The examined life

The examined life – by P.K. Odendaal – December 2019

Oh, please, I wrote my matric exams many years ago and I still shudder when I think of how difficult it was and how I stressed. Fortunately I passed it and its past. More exams for me ever …  no thank you. I have had enough; what with all those sleepless nights.

I understand that fully ... but

What we say defines who and what we are.

What we say defines who and what we are - by P.K. Odendaal - November 2019.

We are the most conceited species still alive, although, considering our desire for self and mutual destruction, we should have been extinct long ago ... but the time is not ripe yet.

If I only had time - a poem

If I only had time - a poem by P.K. Odendaal - Nov 2019.

You may see me now as I rush and row 
which doesn't have much of a final touch
As I arrive too late at some entrance gate
For something quite vague like escaping the plague

An Ode to God - no. 2

An Ode to God – No. 2 – by P.K. Odendaal – October 2019

I stand in awe when endued and by God imbued

Who is so tall and care of things so small
and not as you and I who sometimes lie
and shield our shame while pursuing fame

What a joy - a poem

What a joy - by P.K. Odendaal - September 2019

It is with joy that I jump like a boy

having dodged that bullet before she could pull it

Please do not abuse me when the muse wants to use me
As I yearn to be free while you're gunning for me

The notion of emotion – a poem

The notion of emotion – a poem – by P.K. Odendaal- September 2019

It is well known that philosophers have shown

That we are what we think although there's a kink
Because we think what we are before we are what we think
And care not what we feel until we feel that we care
And none of the above is neither here nor there
And until we find what we do is all that's true
Our hearts do not care a hoot of what our minds can moot

Atheism - the biggest delusion

Atheism – the biggest delusion - by P.K. Odendaal – August 2019

Just look at this!

This is a light truck manufactured by one of the best light truck manufacturers in the world. The latest technology, computers and design engineers in the world designed this. It took them days and years to come to this design, strength, beauty and robustness. The best we as mankind has on offer. It had beautiful lines when it was manufactured and was almost perfectly manufactured, but objects in the universe scolded it.

Adult Sunday School - Part 23 - Paradise

The Eight destinations  after death – Part 3 – Paradise - by P.K. Odendaal – August 2019

We are continuing our excursion into places we might go to after death and next it is Paradise’s turn, a name we associate with bliss.

The central theme of the whole Bible is Paradise Lost in Genesis and Paradise regained in Revelation, but what a long and treacherous route that is. Some of us lose our way there and end up in other destinations which I write about in other parts of this series.

That is such a sorry state of affairs, but fully understandable due to the fact that the way leading there it is so narrow and beset with crooks and diverse temptations, most of all by our own choice and making. We are literally the masters of our fate and it should not be difficult to recognize the evil which meet us on our way to Paradise.

Love of my Life – Part 15 – A poem

Love of my Life – Part 15 – A poem by P.K. Odendaal – August 2019

Here we go once again with the same old refrain

Of desire and pain which are all still the same
For a purpose so alaine as an old steam train
But the dream that she had made us both feel bad

As a chance which went by like an unheard sigh

The gist of the dream was to be my queen
For ever and ever in bonds which won't sever
But this dream was too late to consecrate
And must be a sign of our long lost prime

The stuff Reality is made of – Part 2 - Induction

The stuff Reality is made of – Part 2 – Induction - by P.K. Odendaal - July 2019

We continue our exploration of the Universe with a second postulate.

 

POSTULATE 2 – GENERAL PROOF BY WAY OF INDUCTION IS A VALID UNIVERSAL PHENOMENON AND PRINCIPLE.

We are going to use Hilbert Space to prove this.

There is a principle in mathematics called induction which is a mathematical proof technique. It is essentially used to prove that a property holds for every natural number n, i.e. for n = 0, 1, 2, 3, and so on.

The problem arises from the … and so on. Is that up to ten, up to ten million or up to infinity? If we start at counting we know intuitively that it is valid for all integers up to infinity. The question which begs itself is: How far should we go until we accept it as being true. In the mentioned case ten is enough for me and a million is enough for a sceptic.

Love of my life – Part 14 – A poem

Love of my life – Part 14 (the end) – A poem by P.K. Odendaal – July 2019

When she has found that I'm still around

I wondered whether I should give it a try
Excitement still reigns in stead of my brains
As we want to know how things might still go.

But my previous conviction prevented benediction

As I knew an old flame just gives off smoke and shame
So I waited until fate started knocking at my gate
To show me how to handle this without a row

Love of my life – Part 13 – A poem

Love of my life – Part 13 – A poem by P.K. Odendaal – July 2019

 
If you think you are smart and follow your heart
There's one way my friend this story will end
It will drench you in tears for another few years
before you follow your mind and return to be kind

I started this venture as a sort of debenture

giving long term yields in various fields
but it was not to be as you shortly will see
if you care to glance at part two by some chance

The stuff Reality is made of – Part 1 - Existence

The stuff Reality is made of – Part 1 –by P.K. Odendaal - July 2019

In this series I will be exploring important aspects of reality and explain it in some general terms. The main aspects I will be discussing are in some way connected to general intuitive axioms which, according to Gödel’s theorem, will not be provable in our terrestrial domain. Although this series of articles are technical and scientific in many ways, it will not be difficult to read and understand it for other-minded readers, as I will keep it simple and basic.

