ON THE PATH TO UNDERSTANDING

STILL HERE AND DETERMINED!

2012-01-25T16:50:00.000-08:00

It's been a long while but I am back in 2012 and busy as a one armed paper hanger!

Poetry book, Sensual Woman is in the making. On the Path to Understanding website is back up and running. On the Path to Understanding Newsletter first issue has left the building and so much more for 2012. Please head over to the OTPTU website for your free MP3 relaxation recording and sign up for the newsletter. Looking forward to seeing you there.

Much love and appreciation,
Tracey

THE POWER OF KNOWLEDGE: The Key to Victory

2009-09-09T07:39:00.001-07:00

Can you begin to calculate the amount of knowledge you have gained since you transitioned into this time and place? From the moment of conception, we have been in a learning mode. But what is the purpose of all this knowledge? Why have we had to learn so much in so many different ways? As we look around us we see such slogans as: Knowledge is Power or Knowledge is Key. But have you ever asked yourself, “The power and the key to what?”

We learn in many different ways. Primarily, learning is the acquisition of knowledge and the ability to recall that knowledge at will, either consciously or unconsciously, to aid our abilities during a multitude of daily interactions with ourselves and our environments. Everything that you can begin to imagine and more, is all a part of the many learning experiences we have had. Basic knowledge, how to eat, how to dress, when to sleep and awaken, have all been acquired to satisfy our specific physical, mental and spiritual needs as we transition through life.

Some are more adapt at specific things than others, due to perception, physical and mental makeup. We see this in the noted individuals who accomplish things beyond the norm; the famous dancers, scientist, spiritual leaders, politicians, etc. Yet, we all have the same potential depending upon those physical, mental and spiritual abilities. So why is it that there are so few of the famous and infamous persons in the world? Motivation!

When we are motivated to accomplish a thing, we work harder to acquire the necessary knowledge to accomplish this thing. The variables involved, however, still may prevent us from accomplishing that which we desire.

There have been many theories written regarding the inability for geniuses to be successful due to such things as emotional intelligent quotient (IQ) and sociability. Those persons who are more charismatic are more likely to be successful than those who do not have that ability. Therefore, the desire to be pleasing to others creates a situation whereby one is more likely to succeed. In a like way, a person who is considerably more emotionally mature and therefore more evenly balanced psychologically has a greater chance of success as well.

Desire is the greatest of motivators because when we want something we are more likely to pursue the knowledge and develop the necessary skills in order to have what we desire. Often, however, although we have the desire for a specific thing, we don't always have the knowledge to pursue it, nor the ability to develop the means of accomplishing it. Or so we think.

I have learned that when we truly desire something, the doors to knowledge open before me. There is nothing that I have truly desired that opportunities for the knowledge have not presented themselves. Everything from my grandmother paying for me to go to elite private schools to talking to taxi drivers that give me information about a new town I have lived in. The information is always there, I only have to be open and aware to grasp it.

One of the things that I do, is in my daily determination I set my purpose to acquire clarity of my situations and acquire the knowledge to handle each event that takes place. Granted sometimes the motivation to acquire clarity and knowledge is preceded by a situation that has disturbed me since I didn't have the knowledge or clarity to handle it. Regardless of the process, ultimately, the motivation to acquire knowledge is awakened in me and I eventually acquire that knowledge and clarity in order to do what it is I am determined to accomplish. The difference lies in whether or not I am aware of the opportunity and take advantage of it. With the appropriate knowledge there is nothing that can not be accomplished. This brings us to the purpose of knowledge.

As I perceive it, the purpose of knowledge is to aid us in maximizing our potential in any given situation. The importance of the situation is determined by each individual. What is important to one, may not necessarily be important to another. This can be seen in the slang response of, “Whatever!”

When we are involved in a situation whereby we really don't care about the outcome of the situation, many of us use the whatever response. This is indicative that we don't care about what is happening in the moment. We don't care about the outcome. When we do care about the outcome, we become tenacious in our efforts. We respond as though it was a matter of life and death. The varying degrees between whatever and life and death responses allow us to realize how important the outcome of a situation is to us.

When we are victorious, be it against a person or a situation, we become confident in our knowledge and our ability is sharpened. When we fail in our efforts, it allows us to know that we have to return to the proverbial drawing board to acquire more knowledge. Our level of determination will decide whether we maximize our efforts to acquire knowledge or think whatever, thereby setting us up for future failures. It is in our pursuit of knowledge that we become more victorious in our lives. It is in this pursuit of knowledge that we determine our future victories.

The purpose of knowledge then, is to guarantee as many victories in our lives as possible. Materially, physically, mentally or spiritually, the key to victory is the same: The power of knowledge.

THE PERFECT LIFE

2009-09-05T11:37:00.000-07:00

Each day we awaken, striving for some form of perfection in our life. The perfect cup of coffee or tea, the perfect workout, the perfect day on the job, the perfect mate, etc. Yet, we don't put forth our maximum best effort in each day. Basically we create a humdrum existence for ourselves, fall into our perfect rut and stay there. The moment that anything our of our daily norm pulls us out of our rut, we panic. Rarely do we perceive this break in our monotony as part of the perfect lives that we lead.

It appears to be that most of us perceive perfection as that state whereby everything in our lives is only defined by the positive things that happen in our lives. Therefore, when anything negative happens we perceive it as a lack of perfection. Yet, when we study the workings of the universe, everything has a positive and negative charge. However, for some strange reason, we think we live outside of these laws of duality within the universe. Why than do we believe that our lives should be a lopsided reflection of these universal truths? The perfect harmony we seek lies not in this lopsided viewpoint, but in harnessing both the negative and positive forces of our lives to work for us and never against us.

The social judgments of good and evil are the reason for this off balanced perception. Good is to be nurtured, while evil is to be thwarted. Yet, as we look around us we find more “evil” in the world than ever before. I believe this to be the result of our flawed perception as when we struggle to find perfection outside of our lives, we fail to understand how the forces of positive and negative work within our lives and the balance it creates externally when we do. These social perceptions are an antithesis to creating the perfect good which we believe we are to adhere to in order to find perfection.

We all are aware how hard it is to be good all the time. Many have given up and do as they please as they have witnessed that being “good” is often a sacrificial stance and not many want to be the sacrificial lamb of their lives. It creates confusion within us as we look around and become aware that it is mostly the “evil” who seem to thrive in their negative attainment of wealth and fortune of varying sorts. We spend our lives striving to catch up in ways that we deem “good”, only to find that we are not making the progress that we would like.

We have been convinced that the things we need for our happiness are all external. We believe that material gain, perfect relationships and fulfilling our hearts' desires from an external viewpoint are the only ways to become happy. Even as we strive for these things and attain them, we find that this happiness we chase so fervently, is still elusive. Regardless of the wealth, fortune and good relationships we acquire, we're still plagued with the same types of problems to one degree or another.
Sometimes the mere striving results in physical malfunctions that rob us of our health over time. So what is the key to attaining this state we desire without the side effects of doing so? I believe it to be a rather simple one, yet one that is very difficult to put into play. The key is a change in perception.

The first step is to realize that there is no such thing as good and evil. The ability to realize that these are merely socially implemented ideas about phenomena and not based on an objective reality is the first and most difficult step to take.

The reason that this is difficult, yet absolutely necessary is that each culture or society has its own rules about what is “good” or “evil”. The example I like to use is that of cannibalism. In most societies, cannibalism is frowned upon. It is a simple a rule against what has been deemed social and religious atrocities that we do not ingest the flesh of fellow humans. Yet, in other cultures of the past and present, cannibalism is part of their life rituals. There is documentation that cannibalism is still practiced in the world. You can find out more about cannibalistic behavior at this website. (http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/criminal_mind/psychology/cannibalism/index.html )

Often “good” or “evil” social, cultural and religious judgment is passed regarding the marriage age of minors, abortion or the practice of homosexuality. In the United States of America, most states require parental consent if a person is under the age of 18 with a minimum age of 16. Arkansas, however, allows any person of any age to be married with parental consent and judicial order.

Although these practices are frowned upon by most cultures, there are still cultures which actively practice cannibalism, the marriages of minors to adults and homosexuality. It is a social-cultural and religious judgment whether these behaviors are “good” or “evil”

It is not my point to take a political, social, cultural, religious or moral stance on any of these subjects therefore, I need not reiterate upon the legality and morality of these as there has been and is ongoing, enough of an uproar regarding these subjects in the news media. The focus is on the ramifications of the concepts of “good” and “evil and how our thought processes are conditioned by these.

In science we learn about the positive, negative and neutral forces at work in the form of atoms. When we begin to understand that these principles are at work in everything and learn to apply them to ourselves as well, we begin to realize that “good” and “evil” are merely misconstrued concepts regarding the positive and negative forces. We have always perceived “good” as positive and “evil” as negative. However, the concepts of positive and negative fade in the light of social judgment and become separated from the actual understanding of “good” and “evil” as energy and creates a perception of behavior, to which we apply judgment.

In order to change our perception we have to take a diametric position to the one currently held.
In other words, we have to change our perception from one of judging behavior to one of recognizing the energy of the concepts of “good” and “evil”. By doing so, we can develop a state of mind that is more tolerant of others as well as relieve ourselves of the stressful reactions that take place within us when we see something that we dislike or disagree with. When we recognize, positive, negative and neutral energy, we can form a position that is more accurate in dealing with the situation and thereby develop theories more apropos to the situation and use it as a medium to develop positive energy.

Imagine yourself, much as anything that runs off of electrical energy. Both the positive and negative current is necessary to manifest action. A lamp or car for example, must have both negative and positive energy in order to fulfill the purpose which they were intended. If one or the other is missing, the lamp will not light, nor will the car start. In a like way, all things in the universe work identically; including human beings.

Although it is our desire to have things moving positively all the time, it is an antithesis to using our personal power to manifest the energy for the actions we desire. Instead of harnessing the power of each situation, we deflate and become limp with exertion as we try to move against the forces involved. This deflated attitude is a failure to recognize our personal power to manifest change toward the positive by forcing us to become negative in the forms of anger, frustration, defeatism, sadness, depression and other forms of frustration. When we inflate and rise to the challenge that the opportunity presents, we become elated, self directed, and develop a sense of our personal power. This is the purpose of all things. To prove who we are to ourselves: To prove that we are spiritual beings who are in this world to maximize our spiritual potential and that all that we encounter is for that purpose alone.

So how do we use these impetuses for our spiritual growth to harness and develop our spiritual power? First off, we must see the truth of this theory. Secondly, through trial and error, we learn to perceive each phenomenon as an opportunity. This is not to say that you force yourself to not feel whatever you are feeling regarding the event, but that once you resolve those feelings, you take a stance and reach inside yourself for the energy to accept the opportunity and challenge it and yourself.

When an event takes place, as an example, a job is lost; after feeling whatever you need to feel about it, you state to yourself, this is my opportunity to get a better job. I will be confident; I will find the best possible job for me, which includes: here you make a list of all the things that are necessary in your perfect job. If it is a failed relationship, you make a list of all the things that you deem necessary for that perfect relationship. No matter what the circumstance, you follow the same pattern until it becomes automatic. Then you take action!

If you don’t have the skills for the job, you develop those skills. If you want a perfect relationship, than you develop yourself into becoming the kind of person you want to have in your life. In this way, you keep moving forward toward your goals at all times. This will take as long as it will take. It is akin to baking a cake. You must amass all the ingredients. You must mix the ingredients as necessary to make the cake batter. You must bring the oven to the right temperature. You must use the appropriate pans. You must go through every step as prescribed in the recipe until your cake is baked. The same applies to your life.

If you don’t have a recipe, find one that works for you. Find a means and method to have all that you desire. When you reach out to the universe for the answers that you need, all the information you must have to accomplish your goal will be placed before you. You only have to recognize each opportunity as it appears in order to manifest your desire into reality.

By changing your perception from “good” and “evil” to positive and negative, you gain control over every situation and in this way accomplish all you desire.

THE POWER WITHIN

2009-09-02T07:13:00.000-07:00

It seems that every where I turn, people are going through so much. Health, Economics, Family issues and more coming at them from all directions and they are afraid! When I talk to them my heart goes out to them because they have no clue how much power for change resides within them. They tremble with the anticipation of things getting worse, instead of rejoicing at the opportunity to make things better.

We all have this power, this ability to bring about the changes we desire. It's all a matter of realizing that we have the power to do so. Instead we shake in our boots, so to speak, at every little thing that veers from the direction we want things to go.

In reality, what is happening is that we're being presented with opportunity. The things we name trials, tribulations, disaster, are only opportunities to prove our power to ourselves. When we face our opportunities with the belief that we are in a position to strengthen ourselves, reveal our power to ourselves, than and only than do they become an impetus for change. This is no easy feat.

We have been conditioned to perceive things as we do. We see these opportunities as trials and places of suffering because we have been taught to do so by all those who have come before us and those who stand with us. When we face a change that appears negative to us, we receive pity and perhaps religious support from those around us as we are told that these are trials that we must overcome. We are looked upon with sympathetic eyes which reinforce the belief that these things are negative things that we have to get through. In reality, as I will continue to say, these are opportunities.

Many years ago I had a job that I really loved; so much so that I worked 70 hours a week while only being paid for 35 hours. My coworkers were resentful of my circumstances because of the level of freedom I had in the position. To make a long story short, others in authority decided that checks and balances were needed and made changes that I determined would undermine my effectiveness. I quit the position.

I was devastated and ran home to my husband grief stricken and suffering due to the circumstances. He looked at me with a big smile on his face and said, “Congratulations baby, this is wonderful! Let's go out and celebrate!” While out for dinner and drinks, he asked me, “So what great thing are you planning to do next?”

His attitude left me incapable of feeling sorry for myself and needless to say, I found reason to keep moving forward in my life as opposed to becoming mired down in self pity. In this instant, he was more than a spouse, he was a good friend.

Since than, although it is difficult sometimes, I try to remember to apply his attitude from an internal perspective. After I go through whatever I want to feel about the situation, I stand back and say to myself, “Okay, what am I going to do with this opportunity? What great thing am I going to do next?” In this way, I continue moving forward and quickly change the negative perception to a positive one and therefore change the entire scenario to one of positivity. This is the power that we all have.

This is also the reason we should have at least one person in our lives who perceives things differently than we do. In this way we can have reinforcement to shore up our positive selves when we become disillusioned and confused about the limits of our power. Our power for change is unlimited, it's totally a matter of how we look at things. It is a matter of what thoughts, words and actions we use to deal with things.

The moment we begin to feel ourselves falling apart, we should put on the brakes, come to a full stop and look at what we are thinking, saying and doing about the event. The truth of the matter is that an event has no power, no polarity. We give it power and polarity based on how we perceive it.
If we are viewing it from a negative stance, than it becomes negative. In a like way, if we are viewing it from a positive viewpoint, than it becomes positive. This is true no matter how dastardly it appears on the surface of things.

So next time you lose a job, a lover, a friend, your children become unruly, you wreck the car or any of the other opportunities that present themselves, put on the brakes, come to a dead stop and do a deep introspection of how your perception. The power to change things for the better lives within.

A GIFT OF JOY

2009-08-23T08:50:00.000-07:00

This morning I decided to find Haitian music videos as a gift to a friend of mind. I planned to post them on their profile page at one of the many websites I go to. In the process of searching I ran across the most upbeat happy song of the decade: I'm Loving My Life by Michael Benjamin aka Mika Ben. I became so enthused with the magic of this song that I've spent my entire morning, much like the boy Snow Mountains when he heard the Buddhist teaching, writing it on every rock and tree I can find.

I've posted this video on all my friends profiles, gave them all the link for it on all of my instant messengers and than finding it at amazon.com, I purchased it and uploaded it to my blog for all of you to share with me. This means that anyone who comes here to visit me can partake of this wonderful, magical music that has everyone smiling and dancing in front of their p.c.'s on this marvelous day. Don't forget to go to amazon.com and purchase it as well.

It's absolutely amazing that when, with our whole hearts we want to do something beautiful for someone else, it always becomes a gift to ourselves. In this world of so many not so bright and sunshiny things, in that moment when I am granted a boon of beauty as the clouds part and allow the most brilliant rays of sun to shine into my life, I obsessively run around pointing at it and in a loud and excited voice screaming, “Can you see it? Do you see it? You must see it!” This is one of those times.

I have decided that this song is my personal morning anthem to be played as many days of my life as possible to remind me that I 'm Loving My Life. Thanks Mika Ben, Great Work!

THE HARDEST PART OF RAISING CHILDREN

2009-08-18T16:39:00.000-07:00

ARt by www.lanreburaimohart.com

Following a year with the grandchildren, visits from brothers and capped off by a summer of three of my younger grandchildren, I realize that the hardest part of parenting is placing yourself between them and the erroneous viewpoints of those that whom they will come in contact with on a day to day basis in the world.

We work so hard to give our families a solid foundation in basic knowledge that we hope and pray will assist them in generating the necessary wisdom to live their lives with the least amount of bruising. In some ways we are successful; but in others, we fail miserably.

When, out of care and concern, we point to their flawed perceptions in an effort to assist them in correcting them, they become quiet violent in their feelings toward us. This is not to say that they physically attack us, but that their feeling of being attacked by us brings out behaviors and responses that we did not think they could possibly harbor as we remember the sweet, wonderful persons we nurtured. Yet, without fail, they rebel against our interference in their process.

Of late I have been bombarded with negativity so immense, and if I had been a weaker person, so all consuming, that I was left flabbergasted and in shock at the responses I received. Although I have been trying to grow in the area of relinquishing protection to the protective forces in the universe, I have resorted to my time worn trait of pushing those who attack me as far away as I can. This is how I protect myself and release me from feelings of responsibility towards these persons. I basically leave them to their own devices on their journey. In other words, I love them from a distance.

As parents and/or siblings, who sometimes take on the roll of parents, we don't want to see our loved ones suffer. We want their journey to be as free of distress as possible. The fact is, it is in distress that we learn our greatest lessons, if we open ourselves to those lessons.

As we watch them writhing in the pain of their lives we want to “fix” them, to “make” the pain stop. In reality, we have no control over their lives. They are the only ones who can “fix” themselves or alleviate their pain. Yet, being surrounded by persons and things to blame for their condition, they fail to do so. Sadly, the more we tell them of their power and control in their lives, the more they dislike us for it.

I have been perceived as controlling, mean spirited (my use of verbal abuse as shock treatment), self absorbed, bitter, negative, selfish, mentally ill and other tags of criticism in my pursuit in helping them to become happier. I am tough on everyone, but tougher on myself. My life has been filled with so much suffering that I have learned a massive amount about perceptions and their effect upon me and as an extension, everyone else. Yet, as I have been told, due to the levels of frustration I reach in trying to teach others what I have learned ( I want them to hurry up and get it so I don't have to hurt for them) and must learn to be more patient. After all, everything and everyone blooms in their own time.

I erroneously, perhaps, perceive everyone as my children, and I as their teacher. Since I usually “get it” rather quickly, it is my false expectation that they “get it quickly also. Sadly, it does not work this way. Therefore, I remove myself emotionally and watch their continued torture with remorse that I could not reach them.

I am aware that it is not my journey that they take. I am aware that I can't reach everyone. I am too aware that they will suffer until they learn what their lives are trying to teach them. Yet, there is nothing I can do except, love them from a distance and continuously send positive energy for their self healing their way. The hardest part of raising children is not being able to help them to be happy.

Summer

2009-07-10T11:24:00.001-07:00

Okay! I haven't been writing again, so shoot me, I need the rest! It's summer and I have three of the grandchildren here visiting. I got lucky, I was suppose to have seven and four couldn't make it. I love how the universe protects! The way the three are running me ragged, I can't imagine the levels of insanity I would have reached by now with seven of them.

Did I mention the number of times I've gone to the market to shop for these little ones? It's not that they eat so much, it's that they only eat what they want to eat. I don't understand modern parents. When I was a kid, you ate what was on the table, there was no choice, food is for nutrition, not to satisfy your whims. No one had food allergies so there was no reason to say that we wouldn't eat what was placed before us. These kids won't eat anything good, but say McDonald's or junk food and they're all over it.

I have to keep reminding myself that this is only going to last for the summer. Mid-August and they'll be back home with their mom, living the life that they've become accustomed. I remind myself of this hourly. After all, if I force a temporary fix, it'll only last for as long as it takes me to get the fix into place and the amount of time they'll stay here.

The eldest one, he's ten years old, has something to say every time I give a directive. When did parenting become a democracy? To make matters worse, the younger ones, aged four and six, look to the ten year old for permissions and decisions about what they are suppose to do. My summer anthem is that “there is only one boss in this house and it's ME!” You can't begin to imagine how many times I've said this. Parenting and grand-parenting is a dictatorship, not a democracy! Yet, this ten year old thinks he has the power to run things. THIS IS ONLY FOR THE SUMMER!

I bought them one of those above the ground pools so they could have a cool place to hang outside since these 100 degree temperatures are roasting. The ten year old reads extremely well. He read on the side of the pool, “NO DIVING” than proceeded to dive into the pool. He's been punished by not allowing him to play in the pool for two days. Yes, I'm hard, but when you can read the directions, know the rules, and flaunt them anyway, hard is necessary.

We went to the library as one of our outings. I push the library on all the kids. We got tons of books for them to read and a couple of movies. I allow them one movie a day, no pc and no video games. I'm an ogre. Of course when they return home they have their own pc and will be able to use it as much as they like. Grand-parents are suppose to teach their grandchildren different ways to live. Mine did and I don't regret it. Just wait until they're older than I can really begin to torture them with things like summer jobs and more responsibility.

I remember spending the summer with my grandparents. My grandfather was the demon from grandchildren's hell. Of course we were allowed to play with our cousins who lived a mile away, but we also worked our tails off. We stripped and waxed hardwood floors, which was a big game to us as we dragged each other around on towels in order to polish those floors.

My brothers went to work with my grandfather who was a carpenter and I went to work with my grandmother who worked in a hotel laundry. Back in those days hotels had their own mangles and did their own sheets and this was the monster I learned to handle at fourteen years old. Of course I hated it, it's always been hot during the summer in Louisiana, but because of the paternal and maternal grandparents, we have a strong work ethic. I hated it as a child but as an adult I am deeply appreciative of them.

Back to present day grandchildren: They pout every time I tell them to pick up their mess. They seem to have a belief system that tells them they shouldn't have to do anything that includes their personal maintenance. Now I know my daughter has taught them to take care of their space, maybe they just think vacation means all work ceases. I guess that's why hotels are so popular for adults, we only need to unpack and pack and leave the mess we make for the housekeepers.

I think I need to work on my perspective. I'm suppose to be enjoying the kids and having a good time with them. I had forgotten how much work is involved in having young children around and here in lies the rub. It was my plan to have fun with them, but I've become an eternal housekeeper and cook, referee and guidance counselor and praying for bedtime so I can relax. I think I'm just too damn intense about everything and once again have forgotten to enjoy what there is to enjoy.

Maybe since this is only for the summer, I should reevaluate my position, suspend with all but the absolutely necessary rules, and have fun. After all, isn't that what summer is all about?

IN ONE MOMENT

2009-06-28T10:38:00.000-07:00

This morning, shortly after awakening, I heard a keening somewhere. It was my neighbor across the street. Her six month old baby had died.

I had not introduced myself to this neighbor. She had bought the house across the street and moved in a few months ago. This is different than I usually act; I normally introduce my self to my neighbors and let them know I am available to them. This town I moved into fourteen months ago, is different than any other place I've ever lived and so I had changed this habit as I found most people seem to keep to themselves, except for their current friends and associates. It makes me sad that I did not take five minutes to do this.

I wonder how many of us fail to know our neighbors and even in crisis such as this, can we be there for them. I watch as my street fills with friends, family and lookie-loos of this woman, all standing around with no expressions upon their faces. A few are talking as they watch, waiting for the coroner to brink the infant out of the house. Throughout this time the mother and paternal aunt are keening as Apaches might at the lost of a loved one. I feel their spirits wrought with confusion second to their suffering. The mother screaming for her daughter to “wake up”, the aunt crying, “why did my niece have to die.” It is a sad day on my block. I take so much for granted, especially that my life, the people I'm connected to and the love for them I have will always be manifested on this plane of existence. I am always shocked when that physical connection is severed.

I look around at all of us, holding grudges, wasted moments in our expression of our positive and true feelings for each other, always thinking we can do it later or we have time. Ultimately, all we have is this moment and live the illusion of time. I've spent my life thinking of tomorrows and losing in the procrastination of today. Like many, my perception is caught up in the belief that my eternity is a material thing. It is only death or the threat of death that makes me realize that all I have is this moment and in one moment it is changed for this lifetime.

SELFISH

2009-06-16T12:28:00.000-07:00

I was recently thinking how selfish I’ve become. I don’t want to share my time, my space, my money, my heart, my body, with anyone. I was thinking that this is something I need to correct, when I realized, I’ve become selfish because of others’ selfishness.

I was born a very generous person. I remember how loving and giving of everything I am or own. I’ve had people compliment me on something, and have removed it and given it to them on the spot, in spite of their protesting. My rationale is that if they like it so much, than they should have it.

On my birthday, I use to give others gifts. I never received any therefore, I decided to give gifts instead to appease my hurt feelings. I feel into this habit with gusto, because I’d always tried to live my life by example. I never believed the axiom, “Do as I say, not as I do.” I turned it around to, “Do as I say and as I do.” No one has heard me.

I look around and I wonder how the world might be if others had listened to my revised concept of that old saying. I fought the tide as long as I could, but, once weary; I succumbed to the same methods as everyone else: Selfishness. Granted, it is a protective mechanism to save myself. To save one’s self is the epitome of selfishness.

In a world of the selfish, the selfless are ridiculed and abused. One is considered a fool, a buffoon, and other negative adjectives accompany one’s name. The damage that is done physically, mentally and spiritually is beyond endurance. Selfish is the only salvation. This selfishness is rooted in fear.

Fear is the governing force in the lives of all whom I meet as they work unwittingly at trying to save themselves. Ultimately, we can’t save ourselves through fear. We become more fearful, untrusting, unloving, disconnected and thrive on the negative we are bombarded with from moment to moment. These aforementioned are evidence of our justification in protecting ourselves. We feed our fear of them and that fear grows strong and robust within us.

As it takes root and spreads throughout our minds, bodies and society, we become dysfunctional in every aspect of our lives. Our health, bodies, minds and society deteriorate more and more as we try to find a reason for the uncommon levels of negativity; never realizing that individually we are the source. We say we want it to end, yet have no power within ourselves to change it, to stop it.

