even if no one wants to hear

What you have to say that is important

Because it’s beyond their scope of perspective

Even if—no, especially if—

They want to hush you up

“There’s nothing to talk about.”

Or if you don’t speak their cult language and align with their cultish mind

Anyone who’s been (or knows someone who’s been)

In an abusive relationship

Or with a narcissist

Knows when one is being manipulated and controlled, converted or gaslit

With bullshit.

Dare to be vulnerable.

Lone wild flower, Sahara Desert, Morocco

Lone wild flower, Sahara Desert, Morocco

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Mediocrity at the Expense of Excellence

When mediocrity is not only encouraged and marketed, but excellence is punished—not only discouraged—it’s a sure way for humanity to descend into chaos.

When there’s no check-and-balance in place, say in the example of pursuit of excellence, for honesty and fairness, it can led into greed and cheating as a way of winning a competition. Likewise the pursuit of “who’s got it worse” victimhood mindset has to have check-and-balances so one doesn’t descend into feeling self-righteous and justification to condemn others for pursuing excellence in an honest and fair manner.

“I know nothing about surpassing others. I only know how to outdo myself.” ~ Bushido

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Water Cooler for Dogs

Snow, snow—white and pristine
Everywhere

Yellow snow too
All over certain spots

Except this one

The Water Cooler for Dogs
Where yellow snow is absent
Only white, clean, pristine snow.

file-9E1B5F86-2FEE-43A6-9C12-57C69B284AB9.jpeg
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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Shackles of Lies

Liberated from 
The shackles of lies
That were woven for you
Before you even had a chance
To weave your own


It takes that special
One
To recognize and see
The primal being that you are


You couldn’t hold back
Your constraints
Shaped by shackles of
Lies


Like a house of sand
As soon as the door opens
The primal maiden with her
Primal breath 
Blows away all the sand of 
Lies


Reveals a person
Free from the shackles of lies
Of who he was made to believe
He is, but is not
Until he’s freed 
By the breath of Life

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Jessica Wee Jessica Wee

Vicious Cycles

Rush infants, babies, and toddlers
To reach, Not master on their own accord
Milestones and independence
By projecting our deficits and unrealized dreams
Our images of who we wished we were
By overcompensating
How we were not raised

Override their innate
Instincts and intuitions
Rather than
Connecting and understanding them
As they already are

Take away opportunities
To master sound judgments and critical thinking
To build freethinking individuals
Who are resilient and authentic
Against tyranny

Take away opportunities
To cultivate real connected compassion
Healthy competitions
That elevate each other’s excellence,
Innate self-confidence and self-reliance
Instead of superiority and domination
And manufactured self-esteem

Rob them of
Intrinsic motivations and internal rewards
With authoritarian external rewards and punishments
Condition them
While elevate authoritarians’
Status and esteem

When they become adults
We infantilise them
And they grow to expect
To be infantilised

No resilience
No critical thinking
No stoicism
No freethinkers
No consequential thinking
No adherence to indisputable facts and evidence
Avoid sound debates
Favour rationalization over rationality
No morality or ethics

Be Warriors in the Garden
To stand up
Effectively and tactfully against

Oppression
Tyranny
Victimhood mindset
Superiority
Control
Power
Trauma

Instead…

Oppression to oppress oppression
Tyranny to tyrannize tyranny
Pathological compassion to victimize
Superiority to dominate superiority
Control others to replace self-control
Power over others in place of personal power
Incite trauma to further traumatize

Repetitive and cyclical
Will we ever learn from history
The long human history
And personal short history

Do you dare
To drum up courage and prepare for pain
To heed to indisputable facts and evidence
To humbleness
Of our real world, in reality, and
Build a network of antifragile, indefatigable humanity
To change this tide?

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