So, after pondering this subject for over twenty years, and although I have come to understand it only in a miniscule way and only an infinitesimal part of it, I am able to make a few basic postulates of the tenets of reality.

Love of my life – Part 12 – A poem

Love of my life – Part 12 – A poem by P.K. Odendaal – July 2019

When we come to the end of our present stipend

Do you think that by then it’ll be grief once again?
If we do not achieve some form of reprieve
For our desire to achieve something higher
Than just to be free from some human decree
Without any gain for the price of our pain

Love of my life – Part 11 – A poem

Love of my life – Part 11 – A poem by P.K. Odendaal – July 2019

There once was a wife who came into my life

To bring me some joy when I was a boy
But she left me for good which I then understood
Was the end of that game and the start of my shame.

Love of my life – Part 10 – A poem

Love of my life – Part 10 – A poem – by P.K. Odendaal – July 2019

There once lived a giant who was really unkind

And he abused all who didn't walk tall
Shouting and reeling without any feeling
For what is decent and right even at night

Love of my Life - Part 9 - A poem

Love of my Life – Part 9 – by P.K. Odendaal – June 2019

She says that she trembles when something resembles

my picture or name which sets her aflame
and makes her desire to burn like fire
and touch my body and mind in a way that is kind

As I put my arm around her to calm

the passion we feel whilst our emotions still reel
from the caresses and hugs which feel like drugs
which mostly controls our bodies and souls

Love of my Life - Part 8 - A poem

Love of my Life – Part 8 – by P.K. Odendaal – June 2019

As another day draws to a close I am getting morose

And as another day is past I stand aghast
That she is not here for me to endear,
but she still appear in my blogosphere

To caress and to hold in the winter cold

when we are alone in a world of our own
to let passion fly like a banner on high
As we take flight to our own shelters at night

Love of my Life - Part 7 - A poem

Love of my life – Part 7 – by P.K. Odendaal – May 2019

Do you know how much I long for your touch

specially at the end of the day when you are away
when I could entwine your body with mine
Just being at your side with no reason to hide
the passions we feel in the moments we steal

To be close together forever and ever

to make up the time we lost in our prime
as we thought we could relate without deciding our fate
but how blind I had been for the things then unseen
Not having to talk at the end of that walk
about what we should do when our time there was through

Love of my life – Part 6 - A poem

Love of my life – Part 6 – by P.K. Odendaal – May 2019

I was quite alone when she messaged my phone

Her photo was distinct and it made me to shrink.
I pretended to not see it was really for me
And kindly asked if she knew of the past.

Her answer was right and it gave me a fright,

just knowing it could only be for the good
As she left me cold in the days of old
After all these years of manifold tears.

Oh, the rapture of love! – a poem

Oh, the rapture of love! – a poem by P.K. Odendaal – May 2019

I dreamed a dream which may be extreme

That love can be found when no one's around
For love does not care whether someone's there
To have and to hold in fire or cold

Until the pyres of our earthly desires

Vanishe from sight in the deep of the night
Leaving us still and content without life's lament
To let us acquire some other desire

Adult Sunday School – Part 22 – Outer Darkness

Eight destinations after death – Part 2 – Outer Darkness – by P.K. Odendaal – May 2019.

This is the second place which we are visiting in this series and the places will be getting more and more inhospitable as we go along. This is a place which will mainly be populated by people who knew God and Jesus Christ, but who were unfaithful and disobedient. People who belonged to the Kingdom of God at one time.

The Cleft in the Rock of Ages

The Cleft in the Rock of Ages – by P.K. Odendaal – May 2019

It is well covered in the Bible that Jesus Christ is The Rock and that This Rock has got a cleft in it, made by a sword wound in the side of Jesus Christ during crucifixion. The meaning of this cleft is that we can hide in it and so escape the presence, righteousness or wrath of God.

Life is so good - a poem

Life is so good – a poem by P.K. Odendaal – May 2019

Life is so good if it's well understood

If not, we are to blame if we suffer the shame
As free will empowers before it devours
If we take the time to do something sublime.

Who am I - the Quest for knowing me

Who am I - the Quest for knowing me - Part 1 by P.K. Odendaal
Written August 2011, Rewritten April 2019

No, I have not forgotten my name and ID number nor my family and friends' names, but I wish to pursue a question almost every person on earth ask themselves from time to time and which I often ask myself.