A tiny seed of awareness awakens. I am the only one responsible it proclaims. I am the only one who can stop it. I must be the first to find the courage, the words, the reason and logic to turn it around. In defeat we admit, but I’m only one person. Yet, isn’t it one person who started the decline? Isn’t it one person who committed the first cruel act? Isn’t it one person who fell from grace and led others as well? Than I as one person must be capable of turning the tide!

I dream, of each person, in his or her environment, taking a stand, refusing to fear, refusing to perpetrate negativity, refusing to believe the negative that flows from within, taking that stand and remodeling him or her self into the person they want to see in others. In this way, the flood begins to ebb as the power of positive thought and action becomes the smallest dike that others rally to join, to build a levee, than a dam which ceases the flow of negativity.

This all consuming fear didn’t happen in one moment of time, nor will it be stinted rapidly. If we take action in our small place, doing this one great thing, than over time, like so many tiny patchwork pieces, we will crate the great quilt of compassion and humanity that covers all.

WHERE IS THE LOVE?

2009-06-09T06:55:00.000-07:00

Tuesday morning, I’ve awakened with a strong, positive flow of energy. I turn on the pc and go to my most frequented websites and all I see is violence, murder, abuse and mayhem, with the Black Eye Peas singing “Where is the Love?” as I peruse the content of this other world.

I watch the surveillance camera video as a cop violently beats a man who was standing on a corner in New Jersey. I can’t believe what I am seeing, so I watch it again. I still can’t believe it so again I watch it. Am I seeing what I am seeing? The officers told the man to zip up his sweat jacket, the man complies. It appears as though the cops told him to zip up his jacket so that when he was grabbed to be beaten, he couldn’t slip out of the jacket.

The two cops, one male and female (the female did not participate in the violence and at one point seemed to be trying to stop her male counterpart) accosted the man simply because he was standing on the corner. There is no audio on the video therefore we have no clue what verbal transactions took place. Yet, the victim of this violence appeared to be completely passive throughout the entire interaction.

Last week, Omar J. Edwards, a police officer, was murdered by another in Harlem, New York while he was trying to apprehend a suspect he found breaking into his vehicle.

In the San Francisco Bay Area a BART police officer murders a suspect who was prone on the ground. Oscar Grant, III and a group of young men were being detained by the police. The young men were all either sitting or kneeling on the ground in the open-air BART station. Grant was being held to the ground by three officers when the shot was fired wounding and killing Grant. As with the first incident above, the action was caught on video and has been posted at www.youtube.com.

Last month there were four Floridian teens that raped and sodomized a school mate with hockey sticks and plungers as well as the more current incident of 17 year old Arnold T. Ross raping and beating to death an 8 month old infant. And these incidents are only the tip of a very big iceberg of violence taking place hourly here in the good old U.S. of A.

People, tell me, what are we doing that is creating so much violence in our world? What random acts are we perhaps inflicting upon our fellows which is bringing this violence out of so many lives? The most important question is; what can we do to stop it?

Everywhere you turn, people are filled with fear generated anger and confusion. This country was built on fear and violence and it still prevails. Where does it stop? Where is the love? I'm crying for us all.

PROM NIGHT

2009-05-26T15:28:00.000-07:00

Its 2009, more than 40 years since blacks fought for desegregation and got integration (there is a difference). Down in south-central Georgia’s Montgomery County High School, black students had their prom on a Saturday, whereas white students had theirs on a Friday night.

Now mind you, this wouldn’t be a big deal if we had arrived at desegregation in the 60’s instead of integration; but because it is a time of integration, apparently white people don’t have the right to choose not to have an integrated prom.

The white hate mongers of Montgomery County decided that they didn’t want their lily white daughters being pressed upon by black students (I’m thinking they were thinking of black males) because, as the ring leader of this charade says, “There’s never going to be any mixed babies in my family!” according to one of the students who attended a private meeting of white students at one white female student’s home. This meeting was instigated and chaired by the student’s parents. The problem isn’t that the students agreed amongst themselves that they did not want to socialize with their black counterparts. The problem is that some parents are still teaching racial hate to our children.

Actor Morgan Freeman, a resident of the same community, was so appalled by this situation that he called his own meeting, an interracial one, expounding upon his heartfelt sadness and a determination to allow the children who did not feel and believe in this racist attitude of some, to have their own interracial prom, which he would pay for. You go boy!

The south is a strange place, filled with many different kinds of passions and perceptions, some of which, I believe, have no place in today’s society. This belief is one based upon knowledge of children; if they aren’t taught hate and racism, they don’t espouse it. Why are we corrupting our children with our useless and counterproductive biases when allowing them to find their own way in these personal choices is a much more healthy state?

I grew up in the south. I grew up in an integrated neighborhood, during the era of segregation. Rarely was there a racial incident. When there was, it was because parents like the ones in this scenario took charge and taught their children a deep seated hate without understanding. We learn our religion at our mother’s breast and our politics at our father’s table. I wonder what we’re feeding our children tonight.

THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED

2009-05-24T12:18:00.000-07:00

I was reading Time Magazines article on Michelle Obama and was held in thrall by the massive change this woman has brought about as first lady. Everything from her quiet insistence that her staff shall know the names of all the White House service staff to her enlistment of celebrities to attend public schools in order to give the children hope for their futures in real time.
From sober faced, filling the role as necessary first ladies to one who is taking action, creating a revolution in her new position, Michelle Obama brings a much needed change in political iconism. In the past public figures, especially those in politics, aggrandized individuals viewed from a distance. The White House characters in attendance have been placed on the throne of adulation when popular or infamy when not, only to be usurped by the next aggregation of the political herd with quickly fading memory of the previous. Yet, here is the quiet energy of Michelle Obama, revolutionizing the position of first lady as no one has ever done previously.
Apparently, Barak Obama isn’t the only one in his household who prefers cooperation over confrontation and an expectation of that cooperation from the entire constituency; and gets it. The Obama’s have apparently figured out that politics is just another job, another service to the community in which they have no concept of elitism or dictatorship in performing the functions of this job. One performed by less use of ego and with more compassion than anyone in a political position.
It’s not my intent to compare the Obama’s to anyone else, that would be impossible, since it is my belief that we are finally seeing for the first time what it means to “think outside of the box” in a political forum. The tools that the Obama’s have acquired to do this particular job are revolutionary to say the least. These people are not only self directed, but are able to push their full agenda without creating animosity in their wake. Contrarily, they create a sense of awe, appreciation, cooperation and accommodation by all whom they enlist to support them.
I belong to a group that says a true leader, leads from behind. That is, they support the people they lead and understand that they are working for their empowerment and do not perceive their position as one of power, but one of empowerment. The Obama’s seem to do this without breaking a sweat.
During the presidential campaign, I was asked a number of times if I was going to vote for Obama because he is a black man. My statement, then as now, is no, I’m voting for the best candidate for the job. The fact that he is black has nothing to do with his capabilities of being the best possible presidential candidate. Thus far, the Obama’s are proving to be a greater asset to this country than I had originally thought he might be. Michelle is a force to be reckoned with. Whereas, Barack is revolutionizing politics on an international level, Michelle, like the woman she is, is revolutionizing on the home front. Both Obama’s are giving the younger generations hope of a better future through their examples and concerted efforts to “walk that talk”. Gil Scott-Heron was wrong, the revolution is being televised.

OBAMA IN LOVE

2009-05-23T05:06:00.000-07:00

When I see the way the Obama’s look at each other, if I were not who I am, I would be envious of them, jealous of her and develop deep seated feelings of aloneness.
Every picture I have seen of this couple exudes the love they have for each other. They are definitely soul mates; the fantasy we all dream, personified. Could this be the secret of his success?
Obama’s love for his wife, I am sure, is merely an extension of the human being he is. He is a man generous of spirit and his love for his wife is merely an extension of his generosity. Of course this is all the perception of the writer. However, pictures don’t lie. I’m sure that I’m not the only one who is witnessing this phenomenon.
Kennedy was a philanderer. Carter and young Bush, I can’t remember their wives at all. Clinton, well now he’s a whole different story. He and his wife are business partners. They both have strong political goals and support each other in accomplishing them, even when there are distractions like Monica Lewinsky. All of these pictures are cold.
The Obama picture of love, marriage and family, on the other hand is one of the life filled with passion. It is evident in everything they do.
While Michelle, is apparently, caught up in the wake of his tsunami, her power is still clearly seen and her identity recognizable. She has the uncanny ability to be an individual in their relationship, while at the same time having her goals and agenda. She is most definitely a woman to watch and model.
Barack, well he simply has magic. His capacity and capabilities are legend. His roles as man, husband, father, political figure and now president are tied yet separate in an unearthly manner. He appears to be fulfilling every single role with stellar performance; unheard of in this time and probably in human history.
We have witnessed wives, families and friends, pushed to the side, neglected and even murdered in the pursuit of such grandiose schemes as the ones Obama has accomplished. We have seen betrayals and beheadings of men and women who have attempted to attain loft goals and positions throughout world history. Yet, here is this one guy doing it all. This is the answer to the question Tina Turner placed before us, “What’s love got to do with it?” Apparently the answer is everything.
Obama loves. He loves family, friends, progeny, work and country. But most of all, his love and confidence in himself are not filled with arrogance and self importance, but one sent out in rays of benevolence and good will.
During his campaign, I watched as some of his constituencies basked in those rays of benevolence and the awe upon their faces in his presence. It was glorious to say the least. He charmed everyone in his environs without Machiavellian intent and purpose: the employment of cunning and duplicity in statecraft or in general conduct (Wikipedia on Machiavellianism), yet with the same precision. We have been one by his positive spirit.
I watched as he has been upbraided by his competitors and naysayers, yet he has held a tight reign on his supporters with a determination not to respond with the same negativity. I’m sure I would have been a party to responding in kind over time as I would have become angered at this unfair and unjust behavior. Nonetheless, Obama has maintained his integrity and honor throughout. His in the moment state of being had me wonder if he is not a closet Buddhist. Some might even wonder of the possibility of a reincarnation of an ancient wisdom.
All in all, Obama appears to be a man filled with love, not frivolously or naively, but with wisdom and grace.

OBAMA'S SWAGGA

2009-05-22T10:16:00.000-07:00

Recently I was at one of the chat websites I participate in and a CNN video regarding "Obama's Swagga" was presented and asked if it could be considered racist. CNN Anchor T.J. Holmes and co-anchor's discussion of Obama's "blackness". The video can be viewed at www.youtube.com: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPX_m5LaltA.

Well I must say, the video was not racist from my point of view; it was merely observing facts of cultural attitude in the president. No president before this time has been a freeman as Obama is. What I mean by free is that Obama is doing Obama, with all the cultural, ethnic and black characteristics without care or concern for the opinions of others.

Look around you at corporate blacks, they lose what I call the drum in their voices and attitudes. Yes I said drum, our rhythm, language, customs and attitudes, in order to survive in the corporate world. But here is a blackman, half blackman, half whiteman, whatever you want to call him who has taken the attitude that the presidency is just a job that won’t last more than 8 years and he’s not sacrificing the person he is to do it. And he did the same thing in the Senate!

So we need to laugh and rejoice, because we have finally seen "black" is not a negative and does not need to be altered or changed in anyway to be successful.He’s also shown us that if you have a plan, keep your ducks in a row, you can do you and do any job you want to do. That goes for men and women of color everywhere. I think that lil thingy is called INTEGRITY, supplemented by a huge portion of honor.

RANDOM THOUGHTS OF AN INSANE MIND

2009-04-20T03:44:00.000-07:00

ART BY: Steven Lopez ( www.IKEEPMOVING.COM )
Okay! So I haven't been here in a while. I know you didn't miss me because I didn't get one email, one comment, one question as to my whereabouts. I KNOW I am the invisible woman, screaming from her tower/dungeon/cloud/earth, but couldn't you send a telegram or something? Still I'm alive and well and only a tiny bit more insane than I was last we meant. But that's only because I've been scraping up the mental pieces and applying crazy glue liberally.

So where have I been, what have I been doing/ Losing my mind at the least, transforming, once again, at the most, doing what I always do, swinging to the beat of my rhythm and my rhyme, crescendos to decrescendos, off key, perfect tune, flat. Only to crank up and start all over again. Anybody want to ride with me?

Well in my mental travels, surfing the net, watching youtube, I ran across this fantastic artist, painter. The way he uses color and light is breath taking; a journey in itself. Thank heavens I don't take any of those trippy drugs or I might still be at his site zoned out. Back in the day, I had friends who would have spent their entire high lost in his colors. I never partook, figured I only had one brain, which I valued highly, and didn't want to queer the works any more than they already were.

The truth is Steven Lopez, that’s the artist, was just what I needed to resurrect. He proved to be my prince charming with the long awaited kiss needed to awaken a mind, asleep with the poisoning of the apple of knowledge. What knowledge you might ask? Well the knowledge that ultimately the only thing that keeps me from going over the edge is me and if I don’t stay grounded, if I for one minute depend on anything other than me, than whoosh! Off I go into the abyss. But miraculously, there is Steven Lopez, with his brilliant colors and light that trigger the sleeping being within who can not help but respond to ravenous beauty.

You might think “ravenous” is a strange adjective to attach to beauty. But think about it. Beauty, rapaciously demands that we respond. It doesn’t care what our mood or frame of mind, it just wants to devour us, hold us in thrall, snatch us back from the ugliness that prevails in the world, for that one brief moment in which we surrender to it; wholly and completely. And once we do, we are lost to our issues, our problems, our pain and suffering, if only for a moment. Yes, beauty is quite ravenous.

So my thought for today: Allow yourselves to be totally and completely devoured by whatever beauty you come across. After all, it’s all that can save us.

A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NAME

2009-01-05T01:11:00.000-08:00

A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NAME
Well in my last blog I decided that I would be a spiritual consultant, by name alone. Unfortunately, after choosing this tag, I decided to do research and was appalled by the number of labels people have used to define who they are and what they do. After glancing and becoming totally inundated by the choices others have made, I realized that I am not a spiritual consultant in the sense that others mean this term. I'm something different.
I'm not a spiritual consultant. I'm a roadsign consultant. When someone arrives at the crossroads and doesn't understand, I help them to find clarity. I shine a light on their inherent value, there perfection as they are in the moment and allow them to realize their ability to accept what they already know. Thats what I do, that's who I am! What the hell is that? This tag stuff is driving me crazy. I don't like labels and to find one that I identify with, we ll this is the closest I can get!
Now I don' t think roadsign consultant will sell, but I don't do this to get rich, I do this to relieve suffering. So what do I tell you when you're standing there in front of me totally perplexed? What do I say when you are so lost in confusion that you can't make up your mind that you are worth any effort at all? What is it I do when even when you do have the courage to make a choice, you're not sure which choice to make? To use a term from my friend DeLeon, I use outuition!
The things that I have learned from my intuition, from my self discovery, from my observations and experiences, come out to point you where you need to go. Ultimately, I'm a roadsign consultant with a flash light using outuition, shining it on that dark spot so you can see it clearly. I let you tell me where you are, I let you show me what you think, I look at your perceptions and I show you another one and allow you to assimilate the information to see what you already know. This is what I do.
So now tell me; what do you call that? If it has to have a label in order for those who need to hear what I have to say to know that I am the one that they are looking for, what tag do I use to define my ability? If you know won't you please tell me so I can go to bed?

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2009-01-01T21:14:00.000-08:00

Art From: www.talk2action.org/ story/2006/6/4/145852/2596

2009 is the Chinese Astrological Year of the Ox. The Ox year is considered a year of prosperity. Therefore, all you hard working folks that have been struggling for your place in the sun, this is the year that the opportunity for the fruition of all your hard work to be manifest.

I am born in the year of the Ox and for my family it was a year of great prosperity as I was the first child born of my generation; making me the first great grandchild, great grandchild, first child of my parents, first niece and first god-child to my god parents. Could anyone ask for a greater position in any family? Well, actually, yes! My brother could have waited another three or four years to arrive! Nonetheless, I was greatly welcomed and deeply cherished for a little while anyway.

Fortunately being firstborn comes with a lot of perks, such as not having to wear hand-me-downs, natural dominance and more self directed. Hooray for the first born of the world! However, back to this prosperity thingy.

Prosperity is a given for those who work hard. Of course we don't know when it's going to arrive, but we do know that our hard work will eventually pay off. The key is to decide what you want. Let the universe know. Do not try to determine the outcome, but do the work and wait for the results. One more thing, never, never, ever say what you don't want because I guarantee that you will get it!

Perfect example: One of my friends and I were coming from shopping on New Year's Eve and jabbering about how we wish we didn't have so many governmental agencies to deal with due to some of our undertakings. Well, low and behold, we weren't three blocks into driving when we see the blue lights flashing behind us! Well there we were talking about what we didn't want anymore of, and it manifested before the vapor from our breath was dry from saying the words! Fortunately it was an officer I knew, and we breezed through the stop with a Happy New Year and good wishes for all.
Needless to say, I'll be thinking twice about how I phrase my desires.

I've been practicing for the new year since the first day of December. The reason for this is that as an ox, like oxen everywhere, it takes me a minute to slow down and get turned in the direction I want to head. Therefore, I figured I'd practice my great skill of one-upman-ship by starting early so that I would be ready when 2009 arrived. I've been doing a great job, I might add.

I'm not one for New Years resolutions. My normal method of operation is to count my blessings of the ending year and make firm determinations regarding my direction for the new year. I don't get involved with the concept of breaking bad habits and the like as many do. I just decide where I want to be by the time the New Year becomes the old again.

As always, with this attitude about my direction, the universe presents those things I should be aware of and points me to what I need to know. Well, while at a Buddhist meeting on New Years Day, which is where I am every New Years Day, I was passing out my business cards when I was asked what kind of consultant was I. My response was that I didn't know. Now that made me feel kind of foolish to a degree, but I am not one to accept labels, so I don't think about how I should label myself. Yet, it's not about me, it's about how I define the service I offer so that those people needing my service can find me. Well, by the time I arrived home three hours later, I knew. I am a spiritual consultant. That's what I do, that's who I am. I am a teacher of new perceptions. I am the person other people come to in order to understand what they are missing in the scheme of things. Hence, I am a spiritual consultant.

Therefore, with this epiphany, I can now offer my services to those who seek them. I am not a theologian. I am not a mental health therapist. I am not a healer. I merely consult and point the way toward what has not heretofore been obvious.

For those of you who want to contact me, please go to my website: onthepathtounderstanding.org to preview what I offer. Contact me in the space provided and please leave comments. I'm still working on the book. HAPPY NEW YEAR!

TO GAIN WISDOM

2008-12-20T18:39:00.000-08:00

ART FROM: (http://earthtreeyoga.com/About.html)

We are often told that we must gain or develop wisdom. But, what is wisdom and how do we gain it?

At www.dictionary.com one of the definitions for wisdom is stated as being:

The quality or state of being wise; knowledge of what is true or right coupled with just judgment as to action; sagacity, discernment, or insight.

Wisdom, by my definition, is the ability to take all the information gained about a particular thing, see beyond the subjective reality of that thing and move into the objective reality with a clear and concise understanding of this thing. From this place one then uses that information to aid in transferring that clarity to others.

The ability to do this does not come easily or to all. Many of us have a greater capacity than others to develop this sagacity, and yet it is evident in one way or another in each of us. This is the what of wisdom.
As for the how to attain part, allow me to borrow from one of the ancient sages;

Confucius says:

“By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest. Second, by imitation, this is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest.”

To reflect or give thought to something does not always open the windows and doors of enlightenment. Our capacity to widely open the door to an objective reality and then accept that which is found is a most difficult task. To know without being capable of proving that knowledge and have faith in that knowledge is the key which many cannot manifest due to the training that has left us mired in a base of subjectivity.
This is perhaps the reason that Confucius believes it to be the noblest of routes; for those who can surmount the many obstacles that societal and parental training and nurturing place in our path of self realization are many. We have to relinquish an astronomical amount of what we have learned in order to see the objective reality with clarity. However, when we can, it places us in the seat of control over our knowledge and understanding.

In Confucian philosophy imitation is the easiest method of gaining wisdom. I surmise that this is because it is merely a mindless parroting of what we see others do without seeking understanding of why it is done. At best, imitation is the act of copying; a counterfeit of the original. Seldom is a mindless copy of a set process of thought conducive to a healthy body, mind, spirit, or environment. Nor is anything counterfeit of the same value as the original. However, still, counterfeits may exact the same beauty in appearance as the original.
Examples of this are being seen as culturally we lose our uniqueness in pursuit of being in the fashion of the moment or being acceptable to others. We must remember that the beauty of humanity is a direct result of our differences and do whatever is necessary to develop our unique traits.
My grandmother use to say to me: “Bought experience is the best.” I am always self directed and due to this trait my path is more difficult than might have been if I was an imitator.
A proverb which appeals to me is the one that states: The wagon following learns of the bumps in the road from the one preceding it. This too is directed at the concept of learning through observation, assimilating the information and using it to aid in appropriate choices.
The combination of the technology today and the vast wealth of knowledge in the world make it relatively easy to learn of anything one desires to learn and some things one doesn’t. This method creates an environment whereby we can do and be anything we choose to, simply through imitation.
Our experiences, however, are what truly brings the knowledge home and ingrains it deeply into our psyche making it possible to more readily learn the lesson that the experience brings. It is up to each of us to be aware of this. It is third premise of Confucian theory regarding wisdom which is tagged as the bitterest.
The perception with which we view our experiences will determine if it will be sweet or bitter. Everything always comes back to our personal perception; therefore, a change in perception automatically changes the degree of our pleasure. We must determine if our attitude is one that brings joy or pain and alter our perceptions accordingly. This we will learn to do as we develop more wisdom over time.
Hence, wisdom, as stated earlier, is the accumulation of experiences viewed with the perception that is reasoning for us to attain happiness, compassion and wisdom.

‘TIS THE SEASON

2008-12-19T10:55:00.001-08:00

ART FROM: www.creatingpositivelives.co.uk/reikicourses.htm
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The holiday season is upon us and for many it is the time to make special efforts to give and to receive. But others of us have come to the reality that every moment of our lives is a place of giving and receiving.
I am a giver by nature. Even as a small child I would constantly bring gifts to those in my environment. I would pick flowers, draw pictures and bring found treasures to parents, teachers, friends and associates. This sounds great doesn’t it? The problem here, as I have learned relatively recently, is that I am off balance. Though I have no problem giving, receiving is a whole different thing. I don’t receive well.
I’m sure this is primarily nurturing by parents and society. As a child I was always taught to share and put myself aside in deference to my four siblings. As the oldest child I was expected to make sacrifices for them, which I did until I was fifteen years old. At that time, feeling totally emotionally and materially abused, probably because I didn’t receive as much as I gave, I left home to seek whatever it was that I believed to be missing in my life.
Socially, because of my exceptional height (I was 5’11” at 14 years old), I was always made to go to the rear in places where it was deemed that I was too tall for others to see around me. This is in essence a request to “give” up my place in deference to the comfort of others without regard for my desires, preferences or comfort. I could probably create a lengthy list of societal demands upon my life, but no doubt you can think of your own list so I will forego this redundancy.
I can name many who have a lopsided balance in the scheme of giving and receiving. Usually the givers pair up with the receivers and live happily ever after; forever out of balance but finding a balance in paring with their opposites. Yet it is our responsibility to find completeness within ourselves and form a union with others of an equal balance in order to do the work that we are meant to do in this lifetime.
When we are caught up in trying to find balance by unifying with another more than likely we will spend our whole lives doing so losing the necessary focus to develop the unique characteristics that are necessary for us to develop into highly spiritual beings. This said, it is an internal balance that we must seek in order to give back to the universe based on our unique capabilities.
Please understand that giving has nothing to do with how much money one has or doesn’t. It has to do with the attitude of giving what we can; a smile, a kind word, a prayer or anything that will bring out the good feelings in another being.
So how do we correct this imbalance? If one is a giver, they should begin making a conscious effort to become receivers as well. Of course the opposite is equally true, if one is a receiver than the practice of giving should be implemented. In this way we effect a change which will bring about the necessary balance to allow us to maximize our spiritual potential.
So in this season of giving, begin the preparation to become a balanced and fully complete person by allowing your spirituality to expand through manifesting both a giving and receiving nature. HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

TRUE FRIENDS

2008-12-17T19:45:00.000-08:00

ART FROM: http://www.knitemare.org/cats/friends-cats-large.jpg

Over the years I have lived in several states; always leaving good friends behind. Yet from each of those states, there is always one person, no matter how long in between calls, that I have kept contact with.
The reason that this comes to mind is because today I received a call from one of those friends and her timing was immaculate! She said she called to give me a hug. How could she have possibly known that today was the day I really needed one? This person has always been in tune to me. She’s always had the exact words I need to hear at the moment I needed to hear it. She’s remarkable that way and so are my other friends.
Now I’m not a person that keeps friends because I’m not emotionally needy. People desperately need to be needed, if only for a moment. Strangely enough the people who have been my long term friends aren’t emotionally needy either.
Good friends are truly hard to come by and this is why I make it a point to cherish and deeply appreciate those who are my friends. They are those special people who look past your façade, delve into your being and accept you as you are.
They are the ones who don’t try to manipulate you or get caught up in your madness when you’re coming unglued. They are the ones who don’t feel you owe them anything simply because you have a friendship or abuse that friendship in any fashion. All of my friends are positive, self directed people who have managed to somehow not been caught up in the erroneous views of that many have of friendships. This makes me the richest woman in the world.
The reason for this great wealth is that I have not one or two people of this ilk in my life, but many. At the end of this year, 2008, I am feeling the bounty of my life. As I move into the coming year I plan to let these people know more often how I feel about them and how much I appreciate them.
As we get older our focus changes and the treasures of our youth or not the treasures of our later years. Neither is less valid than the other but the profundity of the levels of appreciation developed in later years is not the shallow appreciation of youth. Perhaps this is because as we grow older we realize that we are no longer invincible or have an eternity to live our lives. This also is reason for choosing our friends more carefully.
So during this time of reflection, remember the good friends and show them how much we appreciate them, respect them and bring as much happiness into their lives as possible.

THE POINT OF FOCUS

2008-12-15T21:47:00.000-08:00

ART: http://www.abm-enterprises.net/fractals/bluenautiluswallpaper.html

So often we allow our focus to be external when the only place to bring about change is within us. We focus on others as we judge the acceptability of them and their behaviors. We allow ourselves to be shaken from our center as we become more and more involved in our environment. We are not aware of the power in our lives that attracts the things and people that are there.
We spend so much of our time trying to shape and manipulate our environment to suit us with the erroneous perception that we can actually change things in this way. In reference to persons, we can only supply information which will point them in the correct direction if they choose to use it. It is only when they desire to move in this direction that they decide to bring about a change. Rarely does anyone change because we desire for them to do so.
They may appear to change in order to manipulate us into giving them whatever it is they desire of us, but ultimately we all must determine to change our perceptions based on information we deem viable. Since this is a fact, we must additionally realize that the only way to change anything is to change our personal perceptions. In doing so everything around us changes as we become witness from a different perspective.
When something is going on that we dislike, do not approve of or which makes us uncomfortable, we must look within ourselves for the reason and bring about a change of perception which will alleviate our suffering because our personal discomfort is ours and totally based on our perceptions.
When we go inside and try to develop a clear understanding of why we are feeling the way we do, once we develop clarity we will begin to understand why we are affected and what needs to change within us. Ultimately our basic desire is to become happy in all circumstances. This discomfort we feel when we perceive the behavior of others that is different from our own is in no way their fault. They are not to blame for being who they are. Nor does the blame lie with us.
Everyone is as they are because it is their right to choose how they want to be in the world. Due to societal conditioning we believe that we have the right to tell others how to be and this is where our unhappiness comes from; in the erroneous belief that we can choose how others are suppose to be and live. Once we accept the truth that others have as much right to be as they choose as we do, than we will begin to perceive that we have no power to change them and learn to accept their rights equally as our own.
We must learn tolerance of others and their differences, for without this tolerance and acceptance we will find no peace. We should have no desire to suffer needlessly when the behavior that we witness is not detrimental to ourselves or the environment. When it is than we should determine how to be proactive rather than reacting to their behavior. In this way we are functioning from a place of centered realization as opposed to mindless reaction.
When we once again regain our point of internal focus we can than bring about the change in perception that will alleviate our suffering and place us in control of our emotions.

THE BIRTH OF ENLIGHTENMENT

2008-12-14T21:04:00.001-08:00

ART: Maya Devi and Buddha's Birth http://www.exoticindiaart.com

Awakening to our inner voices, we find the ultimate truth. That which we seek has always been there and permeates the universe in the manifestations of all things.

When I speak these words to myself, I feel the truth of them, yet in my mundane guise as a human, it is often difficult to hold on to this truth. I am, more often than not, distracted by the workings of my environment and often forget the unlimited power which resides within my life. I waste my time trying to stop what is happening in my external environment or trying to control its workings when the truth of the matter is that I have to bring about the change within myself in order for anything around me to change. It is my perceptions that determine the outcome of each and every thing.

How often I traverse this portion of my path as I wind upward on this spiral toward my enlightenment. The societal views which color my perception are strongly anchored in my life, often leaving me confused as I fight the battle between the subjective and objective realities. Perhaps herein lays my error.

I am always doing battle on every front of my life. I fight everyone and everything with the belief that I can in someway control things from an external oriented perspective. Repetitively I make this error as I struggle harder against the emotional ropes that bind me. I rage with the perceived offense of what is happening in my life as my ego keeps a picture of a separate self before me.

I am not separate; no thing is. In the struggle to control the external forces I only tangle myself tighter in the web of my perceived visions, never bringing about any change until I am exhausted. Once I’ve reached this pentacle of discomfort, than and only than do I remember this truth that has been quietly waiting in the background of my being until I am quiet enough to hear. The quiet only comes after my throat is ragged with screaming and my mind has run out of processes to execute in rescuing me from my hell.

My desire to learn is strong and this is my saving grace. The universe hears my plea for knowledge and sends me the teacher I need in the moment in order that I might grasp the lesson which is being provided for that much needed change in perception. I am elated and so profoundly appreciative of all my teachers. They have guided me every step of the way on my journey, pointing me in the direction to that which will release me from my sufferings.
I am reborn into enlightenment over and over again as I firmly grasp what I am to learn; only to have it disappear as a wisp of smoke on a gentle breeze. For in the birth of all things is the seed of the death of those same things. As I have arisen, so I shall fall. But with this knowledge comes clarity that all things undergo this cycle. There is nothing to fear for the time shall come again when I am birthed into enlightenment.

MORE KNOWLEDGE

2008-12-14T05:14:00.001-08:00

I couldn’t sleep because I was feeling some discomfort with my health last night. I know it’s because I’ve been under a great deal of stress this year. I’m sure many of you have seen the stress list that you might have been asked to fill out to determine what stressors you might have been exposed to in the past year. When I think of my stressors I find the list is lengthy.

I didn’t just sit around and stress myself further because I couldn’t sleep. Instead I went to YOUTUBE and looked around for a meditation video I had seen that was done by Deepak Chopra. I couldn’t find it so instead I found other of his videos; a series called the 7 Laws of Yoga.

Now I’m not one to believe in coincidence and since I’d been asking myself many questions about repetitive behavior that I hadn’t been capable of changing, I realized that this series of videos had the answers that I had been seeking to adjust many of my behavior patterns. The thing about change is that we have to first and foremost be uncomfortable with where we are in a given instance. We than have to determine why we feel this discomfort and have a desire to seek what we need in order to manifest different responses. Often, however, we don’t have a clue about how to act in a different way so that we might get different results.

Nature or nurturing is a paradox that is not easily resolved when we take stock of who we are and why we are the way we are. I’ve had the ability to see both of my parents’ behavior manifested in myself in these past few years. I see myself at times exacting the same fears and confusions that led them to behave as they did. It is strange how we all seem to eventually become our parents. The thing of it is that we haven’t learned to do things differently; therefore we end up doing the same things our parents did, even though it might have been behavior that we abhorred.

Granted, we each have our own temperaments and this is what creates the difference in our levels of comfort or discomfort with our personal behaviors. We either accept ourselves or detest ourselves. Rarely do we recognize what to do about what we perceive as the problem with ourselves. Primarily, this is because we have learned to be a certain way and have no concept of how to be any different. Sadly, for the most part, we just continuously move around in our little cycle of being until we’re in a rut up to our eyebrows. The rest of us manifest a strong desire to learn to be different and the universe gives us the answers we seek.

Dr. Chopra’s videos covered these seven aspects or laws of yoga as follows:

The Law of Pure Potentiality – The realization that we have no limits.

How difficult this concept is in a society that sets limitations by so many mundane rules. So many people believe that we have to be of a certain race, creed, color or economic status to manifest our desires. We constantly negate our inherent power to live the lives we want, have the relationships we desire because we’ve been told so many times that this is the way it is as well as how those limitations apply to us. The realization from the depth of our being that we have no such limitations is the key to manifesting, in Dr. Chopra’s words, “a life of peace, harmony, laughter and love.”

The Law of Giving and Receiving – The realization that this is a process of circulation and to learn to equate giving with receiving so as to keep the process in movement by opening ourselves to receive the abundance of the universe and experiencing gratitude.

I found this second to be very pertinent to my life. I’m a giver, yet, I more often than not refuse to allow others to give to me. I don’t receive very well. I’ve been taught to be independent. I’ve found that independence works for me because I don’t have to place myself in the position of being beholding to anyone else. Of course I’ve learned that this is a delusion based on my erroneous concepts of a separate self. Everything in the universe is codependent upon everything else and is in no way separate from anything else.

I remember a friend asking me about how it felt to give. I spoke to her of all the positive feelings and joy that giving brought into my life. After I had completed my testimony she asked me, “Than how can you be so selfish as not to let others have those same feelings by giving to you?”

The Law of Karma – where Karma is used in a proactive way and equals action we recognize that we make choices and that those choices have consequences and we must make conscious choices while asking of ourselves will this choice increase the experiences of love and happiness.

We’ve often been taught only half of the concept of karma, that of getting payback for whatever we’ve done in the past. Here is a proactive perception of karma in which we make conscious choices that are positive and beneficial to ourselves and others. This proactive perception and use of karmic action gives us absolute control over our destiny. If you’re anything like me, I love being in the drivers seat.

The Law of Less Effort - The concept of effortless spontaneity which basically states that the less we do the more we accomplish.

Now this concept hit home for sure! I am one person who is totally obsessive about accomplishing my goals. If I have to sleep on the point of a needle to see my goal manifest, so be it. I work myself into frenzy and bulldoze over anyone and anything that gets in my way. I’ve had people who rely solely on me to get things done because of this characteristic and as they say, “give it to Tracey, she gets the job done!” The problem is that I end up wearing myself and everyone else to a frazzle in the process.

The Law of Intention and Desire – The process of envisioning with clarity of intention and knowledge of exactly what you want in material, personal achievement, relationships (love and belonging), creative expression and community (what you want to do for the world, and with the universe (god, etc.)
Dr. Chopra suggest that we write these desires down and envision ourselves there already as we see with absolute clarity exactly what we want.

The Law of Detachment – To realize that letting go is better than hanging on by detaching yourself from the outcome or results of the fulfillment of your desires.

When we think of detachment we see it as becoming stoic, but this is not what is meant here. Dr. Chopra’s analogy to the good gardener explains it precisely when we liken ourselves to the gardener and our desires to seeds. He states: “A good gardener plants seeds but he doesn’t dig them up everyday to see how much they’ve grown.”

We must also recognize that we are not the roles we play. We are a spirit playing different roles and the roles are not us. We must become witness of the roles we play.

My opinion is that as spiritual beings, we put on the garb of this life and play many roles in it. Parent, teacher, worker, philosopher and others to name a few, but ultimately, these are only roles.

The Law of Dharma – Where Dharma equates to the evolutionary impulse of the universe.

Here Dr. Chopra states that when we are doing what is unique to us, than we will have everything we desire. He says that each of us has one or more unique talent and that talent can be discovered by self observation. When we are doing the thing that we passionately pursue, with no concept of time when we are doing it, than we have discovered what our unique talent is. He says we should write these things down and find a way to use that talent to give.

I’ve only touched on a small amount of the knowledge garnered from Dr. Chopra’s videos. This was done purposely because when knowledge is offered, we each have a different perception and therefore gain different things as needed on an individual basis. Therefore, we should take the initiative to further delve into that knowledge from the source when at all possible. This time it is possible.

NEW BEGINNINGS

2008-12-06T11:43:00.000-08:00

ART BY: Marcella Muhammad
Yesterday I spoke of coming back from the flip side of me. Lest we forget, everything and its opposite are merely flip sides of the same coin. If we don’t like the way a thing is, than flip it to the other side. This is not always as easy as it sounds for the simple reason that we forget that everything in the universe manifest in tandem.

The polarity of the universe seems to be the one great truth of all things, that each has its opposite. If this scientifically proven theory is in fact a law, than it stands to reason that in order to change anything, we have to do the opposite of what we’ve always done in order to change it. But again, this is not an easy process as we always seem to think that by trying to force other things to change we’ll be able to manifest that which we desire. This is totally contradictory to all proven theories.

Essentially, the power to change the universe lives in each of us. The choice to do so lies in each of us. The difference is whether or not we chose to internalize this truth and manifest it or if we repetitively react in the same manner as we always have. Even when we know this truth, it is not always easy to use it in every moment and with every decision.

There is a Confucian proverb that states:

"A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step."
(Confucius, http://www.quotedb.com/quotes/1483)

This is reiterating the fact that no matter what we know or desire, if we don’t make an effort to do those things necessary to bring about that which we seek, than the journey that will ensue because of this action will never begin.

As indicated, all beginnings start at the beginning. No matter what choices we make we have to have a thought or desire, speak the words in our minds and take an action to begin. All these create the necessary energy that is needed to begin any new journey.
The first step of thought comes often, while the second step of speaking to the energy comes less often. It the third part of this process, action, which is where most of us falter as we don’t understand the power for change which we have. Our abilities are as unlimited as we believe they are. If we fear failure or success, believe in the limitations that we and others place upon ourselves, than we will accomplish nothing.

Our greatest successes are lost to procrastination. As moment after moment, day after day and year after year, we push our desires, our hopes and our dreams aside, it becomes harder to take that first step.

As another great sage states in one of his writings:

“Deep in the Snow Mountains lives a bird called the cold-suffering bird that, tortured by the numbing cold, cries that it will build a nest in the morning. Yet when day breaks, it sleeps away the hours in the warm light of the morning sun without building its nest. So it continues to cry vainly throughout its life.”
(The Major Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, Letter to Nikke, Page 1027 (http://www.sgilibrary.org/view.php?page=1027&m=1&q=the%20journey%20to%20kamakura)

When we are in the throes of the eight winds: prosperity, decline, disgrace, honor, praise, censure, suffering, and pleasure, our minds race, we are filled with ideas for many endeavors, make determinations to scale the highest mountains or swim the deepest seas in order to escalate our progress or refute negative forces, yet in a moment it is all forgotten. This is why it is vital to immediately take steps to attain our goals.

“The journey from Kamakura to Kyoto takes twelve days. If you travel for eleven but stop with only one day remaining, how can you admire the moon over the capital?”
(The Major Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, Letter to Nikke, Page 1027 http://www.sgilibrary.org/view.php?page=1027&m=1&q=the%20journey%20to%20kamakura)

A dream is but a dream unless we change it into a goal and forge a plan to accomplish that goal and bring our dreams to reality. Until we take that first step on the journey of manifesting our dreams concretely and follow through with every other step necessary to do so, we will be lost in disappointment and failure to take control of our lives. We must not relinquish our power by remaining deluded by our circumstances or indecision. We must create our new beginnings from moment to moment in our lives.

ART FROM: (http://www.itsablackthang.com/Marcella-Muhammad-art-work.html)

TAKING RESPONSIBILITY

2008-12-05T16:09:00.000-08:00

How easily we give over responsibility for our lives to others. We are quick to say they or you, yet rarely say I as the only person responsible for what ails us.

Most recently, after a long and few months of chaotic reaction to my experiences, I realized that something was unnatural when I found myself lambasting everyone about everything. The sane person in my head whispered above the roar, reminding me of who I really am and negated the behavior that showed me to be a helpless victim of my life experiences. I actually remembered that I have this abyss of power that I have used repetitively to live my life independently of the mobocratic environment that I am destined to live in. With my normal response of laughing at myself, I regained control of me and started using that I and me that are indicative of a control of my life.

I’m never sure how I come to this place, but I always seem to find myself there. When I fall off my throne of self awareness, I manage to become a creature as unfamiliar as any from another planet. The compassionate, caring, dominate force becomes a whining, self interested, threatening force which accomplishes very little. I become an obnoxious tyrant who tries to exact control over everyone and everything, to no avail.

What is especially strange is my inability to allow others to know what I need of them as opposed to censuring everyone’s behavior because of my personal feelings of inadequacy which manifest when I am off center.

While in a healthy state of mind I recognize that I am captain of my ship and that no one can take the helm unless I turn it over to them. When in an unhealthy state of mind, I am a galley slave rowing to the beat of a drum which drives me to perform against my will. This performance is just that, an act, a play at living my life and creating the destiny I desire.

The first cause is to determine in my own mind what it is I desire. The second is to think, say and do those things that will aid in the fulfillment of those desires. When I relinquish control of myself to the emotional rampages that I traverse, I am not doing these things. I am not making determinations nor acting in my best interest. When I reassert the correct perspective, than and only then am I taking 100% responsibility for everything in my life.

If I am seeing things which I don’t want in my life, than I become aware that I must make the choices to bring about a change. Once I make those internal alterations, than and only than do I see the manifestation of that which I desire.

This lesson has been repeated many times within my life and apparently it is a hard one to completely assimilate; therefore, it will be repeated until I get it. I understand that the root cause of the perception that brings about this negative manifestation has been buried deeply within my psyche and that only through this journey will I be capable of bringing about an uprooting and replacing of this perception with a positive one.
Ultimately, each of the journeys that we must travel is about correcting those erroneous perceptions, about taking responsibility for our minds and destinies in order to become the enlightened being which lives within the core of us all.

In the words of Magdala Rameriz, Maya Priestess in her article Spirituality Can Not Be Taught:
It can only be experienced. As the mother has been showing, what we can do is to create the environment where people can grow and re-discover themselves in a powerful manner.

It is to point the direction where people can find their questions and answers, in the place where the cause and effect takes place at the same time.

For human beings need to reach themselves.

The inner worlds that resides in the virtual reality is being unfolded and uncovered for the many, for the new perception has been achieve in the authentic humans.

The feminine, the virtual reality, is unfolding as a lotus flower! All over the world, she has become a bridge of many worlds.

People are ready to reach themselves. People understand their experiences in the spirit, as well as a new perspective of spirituality has been born.

A perception that is guiding the people to recognize them as they have always been, the sons and daughters of the Great Spirit, for unity cannot be imposed; it can only be embraced in the heart of all humans, in the heart of all creation.

There is so much to uncover, so much to embrace, so much to love! We have work to do!

ART FROM: (http://www.manataka.org/Butterfly%20Painting.jpg)

TIME TO ROCK

2008-12-04T20:35:00.001-08:00

WOW! How time seems to get away from us all. I’ve moved into the new house, gained custody of my two boys and made it through the Thanksgiving Holidays. Now I’m enrolling in school again to get my teaching credentials. I’m really looking forward to 2009!

I never make New Years Resolutions. Instead, I thank the Universe in all its great wonders and determine to be successful in everything I undertake in the upcoming year. I must say, this year I’ve surpassed myself as I have accomplished every one of my goals. 2008 has been a year for family. I’ve devoted my entire year to gathering the lost amongst us. This process will continue in 2009.

2009 is the Year of the Ox. This is my year baby and I am ready for it. This is my year. Well they’re all my year, but this one more so than most. Once every twelve years the stars align to perfection for me to accomplish my goals in an easier fashion. I really need this because the past twelve years have been uphill all the way. I coast down to the valley in 2009. I haven’t forgotten it all moves in cycles, so I plan to make the best of this one because I’ll be back on the uphill climb after it’s gone.

The cycle of live is a most phenomenal thing. We can glance over our shoulders and see where we have been, measure where we are by the things we’ve gone through, and grown and predict our capability of being successful in our future. We humans have a monopoly of this on this planet.

Unlike the other animals, we don’t make our lives easy. These brains of ours confuse us as they become tainted with the myriad of concepts that we learn about living life. We make our journey harder than it has to be sometimes because of this ability to conceptualize. I can’t tell you the amount of time I spend trying to keep me on track. The strange thing is, I get off track more often than I care to remember; hence the amount of time that’s passed since my last blog.

It seems that we get so caught up in what’s happening around us that we forget we have something to do. The greater the mission we have to fulfill, the more the distractions, or so it seems. Don’t ask me what my mission is, but I’ll tell you one thing, it must be stupendous given the things I have to deal with!

Strangely, while I’m running around blindly, screaming like a banshee and creating chaos at every turn, it never occurs to me that I’m the one with the problem. That problem is that I forget everything I’ve learned and fall into my experiences without a clue of what I have learned. Than of course, that positive little person that lives in my head with the giant demon, asks me why I’m being this way, when I know a better way of being. I’m not sure how this works, that I get off track, but I do. Than I laugh at myself and do what I know to do.

It’s interesting how that works, but it does. One thing I know for sure is that whatever and whomever I need to be in the moment is the exact person that I am in that moment. I have no doubt that although I don’t understand how it all works I am doing what I need to be doing, chaos and all. Needless to say, this creates a guilt-free, remorseless state of mind for me. That means that I have learned to no longer beat myself up if I am not some idealized version of myself. Boy, do I remember those days, depression city for sure!

Well once gain I’m back on track and hope you get to enjoy my cerebral meandering. Until next time, be easy, be you.

ART FROM: http://nexus404.com/Blog/2007/07/25/customisable-multi-time-zone-analogue-clocks/

DIABETES: The Silent Killer

2008-11-13T07:54:00.000-08:00

There are more than 86 million Americans with diabetes or pre-diabetes, according to the American Diabetes Association, and at least 25% of the 23.6 who have diabetes haven’t been diagnosed yet. I’m one who was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes approximately four years ago.

There are four types of diabetes: Type 1 in which the body fails to produce insulin at all. Type 2 in which the body fails to use insulin properly and/or enough insulin is not produced. Gestation diabetes occurs in pregnant women and pre-diabetes in which the person’s glucose levels are higher than normal. I am a type 2 diabetic and today I wish to speak about my experience and my battle with this malfunction.
I call my particular ailments malfunctions because that’s what they are, not illnesses at all, but malfunctions of the bodies system of checks and balances. Some of these malfunctions, I believe can be rectified or balanced in such a way in which we can prevent them from becoming debilitating.

In the case of diabetes, failure to regulate this malfunction will ultimately cause deterioration of a number of the bodies systems. The blood is loaded with high levels of glucose which in turn produces an imbalanced supply of glucose to all of the systems of the body, including the nerves, heart and kidneys. These high levels of glucose create an unhealthy environment for the systems of the body to balance themselves and therefore major damage takes place which can result in heart failure, stroke, high blood pressure, death of the nerves in many parts of the body, including the eyes and kidney failure.

If you likened your body to a car with all of it’s systems that run on oil, for instance, it would be the same as putting water in the oil. If there is water in the oil there is improper lubrication so that the parts of the automotive system become corroded and breakdown in a relative short period of time. This in effect is what happens to the body when the glucose levels remain high and our parts break down in a relatively short period of time.

Or if you liken the body to a houseplant, we all know what happens when we over water them; the roots rot and the plant dies. Although the plant needs water, when it has too much, the water develops an adverse effect. This is what happens to the body when we have too much of what we can assimilate, even though the glucose is a dire necessity to sustain life in its regulated form.

In a normally functioning body, insulin acts as an escort to change the glucose into a usable form and take the overrun of glucose out of the body so that homeostasis, balance is maintained. When there is not enough insulin, the glucose just hangs around unused and wrecks havoc upon our bodily systems. This being the case, once we find out that we are diabetics we have to study how our food effects our body and make the necessary changes to control and finally to rid ourselves of the immediate problem.

The thing about diabetes is this; we seem to have to have a genetic predisposition for it to happen. There is loads of information at the American Diabetes Association website (http://www.diabetes.org/about-diabetes.jsp ) to assist in this process.
Unlike my mother, her paternal family and my husband, I was warned by my predecessors of the possibility of developing diabetes, yet I did nothing to prevent it. Fortunately, I developed this malfunction at a time when the technology and information was readily available.

Since I knew that my mother and her family all developed this malfunction of type 2 diabetes, I made it a point to have my doctor test me every few months in order to be on top of the situation. What I did not do was take preventive measures.
I was aware that since I did have the genetic possibility of developing type 2 diabetes that more than likely it would take place after I turned 40 years old, especially if I was obese. I became obese when I was 40 years old due to another malfunction, hypothyroidism. Basically that just means that my thyroid ceased to regulate many of my bodily functions in a balanced way. I managed to correct the thyroid problem, but failed to do what was necessary to reduce the 100lbs I had gained during this year that I fought to regulate the thyroid. I’ll save the details of this for another blog.

I continued to request that my doctor do quarterly checks of my glucose levels and continued to just be a watcher, never once acting proactive on my behalf. When my 56th birthday arrived, before the month of October was over, I was diabetic.
My doctor wanted me to take metformin (glucophage) medication right away, but I’m bullheaded and resisted, believing that I could control it without the medication. The sad thing is that if I had been more proactive, I probably would have been able to control it without medication. Fortunately my A1C’s never rose higher than 7.6, which is my highest reading throughout this entire 4 year period.
The A1C is a quarterly test that determines how your body is using glucose over a three month period. Although the daily test is self administered, this is a more accurate depiction of how your body is using glucose and the levels that are being maintained.

When I say proactive, what I mean is proper diet, exercise and stress reduction. When we’re not diabetic, we can eat what we want, as much as we want without concern about glucose levels. But once we are diagnosed as diabetic this is no longer possible. We must be aware and take charge of our bodies. If we rely fully on our doctors, nutritionist and medication, than we will lose this battle.
In my case, I did some of the things the doctor advised, everything except exercise. I had logical and valid reasons for not doing exercise, but that’s another story. One of the things that was necessary was attending a diabetes class and having the nutritionist who taught the class develop a diet plan for me. The class was informative and waylaid some of my fears. The nutritionist suggestions for my diet was a completely different story.

Due to my height, weight and age factors, I was told I needed 90 grams of carbohydrates per meal and increase the number of meals daily to control my diabetes. This did not work for me. I couldn’t get my blood glucose levels below 250 on this diet. I decided to figure it out for myself.
I began doing my blood sugar test before and 2 hours after eating as I was informed that it takes two hours for the body to fully digest a meal. I varied my diet over all the types of food I enjoy eating during this period so that I might understand how each food affected my body. In this way I determined that I needed 30-40 grams of carbs for each of my six daily meals. That’s one meal every three hours. I’ve continued to eat this way for the past four years.

The first thing I noticed was an increase in energy levels. I must admit, my weight fluctuates depending on my activity level because I still don’t have a planned exercise program. I managed to get my A1C’s down to 5.2 after taking metformin for 3 years. I managed to lose 38 lbs and now I take no medication at all.
As far as my diet goes, I eat what I want when I want, but in moderation. I don’t always keep my carbs below 40g per meal, but if I mess up on one meal, I cut back on the next. This allows me to binge without guilt. Okay, so I’m not perfect, but who of us is.

Diabetes has been especially difficult for me because I am a sensualist. The taste, appearance, smell and texture of my food are heaven to me. I researched and found that I can eat just about anything I desire, as long as I keep my carbs low and do something other than sitting around all day. One of the things that I learned is that exercise stimulates the pancreas to make more insulin thereby creating an environment that is capable of keeping the body’s glucose levels balanced. Another thing about exercise is that it builds muscle and muscle needs more energy, therefore, muscles use more glucose.

The combination of good diet and nutrition, exercise and stress reduction is the key to correcting the malfunction of diabetes. Here’s to a long and healthy life.

THE LOST ART OF ART

2008-10-27T12:09:00.000-07:00

ART FROM: WWW.ART.COM The Artist's Garden at Giverny, c.1900, Claude Monet

There was a time when everywhere I looked I was surrounded by the sensual beauty of one art form or another. There were museums, art galleries, statues in parks and the like.
Buildings were constructed to be aesthetically pleasing and surrounded by beautiful landscaping as were the parks. Everything cried out to express its’ exorbitant beauty and my soul was sated by it all.