I wish to pursue this on many levels, except the physical, and I will do excursions into the realms of philosophy, psychology, physics, meta-physics and religion on the levels of the mind, soul and spirit.

Equality

Equality - by P.K. Odendaal
Written June 2011, Rewritten April 2019.

Liberty, Equality and Fraternity was the slogan of the French Revolution - and how many people died for that pipe dream? Before you could say 'kill', they killed the King and Queen and before you could say 'slave', they were back in slavery, oppression and bondage.

Minimalism

Minimalism - by P.K. Odendaal.

Written 11 May 2011, Rewritten April 2019

This is a life lesson, which I am reluctant to take, but happy to talk about.

There was one who was famous for the number of things
He forgot when he entered the ship
His umbrella, his watch, all his jewels and rings
and the clothes he had brought for the trip.

At the end of my search

At the end of my search - a poem by P.K. Odendaal - April 2019

I had always known the decision was my own

To surrender what was mine unto God's plan and design
Not that it was mine to use for whatever I choose
And not to keep it forever for my own endeavour.

It is about how we look and think about things

It is about how we look and think about things - by P.K. Odendaal - April 2019

The most outstanding accomplishments of mankind were achieved by people who thought of things in a different way than we do. We are each being dealt the same kind of problems to solve and somehow we are not able to solve them, whether it be in our personal lives or in our work. That is why we have this saying that people must think out of the box. This implies that we have a thought box and the name of this box in called conventional wisdom.

Adult Sunday School - Part 21 - The Grave

Eight destinations after death - by P.K. Odendaal – April 2019

Introduction and Part 1 – The Grave
 

Introduction.

I think we should know where we go from here quite often, but never so often as when we die. Yes, we might go nowhere as atheists believe when they are on earth and when they die, but we have a purpose. In fact a heavenly purpose for which we have been preparing since our birth and our death will be the culmination of our human career so to speak.

But, some of us may not land up where we intend or want to, because we have seven possible destinations to choose from while we live and one to go to when we die. These are The Grave, Hell, the Outer Darkness, The Bottomless Pit, Paradise and the Three Heavens, and for the sake of Catholics who read my articles, I will include and consider Purgatory.

Rewriting old articles and publishing

Rewriting old articles and publishing.

I have decided to compile a book with all my articles and poems.

For this purpose I will be improving all the articles by rewriting parts of it, especially the older ones where my writing skills were still under developed - not that it is much better today - but perspectives and styles change with time.

I will then publish the rewritten ones here and delete the old ones.

The oldest articles were published from 2002 onwards.

PK

Capture of the Church - Part 1

CAPTURE OF THE CHURCH

Part 1 - by P.K. Odendaal - March 2019.

Capturing is one of the oldest of human pastimes, and the Church, being the oldest institution, suffers most from this. We humans seem to relish capturing or usurping anything and everything from animals to humans to power to countries with coercion, exertion, pain, violence, death and deception.

Things which do not Rhyme - a poem

Things which do not Rhyme

A poem - by P.K. Odendaal - March 2019

Life is so sure to make us endure
Conflicts which last from a bygone past
For which I assure there is no quick cure
It will linger on from dusk to dawn
And always sows doubt of what its about.

At the end of our date - a poem

At the end of our date - A poem by P.K. Odendaal - March 2019

At the end of our date we pondered our fate
Whether indeed it was to be sweet
Or whether some  fairy made us say something scary
Or the moon did not shine for most of the time.

Human abuse - A poem

Human abuse - A poem by P.K. Odendaal - March 2019.
 

There once lived a giant who was really unkind
And he abused all who didn't walk tall
Shouting and reeling without any feeling
For what is decent and right even at night

The Essence of being Human Part 2 – Kindness cannot Kill

The Essence of being Human Part 2 – Kindness cannot Kill – by P.K. Odendaal – February 2019.

Be kind and exercise kindness. Contrary to what the adage says, kindness cannot kill. Kindness lets us live and inspires us to reach heights unknown to the unkind.

In the previous part I postulated that kindness and compassion are all we need to become human again. Of course the corollary to that is that we need compassion to be kind. The first is the thought and the second the acts which flow from it.

The Essence of being human - part 1

The Essence of being human by P.K. Odendaal – February 2019

Part 1 - Basic human values.

This article series was conceived as a single article centred on basic human values, but as I pondered the richness of being human, the subject has grown out of all proportion with my limited mind, and into proportion with our human divine calling to be like God.

I never could have thought that to be human was also to be divine. Humanity was always such a basic and simple concept for me until I started applying my mind to all the ramifications and implications of what it entails to being human.

Love of my Life – part 5 - A poem

Love of my Life – part 5 – by P.K. Odendaal – January 2019

How can I believe that there may be reprieve

In times like these while I'm at ease
An apparition appears after all these years
Which made me to think of things now extinct