Now, times have changed. The brick, wood and glass monstrosities that we live and work in rob my soul of any satisfaction. Everything has become generic in shape, form and energy. Every vehicle looks the same as every other vehicle. The shape and context of everything is a muddled grey, bland and tasteless. Poets scream their rage, their hunger for sex and have forgotten about love. Canvass is coated with layers of excrement in the name of art: And it all stinks!

Perhaps I’m growing old and hungering for the pleasures of my youth. Perhaps the change of time has not been kind to any of us. Whatever the reason, it seems that all that was good and beautiful in the world is as asleep as the trees losing their leaves around me in preparation for fall. I pray, that like the trees, the lost art of art will revive again soon and quench my starving soul.

FOR THE LOVE OF MONEY

2008-10-20T09:37:00.000-07:00

I was out shopping with one of my friends a while ago and as we were in the checkout line we struck up a conversation with the cashier. She was a young woman in her early 20’s who stated that she was a student. When asked her major, she replied teacher. This sent my friend off on a diatribe referencing the lack of lucrative income that came along with teaching.

The friend proceeded to tell the young woman what career she needed, that only careers of high salaries were worthy because everything ultimately was about getting the money. I, on the other hand, while impossibly trying to get a word in edgewise, was trying to tell her to ignore my friend and follow her own drummer.

In the meantime, my friend is still going on about how much her daughters make and in which careers and that it was all about the money. She reiterated that this is what she taught her children and what it was all about.

I’m stating that it’s about happiness; which the gentlemen in line behind us nodded in agreement with. I continued to tell her that although money was important for what it was important for, it had nothing to do with the level of happiness that she would arrive at in her life. My friend is still trying to override me in volume and rapid fire speech patterns as she tries to influence the young woman.

Finally, the young woman said that she had several degrees, one in pharmacy and this one in teaching and that teaching was her love. My response was bingo that is the key to your happiness doing something you love to do!

It never fails to amaze me how many people are hung up on the acquisition of monetary gain, without thinking of their happiness first and foremost. Or if they are thinking of their happiness in relationship to money, it is because they think the acquisition of money is the only way to be happy.

Now this friend of mine is in poor health, in the process of a second or third divorce, smokes two packs of cigarettes a day because she’s so stressed all the time, hates being alone and is therefore dependent upon others (including 2 televisions on full blast in her house at all times) and several other things that are signs of sources of unhappiness in her life. She has money, home, successful children (who are also stressed beyond endurance and at least one is border line to divorce) and is always trying to get as much as she can for nothing so that she might hold on to what she has.

I’m not trying to badmouth my friend, only showing that her philosophy regarding economic security, while not a fallacy, is still not giving her the happiness or personal satisfaction she deserves. With my minimal understanding of life, it’s my assumption that it is because she’s looking for happiness in external places and therefore hasn’t learned to appreciate the internal causes that determine if she is happy or not.

So many persons chase their economic and other sorts of dreams believing that their success in reaching these goals is going to determine their level of happiness. I’m sure you readers have enough experiences to the contrary to know that what I speak of is truth.
Money, other persons or fulfillment of dreams and goals do not guarantee your happiness. The only way that I have learned to be absolutely happy is through an appreciation of everything, negative and positive and in this way turning everything into a cause for your absolute happiness as opposed to your subjective one that comes and goes given the state of your affairs.

As long as we base our lives on things outside of ourselves, our happiness will be dependent upon them. Our joy will rise and fall with each accomplishment or lack of accomplishment and be absolutely dependent upon those fluxes.

When we base our lives on a firm and solid foundation of self belief, self worth, compassion for ourselves and placing everyone and everything into a proper perspective others a perception that turn anything into a source of benefit, than and only than can we be truly happy.

Many say money is the root of all evil, which I beg to differ. Money is a bartering tool to have the things we need. If we hold money itself in esteem, than we become slaves to a tool which can only be of value when it is used to care for ourselves and others.
ARTWORK: "THE AMAZING MUTANT WORK 4"

PARASITE TO PRODIGY

2008-10-19T15:43:00.000-07:00

From the moment of conception, many of us are in tune and in touch with the new life that grows within us. We begin dreaming for them; dreams of raising beautiful, positive, productive, self sufficient members of our society. But rarely are our dreams fully realized as we try to project our concepts and expectations of life into the minds of these tiny beings.

These little parasites (and many will get angry because I use this term in reference to the children we carried in our bodies) become a motivating force for all our endeavors. Any failures of our lost dreams or expectations of life we often try to relive in them, even at an unconscious level.

If the parenting we received was not as we deemed it should be, we try to make corrections when raising our own children. We try to do the best we can, with the tools we have learned throughout our lives. But let’s face it, these are little parasites; draining all of our energy as we struggle to get them from womb to adulthood, creating beings who might justify our existence.

They come into this world totally dependent upon us for everything, which for the most part we relish giving to them all. Yet, we have to train them to grow and develop independently of us and for the most part become islands within themselves; secure, self trusting and self reliant. The journey is a most difficult one to say the least.

To train these children to become less parasitic and more contributive in their existence is the most difficult of journeys. Yet, we know from the moment of their birth that this being has a most extraordinary talent or some abilities that will make them unique in the world. The question is how do we help them to manifest this great potential which we see in them? How do we turn our seed into a most radiant blossom of human pulchritude?

Given the right formula, each child can become a marvelous example of awe and wonder; a prodigy of some human form of expression. But lest we forget, prodigy can also be defined as something monstrous and abnormal and many times we see this manifest in adolescence.

The key, it seems, is to understand the nature of each child, what he or she is interested in or stimulated by. We have to determine if the stimulation is of a positive or negative source and guide them in the positive direction and set up systems to divert them from the negative one.

How do we manage this, along with all the other duties involved in raising and caring for our children? How do we determine which each needs? How do we become the parents who are capable of this sort of fine tuned awareness, alert to the subtle changes that take place from moment to moment? There are many questions and few answers, as every child is different while we remain the same.

This I believe is the key: Our ability to remain flexible and open to change as we rear these beings and help them to achieve their maximum potential as they traverse from a parasitic state to one of the most enlightened of prodigies.

WINTER ALWAYS TURNS TO SPRING

2008-09-19T12:25:00.000-07:00

Another day and another situation out of hand. They seem to pile up don’t they? It seems as if every day brings some new and trying situation that leads to our becoming overwhelmed. Most of us handle it, one way or another. Than there are the outliers, the ones that nothing seems to bother or the opposite, those that go postal.

“What’s the difference amongst us,” you might ask, “that we are at such odds when it comes to dealing with the bombardment of situations that we must undergo as?” I think the answer is the same as always, perception. You’ll notice that in almost everything written in the blogs, the recurring theme is perception. Ultimately, we will all understand totally and completely, that it is our perception that determines the conditions of our lives and environments.

In the case of our daily functions, nothing grandiose or lofty, just those things which happen from getting up in the morning to going to bed at night which all of us must deal with, our perception determines if we are having a smiley face day, a woo-sa day, or a day spent in a war zone. While some of us allude to the silver linings of the clouds others of us check our ammunition supplies. Why this difference? Again, the answer is perception.

Many of us are blamers. No matter what happens, it is someone else’s fault and we had nothing whatsoever to do with the circumstances that were created and ensued thereafter in the manifestation of the thing that we are facing. Others are excuse makers who have an excuse for everything under the sun and explain why this happened and accept that there is nothing they or we can do about it. Of course there are also those who accept responsibility yet do so in a condescending manner that leaves them in victim status as oppose to a person of power.

Of course there are also those who rage, no matter what the situation, they respond with equal fervor and passion as though all displeasing things are equally monumental in their assessment. Furthermore, they are under the illusion that their ranting might actually change a situation for the better. These ragers are usually bullies who are trying to use their power and passion to intimidate others into whatever it is they desire.

All in all, these people have one thing in common, their perceptions of their life experiences. How might we aid them in a change of perception? Through sharing our similar experiences with them and how we gained what we have through our change in perception. Of course this may take time because all we are doing is giving them information which they must assimilate, test and decide to use of their own free will; and of course their time to blossom is not ours.

There is another proverb that reads: Apple, peach, pear and damson, all bloom in its own time. In a like way, human beings also bear the fruit of themselves in their own season. This is a difficult concept for many of us to accept. Many of us cannot fathom things happening any other way than in the time we allot for it to happen. Mostly our response wants what we want when we want it and not a second later. It doesn’t matter if we are applying this principle to sentient or insentient beings.

This is why we’ve had the multitude of scientific and technological break throughs, we refuse to accept that things must happen the way they must. As I’ve often said before, everything has its negative and positive aspect. For the most part, as this applies to humans, we often make demands in a time frame that most can’t adhere to without developing some form of psychological breakdown; no matter how minute.

Where am I going with all of this? Well it’s actually about some other people and child rearing issues I am having. The blogs are about lessons learned and learning. They are about the pursuit of a change in perception. I am having problems because I need a change in perception.

Things have been piling up here, there and everywhere, the way issues, situations, obstacles and problems are wont to do. From experience, I’ve learned that when this happens, the problems aren’t with everyone and everything else, the problem lies in me. There is just something I am not getting. Of course when I’m in it up to my eyeballs it’s difficult to come to this realization as I continuously fight things with a tennis racket. Playing tennis with the universe only tires you out, this I guarantee!

Than a moment of enlightenment: I had allowed my self to be distracted, once again, by external affairs. I was blaming, making excuses, complaining and all of the other things I do once everything becomes externalized in my perception. I decided, determined in that moment that I would once again take control of my life and that was that. The positive results started coming immediately.

I stopped blaming the stress for my smoking and let it go. I stopped blaming the kid for my tirades and let them go and brought responsibility for my actions back to me. I stopped blaming and accusing others of what they were doing and rather than focusing on them, I brought the focus back to where it belonged, on me!

Rather than screaming I’m sick of this person, that problem or the other situation, I began to think, “What do I want? What results do I seek? What goals do I have?” and “Would the universe be kind enough to direct me to all of the above and more?” The first great thing that happened was my stress levels dropped to almost normal. The second thing was that the things that I had been struggling to make happen for the past couple of months started to manifest without further effort from me. The third thing that happened, all hell broke loose in response as I was bombarded with more stuff to resolve and learn from.

Fortunately, I realized that this last was more of the previous pattern to determine if I was getting it and how well I understood. I stayed focused. I am focused; I have it now, until the next time the pendulum swings in the other directions.

The thing of it is, through the vast storms in my life that pelt me with the ferocity of Hurricanes Gustav and Ike, I still stand, I got the lesson, life goes on and never stops and winter always turns to spring.

Art from:(http://www.trainingreference.co.uk/free_pictures/gallery_8/snow_6.htm)

THE MONSTER YOU DON’T MESS WITH!!!!

2008-09-18T12:11:00.000-07:00

Inside of me lives a being, a demon, a monster! She came into being for the sole reason of protecting me. In order for her manifestation to take place I guess she was always there as a seedling, a little egg, just in case she was needed.

I grew up being constantly abused, mostly through the mere lack of compassion and wisdom for others. The majority of the time, the hurt was not intentional, it was ignorance. At other times, coming from peers, it was intentional. However, the seed for pain and suffering was deeply embedded in my psyche as I am hypersensitive to all that goes on in my environment whether it is directed toward me or not. I suffer because the world suffers. But this suffering has morphed into rage!

As a child I was very tall, so tall as a matter of fact, my mother had to carry my birth certificate with her in order to prove that I was young enough to ride the bus free or receive other benefits of my tender age. This height proved to be the cause of much pain in my life as I was ridiculed for it, not dated because of it, and always told to move to the rear of every gathering out of consideration for the shorter persons. Even Halloween was disastrous as house after house I would be told to move to the rear and let the younger children help themselves first. They had no clue that chronologically and emotionally, I was one of the younger children!

In my youth, I would go into deep sadness that was fraught with days of tears and immense pain. The things that caused me pain ranged from personal to worldly, or as big as my world was back then. With all the new technology now the worldly sufferings are really big. I clearly remember someone telling me that because I suffered so much, god would take me away from here. I think now if a god had been so merciful, he would not have made me as I am but since my beliefs are so different now it’s a moot point.

In the past, this beast of me usually only manifested in defense of others and only rarely. As a child she came into being when my brothers, pets or friends were bullied, but never in defense of me. I knew my power even as a child and feared unleashing it willfully in defense of my self. I had this great fear of harming others, so I never defended myself. This feeling continued for more than half of my life as my desire not to harm others stayed strong in my heart.
I went through the usual rigmarole of family telling me to stand up for myself and failing to do so was dealt corporal punishment. Basically this led to my being beaten up by the kids that I allowed to bully me and by my parents as well. Still I refused for fear of hurting others. I also had to endure psychological therapy and being told that I was depressed, had low self esteem, didn’t love myself and the like. I later found this was all a bunch of malarkey as my knowledge of self and life grew.

In my late 20’s I found a life philosophy that worked for me and came to understand that, 1) all persons have the same potential as all others and that the only difference is the choice of the moment. 2) That I have no control over anyone’s life except my own, not even my children’s and especially not my parents’. 3) That I was okay and who I need to be in any given moment. 4) Lastly, that I in fact did love myself but that I did not manifest the same compassion for my own life as I did for others. This last gave full birth to the monster.

With the realization that I was lacking in compassion for myself, I immediately began to rectify this slight. I made up my mind that I would tell people verbally when they were hurting me and ask them to stop and not do it anymore. The first event following this decision was disastrous! I’ve related the event before, but will do so again for those who are unaware.
I was attending truck driving school in Northern California. We had classes that rotated around the day in three different shifts to immolate the various driving conditions that we might have to work under. We even went to Tahoe, California when it was snowing.

One evening while the night shift we were doing our mandatory five fluid checks and inspection of our vehicle when one of the male students shined his flashlight into my eyes. I am very light sensitive so this caused sharp pains in my eyes. I explained to him that my eyes were very sensitive and that he please not do this again because it was painful. His response was to immediately shine the light in my eyes again at closer range. I slapped him!

I was appalled at my response and apologized profusely, but unaware, as we often are with psychological changes, the demon had been released. Little by little the way I walked in the world changed. My power was felt greatly and each time I came to battle, I won. I am magnificent! But the battles don’t stop, nor does the beast stop growing and before you know it, it’s you against the world and all are scheduled to have their heads lopped off! This is my life.

In today’s world, the cashier at the store ranks right up there with the worst possible villains in the world. If they do anything that I deem stupid, a verbal assault ensues with no care or concern of the damage I may cause. This is what happens when abuse people, be it out of ignorance or willfulness. The gentle become the monsters, the weak become the psychotic and abuse is the gift that keeps on giving.

Fortunately, in my case, the pendulum is in its stasis preparing for its swing into the opposite direction and I am now aware that the beast is dominant in my psyche. This awareness has been the catalyst to reflect as the gentle person of me cries for balance. We do not wish the death of the demon; we wish her appropriate assimilation into the whole person that I am. Remember, as I’ve stated numerous times before, everything has both negative and positive aspects.

With all this in mind, the point being, that we must be careful of the bricks we lay in each others hearts. These bricks eventually go into a giant wall from which the keeper of the bricks finds most difficult to escape, if at all and the layer of the bricks finds that they can no longer reach that person behind the wall. This great wall keeps the person and the rest of the world estranged from each other and therefore the person walled in loses his/her compassion in their effort to protect themselves, or worse case scenario, attack the presumed perpetrators or their proxies whom laid the bricks to start with.

One tiny unintended action or word can be a step in someone’s resurrection or demise. It is up to us to determine which roll we choose play.

A CHANGE OF SEASONS

2008-09-15T06:29:00.000-07:00

A beautiful fall morning, filled with the air of expectation, I awaken to what the season is truly all about. Death!

When we look at the beauty of the dying fall leaves on hardwood trees, we don’t think of it as death, we only relish the beauty that we behold. But in truth fall is about death, promise and the hope of new beginnings.

When I was a truck driver, I used to love being in Vermont this time of year. People from all over the world come to Vermont throughout the later part of September and October to see the brilliant coloring of the trees as they don their garb of brilliant oranges, reds and yellows. As the trees prepare for a wintry death, they put on a performance that besieges the mind with an abundance of emotional responses.

We gaze in awe at this phenomenon and gasp in wonder at its dying gesture of promise. This promise exhibited in giving us their most magnificent beauty, places in our mind the memory of all that has been and that which is to come. Summer, with it’s shining greenery and decline in energy of the month of August when the Sun beaten us into lazy repose has ended in turbulent storms from warmer places and winter is waiting in the wings, all playing second fiddle to the finale presented in Fall.

It is as though Mother Nature is warning us of the upcoming hardships that winter places upon us; signaling us to prepare for the disappearance of her gracious care in the upcoming season where she becomes harsh and cruel. If we watch her signals, we are capable of preparing for all that is to come.

In a like way when our lives cycle we are given ample warning. We need to be as alert and aware on a daily basis as we are in our watch and participation of and in the seasons. I cannot count the number of times that after the fact I’ve thought about a situation and realized that the warnings were prevalent in my environment, yet I had failed to see them and was surprised when an event took place.
Perhaps it was my poor understanding of things, or merely the fact that I was not tuned into the moment at the time that the warnings came. Whatever the reason, in hindsight, I realized what I had seen and realized I would not have been so unprepared had I been paying attention.

Everything goes through the cycles of spring, summer, winter and fall. Every single moment in our lives are governed by the laws of birth, growth, decline and cessation. Yet for some reason, we hope in vain that everything that is pleasing will stay the same and believe that everything that is not pleasing will never change. In our macro perception we can see the obvious in the trees and seasons, other living beings being born, growing, becoming old and lives ceasing. Yet, we fail to apply those same rules to all other aspects of our existence.

If we look carefully at every circumstance of our lives, we would realize that this rule applies. We get jobs or businesses, watch them grow and decline. We develop relationships and watch them grow and decline as well. Our problems and our rewards come and go in the same manner. Nothing is stagnant on this journey.

In broadening our perspective of creation, growth, decline and cessation to include all things, we begin to understand that this law applies to all things and in the process, increase our level of happiness as we realize more and more that we can hold on to nothing; we can make nothing stay the same. It gives us the power to appreciate everything in the moment that we have it as we realize that it will not be with us forever.

Of course many of us will become saddened by this concept, with the realization that nothing we care about will be with us for long; even sadness only last for a while as it to is governed by this principle. The more we hold onto a thing, the harder to let go of it.

Once we realize that in truth, nothing belongs to us, nothing is ours to keep, than our greed might diminish and we might develop more compassion and appreciation for those things of good, beauty and virtue over the superficial accruements we have chosen to hoard in our need to posses. Perhaps a change in the mind of the multitude will elicit a change in the seasons for all humankind.

THE RACE TO ACCOMPLISH GOALS

2008-09-10T12:25:00.000-07:00

ART FROM: Grecian Urn (Greek foot race) (http://www.biblepicturegallery.com/)
I have always been a goal oriented person. I have, when I put my mind to it, always accomplished my goals; no matter the obstacles in the form of internal or external hindrances or circumstances. My stubbornness, which I have labeled single minded determination, has held me in good stead throughout all my accomplishments. Yet, recently, I found myself floundering. I was loss, confused and couldn’t figure out what the problem was. This lack of information created a constant chaos in one form or another in my life; until yesterday.

I had gone to an agency to seek help for someone else. What I found was the help I needed; information which was necessary for my change of perception. It’s strange how that always seems to work out that way. More often than not when we feel there is a problem with someone else, usually we are the one with the problem.

The thing of it is that I had focused so hard on accomplishing my goal, than once the positive results manifested; I had no plan of what to do next! The goal was such a tough one and I had paid such a high personal price to accomplish it, that I had the expectation that I would be rewarded with perfection. You know the mind set, “Since I did all this, the world will bow down, suck up and give me peace and quiet while I rejuvenate.” Or some like mind speak.

Well this presumption, although unconscious, let to one chaotic experience after another until I was gasping for breath and ready to lay down and never get up again. Thanks to the sincerity within regarding the accomplishment and the desire to do my best at all cost plus that single minded determination thing that I have going, I was forced to seek additional assistance and found the answer I was looking to find.

When I say looking to find, I don’t mean anything that we’ve set our mind to, but that thing in us that wants resolution, no matter what. Finding this information and what to do with it are entirely two different things. But I digress, allow me to return to my primary point.

Often when we have humongous goals that take a great deal to accomplish, we involve ourselves so deeply that we forget, there is another day following the day of attaining our goal. Now I’ve never been a plan B person because my belief is that if you have a plan B than you have at least one iota of doubt that you will not accomplish your goal so had better prepare for an alternative.

At this moment my position and perception of plan B has changed. I no longer think of it as an alternative plan, but a plan of what to do with the accomplished goal. In this way, once the primary goal is accomplished there is some vision of what you will do with that accomplishment. Therefore, there is no surprise about the consequences of accomplishing the goal and there is no false expectation of peace and order.

One would think that I have been in the world long enough to totally understand that there is no rest, there is no peace, there is only more of the same to a more or lesser degree. Yet I still have this fantasy of peace and order and become furious when it is not realized. The flaw is not in the environment, but in myself. It’s up to me to figure out how to garner the energy I need at all times from the universe to continue in the uphill struggle that we call life.

This change of perception is so total at the present moment that I actually feel well rested and ready to continue the momentum! So, into battle! We now attack plan B! And don’t forget, there will always be another Plan B behind this one!

BEHIND OUR MASK

2008-09-09T01:41:00.000-07:00

ART: TIGRESS BY: Jim Warren

We all live behind a façade of our own making; one that protects our most secret, vulnerable self from the world. Sometimes I wonder what kind of world is it that we find a need to protect ourselves. But, that answer is self evident given my personal experiences.

The sad part about it is that in protecting ourselves so ferociously, we become all that we found the need to protect ourselves from to start with. A sad conclusion, I think, when we manage to become that which we dislike most.

I think most of us built our mask due to the rejection and the pain we suffered because of that rejection. We only wanted love and acceptance and perhaps received ridicule, negligence and other negative results when we reached out for the love and understanding we, as human beings, need. Yet, the kind, gentle and compassionate parts of our selves died in a prison of our making.

What we once needed so desperately, has now become a thing we no longer need as we build our prison of denial, work, drugs or whatever other form of escape we choose. We convince ourselves that we no longer need it and drive ourselves to distraction, literally, so that we no longer recognize those needs. When the subject is approached, we still believe ourselves to be that kind, gentle and compassionate person of the past; never once realizing that this person is only a figment of our imagination.

We may not deliberately set out to bring harm to others, but we now place our selves in the position of being incapable of accepting the warmth of other beings nor do we continue to reach out for it.

I’ve seen this happen in many abused children; those who have had emotionally unavailable caregivers in their lives and did not learn how to give or receive affection. Ofttimes this is in no way intentional on the part of the parents, they have not learned from their parents or are so bogged down in assembling the necessities of life that their focus is not on the emotional development of the child/children. After all parenting is a learned skill, not a natural one.

If we did not have excellent parents, if we do not acquire the skills to become excellent parents, than it is not possible for us to become excellent parents. This being the case, it appears that fewer and fewer of our children are becoming excellent parents and regenerating the same errors that created them in the first place.

I know many of us disliked some of our parents parenting skills and determined that we would not be the same kinds of parents if and when we had children. This has been evident in the laws created by my generation in particular as there is more and more governmental interference in family life. Yet, now it is these same laws that prevent parents from parenting effectively. This has snowballed to the point that many of our children are ending up in state group homes and suffering greater psychological damage than they might have if allowed to stay in the home.

The mask which we hide behind is causing an untold number of errors to be created in our fear of what might happen if we don’t exact certain actions from others. It is this that is the source of so many assumptions, presumptions, arrogant and erroneous actions being put forth in our society, community and homes. I think it’s time to take off the mask. Don’t you?

THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF LIFE: The Spirit

2008-09-08T15:35:00.001-07:00

ART: Stairway to Heaven by Jim Warren

The spirit is the most difficult aspect of life to define. Some have no concept of and therefore do not believe that there is such a thing as spirit. None the less, it is my contention that there is such an entity at spirit that is both individual and conglomerate in its function.

I believe that the spirit is that part of our selves that is neither beginning nor ending and has always existed at all times in all places. I believe that we contribute to that entity by the things we think, say and do, as defined in many religions. I also believe in reincarnation and that this entity can only take and bring with it the energy we create in any life time.

The concept of spirit, in my perception is similar to an ocean (the conglomerate), and each wave of that ocean (the individual) manifest as the beings that it has chosen to become due entirely to the energy that it creates, collects and stores (karma) from one life time to another.

This being the case, the wave, the spirit or any of it’s other myriad names, is never disconnected from the ocean (conglomerate), but manifest as individual waves (spirit) as the conditions necessary for each wave (spirit) to manifest come into play. These influences to manifest are dependent first upon the fact that the energy exist; secondly, that the causes and conditions necessary to manifest are in place and thirdly; that the energy is actually effected by these causes and conditions.

If this premise be true, than any form of energy created not only affects the wave, but the ocean as well and in like manner, the ocean has an effect upon the wave. These entities are in no way separate nor are they the same, but have the extraordinary position of being separate and the same simultaneously. Therefore whatever one does, affects the other. In this there is no separation, although they can create energy separately, yet everything affects the other equally.

Keeping this in mind, there is nothing that we think, say or do that does not effect everything else in all of existence, past, present and future. This is why we, as a society are always recanting our efforts after periods of time. We do something with the intent of aiding society, of bettering our condition, but after a time find out that it was a negative thing to do after the necessary time has passed to show the effect of our choice.

In our delusion of separateness, we make tiny mistakes or accept tiny consequences in the desire for the greater good. Yet, like a tiny drop of water pounding away in the same spot over and over, we eventually erode that same society which we had thought our work for the greater good would aid. But let me move on to what we need as building blocks for the spirit.

Since the spirit is infinite and omnipotent, it comes into the world with everything it needs to complete its current mission. That mission primarily being twofold; for it and others. For itself, the spirit needs to manifest its maximum potential in each lifetime. For others, it needs to help them to complete their journey in manifesting their maximum potential. This being the case, the first thing the spirit needs is confidence in itself.

How does one gather confidence in self or spirit, first and foremost by being guided in such a way as to understand that they have both a source of knowledge beyond the obvious and the ability to acquire and use that knowledge at will.

Secondly, one must realize that although one can direct their own life, rarely can they direct the life of another and can only point them to the direction where they might acquire the same knowledge as themselves in order to fulfill their spiritual potential.

Therefore, my conclusion is that the building blocks of the spirit are knowledge of self and the confidence of that knowledge. Since there is nothing outside of one’s own life in knowing self, one knows others and in knowing self one also knows the universe. In this way we apply the laws of the universe to ourselves and the laws of self to everything else.

THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF LIFE: The Mind

2008-09-07T08:40:00.000-07:00

The mind, in my estimation, is that part of oneself that connects the physical with the spiritual. It’s the place where we assemble all we gather from our senses, develop some perception of that information and use it to enhance our spiritual development. I’m not sure anyone else sees the mind this way, but as I said, it’s my estimation.

When the mind is in disarray, the body does not function properly nor is the spirit at peace. The condition of the mind determines the health of both the body and spirit and must be guarded carefully. If we allow erroneous perceptions to take shape, not only is the mind damaged, but also the body and the spirit. It is up to us to carefully build perceptions that hold it all together in a positive manner.

So what are the building blocks of the mind? I think it is every single experience that we have, colored by the perceptions of those experiences and how they help or hurt our psyche. If we develop positive perceptions, we sustain a healthy mind. But, if we develop negative perceptions, than our minds aren’t so healthy. This is why the process of introspection is so important. If we delve into our minds and find that we have a lot of experiences from which we have developed pain, anger and suffering than our perspective is most likely a negative one. When we use that same information to propel us into positive places, then our minds are healthy ones. This is a most difficult skill to develop and takes place over a lifetime.

When we learn that ever phenomenon is neither positive nor negative, but takes on the color of our perceptions, than we begin to slowly understand the process. I’m finding that it is not one great big eureka moment, but a vacillation between those feelings as we become more adept at this particular skill. In one moment we might have the ability to see very clearly how to understand the situation. In another we may be off on an emotional tangent that takes us weeks, months or years to overcome. It is all a uniquely individual process that we have to hone our skills to master.

I think that one of the important building blocks of this process is to develop the ability to live in the moment. In this way we are not drudging up our past perceptions of a current situation. The saying that if it walks like a duck i it must be a duck is not always a truism. The perception of a duck may just as well be applied to a goose, swan or loon. This being the case we must always make sure that we have enough information to determine what we are seeing because our duck may be a figment of our imagination based on old and flawed experiences.

One such misconception might be explained in reference to feelings of jealousy toward or about one’s mate. If perchance we see that mate with someone, holding and caressing them in what might simply be a warm hug, it would be easy to jump to the conclusion that it is a lover. Yet, later, after having gained more information, we find that this person is the sibling, relative or friend that we had not previously met, we find ourselves feeling quite foolish about our jealousy. I’ve seen this happen many times amongst my friends.

What they don’t realize is that the problem is not with their mate, but with themselves. It’s their feelings of inadequacies that are the root cause of their jealous feelings. Again, he more information we gather about anything, the more we become aware that ultimately everything is about us as individuals. Therefore, the building blocks of the mind is the gathering and assimilation of knowledge. Think about it!

THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF LIFE: The Body

2008-09-06T08:05:00.000-07:00

Life is an ongoing process that needs the body, mind and spirit to be constantly supplied with building materials. Generations before we are born, our ancestors had to have specific materials available in order for us to have been conceived. Without the proper life supporting materials, we would not be the beings we are today.

The body needs proper nutrients to be at its best at all times. If we don’t get those nutrients our cells do not form properly; with the ability to complete their appropriate functions and perform strongly. We need resources from grains, vegetables, fruits, dairy (calcium laden foods), meat and beans (proteins and fatty foods) daily. The thing of it is, even if we eat all we need to daily, with the levels of toxins in our air, soil and water, we are also ingesting large numbers of toxins and are being constantly bombarded with negative radiations.

During the industrial revolution, with the ignorance of the damage being caused by the many toxins used to produce products, billions of gallons of chemicals of all kind were dumped into the water and buried in corrosive metal drums, while the plants pumped out by-products of coal burning. Add to this the numerous poisons used by farmers to produce our food, the worse being DDT, and the run off from the fields into the water systems of our planet, we have no truly safe and pure sources of nutrients for our bodies. With the coming of awareness of the damage we have been doing to our eco-system, we are now trying to make some corrects. Yet, at the same time we are creating situations that may be worse in the long run. The genetic engineering of our foods and seeds for food are one of the things that we do not know the consequences of in the future as well as the amounts of chemicals used in sustaining our food sources.

Already we are beginning to see the effects of over use of antibiotics in the mutation of the microbes that we have been combating in our germ warfare programs. It is suspected that the hormones used in producing meats for consumption may be a portion of the problem for the obesity in the United States. With all of this going on, how do we get the proper nutrients for our physical development? In my opinion the only thing that we can do is supply these necessary building blocks with the aid of natural vitamins and other supplements. Since we can’t rapidly undo the damage already created, it would seem that we need to build our cellular defenses against the things that we have done so that we might generate normal cellular growth.

We have to remember that like a million bricks used to build a house, our cells are the million bricks used to build our bodies. If these cellular bricks are damaged and broken with insufficient mortar, than we will not have strong bodies or sharp minds. Therefore, we need to give our bodies the bricks and mortar needed for growth and repair.

We need to realize that our bodies are vehicles which carry our spirit in this life time. We must become aware of what we need to do to sustain this vehicle so that it gives maximum performance over a long period of time. This education should begin in early childhood so that we are aware of what we should and should not do in order to sustain our personal vehicles. Though generally, everyone’s body has the same parts, they do not function in the same way. This is why we need to be aware of how our body functions and what has a negative or positive effect upon it.

With the vast amount of information currently at our disposal, this is not difficult to do, although, granted, it may be time consuming initially. But as we acquire knowledge and build on that knowledge, it becomes easier over time to do what is necessary for our bodies. With this in mind, let us all work to build the fountain of youth from within.

SEX

2008-09-03T18:03:00.000-07:00

I’ve been celibate for most of the past fifteen and a half years. My friends think I’m crazy as they are emotionally dependent enough to want to stay in relationships, regardless of whether it is good, bad or indifferent. I’m not saying that my situation is any easier or harder than their’s, its just the choice I made for my life.

After my last relationship all those years ago, I made the determination that I would never have another bad or unhappy relationship nor one in which my mate was emotionally unavailable. I’ve stubbornly adhered to this determination for all these years.

It’s no mistake that I have also developed the personality necessary to keep men at a distance or spend the early part of a potential relationship telling them about all my physical malfunctions, bad attitudes, what I will not do or tolerate in order to force them to realize that I’m not the one for them.

Back to the sex thing; everyone around me seems to think that sex is the only denomination that creates a good relationship. Sex, for me, is like salt to food. Food will supply the proper nutrients needed for my body but a little salt definitely enhances the flavor. In a like way, salt can enhance the relationship exponentially, if all other things are in proper perspective.

It seems that all the people I’ve talked with feel that sex is the necessary key to a good relationship. I’ve had some stupendous sexual partners in this lifetime, but they sure sucked when it came to almost every other aspect of the relationship.

On the other hand, it seemed like those dynamic sex partners were always in demand by everyone else I knew as well and my partners had no problem providing for as many of them as possible.

The thing I miss most about being in a relationship, is not the sex as most would think, but the touching, kissing and having my back washed and scratched. If the truth be told, sex doesn’t last long enough, take up enough hours of each day, to warrant the press it gets. If a person has no communication stills, no ability to sustain the relationship after the party’s over, than the true aspects of the relationship are sorely neglected.

When I think of my past relationships, it’s never the sex that comes to mind; it’s the person and how we were together in all the other aspects of the relationships. The remembered birthdays, the daily adventures, and the support that we gave each other are the primary focal points. These are the sturdy building blocks of a relationship. These are the wheels that make it turn.

Sex, well, as good as it is, it’s only the salt in the food of the relationship.

ANOTHER SCAM?

2008-09-02T14:42:00.000-07:00

Ok, I've been invited to join a website that says they pay you to be there. Is this another scam or what? Well I decided to join and see what happens. Of course it's got the normal m.o. of creating a downline and other usual mlm marketing stuff. But, you don't have to give them money! They do want your time however because part of the process is logging in at least 30 times in a month. I'm going to check this out and see what happens. Want to come along for the ride? Click on the banner!

THE GODS OF GOOD AND EVIL

2008-09-01T10:28:00.000-07:00

It’s amazing how we as human beings tend to focus on the negative aspects of our lives. We spend and exorbitant amount of time thinking and talking about what we don’t have, who’s not doing it for us and being miserable about it. It seldom occurs to us to find all the things of our lives as sources necessary to develop a full and complete aspect of appreciation.

I remember as I was reaching adolescence the amount of dislike I had for my father. This was so much the case that I actually changed my name as not to carry his. To lend an understanding to my feelings about my father, my internal perception was one of the lights being turned off when he reentered our lives. It was as though from a brilliant sun shining in my life, it just got dark one day and never became light again.

Of course I was young, hypersensitive to my environment and extremely emotional. This combination is the root of all my perceptions, although granted I am no longer physically young.

Many years later, after learning more about who I am and how I function, I realized that this darkness was not mine, but his. Not his in the sense that he made things dark, but in the sense that I was suffused in his innate darkness. My father was a sad and unhappy man and his dark perception of his life was sensed by me due to my clairsentient nature. I could feel the emotions, the feelings of others. For many years of my life, this ability left me feeling insane.

The reason for the feelings of insanity was multi-folded. First, I was not aware that I could feel others feelings. Secondly, I was not aware that the feelings were not my own. Thirdly, I could not separate my feelings from the others and therefore believed and acted on them as if they were my own. All this led to a feeling of insanity as my feelings took which ever direction of those in my environment at any give point in time.

If I am around happy people, I am manic with joy; if I am around unhappy persons than that feeling is one of abject misery. If I watch the news, read the newspaper or hear about the grief of the world, I am totally despondent. Yet, if I am alone, I am calm, quiet with a sense of intense peacefulness.

In my youth, I had more hiding places to get away from others due to what I later named, sensory overload. The more time spent with others the more angst I feel, the more agitation, the more discord. I assume this to be the confusion to my senses as I can not decipher what I feel as opposed to what I am feeling from them. It is only in total isolation that I am free of this confusion and can feel what my emotions truly are.

This ability is both a gift and a curse as I am able to feel what others need from me without them being aware of it themselves, while at the same time feeling the intensity of their emotions which often takes my breath away. The levels of unhappiness and grief in others can be extremely overwhelming.

On the one hand I am greatly appreciative of this gift, on the other; I abhor my lack of freedom to be totally selfish in how I am to live. How can I ignore everyone and allow them their own fate, when their fate is mine because I feel them? In my youth, I did not know what it is with me. For many years, I denounced this ability, ran from it, and refused it in my isolation. Yet, I never escaped.

It sometimes make me laugh at myself when I realize how much knowledge I have about the workings of the universe, yet, think that I can escape its workings, its laws. We are as we need to be in each lifetime, having the abilities, acquiring the knowledge, developing the wisdom we need to fulfill our unique missions in each lifetime. Yet, I think I am exempt. How bodacious of me!

The thing of it is my gift has always been a curse. As we already know, a phenomenon is not good or evil, negative or positive. It is and we in our minds determine its polarity. For me, my mind had made it a curse. I did not have, do not have, the skills to use it as it is meant to be used. I suffer for it. I am wounded for it. This in no way has anything to do with the gift of it; it has to do with the weakness in my life that has to be strengthened so that this curse is honed into a gift. The thing of it is, others, at a level beyond consciousness have the confidence in me and my ability, even though they don’t know that they do.

I have been laden with the responsibility of aiding others in developing their perceptions of themselves and their circumstances from as far back as I can remember. It is me that people come with their troubles, their confusions and their negative perceptions of their circumstances. It is me who has the ability to show them the light that is their darkness.

I have walked into gas stations and had a person tell me their whole life story and once I say what I perceive, their whole perspective changes. That, which has made them miserable, now brings them joy. That which was not understood, they now understand. Such is my mission, such is my joy; as the teacher as the perceiver of good.

I remember my husband telling me, “Tracey, I’ve never known anyone who can find the best in the worst person, the worst situation, as you do.” Strangely, what he has said is true. It may take me a moment in my own circumstances to see things clearly, but eventually, I always do. For others, the vision is immediate.

I find that we are wont to succumb to the pressures of life by perceiving our circumstances as either good or bad. Yet, we never know where that thing will lead us or how to use it to always create a good situation. If the house burns down, we think it a bad thing. Yet if we are able to get a better house because of it, that original phenomenon proves to be a good one. This is a physical manifestation of that negative perception proving to be a positive one.

But what happens if we decide it is negative and hold on to that belief? This is most difficult to explain. It’s not positive thinking although this is a close concept. It’s more. We direct our destiny. We are in charge of it. Although many believe that the opposite is true. Once we decide the polarity of an event, until we change that belief it will remain the same.

As long as I consider my gift a curse, I will always be subject to this polarity. Granted it is not my gift, but my compassion which creates my suffering. If I didn’t care about people, the state of the world or the events that take place, I would not suffer. This is the state of being human and compassionate, we suffer when our fellows suffer and rejoice in their joy.

My fear of suffering led me to want to be free of my gift, until I understood its importance in fulfilling my mission as teacher to all. In feeling the pain and suffering, I have no choice but to bring the necessary clarity of perception so that they can become happy. This is my job whether I like it or not.

Strangely I love sharing and teaching what I learn. I love helping and guiding others. This being the case, I can’t have it both ways. Either I learn to change my perception and thereby nullify the suffering or I continue to be ignorant of the objective truths and therefore, continue to suffer. Of course I’m choosing the former. I just haven’t figured it all out yet.

On this journey, I expect that many will be my teachers as well and lead me to that place where I comprehend that good and evil are merely a figment of my imagination and in that imagination lays the key to my freedom.
Everything and its opposite are merely flip sides of the same coin and it is I who chooses whether it is to be heads or tails.

ART FROM: (http://s224.photobucket.com/albums/dd171/Cynbel/?action=view&current=GoodvsEvil.jpg)

FOUND ON THE SITE OF: (http://www.shoutlife.com/profile_view.cfm?uid=7535 )

PARENTING REVISTED: AGAIN

2008-08-31T11:46:00.001-07:00

There is a definite advantage to being a stay at home mom. I find that I have a lot more patience than I did when I raised my girls. Back than my days were long and my patience short. The hustle and bustle of commuter traffic after a hard days work lent to a hyper sensitive response to my family when I got home. The slightest thing and I was off on a tangent.

The usual method of operation was for me to run into the door, telling the children not to bother me right now because I’d just come home and had to get dinner going. After dinner it was, did you get your homework done, is your room clean, get your school clothes together for tomorrow, it’s time to say evening prayers, go take your baths, finally it’s 9:00pm, my time! This was the weekday pattern.

Saturday mornings were a lot better as I almost always cooked a big breakfast and we all climbed into my bed with their father and watched cartoons. Shortly thereafter it was, honey can you and the kids get out so I can clean the house! I spent all day Saturday doing the heavy cleaning and doing laundry, including ironing.

Sunday’s we usually found something to do outside of the house when we could afford to. But raising children in San Francisco was heaven back then because there was so much free stuff to do. Stern Grove had plays, opera, concerts and the like. There was always something going on in one of the parks that I could take the children to. There was also our most favorite thing to do ever; drive down Delores Street at a rate of speed that made its up and down hills a roller coaster.

At the foot of Delores Street and San Jose Avenue was an ice cream parlor with the best ice cream ever and it had no preservatives or extra junk in it. Well actually that was our second most favorite thing to do. The first was the Exploratorium which sits on the old world fair site. It is the most exciting place in the whole city if you like educational experiences. This was my life with the girls.

Now I have boys. They’re quite different I must say. They don’t appear to be as focused as girls and I find myself repeating the same instructions over and over again. But than again, I must admit, there focus seems to be nonexistent when dealing with adults. With each other it’s a whole different world. They can’t seem to take care of any responsibilities without multiple directives if their friends are around. Back in the day this would have driven me crazy! Raising adolescent boys is a whole no training ground for me.

My eldest grandson has figured me out, so he knows that I want things done the way I want them do and is not afraid to say, “Gramma how do you want this done?” He’s realized that it saves him the hassle of having me stand over him and direct every movement or get upset because he’s not doing things in a way that I prefer.

I try to have him understand that I am not such a stickler for how things are done, I just want him to realize that there are different ways to do the same thing. I want them to have choices. As I’ve explained to them, one must always have choices. If you only know one way to do things, than you never have a choice. If you are rigidly set in your way of doing things, you mind doesn’t develop in a way that allows you to analyze the situation and choose the best way to handle it. This is why I drive them to do things my way. Once they learn my way and do it effectively, than I allow them to do things in the way they think is best as it gives them the ability to determine for themselves which is the most effective and efficient way of doing things.

When they iron a shirt (yes I taught them to iron) they want to iron it haphazardly. When they mow the lawn, they want to push the mower all over the yard randomly which creates island patches of grass which they than have to go back and mow separately. When they clean their rooms if things are out of site from the immediate observation, they consider it clean although their may be things under the beds, couches, chairs and behind doors. I’m beginning to learn how to give detailed instructions in order to correct these flaws in perception.

I’m learning new perceptions as I try to view things from the male child perspective. It’s definitely an interesting journey.

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER

2008-08-30T08:16:00.000-07:00

Knowledge is Power
ART BY W.A.K.
When we learn of a thing, when we know of a thing it creates a definite power within us. The thing about knowledge is that there is so much to learn and all of it or none of it might be tools for personal spiritual growth. But the simplistic knowledge is power does not mean that knowledge in and of itself is power. Knowledge is merely the path to power. It how we use that knowledge that determines the power we gain.

I’m sure we’ve all heard the old term educated fool and I’m sure we all know at least one. In my definition an educated fool is that person who has acquired vast knowledge, yet is incapable of using that knowledge to further his/her spiritual growth. We watch as that person gains infinite amounts of knowledge, but never develops the internal catalyst to change it into wisdom. Wisdom is the act of having the ability to use the knowledge we gain to understand everything internally and externally. The more we know of our selves, the more we know of the world and the more we know of the world, the more we know of ourselves. This process is a cyclical continuum whereby each feeds off of the other and leads us to greater understanding and wisdom of how all things work.

Another thing I’ve learned about knowledge is that it is threefold; for self, for others and for both. Knowledge for self is to understand self through alert observation, , self awareness, information previously and currently gained and intuition, why we are how we are and do what we do, and the wisdom that comes when we understand how to use that knowledge to advance our spiritual growth.

Knowledge for others is when through external and internal influences, those of observation, information previously and currently gained and intuition, share that knowledge with the intention of helping them to advance their spiritual growth. Ofttimes, however, the proverb: The road to hell is paved with good intentions is realized when we fail to understand that this person may not be ready for the knowledge which we share with them. This is a difficult thing in that often knowledge that is meant for our personal use is misconstrued as being for another since it is about them. Yet, it was never intended that this knowledge be shared with them as it is only for us to understand the person better and aid us in staying clear of their personal chaos as well as aiding them to the best of our ability. When we share what was not meant to be shared, it usually ends up drawing us deeper into their situation as opposed to helping them to advance spiritually independent and thereby building their personal confidence.

I have had many such experiences and unfortunately have not yet gained the wisdom to understand that I wasn’t suppose to share the information I have. This draws me further into the chaotic space of that person and ends with absolute frustration on my part as they just don’t have the ability to get it. I’ve lost many friends this way as I tend to try to push others into getting it. This is another example of the educated fool. Granted, my desire and intention is for their ultimate happiness and spiritual growth, but you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink!

So many of the axioms, proverbs and sayings that we have garnered from the older generations are quite apropos, it is we who fail to understand the significance of them as we remember the sayings but fail to decipher the meanings of them. There is much sagacious knowledge embedded in our societies and cultures that we use by rote without a clear understanding of why we do them.

When I was a child in school, we learned almost everything by incessant repetition. We, as children and students, were totally bored out of our minds by the repetition of the multiple tables, for example. We had no clue about the principles behind the math or that they were a constant. Yet, as we developed more experiences with math, we understood the necessity of having this knowledge that was forced into our memories by repetition.

It is the same with all other knowledge. We learn from the example or teachings of others. We learn through our experiences and observations. Initially we don’t understand the principles behind things, but as time passes and the experiences, etc. are repeated in our lives, we learn those principles, those laws at work behind those things. In this way we learn to use the knowledge that life imposes upon us as well as that information which we seek, to ideally advance on all fronts.

In writing these blogs almost daily, I am not only sharing what I have learned, I am learning what I have learned and therefore reinforcing the knowledge and hopefully, seeing things more clearly and using it better in my own life.

When I was a child, I had the ability to grasp concepts immediately, so often finished my class work long before my fellow students. Back than, teachers actually dealt with children as individuals and used their character and intellectual traits to help them to develop self actualization. In my situation, I was asked to help the other children who processed information slower than I did. This had a multiple effect upon me and the formation of specific character traits that continue. I became a helper, rather than arrogant because of my intellect. I learned that others were no less intelligent, that they just processed information differently. I learned that we all had the ability to excel given the necessary tools to do so. I learned to develop compassion and to provide the help needed by others, without being asked to. There were many more things that this experience taught me. It also taught me that just because you helped others, the expectation that they would be appreciative of your help was a false one and that one should not take it personally when appreciation was not forthcoming. This last led me to understand that in giving we must do it with no strings attached as this will only set us up for disappointment, frustrations and feelings of inadequacy.

These and a multitude of other experiences have given me the ability to do what I want to do, when I want to do it and how I want to do without care or concern whether anyone else likes it or not. I have developed absolute emotional and spiritual independence, although not always an economic independence. This has given me an irrevocable power to live my life in the way I see fit at any given moment, do what I chose to do, without care or concern as to how I am perceived by others and to never, ever let anything get in the way of my accomplishing my goals.

The knowledge I have gained and the wisdom to use that knowledge has created a liquidity of spirit that allows me to bounce back from the most traumatic experiences due to my spiritual development. My minute understanding of the difference between the objective and subjective realities, gives me a slight edge in being spiritually successful in the world. This is my desire for all those who hear me, understand me or come to me so that I may share what I have learned. I am the teacher and the student; ALWAYS!

This is the beauty in the power of knowledge, the more you know, the more you realize that each person has the same potential as you. The only difference between us is choice and time. Ultimately we are all on the path to understanding, gathering knowledge to enhance our spiritual power.

THE ABYSS: The Dragon Slayer

2008-08-25T20:07:00.000-07:00

ART FROM THE WEBSITE OF http://www.dantejoseph.com/

"Ego," sayest thou, and art proud of that word. But the greater thing--in which thou art unwilling to believe--is thy body with its big sagacity; it saith not "ego," but doeth it. What the sense feeleth, what the spirit discerneth, hath never its end in itself. But sense and spirit would fain persuade thee that they are the end of all things: so vain are they. Instruments and playthings are sense and spirit: behind them there is still the Self. The Self seeketh with the eyes of the senses, it hearkeneth also with the ears of the spirit. Ever hearkeneth the Self, and seeketh; it compareth, mastereth, conquereth, and destroyeth. It ruleth, and is also the ego's ruler. Behind thy thoughts and feelings, my brother, there is a mighty lord, an unknown sage--it is called Self; it dwelleth in thy body, it is thy body. There is more sagacity in thy body than in thy best wisdom. And who then knoweth why thy body requireth just thy best wisdom? Thy Self laugheth at thine ego, and its proud prancing. "What are these prancings and flights of thought unto me?" it saith to itself. "A by-way to my purpose. I am the leading-string of the ego, and the prompter of its notions." The Self saith unto the ego: "Feel pain!" And thereupon it suffereth, and thinketh how it may put an end thereto--and for that very purpose it IS MEANT to think. The Self saith unto the ego: "Feel pleasure!" Thereupon it rejoiceth, and thinketh how it may ofttimes rejoice--and for that very purpose it IS MEANT to think." ((Nietzsche, Friedrich, 1891, Thus Spake Zarathustra) http://nietzsche.thefreelibrary.com/)(Art (Art is CD cover and property of Dante Joseph http://www.dantejoseph.com/)

“Be good.” “Conform.” “Fit in and become a part of the process.” But whose process is it that we must conform? And if we don’t what will become of us? Well I’m sure that each of you can answer that question based on life’s experiences. We all know what happens when we don’t conform: We’re ostracized! Pity the fool who would choose to be master of his own destiny for in doing so he has chosen to live outside of convention and therefore, outside of acceptable society as we come to understand it. Living beings are sociable creatures so can there be a greater punishment. If we do attain the mastery of our destiny which we so diligently seek, we are pronounced, insane, fool or crazy as a loon. If we step forward and try to share that knowledge with our peers and they believe that of which we speak; the attempts to discredit us know no bounds as we are discredited or outwardly murdered to maintain the status quo of acceptable society.

But back to my chaotic decent into understanding the knowledge placed before me.

I’ve said a number of times previously that I was a kind, compassionate and generous being. I have also said that those character traits were ridiculed, maligned and I was humiliated in untold fashion as I journeyed from childhood to adolescence than early adult hood. By the time I was 30 years old I had made up my mind that I would never tolerate such abuse again. Strangely, I never allowed anyone else to be abused in my presence. It was I who took up the gauntlet for the down trodden. Finally, I had to accept that I must give myself and equal amount of compassion and consideration as I did to others. I made a vow to vocalize my displeasure when someone treated me less than in a compassionate way, for I loved myself dearly, but had never exhibited the compassion that I justly deserved.

I’ll never forget my first experience: And what a traumatic experience it was for me, too! I was attending a technical school in order to pursue my career as a truck driver. We mandatory attended classes on three different shifts at various times of the day, including a night shift. On this particular night as we were doing our inspections of our vehicles, the group I was working with had one young man that decided to shine his flashlight into my eyes. I kindly asked him to please not do this and explained that I was light sensitive and his doing so caused me physical pain. He immediately shined the light into my eyes again and without thinking, I slapped him!

I was overwhelmed with remorse. This was not my normal behavior. This was not the way I responded to people. This was the first time in my life that I had every struck someone who had not done the same to me several times before retaliating. Fortunately the young man was not the violent sort so the altercation ended with the one blow. I on the other hand, was beaten into the dust by the realization of what I had actually done. I apologized profusely for a week and we ended by becoming good friends long after I had moved from that state.

Unbeknownst to me, in that moment the monster had been born. The truth is, I did not become a monster in that instant, and the monster had always been there, laying in wait for the opportunity to arise. In the past, the monster had been clad in the clothes of the dragon slayer, defender of the weak, upholder of right and justice. Here the monster had been released for selfish purposes and this was a first. The Queen of Compassion had no clue that she was terminally ill and would shortly be alone on her deathbed, attended by none, judged by all.

It is strange how this happened. I was completely unaware as I defended myself more and more, never realizing that I was etching in granite a behavior pattern that, although necessary, was going to create an untold numbers of belief in my lost of sanity. And so the years passed; the negative outweighing the positive in my life as I bent on my protection, became more and more the negative creature. Strangely, this excess has served me in good stead as the power created by the unabated anger has been the driving force in the accomplishment of every goal I have set for myself.

My attitude became one in which if even one naysayer presented themselves to me, I would work 100 times as hard to prove them a liar. If anyone told me no about anything, I found means and methods to accomplish that thing that they told me I would never accomplish. I have many victories! Yet now, today, I am not so happy with my response to my environment. I have learned only one way to be. I am out of balance.

Like the ionic exchanges in a thunderstorm, my life is roaring to change into sunny skies. It doesn’t appear so from the outside because I refuse to allow anyone to tell me what to do or how to be. Yet, inside, where it counts, I am perplexed by this one sided way of being. The negative must work in harmony with the positive if we are to be all that we were intended. It must work as the negative and positive poles work to turn on a light, run a car or create thunderstorms. Of this I have no doubt. And so, I walk into the abyss prepared to accept whatever comes from this journey. With the courage and wisdom spoken of by Nietzsche, "He hath heart who knoweth fear, but VANQUISHETH it; who seeth the abyss, but with PRIDE. He who seeth the abyss, but with eagle's eyes,--he who with eagle's talons GRASPETH the abyss: he hath courage.”

THE ABYSS

2008-08-25T13:09:00.000-07:00

He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you. (Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 146(http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/26964.html)

"He hath heart who knoweth fear, but VANQUISHETH it; who seeth the abyss, but with PRIDE. He who seeth the abyss, but with eagle's eyes,--he who with eagle's talons GRASPETH the abyss: he hath courage. (Nietzsche, Friedrich, 1891, Thus Spake Zarathustra)

I'm having a Nietzsche moment in which I rant, roil and rave at the primitive level of my and the worlds spirituality. Primarily it is mine that I am concerned with at the moment as once again that perfect balance that I had attained disappeared without warning.

As I said, I ranted, raved and roiled, bringing up the sediment of my base ego in an attempt to bring order to my environment, only creating additional chaos. How foolish we that think we have the answers, but are so unskilled at applying them to our selves with fervor equal to that which we try to instruct and change the world.

It has been a long held belief that my problems stem, not from an external source, but an internal one. Yet, repetitively, I try to, no, I do blame others for what goes on in my life. It is futile, as I well know and quickly forget in the throes of passionate anger and frustrations.

One of my issues is that I sometimes feel that I must respond in this way because if I were to be the passive creature that I have been in my past, it would only serve to encourage those perpetrators to continue their abuses. The angel child that cried incessantly at the cruelty of the world, now screams loudly and carries a big stick, bashing in the egos of those who think they can abuse me as they choose. The world has made me a monster.

It is this of which I wish to speak.

In this world we are taught to rely on forces outside of ourselves. Trust in self is taught to be a fable which will only lead to our destruction if we believe in it. From the moment we are taught to eat, sleep, and drink and potty on schedule, we are disconnected from an understanding of our own needs and desires and how to go about satisfying them. The voice of family, friends, government, religions and bloggers, take over our minds as they tell us what to do, when to do it, how to do it and where to do it throughout our short existence. Sadly, many of us never regain that ability and those of us that do; well we're often found insane.

This brings me back to my tale of birthing a monster.

There are no longer those that remember me from beginning to end in this lifetime. All have quietly passed away without a moment notice, for the most part, only attaining notoriety in my life. Strangely, as they quickly exited this life my only thought was that one; no one knows me from beginning to end any more.

The most interesting aspect of this situation is that I was highly distressed by this set of circumstances. I pondered whether or not I truly existed anymore as those keepers of my history had passed, leaving behind no trace of who I have been from before my birth. I mourned my loss.

Within a matter of moments, the flip side of the energy of this event introduced itself as I realized that those lost are the same that worked to keep me from truly discovering myself as the continually pulled me back from the edge of the abyss of my being. I rejoice in this knowledge and bade them a fond farewell.

I don't know why this event had such an effect on me since I have been highly rebellious since adolescence and in fact have been self sustaining since the age of 15. However, my explorations into self with any clarity did not begin until that many years had passed again.

The thing of it is, I was always teetering on the brink of self discovery and still am. The deeper I go into the abyss, the more often I find myself peering down into its face. This spiritual travel reminds me somewhat of the native American concept of dreaming which they use to find their spiritual power and understanding of who they are and how they fit into the universe. Most interestingly, it seems that at each moment of epiphany, I awake in a state of chaos far from where I thought I had come.

Over time I have learned to attribute this phenomenon to my self revealing my self. That is, after each enlightened state about some aspect of myself, I am taken to another place of myself where work needs to be done. In birthing the angel, the demon is born, and in the birth of the demon, the angel returns. Thus the dragon slayer becomes the dragon only to become the slayer in a never ending cycle. As I proceed through each cycle of this process; birth, growth, decline and cessation, a new cycle begins. This order is inevitable as it is the law of the universe that governs all things. Whether it is our bodies, our world or our thoughts, every thing is constantly moving through this four cycle process. This being the case, I wonder why I do not notice it when it is happening and am always surprised when I find it has?

Since I have most recently fallen from grace in my eyes, again I am bewildered about the process that causes this to take place. Like most, I want the good to last forever and the negative to never come. The knowledge of the process in no way lessens my desire for this. The truth be told, the feeling of having fallen from grace is not mine, but the voice of others so deeply implanted into my psyche. It is the voices of those who incessantly spoke the phrases: “Be good.” “Conform.” “Fit in and become a part of the process.” They, they guarantors of my conformation, who placed time bombs of epitaphs that come to mind repetitively.(to be continued.)

(Art for this blog by Tracey Lin Miller using Corel Painter X)

YOUR BROTHERS KEEPER?

2008-08-23T09:20:00.000-07:00

I was looking for pictures for this blog about giving and our attitudes and responsibilities and found this picture at www.dvorak.org/blog/?p=15950 with Google image search. I could not resist posting it here. Credit given, now own with today's blog.

I happened to be at another of my favorite sites this morning, http://www.theblackpoet.com/, a forum type posting site, when I ran across a posting that brought up the subject of panhandlers/beggars and their and our attitudes in reference thereof. It made me think deeply about this phenomena in our society.

During the 1980 United States Census, I worked as a census worker in San Francisco, CA canvassing street people in an effort to account for their numbers. What was especially interesting was that many of these people, like the biochemist and ex-ceo's that I met, had grown tired of the system and just dropped out. They and other street people had living on the streets down to a science. They knew everything from where free food was served, places to bathe, the best places to panhandle, all the free services available as well as all the times, dates, limitations and expectations of such sites. Needless to say, I was in awe.

With my regular job, that of automotive mechanic, I had to walk from the BART station at Market and Powell Streets, down 5Th Street to get to my job. Since I understand the inherent dignity of all people, regardless of their circumstances, I greeted the street people cordially each morning and evening during my travels. Not only did I greet them, I learned their names and gave them mine as we developed a very pleasant relationship. Strangely, they never asked me for anything.

Crocheting and knitting were a couple of my hobbies at the time and during the winter I would pass by them sleeping in doorways and stop to put a knitted or crocheted hat on their heads and scarfs around their necks as I slept. My husband threatened bodily harm if I took one more blanket or jacket out of the house for these people during the winter. I guess that's why they never asked anything of me, because I gave without being asked.

Joe Jung's, a Chinese restaurant that use to be on the corner of 5Th and Market Streets sold pork buns, so I would grab a bagful on the way to work eat a couple and pass the rest out to my street friends. No monetary transactions ever transpired between me and these people because it wasn't necessary. I took care of them and in their own way, they took care of me.

I remember once I had to miss work for a week for lack of daycare for my three girls. When I returned to work, my street friends asked me where I had been the proceeding week. I explained my situation to them and they immediately informed me that they would be more than willing to take care of my girls if I ever again ran into such a problem. Of course I would never have considered such a thing, not because I didn't trust them, but because I didn't trust my husband or the child protective officials to understand.

Fast forward to present time frame. My friend at http://www.theblackpoet.com/, was commenting on how sick and tired he was of all the street people hitting him up for handouts and his discord after having to refuse a handout to a woman that reminded him of his mother. This led me to thinking that she probably had to be someones mother and how would any of us like it if our mother's approached someone for aid, only to be rebuffed.

When a person approaches us on the street, we don't know why they are approaching us, yet we quickly turn aside as to avoid that imminent contact. But suppose it is someone seeking aid other than begging? Suppose they have been attacked, been in an accident or some other situation that causes them to appear disheveled as though they were a panhandler/beggar? I'm sure the majority of us would quickly come to their aid and at least dial 911 on our blackberries without a second thought. Yet, because we're so sick and tired of being panhandled that we more than likely would avoid contact with that person.

This brings me to the thought of the biblical sayings about being our brothers' keepers or others about charity. Granted, we are bombarded by our daily responsibilities to self and family. Granted, it is very difficult to sustain our daily lives living as high on the hog as we like to; but, how do we deal with the millions of people we see on the street everyday who might need our help?

I remember when I was driving truck and as I went from city to city I was often approached for food or money by street people. I remember one time a man asked me for money to buy food, he was sitting outside of a McDonald's as I was going in. I told him that I would be happy to bring him food when I returned from purchasing my own. His response was, "I don't eat out of there". I smiled and said, "Well I guess you aren't really hungry." It's these people who let us know that they really don't want our help, they want our money to supply other desires.

Now I have a problem with supplying the needs of addicts of any kind; drugs, alcohol and the like because I don't use these things and would never spend my money on them. But how do we differentiate between the man needing drugs and the one needing food, when sometimes they are both the same? Furthermore, is it our responsibility to make that distinction?

As I think about this, I realize that it is not my responsibility to discern who is scheming and who is in need. I've been hungry and homeless several times in my life. Fortunately for me it was never because I had deliberately placed myself in that position by mismanagement of funds or drugs/alcohol. I just have one of those lives that keeps me hopping from one strange set of phenomena to another as I gather the lessons I need to know in life. Equally as fortunate am I in that others always take a liking to me as they watch how independently I struggle to overcome my situations and fight with me to do all they can for me as I insist I can go it alone.

Strangely, even when I have nothing, or rather very little, I am sharing what I have with others. This is my nature to give what I have, to generously come to the aid of others without their having to relinquish their dignity in order for me to supply what they appear to need in the moment. But like most, I have grown to think that everyone is trying to get over and perhaps this time I won't give as I might be contributing to their abusive behavior. Is this really my responsibility to determine how they are going to use the resources I share with them? I think not.

We create energy by what we think, say and do. This is understood in most of the life philosophies and religions I have glanced at. If it is a positive thing, than we are rewarded with positive energy in return. If a negative, it garners negative energy. This being the case, regardless of what others do with the good we give them, we benefit. We invite positive energy into our lives.

Given this theory, on the other hand, our selfish thoughts words and actions invite negativity into our lives. So are we preventing our good fortune with our feelings of disgust and repulsion toward our fellows? Perhaps we are.

What you get from a white crow give to a black one: This is another of my favorite directives concerning our behavior in life. I interpret it to mean that what kindness we get from others, although we seldom have the opportunity to repay them, we do a like kindness when we are in a position to do so.

We waste our time trying to decipher what behavior we should exhibit in a given situation, when in reality, we already know what we are suppose to do. If we didn't would we feel so uncomfortable when we are approached by those needing help? I think one of the problems that exist is that when we give one, like pigeons in the park, we are flooded by others wanting to partake of our generosity. Since we don't have the resources to give everyone we become uncomfortable with ourselves because we don't have enough.

Its sort of like a story I heard long ago about a woman that had a large number of children. She would feed the older children what little food there was than bleed herself and them and feed the blood to the younger children. This story is extremely appalling to many of us I am sure, but it was a viable solution given the circumstances and allowed all of her children to live, although she was almost dead from starvation herself. I'm not sure if this story is true or not. I tried to Google it to no avail.

The point being: do we give until we have nothing left for ourselves? Even the churches and other charity organizations only give limited amounts because of the fraudulent misuse of their programs. There will always be a battle to determine how to take care of the needy, without caring for the greedy; providing services for the users not the abusers. The sad part about it is that services for the needy are depleted by those who abuse the programs.

Am I my brothers keeper? No, I think not. But I do believe it is necessary to live up to our personal natures. If we are givers, than give without question where we can. If we are not, oh well.

UNCLAIMED FREIGHT

2008-08-22T10:21:00.000-07:00

We have unlimited power in our lives. There is nothing we can't accomplish given our determination to do so. Yet, we constantly relinquish our power in favor of allowing others to have power over us.

During the past year, I have rearranged my life to accommodate more and more people, places and things. So much so that my life has become chaotic, disorganized and slow in producing the things that I need to accomplish my goals. This is a repetitive cycle for me. I drown in a sea of demands and persuasions imposed by my choices and forget the inherent power in me to direct my life where I want it to go. I become a piece of flotsam on the sea of my life, until battered, worn, weary and at wits end, I remember who I am.

Who am I? I am a powerful, wondrous person of magical proportions. Yet, I tend to forget this fact over and over as I succumb to the elements of my environment. It's so easy to get caught up in this mode; so easy to forget who I am. This has been an ongoing battle with myself for my entire life.

I use to believe that right and good were determined by religious, social and cultural beliefs. I learned long ago that this is not true. The universe is both positive and negative and therefore both positive and negative things can be used to create the greatest value. Most recently, my concept of positive and negative has been geared toward doing what is best for those involved in my life, mostly choosing what is the right thing to do based on social and cultural constricts. What has happened in the process is that more and more obstacles have arisen to thwart my efforts. The fault lies in my expectation that others will also do the right thing because it's the right thing to do. Unfortunately, this has proven to be the fallacy that it has always been. Others are going to do what they want to do without care or concern for what I believe is right.

This takes me into a place of rebellion, anger and further misconceptions about life as I become more and more angry. Remember, I am a creature of emotions. My logic and reason goes out of the window as I find that logic and reason is unimportant to those that I am forced to deal with. By allowing myself to get caught up in the negative results of their choices, I lose sight of my own goals and choices as I battle them to do what is right.

Slowly, one event at a time, I relinquish my power to bring about the changes necessary for my success; until like a cancerous cell, I lose the internal messages that are the source of my fulfilling my purpose in a prescribed manner. I become the messenger of chaos and confusion dominating the field of order and harmony with confusion and inappropriate responses in my environment. I become them!

But than, miraculously, I stop; dead in my tracks. I refuse to participate anymore because it is not natural for me to live in such chaos. I close the doors, windows and portals of myself in order to return to normal. The pendulum of equilibrium reaches its furthest swing.

I create a quiet place, swirling with the anger that has grown in me and begin to reclaim the freight that is my power.This is mine! This is me! I feel the truth of this and do what is necessary to change the anger into compassion for myself and others. This happens more quickly now, unlike the past when this quiet phase took years to happen.

This turning point happened after I was forced to explain myself and my actions to others. I resent having to explain myself as people sit in the seat of judgment over me. They do not walk in my shoes. They do not know who I am, nor take the time to find this information. They think that I am wrong, unfair, unjust, foolish, even cruel and violent of nature. I'm sure I can be all of these things at times. The source of these is when I relinquish my power in favor of responding to my environment in kind.

The world is a vicious place. The people in it even more so. No matter how we are, who we are, at times we get caught up in what it is and they are as we are relentlessly buffeted about by their energies. We quickly forget who we are, our mission of spiritual enlightenment and roil about in the chaotic way that our environment forces us to.

As we become stronger in our power, these episodes last for shorter periods of time as we force the constant of flux to bend to our will. We develop tools to escape drowning in these oceans of negative energy that we are bombarded and saturated with. In my case, the tool of isolation works. I isolate myself, mentally, physically and spiritually when possible. When not I do so mentally and spiritually. In this way I place a wall of separation between myself and those who incessantly try to exact their powers of control over my life. I stop myself from participating in the chaos.

Today is that day that the unclaimed freight of my power is opened and used to reinstate my ability to have the responses I want from myself. This is not about the extroverted tirades of logic and reason or explanations used to prove to others that what I so is best. This is the introverted place where I reclaim me and direct my destiny. I am a warrior woman, but sometimes the place I chose is not the place that the battle is being fought. This is not about them, it's about me. This is the thing I always forget as I join in the chaos.

It's not about how good, bad, right or wrong they are. It's about me being true to myself as I journey through these distracts that I allow to prevent me from maximizing my spriritual potential. If, as I believe, the whole purpose of life at any given moment is to aid us in our spiritual growth, than it is up to me to do what is necessary to make this happen. Everything I encounter is for this one purpose only, maximizing my spiritual growth.

Each time I succumb to these events, allowing them to manifest as a negative phenomena, than, like traversing a maze, I have to return to the place that I made the error in judgment, spoke the incorrect word or took the wrong direction in order to proceed along the path in a direction that will further lead me to manifesting the event as a positive phenomena. Phenomena in and of themselves have no energy per se. It is how we use them that determines there effect in our lives.

Do you remember when I told you how happy I was living in my van in a Walmart shopping center? This phenomena, homelessness, could have been constured as negative by me and I would have been totally unhappy. Instead, I precieved it as a wondrous adventure and enjoyed every moment of it. Hence, the phenomena in and of itself had no effect upon me, it was my choice to name it a positive experience.

Often, as in the most recent case, I get caught up in what I do and what they are not doing in response. This is the place I always lose my power. I stop focusing on me and my ability, my power to name the phenomena positive or negative and begin focusing on them and naming it negative. In response, naming it negative has a catalystic effect of inviting more and more perceptions of negative until I am engulfed in a negative sphere of energy.

Most interestingly, when I am caught up, my life still attracts positive experiences to allow me to regain control of my power. As an example, while in the throes of this current chaotic experience, I walked to the store to purchase an item. I had come to the end of my monetary resources which is most often the case in these days of limited funding. I had gathered some change that was available to make this purchase before going to the store.

Upon arriving at the store, with my usual considerate behavior, I told a customer who was in line behind me that they could go before me as I had to count a lot of pennies. The customer who was in line before me was finishing up his purchase and turned to me and said, "What are you buying, I'll get it for you." Needless to say, in a world of selfish, self-centered individuals as the world most often appears these days, I was taken aback.

Of course I politely refused his offer, but he was insistant. My heart was touched deeply by his compassion. It reminded me that I was not alone. It reminded me that am okay, that I had not been deserted by the positive responses of the universe and that I could reclaim my power at will. I really needed this man in my life at this moment and my life, crying out for help beyond he limits of my conciousness had placed him there. This inherent power in my life had called him to be there, doing what he did in order to rescue me from my current situation. The fog of uncertainty cleared slightly in this moment and today is the day I claim the freight of my power to become my true self, no longer remaining the victim of my life's experience.

We can't think our way through our lives. We learn too many things that prevent us from having a true objective perception to analyze and determine what is needed. Yet at the ninth level of conciousness, the being that is our eternal self knows what experiences we need in order to grow as spiritual beings. Sadly, the eighth level of conciousness, that which is the karmic storehouse, often prevents us from using this eternal wisdom of the ninth. It is through trial and error that over time we come to listen more closely to that first mind and become aware of this inherent power to direct our lives. For most of us, myself included, I think we never listen, but are only aware of it in nanosecond views as we move through our lives.

This is not a thing that we can fathom with our concious mind. We can't positively think our way through it or visualize our way into it; although these are some of the tools that can be used to tap into a tiny part of it. I can't tell you how to master this technique because I would have to use words and they don't work to explain it. It would be like describing the place where a thought or idea is born. There are no words to do so because these things existed long before words. I could tell you of my spiritual preference for doing so but I am not here to convert you.
I merely want to share my experiences so that you might have more information to aid you on your journey.

This being said, today is the day to reclaim the freight of your inherent power. You can contact me at that link on the site that allows you to do so if you have questions. Perhaps in trying to answer your questions, I'll further understand what I need to do to further my journey. In the meantime remember, you are right where you need to be along your path to learn what you need to in order to enhance your spiritual power.

WHAT DAY IS IT?

2008-08-21T06:00:00.001-07:00

That old adage of: How time flies when you're having fun seems to hold true. When doing the things that give pleasure in life, the perception is that time flies by quickly. Yet, when we're wrapped up, caught up, tied up in something that we don't particularly enjoy or want to be involved in the perception of time seems to stretch on and on.

As I grow older, it seems that time moves faster and faster. I'm not sure if it is me or if everyone feels this way. The bills need to be paid more often, the days past more quickly, even the transition between the negative and positive aspects of life and circumstances seem to happen more quickly. Yet, in spite of my personal observations of rapid change taking place around me constantly, I still want to hang on to all my stuff.

What I mean by stuff is all of my old emotional responses to things. If I am angry, I can't seem to let it go as quickly, even though I'm questioning myself about holding on so tightly. When I am happy about my circumstances, I become really disheartened when that changes. I am truly resistant to change, while at the same time being very much aware of it. I'm not sure how that works. But than again, its me.

Me, being that person who is a bevy of complex and contradictory emotions and perceptions. I always want to do what is right and what is good, in my preceptions, unfortunately, right and good are not always right and good for me. What day is it? I'll tell you tomorrow.

(This is the post for 8/20/08)

FEELIN' GROOVY

2008-08-20T03:22:00.000-07:00

OK, boomer song of the morning The 59Th Street Bridge Song (Feelin' Groovy, Simon and Garfunkel). I have the unfortunate/fortunate habit of waking up in the morning with these songs singing in my head. They're basically an emotional meter of sorts that are indicative of my mood. The sad part is, I don't think I've learned a new song since the 60's.

It's amazing how the music and the people have changed since than. We've gone from free love to drive by shootings; compassion and political awareness and action to hedonism, ignorance and complacence. Brings to mind another boomer song, Where have all the Flowers Gone (Peter, Paul and Mary). It has been my theory for a long time that we boomers blew our wad in the 60's than joined the establishment. The really sad part about it is that the same love children and revolutionaries who protested so hard against governmental injustices in the 60's are the same idiots making the laws and rules today. Big brother is alive and strong and peeking through our windows with his satellites.

The free love practitioners are now the driving force behind the economy, we're the big time spenders who are not spending so much now as our get rich quick schemes and scams peter out. Our houses bought, lost and paid or paying off of mortages, big ticket items that we don't have to buy again is causing a recession in the housing market. The health and wellness market is growing by the billions annually as we become older and less healthy and continue to seek the fountain of youth.

With our coming of old age in mind, your president and federal government has been changing all the rules regarding social security benefits and the medicare program as a cya (cover your ass) move to make sure that we boomers don't wipe out the social security fund and incur more medical expenses than the government is willing to pay for. If the entire population had been concidered with the Social Security Act was devised, there would have been more than sufficient funds to cover the generations since 1935.

In fact, it is the baby-boomers who paid into the fund as most of the working class of the previous generation were exempt from contributing and using the funds until

The Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund, or Federal Disability Insurance Trust Fund, Federal Hospital Insurance Trust Fund or the Federal Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Fund. The main part of the program is sometimes abbreviated OASDI (Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance) or RSDI (Retirement, Survivors, and Disability Insurance) was signed into law by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1935. It was originally a fund which was directed to the care and protection of the white male population of the United States. Needless to say the funds policies were highly discriminatory.

Most women and minorities were excluded from the benefits of and old age pensions. Employment definitions reflected typical white male categories and patterns. Job categories that were not covered by the act included workers in agricultural labor, domestic service, government employees, and many teachers, nurses, hospital employees, librarians, and social workers. The act also denied coverage to individuals who worked intermittently. These jobs were dominated by women and minorities. For example, women made up 90% of domestic labor in 1940 and two-thirds of all employed black women were in domestic service. Exclusions exempted nearly half the working population. Nearly two-thirds of all African Americans in the labor force, 70 to 80% in some areas in the South, and just over half of all women employed were not covered by Social Security. At the time, the NAACP protested the Social Security Act, describing it as “a sieve with holes just big enough for the majority of Negroes to fall through.”(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Security_(United_States).

By 1990 all workers, regardless of type of work, had been deemed elgible to receive social security benefits and were no longer exempt from the collection of taxes through the Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA) of 1939. Hence, a program that had been put in effect for the white male working class became available to all. If the program had been originally established for all persons, regardless of race, creed, color and type of employment, the funds would have been greater initially. It's also true that more people would have been drawing from those funds.

The coming of age and acceptance of responsibility taught us a lot about taking care of our selves and our own (families and possessions). While we were smoking, toking and starting revolutions, upper and middle class white males were forming our socio-economic destiny in their image.

Well I guess we boomers were Feelin' Groovy because we didn't have a clue that the system would drag us into the battle of survival. Ignorance is still bliss and we can now understand where all the flowers have gone as we struggle day to day to live our lives driven by the latest greatest advertising and marketing campaigns that tell us what we need to be happy.

Given all these heavy thoughts, my question is, "What, if anything, are you doing to get that relaxed groovy feeling into your lives on a daily basis?" Did Stella really get her grove back, or create more and different kinds of problems in her life in the pursuit thereof? That's the thing about rainbows, their end and the pot of gold is never where we look for them.

The things that create value in our lives is not the material and monetary gain that we so hotly pursue; it's the simple things in life that bring us the greatest and longest lasting joy and memories. Many of us think that money is either the root of all evil or the path to happiness. Yet, when we arrive there, we find ourselves just as unhappy as we were previously. So off we go again trying to find that thing that we believe will enhance our joy and the vicious cycle continues.

The happiness we look for, the joy we want to feel, is inside of us. We must choose it if we are to find it. If we choose stress and chaos day in and out than all we will find is stress and chaos. With this in mind, remember, happiness is a choice, choose it!

WHERE DOES THE ROAD TO ANGER END?

2008-08-19T04:03:00.000-07:00

OK, so I'm not my normal chipper self this morning. I just can't handle other peoples stupidity and when that stupidity is hinged on something that I did out of kindness and generosity, it really pisses me off.

I still haven't figured out why it is that every time I do something for someone, something that makes things easier or better for them, that they do something absolutely, unforgivably stupid. Or so it seems. I know that ultimately everything has a lesson in it and if we don't learn that lesson it will keep repeating itself. What I can't seem to do is learn this lesson; connect the dots to how does helping or being generous to others in someway always ends up being detrimental to me in some shape, form or fashion.

Given the misunderstood laws of karma, one might presume that because good is done good will return. What's worse is that my response is always the same, rage, feelings of betrayal and awe at the levels of stupidity that I encounter. Okay, so I admit, I'm not getting it. Lessons in life repeated over and over are a definite clue that I haven't understood or learned anything. I can probably guess that the reason is the high level of emotionality with which I deal with everything.

My modus operandi is one of screaming, yelling, total physical and emotional rejection of the person on whom I lay the blame. Primitive isn't it? Especially given the fact that no one is responsible for our feelings. We choose, although often at an unconscious level in nanoseconds, what we feel about any given circumstances.

In the case of anger, not only are we dealing with the situation of the moment, we also are exercising behaviors that have been learned over time that have given us the defense mechanisms necessary to protect ourselves. In my case, the well known patterns of fight or flight is manifested in my forcing the perceived offender out of my space; my space being both physical and psychological. This behavior, as you might expect, leaves no room for compromise or rejuvenation of the relationship due to the damage that I created through my actions.

So is my behavior one of nature or nurture? That is, do I respond the way I do because of physical attributes or because of learning inappropriate responses to anger in my upbringing?

I won't get into a lot of research to aid in understanding the process as I'm hoping that if you want to draw appropriate conclusions that you'll do the research for yourself. There is a lot of information out there that is available on the Internet if one chooses to spend the rest of their life finding it all.

I must admit that my anger was previously expressed in feelings of pain and self abuse in the first half of my life. In this, the second half, I now outwardly project my anger to those that I feel are the source of that pain. Pain has been transformed into abusive behavior over time.

Yes, I do recognize that my behavior is abusive in response to the perceived abuses by others toward my person. The lesson I have learned from my life experiences is to abuse in return. The sweet, forgiving and accepting young woman has become the formidable dragon slayer. The device is needed for protection, or so I imagine, but where does it end? Am I to continue allowing anger to be the gift that keeps on giving?

This is the sad consequence of this behavior. It leads no one to salvation; not me nor the persons I heap this abuse upon. If I am writing about this it speaks to the fact that I am uncomfortable with myself and behaviors. The questions remain: What can I do about it? How can I change it? How can I undo what I have done to myself in response to treatment I have received from others? At the moment would seem that deep introspection and a behavior modification program is in need.

It's amazing how we are prone to blame others for our responses to their behavior. As I stated earlier on, no one is responsible for the choices we make in expressing out emotions. We can choose to ignore or act responsibly or irresponsibly in any given situation. Of course ignoring is rarely the correct response in my perception as it leaves the door open for more and more inappropriate responses on the part of the perpetrator. Therefore, I deem it necessary that we express what we think and feel in an easily understood and appropriate manner.

In my case, I don't do that. I rage! I rant! I act totally inappropriately. The question is, how do I change this behavior and create value in my situations? This is what I need to learn. This is what I need to actualize. This, I think is my lesson and until learned, is going to continue repetitively until I do.

WHEN I WOKE UP THIS MORNING...

2008-08-18T03:32:00.000-07:00

How many of you boomers remember the song, You Were On My Mind by the We Five? The first line is When I woke up this morning, you were on my mind... Well that was what was on my mind this morning. You, my readers, were on my mind this morning.

I know that at this point I'm probably the only reader of my daily blog. I'm harboring dreams of popularity where one day I will actually have a few readers to my daily missives. I'm not sure why anyone would want to fill their minds with what I have to say in the morning, after all, I'm sure there are many much more interesting lives and things being said than the ones I have to say. Still I dream.

August, the eight month, the month of openings and new beginnings. What a perfect month to have started blogging. So many things have happened this month. My website www.onthepathtounderstanding.org is up and running. Thanks again to www.vanessasdesk.com for casting this seed of my dream out into reality. I'm writting again after a long hiatus. The book, though stubborn, is trying to birth itself. I've found new tools to get what I have to say out into the world and I'm writing daily. What more can a person bursting with ideas dream of?

When I woke up this morning, you were on my mind as I wondered what of value I would have to say to you this morning. I thought about all of you, getting up and readying yourselves for this new and glorious day. Of course I thought about you that are just going to bed as well. I thought of the parents and children rising and preparing for school and those out walking the dogs that had awaken them for their morning walk.

I thought of you that are preparing to or already out fighting rush hour traffic, wondering of the thoughts that plague your minds as you watch the sometimes idiotic things that folks do when they are driving. I've probably seen them all while I was driving truck cross country; everything from the women applying mascara to the sex on the open road. I always wondered why people have this sense of invincibility whereby they think that the things that they do when they are driving can't possibly have an adverse effect on their driving skills.

I remember one day I was headed northbound on I 81 near Bristol, TN, a couple were having sex in the front seat of their car for the benefit of the truck drivers. In the back seat was an infant of about one year old in a car seat. I'm sure the men were enjoying this spectacle. My thoughts and feelings were with the child. I wondered how could his mother who was half the size of the car, display such behavior in front of him/her and with no care or concern for his/her protection?

Another of the really bad ones is the women putting on eye makeup. Do they really think that if they poke themselves in the eye with one of the implements used to apply this makeup that they will be able to see where they are driving? Come on people, wake up, become responsible out there.

Okay, these negatives are coming to mind as I write. But what was really on my mind this morning was the myriad numbers of people we owe our appreciation to. If we think about it we will realize that everyone in the world is taking care of us directly or indirectly.The people who grow and prepare our food, manufacture our clothes, build our houses, make our cars and of course the ones who employ us, purchase our products care for and teach our children, as well as the ones that come to our rescue when we are in trouble be it nurses, doctors, ambulance drivers, police officers, firemen or the person on the streets that offers us a smile; right down to the blog readers of the world.

We are connected to everyone and everything in our environment and it is so important for us to constantly be aware of this fact. We never know what effect we will have on our fellows, or they on us. Strangely, it doesn't even matter their race, creed, ethnicity or any of the many variables that we let get in our way of having a positive relationship with all these people.

So each morning reflect on how much you owe to so many for everything in your life.

SUNDAY, SUN DAY...

2008-08-17T07:34:00.000-07:00

Whether you consider it the first or last day of the week, one fact holds true, without the sun we would not have the opportunity to consider which is the appropriate stance.

For many of us, Sunday is a day of worship; a time to contemplate our previous week and pray for the benefits of the coming one. For some of us, the Sun's day is a daily affair. Each day the sun rises we offer appreciation for that fact. The Sun which appears to be the one true constant in our lives, is the giver of life. Without the sun, Earth would probably be colder than the
-125 degrees of Neptune and therefore incapable of sustaining life as we know it. That, I would say, is reason for great appreciation.

Sometime in our relatively recent past, it seems that the level of appreciation in most of us has all but disappeared. We have an entire generation of individuals that feel a sense of entitlement, making demands that their desires be fulfilled without a hint of thankfulness; let alone gratitude for the Sun. Our belief system has greatly changed.

I remember when I was a child, every Sunday we went to mass as a family. One of the most well known proverbs was: A family that prays together, stays together. Give the state of family life at this point in time, one might surmise that this axiom is quite valid.

Churches, like work places, are losing members by the droves as more and more people chose to do it themselves as they develop their spirituality while rejecting organized religion and seeking to work from home as opposed to going into an office. People seem to be seeking more money and less control. Historically, religion has been the epitome of controlling the masses or in the words of Karl Marx, "Religion is the opiate of the people."

Now I'm not sure why Marx used the concept of opium as a descriptive of the effects of religion on the people. Given my limited understanding of opium and its physical and mental effects as observed in movies, being aware of heroin and morphine junkies, I would say that my understanding of his implication is that religion is a psychological drug that prevents protest of injustices and acceptance of the abhorrent.

The biblical verses of the new testament:

Matthew 5:39 NIV
But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.
Luke 6:29 NIV
If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic.
(http://bible.christianity.com/)

These passages seem far removed from the old testament which state:

23.But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life,
24.eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
25.burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.
(http://bible.christianity.com/)

When did the transition from retribution to passivity take place, and why? More likely than not, the passages, taken out of context, appear to imply that which is not actually directed by these laws of god.

The line in the bible preceding the old testament verse of an eye for an eye reads:

22.
"If men who are fighting hit a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely but there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined whatever the woman's husband demands and the court allows.

If read in its entirety, it appears that this apparent cry for retribution or retaliation is not a call to seek revenge against all who cause harm to others, but actually a list of retribution if a pregnant woman receives serious accidental injury from fighting men.

For the most part, god seems to have the same problem as the common man: that is, he made one set of rules and when his son rose to power, he changed all the rules.

I guess this pretty much sums up the way of the world. Our ancestors set down laws for us to follow, from the most primitive worship of the sun to those rules of strong religious belief laid down by our grandparents. All of which, for the most part have been rejected or modified by the following generations who no longer feel appreciation for the sun, love their neighbors or believe that a family which prays together stays together.

A DAY IN THE LIFE...

2008-08-16T08:50:00.000-07:00

The journey of a lifetime seems long and sometimes arduous, yet when taken from a daily perspective sometimes becomes less so. I think that if we look at our lives as a whole, some of us might become quite discouraged as we relive our failures of the past.

It's amazing how we, as human beings, often focus on our past failures as opposed to our past victories; strangely, with the perception that things are going to get better. Hope, that's what they call it. Yet, when we are in the throws of whatever we are going through, hope seems the furthest thing from our minds, instead we writhe in violent protestation of our current situation.

In my experience, it seems to me, that the more painful one perceives the situation the longer it last. On the other hand when we rejoice in what good we find in the situation, the shorter the sojourn becomes.

Not very long ago, I was forced to live in my van as I was quickly coming to the end of my monetary resources. All of my friends, family and quite a few strangers were in a panic for me as they believed that my homeless state was sort of the bottom of the barrel at this point in my existence. This was especially the feelings of those who thought that at my age I should be comfortable and settled in my life. They All of them were deeply concerned about my circumstances. I, on the other hand, was extremely happy.

I had found a great, well lighted spot that was both safe and comfortable for me, Jelly and Spats. The animals could be tied out all day and not be forced to stay in the van. I could sit and read, write and do whatever else I intended each day without disturbance, for the most part.

I had actually chosen a Walmart parking lot for my residence. I parked my van in the rear of the employees' section of the lot so there was minimal traffic in the area and the employees made it a point to leave two vacant parking spaces to the right side of my van to accommodate me. The front and left sides were bordering grassy areas. This was perfect for the animals as I left the doors of the van open so that they could enter and exit at will. The cat, Spats, often chose a window on the right side of the van that exited into the grass.

It was spring, the weather for the most part was relatively cool during the day and cooler at night as to allow us to sleep comfortably in the van. My view and choice of location were excellent. The lot sat at the top of the highest hill in town and there was always a cooling breeze blowing. The hill slopped downwardly approximately twenty feet from the front of the van and than dropped downhill.

There were evergreens of spruce and other trees on this downward slope, yet where I was parked they were very young so they didn't hinder the view of the flat land and slowly upward sloping hills a mile or so down the road.

Each morning, since I faced east, I could watch the sun rise over the horizon. Shortly thereafter, the dump trucks would come, dropping the red sandy earth that they carried and the lone grader would commence to smoothing it out as they built up and leveled this area.

Often, the medical helicopters would fly in and out as there was a heliport sufficient for one helicopter. One afternoon, there were two helicopters and since their was only one landing pad, the second helicopter had to land a block away in one of the opening fields that had been used to pile dirt from the daily dump trucks. The land was not level and it was a little precarious for the helicopter to land, which he did successfully.

Immediately, an ambulance was seen moving northerly up the street from the service road, bypassing the usual entrance to the heliport and pulling into the lot. Personnel quickly jumped from the helicopter, running across the fading brown of the dirt and grass lot toward the ambulance. The ambulance attendants exited, quickly pulling their charge from the ambulance. The helicopter transport team, in their dark blue, almost black jumpsuit uniforms, along with the white clad ambulance team, quickly moved the patient into the helicopter and in under two minutes the helicopter was taking off as the ambulance team, bowed at the waist moved away from the helicopter. It was as though I had front row seats at IMAX.

Nightly, there were many stray cats that roamed back and forth across the hill. One grey and white cat took a liking to Spats and would sit about ten feet from the van and they would talk to each other in the deep, throaty language of male cats. This cat would circle the van at this ten foot distance and from different angles pursue his friendship with Spats. I found this quite fascinating as it was never an aggressive relationship and continued for the entire two months, on a nightly bases, the entire time we were there.

Late evenings brought the doves and road runners to our garden, as I had come to think of this place. We even had an armadillo that came for three or four nights. I was ecstatic given the performance of nature for my personal benefit. What a remarkable world we live in!

A number of the Walmart employees came out to see if I was okay during my time there. They wanted to know if I was okay, if I needed anything and when I explained my situation, they volunteered to let me know if they became aware of a house that might be available.

My situation was that I was not destitute, I had a regular income. I had a home, although it was a van and we had food, shelter and clothing. Walmart proved the perfect place to park because it was a supercenter, which is open twenty-four hours daily and I only had to walk the distance from my vehicle to their front door which was approximately one block. My reason for choosing this place in particular was that it gave me 24 hour access to a restroom and a place to purchase food and water for me and my animals.

When I was a truck driver, that's another story, I often used Walmart shopping centers as a place to park, shop, eat and sleep because it was safer and more comfortable than truck stops. Many of the Walmart shopping centers have roving security guards and they're always well lighted. This one didn't have the security guards, but police, sheriff and highway patrol vehicles often cruised the parking lot. My experience in Walmart parking lots have always been positive.

One evening I had neighbors who had chosen the Walmart parking lot pretty much for the same reason that I had. This was a group of five guys and two vans, one pulling a small enclosed trailer. The group was a band.

Apparently, they had a gig that canceled and their next was here in the town of Ruston. Rather than paying for a hotel for four days until their next gig, they had opted to live at Walmart's. They were really cool guys; sadly I never thought to ask them the name of their band.

I introduced myself, as good neighbors should, learned of their story, gave them places around town where they could hang out and spent quite a bit of time chatting. They happened to be cooking when I arrived and Jelly, Spats, and I were invited to dinner. I had a couple of hotdogs, but Jelly was given five burgers, and Spats had a burger as well. Of course Jelly managed to get the leftovers of burgers and dogs also. We finished the evening with conversation. These were really great guys.

Shortly thereafter, a police officer drove up to my van and began to question me. How long had I been there? Where was I headed. How long was I going to be there? As a black woman, I've learned to be a little cautious when it comes to law enforcement officers with questions. I answered all of hers vaguely, as she seemed somewhat threatening. I was afraid that I might be arrested for vagrancy and that my animals would be taken so I wasn't completely honest, without outright lying.

After her interrogation, she informed me that she had noticed me in this spot for several days and was really concerned about my safety. With this, her demeanor changed to one of compassion whereas before it was that of an investigating officer. I lowered my guard and explained my situation and informed her that she need not concern herself as not only was I safe I had really great neighbors. We spoke at length for about fifteen minutes and then she moved on... to my neighbors!

She questioned them, found out that not only were they a band, the music they played was a genre of which she was fond; they gave her a cd! She informed us all that she would look out for us and make sure we stayed safe. What a great town this is! The people are proving to be more and more exceptional.

Everyone who came to speak to me, including my brother on the telephone (he lives in Dallas) exhibited concern about my situation. After speaking to me, seeing I was quite happy, always went away feeling greatly encouraged because if I could be so elated in what they considered my dire circumstances, the things they were going through in their lives were nothing.

It's amazing how our attitudes can have such a wonderful and positive affect on others. If I had been moody, feeling downtrodden and sullen, they would have had cause for concern and added my plight to their list of concerns. Instead, I proved to be a source of encouragement.

What they didn't' realize what I had planned to live in my van if circumstances warranted it so; as they had. I had moved to this town to rescue my son. I am obsessive when it comes to accomplishing my goals and will do whatever is necessary, in the moral and ethical range, to do so. I was on a mission to rescue my grandson from the system and in the words of Malcolm X would do so, "...BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY!" It was necessary that I lived in my van for two months until I found a house that was in my budget and in a neighborhood that was great for raising a family. Need I say mission accomplished?

Had I been sullen, unhappy and miserable in my circumstances, I don't believe that my circumstances would have been so enjoyable. I would not have had the pleasure found in both natural and human phenomena, the meeting of others that gave me particular enjoyment, nor do I think I would have attracted such positive people and circumstances. This was indeed a most wondrous adventure and I pray I can hold on to the attitude that made it so.

BACK TO SCHOOL

2008-08-15T03:40:00.000-07:00

Do any of you remember the first day of school? The excitement as we prepared to see friends that we hadn't seen over the summer and the end of summer boredom were a great incentive to get us up and out the door to school the first day. Well I actually don't remember that, been too long since my first day of any kind of school. I don't think any of it left a lasting impression.

Probably one of the reasons was that when I went to school there was no busing. The same kids you hung out with all summer were the same kids you were in school with everyday. We not only made real friends back than, but we didn't have play dates set up by our parents, television to watch daily, video games or adult interference in childhood issues. We had fist fights, made up, hung out at the playground, and actually made a lot of the toys we played with. We actually had lives.

We lived like puppies who were free to roam. We scrapped to determine our place in our social hierarchy and didn't want to do a drive by if we got our butts beat. We roamed all over the city, going where ever we pleased, as long as we were home by the time the street lights came on. And for the most part we were safe doing it.

Jump rope was an old piece of clothes line. Roller skates, clamped to your shoes, pulled apart into two pieces and had metal wheels. Scooters were actually skate mobiles that we built from our roller skates; two pieces of scrap wood, one roller skate, a few ten penny nails and we were in business. Of course there were a few bikes in the neighborhood as well. It wasn't Utopia, but who cared?

But summer's over: Playtime has been cut back to a minimum and it's time to get back to children's work; that of going to school, receiving good grades for hard work and not causing parents have to worry or spend unnecessary time making trips to school. Well that's how I explained it to my kids when I was raising them. Now I'm a second time around parent; I'm parenting my grandson.

This child has to repeat the 7Th grade because he refused to get out of bed for half the school year. No matter what incentives, reprisals or coercions were tried, he just refused to get up. This was spoken about in an earlier blog.

Last night he told me that he was setting his alarm for 5am as to get his morning chores done, cleaning his room and taking care of his puppies, before going to school. I was a non-believer.
This is the same child who slept through half the school year.

Well this morning he was up and busy doing what he had to do and did everything in a timely manner. I didn't have to say one single word to get him to do anything. My morning was filled with praise for his excellence in all that he did; his chores, caring for his animals and for himself.

I must state at this point that I have reiterated over and over during the past four months that he is the only one responsible for his life. I gave him a list of his responsibilities which included his being up on time, completing his chores, getting to school on time, his personal hygiene and appearance, as well as his conduct at school. I informed him that these were his personal responsibilities for his own life and not mine to handle. I added that it was my expectation that he took care of his personal responsibilities because it wasn't my job to do so. Apparently he heard me because he implemented every single aspect this morning.

Now my friends have been telling me that I am too hard on him. They say that I shouldn't be so because he's a child. As I told them and him, in a different culture he would be considered a man at the age of thirteen and expected to exhibit adult male behavior. I wonder if children in the war torn countries of the world have the luxury of remaining children? My expectations are high: He should be taking responsibility for himself and his actions at this age.

OK so we're not a war torn country, you think? Our children should be able to remain children as long as possible, you think. I know better. Isn't this the same country with folks toting guns and using them? Isn't this the same country with crime, pedophilia and other ethical, moral and criminal actions taking place. None of which, I might add, are exempting our children from being the victims of these.

As a matter of fact, I think that the control that has been exacted over him for most of his life is just one more door that adults have created for those negative forces to gain control in his life.
If a child is allowed to learn to think for themselves, while we teach them to be analytical, discerning, capable of understanding the information that will aid them in making choices that create value for their lives, I think they would stand a better chance of being immune to some of these negative forces. When children are educated in this way, I think it trains them better to protect themselves.

Until this time in his life, everyone has tried to or managed to control every aspect of his life. He's rebelled by staying in bed, trashing his room or other forms of protest. My approach on the other hand has been to relinquish control of his life and place that responsibility where it belongs; with him. Apparently it's working.

Now, for my feelings of reacquiring some semblance of freedom. YIPPPEEEEEEE!!!! I actually have time to enjoy my space, work on my projects without someone sitting at my left shoulder watching every letter that I type and hearing every word of conversation that I speak. Back to school time definitely has its perks.

EMOTIONS

2008-08-14T08:13:00.000-07:00

I'm one of those creatures whom happens to be intuitive, emotional, passionate and totally lacking in control when it comes to my emotions. More often than not, you'll find me screaming out my displeasure's, discomforts and perceptions of injustice; this last being the usual cause of my outbursts.

In love I am the same, expressing every iota of the passion I'm feeling for the object d'amour with passionate love letters, some appearing if they had been written during the Victorian era, and other means of constantly expressing that feeling of love within me.

When I'm angry with someone, I spend most of my days quelling flights of fantasy whereby I am committing atrocities against that person. This is not a thing I would ever do, although I have attempted reprisals, only to have them backfire against me. Hence I've learned not to take action, even when it seems appropriate.

A while back, I was living in a house which the landlord verbally contracted to do certain works dependent upon my doing certain things in return. After completing my portion of the agreement, he not only decided to not do his share of the verbal contract (there goes that trusting nature of mine not getting things in writing) he also gave me an eviction notice stating that he was not willing to take care of the repairs, therefore he was requesting that I move from the property. Need I say I was livid, ferocious in the face of injustice.

I retaliated by calling the city housing inspectors and telling them of the situation and showing them the damage that needed to be repaired. The house was an old house in which all of the water pipes, from the meter and throughout the house had rottened. There was standing water in the backward four inches deep and the mosquitoes and other insects were proliferating.

The inspector came out, investigated the situation, requested all of the landlords information from me, which I supplied, than went away. Several days later I heard someone talking in my driveway. I go out it's the city water department. They turned off my water!

I'm in the driveway ranting and raving: "What are you doing? I'm the one that reported this guy to have you intervene in order to get this work done! Why am I being punished for his lack of responsibility?" Of course my ranting was to no avail because the house was not in compliance with city code and they had to follow certain procedures. I wasn't angry with them for doing their job, but was I ever pissed at myself!

Did I mention that I am not diplomatic? I don't have a clue how to negotiate my way through situations. I either change my perception or I bulldoze my way through issues. In this case there was no changing preceptions, I can't force anyone to take care of their responsibilities. I was left with one recourse, MOVE! Needless to say this was not an easy task.

I tried renegotiating with this person, only to find out their level of ignorance and stubbornness was far greater than my own. The issue was never resolved. The house is lonely because he won't fix it for anyone else to move in. Probably if I had been more manipulative I could have gotten him to do many things, but I'm not that kind of girl.

Now you might think that because I wasn't trying to bring harm, that I should have some form of recourse in this situation. This is not the case. I called several agencies only to be told that since I had nothing in writing, I had no recourse and my only alternative was to move as he had requested. I screamed and yelled some more and in the process alienating more people.

I don't know, maybe it's me. I just seem to find that I'm speaking with people that haven't a clue most of the time. It's most definitely me. This arrogant feeling that because I do the right thing, treat people fairly and justly, do what I always say I'm going to do with the false expectation that others will be the same. You might think that as old as I am I would realize through all of my experiences that the world doesn't work in this way. Yet, I keep acting as if it does.

I guess in an ideal world, things would work just this way.But this is not an ideal world. There are no perfect people; but sometimes I think, perhaps foolishly, what if there is one perfect person in the world. One person who can live up to my expectations; if I change, I'll never know that person and they will never be able to meet someone of like mind.

Now this may seem sort of naive to many, but it's how I function. Like Timex I take a licking and keep on ticking. I don't know if I am right or not. Life is too complicated to always know what is the best thing to do. Although I have always been emotional, I haven't always been the way I am.

Flash back to 30 years ago. In the past I was humble and greatly abused. I had the insipient habit of believing everyone would treat me gently because I was a gentle person. They walked on me in every conceivable fashion. They took advantage of my generosity, often to the point of leaving me with nothing although they had more to start with. I was maligned, physically and spiritually abused to the point of sucide. No matter how forgiving my nature, the culprits continued and sometimes doubled their efforts, almost as though they were testing and pushing my boundaries. The thing was, I had no boundaries for how much I could tolerate.

When I was about 28 years old, I had an epiphany. This realization was that in spite of the fact that I had been repetitively told that I had low self esteem, and no self love, this was not the case. The problem was I had no self compassion. Where I had the greatest compassion for my fellows, I had none for myself. This is why I allowed others to beat me down with all their might and continuously got up again allowing us to repeat the cycle.

With this enlightenment, I made the determination to give myself the same compassion that I showed toward others. I decided from that point on to let others know how deeply they hurt me when they did, demand that they cease such actions and if they didn't to remove myself from their environment. This I did with the same passion that I feel for life and living. It didn't work!

Sometimes I felt as though I had a neon sign flashing brightly on my forehead stating that I was the one that would tolerate the worse. I changed my behavior to become one who is more aggressive. Now when I'm attacked, although I don't always retaliate in a like manner, I counter-attack. Hence, the dragon slayer becomes the dragon!

The passionate, compassionate and emotional creature that I am morphed into a passionate, emotional, self concerned creature who learned from being treated badly how to treat others badly.

Now of course I have everyone telling me how I should become more gentle. The cycle evolves. Where were all these persons when I was the abused? Why weren't they fighting my cause to save my gentle self? They let that person die unaided. This is the way of the world.

I have what use to be a most wonderful gentle dog. His name is Jellybean, Jelly for short. This dog use to think that all dogs and cats were playmates. As a matter of fact when he was a young pup, on one of our nightly walks, we found a kitten. Spats, the cat, and Jelly never were cautious are afraid of each other. They played together constantly. This kitten would literally hang off of Jelly's face with claws dug in deeply while he bit Jelly's ears in mock combat. As the kitten got older he would sink his claws into Jelly's face, pull him down into a laying position, run around and bite Jelly's butt and big, slow, goofy Jelly would let him. Me? I was petrified that the poor dog would retaliate in a more permanent way, to Spats demise. Jelly never hurt Tuxedo Spats.

Strange thing is, as friendly as this dog is, he kept meeting not so friendly other dogs and cats. Flash into the future about a year. Jelly has had a personality change. He's become more aggressive with other dogs and now chases cats. He even managed to growl and assume an attack stance toward Spats at one point.

Human beings are no different than animals. No matter what our personalities are, we are directly affected by our environments and the other beings in it. Life teaches us how to be and often, we become different than we were or might become because of these influences.

I remember how Dorothy and I use to swear on solomn oath that we would never become them! Them being those individuals who were lacking in compassion and functioned from what we deemed lower life conditions. I lost track of my best bud, Dorothy a few years back. I also became them to a vast degree also, I think.

Perhaps, if I had held more tightly to the person I had been or wasn't so emotional, I would still be that precious young woman who could take the crushing of the world and bounce back like a rubber ball still filled with compassion and love for my fellows. Than again, different times call for different skills.

Emotional beings are necessary to feel love, compassion, empathy and the like. But, like all things, emotions have their negative and positive aspects and in order to be balanced physically, mentally and spiritually, we must have the ability to display the whole spectrum of emotions. When we cut off one in favor of another, we manage to damage our psyche's; sometimes irreparably. The thing is to find that place along the path that keeps us safely balanced.

EVERYTHING'S A SCAM!

2008-08-13T08:51:00.000-07:00

It never ceases to amaze me the number of ways it seems that everyone is trying to get over on everyone else. The concepts of honor and integrity are as far removed from life anymore as I am from Pluto. So what brings on this tirade? Probably my weakness of trusting everyone and being duped in the process.

Although I had economics and business law in college and am fully aware of caveat emptor, let the buyer beware, I'm such an idealist that I actually believe that persons and other entities are actually going to act in a way that demonstrates honor and integrity. How do I know what wagon I fell off? Apparently when I did I bumped my head really hard! But than again, I've been told I'm rather naive for an old lady.

So back to my point of what has set me off on this tirade. I have been looking at in home businesses to help support me and the child in my new parenting venture. I looked at one company that I tried to work with in the past, invested a bit of money into, and I never worked. Since the reason it hadn't worked was because I didn't put the effort into it, I thought about trying it again.

Well a salesperson calls my home and offers to take my card number repetitively. I inform him that I'm on a fixed monthly income, yada, yada, yada... He than tells me that he can take the number and hold it until some given time in the future and apply it at that time, to which I agree. Well you guessed it. It hit my account immediately, throwing me into overdraft, with all that this implies, and I am livid.

So I call SMC; yes that's who it is, and they tell me that they will review the taped conversation and apply the refund and pay the overdraft fees. I ask them when will this take place, their response: "about a week.' I DON'T HAVE A WEEK! It didn't take them a week to screw up, so why do I have to wait a week for them to fix it?

By rights, they should have credited my account immediately and than resolved it for themselves later. They can't lose, I'm the only one who can! OK and this is just the start.

I rented a house a couple of months ago. I'm quite satisfied with it for the most part. I moved in knowing there was work to be completed, but not knowing how extensive the work is. The owner agreed to complete the work, but once called upon to honor his agreement, he reneges. No I had nothing in writing. Remember, honor and integrity and all that twaddle.

Now this guy is seventy-years old, supposedly born during a time when a man learned that his word was his bond, and all that other drivel that we idealist come to uphold in our lives. I could go on with a few other things that I've recently been through, but I don't want to make myself look too stupid in the process. But this doesn't prevent me from the focus on my point.

I've always been the kind of person that if I tell you I am going to do something, negative or positive, I do it. Sometimes to my detriment. I actually belief that my word is my bond, that honor and integrity are the only things a person can claim as their own. Money, material things, family and friends, come and go in our lives and after the dust settles all that is left is our honor, our reputation.

I have the reputation of being difficult to get along with, bad tempered and opinionated, along with that of being trustworthy when I have committed to a task, idea, ideal or give my word about whatever. This being the case and I being the person that I am, I continuously expect others to be the same. This is a false expectation that brings me no end of grief. One might thin I'd learned by now.

The way in which I perceive life, I believe that everything I do is in effect an offering to my own life. How I keep my person, my possessions, my word, are all in direct proportion to what I receive from life. If I am unkempt, sloppy, lacking in appreciation; than the universe responds in an unkempt, sloppy, unappreciative way toward me.

On the other hand, if I do my best to perform each thing in the best manner that I can, than I get the best in return. One might ask, ok if this is so, than how come you're not getting the best from these so-called scammers you've identified? Well in hindsight, after my anger abates and I've had time to look at it a little bit more objectively, I might conclude that it is my protection to realize that these are scams and scammers. That is, I don't get completely sucked into the cycle of not only being scammed, but that of scamming others.

In my opinion, scamming others is far worse than being scammed. The idea of deliberately hurting another for monetary or any other kind of gain is abhorrent to me. Yet, over and over again, I find so many others that are doing just that. I'm confused by this lack of concern for our fellows and the all consuming greed for materialistic things.

Granted, we all want comfort in life, but how far are we willing to go to have it? Perhaps my belief in the continuity in life along with the concept of cause and effect are the reasons that I think this way. But I'm sure there are many others who feel the same. So where are they?

WHAT IS IT WITH KIDS?

2008-08-12T05:08:00.001-07:00

It's a rainy day here in Louisiana. It feels like the beginning of monsoon season. Those potent 90+ degree temperatures we've been having for weeks have abated as the rain cools us. The respite from such torturous heat and high humidity is a great relief. The cycle of change is unavoidable in every aspect of life and the change in the elements should be a warning that this aspect is prevalent in all of life. So why am I surprised that children function the same way?

There is a saying that great obstacles are always followed by a greater good. Well let me tell you, a greater good is always followed by great obstacles as well. This time the harbinger of negativity was a directive to the thirteen year old to go to bed as I was going out the door to walk the dog. When I returned, he wasn't in bed but had decided to do something else. This has been one of his problems in the past, that he doesn't always follow directives.

My response to his failure to his failure to follow my directive was to tell him to stop what he was doing and go to bed as he was told. Now this child has the unmitigated gall to think that he can punish adults by acting out when he's not allowed to direct his own life. He does this acting out by making noise, throwing his things around and incessantly yammering back at me as I try to talk to him.

When I further explain that going to bed means going to sleep, he vocalizes how I had no right to stop him from what he was doing and should have allowed him to continue. My stance is that I gave a directive and expect for it to be followed, which only garners more protest.

I leave him to his own devises and return to what I had been doing. The noise from his room sounds if someone is having a barroom brawl! I continue to try to ignore him. In the meantime he gets up and turns the lights on in his room! This is war!

Now I admit, I'm not the most tolerant or patient person in the world and dealing with a child with a pattern of learned behavior which, while negative, has placed him in control of the adults in his environment, which makes no sense to me. I watched over the past few months as his staff at the group home bent and changed rules to accommodate him over and over. While watching this process I'm thinking, if you draw a line and the person keeps crossing the line and you move the line and they cross it again, where does this end?

The situation that surrounded this was as follows. For a number of mornings, this child refused to get up and go to school. He had many valid excuses for not doing so. The staff is limited to what action they can take to force him to go to classes which basically means they can't pick him up bodily and take him out of bed.

He was given information as an incentive to make logical and rational decisions concerning his education. He was told that although he completed the class work, he wouldn't be promoted to the next grade level due to his large number of absents. He wasn't allowed to progress from one level to another in his program there, which he hadn't done in two years anyway, nor would he be allowed other privileges. He still refused to get out of the bed or wake up in the mornings.

After all these continuous failures, a group of staff, including house staff, school staff, program staff and therapist decided that as long as he got up at some time during the day, made up his class work and followed other rules, that would be acceptable. Of course most days this child was arriving at school sometime after noon.

I tell them this doesn't make sense. I'm informed that the goal is to get him to go to school. I resign myself to their decision because I have no control over how they do things. I, on the other hand, will only draw one line in the dirt.

A few decades ago I could have taken him out to the woodshed and given him what for. These days if you look at your children cross-eyed you might possibly find yourself in jail for some form of child abuse. If you can't control them you're charged with neglect and the children are taken from you, basically punishing both you and the child for failure to function harmoniously in a trying world.

I was rarely hit as a child, yet I knew that there was a certain order to the universe which placed parents first as the law, god second and everything else thereafter. The reason god came second was that although you might be punished for your sins when you died, you had no doubt that your parents were going to take you to task immediately. With all the governmental interference in family life these days the only control a parent has over a child is the threat of calling law enforcement or some branch of the government in order to control them, without placing themselves in jeopardy. Guess what? It's not working!

Well back to the showdown at the O.K. corral. I respond to the incessant noise by going into his room, removing the light bulbs from the fixtures and closing his doors, to which I get a resounding diatribe about he doesn't care and he'll just get up and open them again. By now it's 11 o'clock p.m. Bedtime was at nine. After more shouting and beating from behind his closed doors, he exits his room, fully dressed and heads for the front door to leave. I inform him that if he leaves the house I will have to call the police to apprehend him as he's a minor and has no business, by law, to be out of the house after the 10 p. m. curfew. He insist that he's leaving, calling my bluff. I pick up the phone and dial 911. After about the second ring, he goes back into his room slamming the door. Well I won that round.

Less than 30 seconds later the phone rings. It's the police asking about the hang up call to their station. At least I know in an emergency situation the police in this town are going to respond rapidly. I inform them that my 13 year old had planned on leaving the premises and I had informed him that if he did I would be calling the police, but at present he had complied by returning to his room. He listened to this conversation, verifying that I had in fact called the police. He once again returned to the destruction of his room.

By this time I'm screaming and yelling about how he is not in control of anything in his life and therefore must comply with the directives given to him. For every word I say, he responds with ten. I tell him, that's it, I don't have the skills or patience to deal with him and that I think he has to return to his placement at the children's home because I can't allow him to stress me this way. I've got a massive headache! I have hypertension and a myriad of other ailments. My stomach is in knots and I feel like I want to break everything in sight! I just stop, calm myself somewhat and ignore everything from this moment on as I realize that if I don't control myself, calm myself, that this child is going to be the catalyst for me to do some serious damage to my health.

After about 15 minutes, I decide I need to get out of the house before I do something that I regret. I go for a walk and see a couple of 17 year old girls hanging out. I stop and talk to them about 15 minutes than return to the house. When I arrive, he's in the process of cleaning his room. I say nothing to him, shower and go to bed. Apparently he got the message that I was no longer going to participate in this insanity and went to bed to. I didn't' hear another word from him all night.

I woke up this morning feeling like the parent from hell at 6 a.m. I will be exacting my revenge today! He's on pins and needles thinking I'm having him removed from the home. I'm not telling him any differently. My attitude sucks! But this child has to realize that I am not going to tolerate or succumb to his tactics. I can't hang him up by his thumbs and horse whip him and though I detest emotional abuse, what other weapon do I have?

Logic and reason only works after he's stewed for a few hours. After the last episode, which was no where near this bad, I did my usual sitting and explaining things to him in detail and as usual, he made up his mind to comply. This time we went to new heights in discord. I was aware that he had exhibited this behavior many times in the group home when he didn't get his way or was peeved about something. Little did I realize that my turn was going to come to deal with the same behavior.

It's amazing how we delude ourselves into believing that because we do so much good for a person that they are going to show us great appreciation and make our lives together easy and harmonious. What makes us think we have that power? I don't have a clue! This is an adolescent who has been to hell and back and I think there is going to be a miraculous change in him. Do I have delusions of grandeur or what?

This child was erroneously taken from his mother when he was about a year old, along with a sister and brother who were both older than he. At the time I was working and on the road three weeks out of the month and couldn't take on three toddlers so they were given to someone else. Well this woman seemed to have spent her time emotionally and physically abusing them for the entire nine or ten years she had them. This child's story ended with her abandoning him in a local hospital.

For the next three years of his life he was in group homes. During hurricane Katrina he was evacuated to a couple of different group homes ending up in northern Louisiana. Enter the grandmother.

After going through the things I went through in my own personal life, I realized I now had time to give to this and two other children, got on the highway and spent Christmas 2007 with two of them and decided that these were great kids and deserved to realize that they were not the bad guys in this scenario. For the next eight months I dedicated myself to recovering them from the system. Victoriously I gained custody of this child. The question is how do I get through all the trials and tribulations we're going to have without harming him further or self destructing?

I'm a stranger in a strange land with no support system other than a weekly visit to the family therapist. With all my knowledge and understanding of life and people, children are a whole different animal. I try to remember when I was a child, how I felt, what I was going through at his age and why I responded to the world the way I had.

The thing of it is, I also was a so called troubled adolescent which I think should give me a definite advantage when dealing with this child. The thing of it is, when I'm in it up to my eyeballs, I'm not thinking of how I can help him, but how I'm not going to let this little bugger get the best of me.

The biggest problem in this relationship is that we are too much alike. We're both head strong, self directed and determined to have our way. Not only this, each of us is determined to have the last word in any confrontation. Usually he wins the latter because I can't see myself standing toe to toe in an argument with someone who is not hearing me.

Now you're probably reading this thinking that I need some serious help here. Believe it or not, we're going to be OK although we may be going about it a little unconventionally. I am the only adult that this child has had in his environment that hasn't betrayed him, thus far. Of course given his history with adults, I'm sure that his expectation is that I will.

THE LOG IN OUR OWN EYE

2008-08-11T10:41:00.000-07:00

How often have we heard that while looking at the sliver in our neighbors eye we manage not to see the log in our own? Well that axiom and others like it remind us that we need to focus on correcting ourselves more so than our fellows.

When I was writing the blog yesterday I thought about the books I'm writing and how much it was not only about helping others to develop different perspectives, but also to use the logs in my eye to build myself a house of greater character and compassion.

I learned long ago, that at an unconscious level, most of the time when we're focused on things we don't like in others, it is actually weaknesses in our own lives that we are really concerned about. Ultimately, the world reflexes our individual lives at any given point in time. This being the case if we find ourselves surrounded by people that appear to be selfish, even though we've painted a picture of ourselves as being generous, at a deeper level we are also selfish.

How is this possible? How can one be generous and selfish at the same time? Take myself for instance. I'm an extremely generous person to others. I bring in stray dogs and feed them. I share with others what I have. Yet, I don't allow others to do the same for me. I love the feeling that I get when I share, but I won't allow others' that same feeling because I have difficulty bringing myself to accept their generosity.

You know the type; persons who say, "no that's alright, you keep it, I'm good," when you try to help them. Well that's been me most of my life. Because of my need to feel absolutely independent, I selfishly refuse to allow others the good feeling of sharing with me.

We I must say that I'm really trying to change that thing about me. Of course I must admit that my life beat me into submission. The great independence I had in life has now been removed by circumstances.

In 2000 I became disabled, but refused to quit working. I deeply and passionately feared the loss of my independence. In 2002 it got to the point that I was barely able to get out of a chair and had to pull and push myself up with my arms. In the process I managed to seriously damage my arm. The problem was I have degenerative disc/spine disease, arthritis in my spine and a number of other physical malfunctions. In spite of all this I'm never ill.

In 2002 I was finally forced to seek work all together. I ended up selling everything that was of any value to sustain my life as I had to wait six years to recieve my disability. To make it worse I was only given a years back pay. I watched my absolute independence corrode into nothingness.

I was forced to beg food and other help during this period. Fortunately, all those people whom I had refused help from previously were still waiting in the wings to assist me and did so generously and without allowing me to lose my dignity in the process. They voluntarily came to my aid without my having to say a word. Although I deeply appreciated them and their magnanomous generosity, I still tried to hold on to my emotional independence witih all my might. The result of this was that I was eventually diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Now you can guess how desperately was I holding on so that I created an emotional malfunction. Thank goodness I'm an introspective humanbeing!

After much deliberation, I realized I was killing myself one bone, one muscle, one braincell and one spiritual inch at a time. So now that my eyes were open, I had to exact a change in order to heal myself.

After a couple of years of solitude, free to develop clarity and understanding, I began to heal. I let go, not completely, but sufficiently enough to allow my spiritual self to guide me in the direction I needed to be heading. I once again regained control of my life. Not in the sense of driving me toward my goals as I had previously. Not in the sense of ostrasizing everyone from my life so they wouldn't distract me from my obsessive need to be in control of my life; but in a way that allowed me to follow the path I need to in order to raise my spiritual potential.

Previously I had been a victim of my life's experiences. I had become what I deemed necessary to prevent the hurts and pain of the world from getting to me. I had succeeded quite well I must say. The problem is, I was an island. I worked like a fiend, kept building higher and higher walls until I was trapped and no one could get in, nor I, out. I was living the life. But after all the time in introspection, I realized, it wasn't the life I wanted for myself.

One day while I was thinking about what would be written on my tombstone. Here Lies Tracey: No friends. No family. No love. Wow! What an epitaph, I thought. This woman, who in her past had deeply valued her friendships, love and loving, was now a hermit. What had happened to me, I wondered? How had I gotten so far away from being the person who still lived in my heart? But more importantly, how do I once again become this wonderful person?

The answer, as I surmized, was to release all the fears I had learned. I had become what I had so strongly admonished others from becoming, a victim of my life experiences. I thought long and deeply about this. Using the tools I have to open the door to all answers, a bright light of clarity shined on my understanding. I was trying to do someone elses job. Who's job you might ask? The job of all those forces out there at work trying to protect me.

I had spent all those years trying to protect myself and always, something or someone always made it under my radar. In essence, I'd done a really poor job of protecting myself simply because I couldn't see all the things at work in the universe. Nor would I ever learn how to protect myself from pain and suffering because it is a natural part of living and loving. What had happened instead was I had learned to live in fear.

Fear of not having enough, of not being able to take care of myself, of not being able to trust anyone else and worse, fear of making a mistake. With all these fears tightly esconed inside of me, I had learned to fear living and all that this entails even though I had the illusion of courage and wisdom, or so I told myself. Which brings me back to my favorite axion: The mind is a most skillful painter.

Sadly, as with most in my condition, I was under the delusion that the right people would enter my life and the walls I had built up would come tumbling down. But let's face it, I had put the walls up therefore, no one could tear them down except me. It's funny how we hold everyone else responsible for our defensiveness. We blame everyone but ourselves. We think, if they hadn't done this or that, I wouldn't have to respond like this. But in reality, we make the choice to be who we are functioning in the world as we are. We are the only one responsible for the condition of our existence.

Given this, in 2007 I made up my mind to let those forces at work in the universe do their job, while I lived my life. To make a long story short, since I've let go of that need to be in control and over protecting myself, it seems that everyone and everything in the universe is working overtime to catch up on the backlog I created. Everyone from the lady who bought me a loaf of bread, to my car breaking down right in front of the auto shop has all worked and is still working perfectly to protect me and give me what I need in the moment.

I reaffirm that determination to let everyone and everything do the job that they were meant to do, while I continue enjoying my life immensely. When I think about looking at the slivers in my neighbors eye, and I will, I'll remember to work on that log in my own as well.

Until next time, keep building houses of joy!

STUFF

2008-08-10T00:07:00.000-07:00

Well I've been working on the books and the more I do, the more I have to undo and redo again and again. Of course I'm a virgin at this whole self publishing racket and have do a trial and error thing.

I thought I had completed two books and had begun work on the third when I glanced over on my desk and saw a catalog that I had mailed to me. My books about 50 pages so let me see how many pages thats about.

Now I'm thinking 50 pages, not the 25 they're actually going to be printed on at the size I had in mind. So I pick up the catalog and realize, whoa, its going to be 25 pages thick! So I reformatted, changed the size added some stuff to it and still it's less than 100 pages! Back to the drawing board!

So I go to the publishing site and start surfing around there and find out I don't have a clue! Now I have got to email dear, sweet, Vanessa, (you remember her http://www.vanessasdesk.com/, my web and cover designer?) who's been hard at work to tell her stop what she's doing and let me get my act together. My muse, like myself, does not pay attention to detail.

Well, as I started writing the blog, I think, I've got some small books on my bookshelf in two different sizes and one of them has to be the smaller size I chose to publish my book. You guessed it, they're both smaller than what I've chosen for the book! Yet, one of them is the perfect size, so back to the drawing board again!

This is one of my most perfect character flaws; I don't acquire all the knowledge I need first, detail work drives me batty, my brain won't slow down enough to do it. My modus operandi is to do what I know, than when I mess up gather the knowledge I need to fix it. If it was a house I was building the foundation would probably be lopsided, that shored up where need it to make it level. Fortunately, its not a house that a good strong wind might topple over.

The wonderful thing about writing is that I can zip through it with the expectation that I'll have a minimum of three rewrites, possible concepts and ideas that I'll have to incorporate from notes on everything from old envelops to journals. Once the writing is complete it's just a matter of figuring out how I want it to be formatted.

But what about the rest of my life? I can't begin to tell you how many disastourous episodes there have been since I can't seem to force myself to do the grunt work. My greatest desire and fantasy is to one day have enough money to hire myself a personal assistant who loves grunt work. Of course it would be much nicer if I had some kind generous person to take care of all my mundane stuff for me, since I can't even be bothered with the whole aspect of money. That too is one of the mundane things. I just want to be able to whip out my debit card and spend to my hearts content.

My philosophy is that I want to be able to do what I want to do, when I want to do it and the wayI want to do in. Where I'm doing it doesn't matter as long as I can. Fortunately for me, I'm not a very materialistic person and have found that it doesn't always take money to get what you truly want from life. Of course not wanting much to start with helps a lot.

I've found that when I go out and spend money to buy most things, within a very short period of time, I might have well have left it in the store becasue my interest in it has waned. I remember years ago George Carlin did this bit on stuff. The gist of it was that we buy stuff and than we get more stuff until we have to not only get a bigger house, but end up renting storage space to keep all this stuff that serves no real purpose in our lives. So what's the purpose of cluttering up our lives with stuff.

When it comes to my brain, I'm in 100% agreement with George, I don't need all that extra stuff! I don't want to clutter my brain with all those unnecessary bits and pieces of information that try to get in from everywhere. Have you see the size of the manuals for your cell phone? They've got to be kidding, like i'm going to sit down and read all that crap. Just show me how to dial and save phone numbers and maybe set an alarm now and again and I'm happy.

I surf the web in search of eclectic knowledge about a myriad of topics, just becasue I want to know. But when it comes to going to a website and reading everything from link to link, sorry, not going to happen. I hope you all don't feel that way about mine. I actually read my site becasue I like what I've said.

But back to the original situation, I didn't read my publishing site from link to link, so I'm hoping I make the deadline of September 30th to have at least one book ready for you guys. Bare with me please, you've been ridiculously patient so far and I hope you will continue to do so. The thing about the knowledge I'm sharing is that its timeless and never going to go out of style because its life, not a fad.

PROCRASTINATION CEASES

2008-08-09T07:15:00.000-07:00

Great Joy and Jubilation!!!! Finally the On the Path website is up and running gloriously! My profuse and humble appreciation for http://www.vanessasdesk.com/, my webdesigner. This sight should have been up and running ages ago, but with my relocation and being queen of procrastination, I held things up. Aind to think all it took was two phone calls that I needed to make, sheesh go figure. But anyway that marvelous creature the universe placed on my path, Vanessa, has been tolerant and patient with me, my myriad of questions and my super duper procrastination.

To top it off, Vanessa's success at getting my site up also gave me the kick in the butt I needed to finish the first book in the On the Path to Understanding Series! That's right, book is uploaded and waiting for Vanessa to get the cover ready for me and she and a myriad of others have been requested to do a critique of the book for me. Hopefully I'll have all my responses in a week and the book will be ready for purchase in September, 2008. Yeaaaaaah TEAM!!! By the way, the book of poetry, Sensual Woman, is up for sale as well. I'm not sure if I'll be selling it at the On the Path site or not. Have to consult with Vanessa about that.

As you can see this wonderful person has a finger in all my pies. She's astute, gives me what I need in reference to this whole business, does sensational work, makes my life easy, consults, designs websites, critiques and develops what is needed on the fly and is a great friend. All at a reasonable fee. You must use her if you need anything to be done referencing your cove design for your books or websites. Check her out at http://www.vanessasdesk.com/.

I'm back to being excited about this project so there should be about half a dozen books in the series out by the end of the year. Please keep watching for their availability.

Who have been waiting for my Muse to break out her cat-o-nine tails, well the wait is over! I'm back to work and loving it. Granted, I did have to relocate, gain custody of my grandson, mourn the lost of my old life and the birth of my new one since I last wrote, but now that all of that is behind me, time to rock and roll!

This doesn't mean that I'm not still in the throws of the daily mundane hassles, still haven't found that personal assistant who's willing to work for the joy of knowing me, but I'm muddling through it all and it's not so traumatic as it has been. The deed will be done, that is, I will be finishing those other 5 books by the end of the year.

2009 will see me developing the seminars and doing online consultations for those who think they want to bring me their thoughts, ideas and adventures and find out what I have to say about it. May even do a Dear Tracey column on this site. Sounds like big fun doesn't it!

Tracey is my name and teaching is my game. I want to teach and also learn in the process all that I can in this lifetime. Sharing our knowledge, our joy in our victories over lifes twist and turns, revealing our experiences and how we are both beaten down and up lifted by them, is what this site is all about. Perhaps sometime in the future, I'll make the site accessible to post from the readers. I'm not sure when or if that is going to happen, but we'll see as this progresses.

Of course when you contact me and send me a message, if I deem your missives to have value I may consider posting them. I'm not going to commit to that right now because I don't want to put too much on my plate. Mom always warned me not to bite off more than I could chew, but she also warned me about not eatting so fast and I am not sure that I've learned either lesson yet. We'll let the path unfold before me and see where the journey takes us.

In the mean time, thank you all for your support, for your valued input, your loyalty and belief in my ability to make this happen. For those of you who think that my method of writing is too simplistic, or that I'm dumbing down, fear not, words are for communication, not to prove how intelligent I am or to join the elitist wordsmiths in creating products that no one but their peers can understand. I'm here to get a message out to all that can read even the slightest. That's my job, communication.

I'm hoping that each and everyone of you can get something out of that which I share. If not, that's ok, too. I'm having so much fun, that I'm going to do it anyway.

Now, off to write the next book.

PARENTING REVISITED

2008-08-08T08:50:00.000-07:00

The fantasy of freedom seems to be expressly desired by those of who have been parents. We think that once we raise our children that we will be free to live our lives the way we desire. We dream of no longer having the reponsibility of caring for those humanbeings that we have taken on as our chargers. These persons that we have agreed to civilize and help to become positive, productive, mentally and spiritually successful and healthy human beings by our own personal input and direction. We believe that once we have accomplished this, if we accomplish this, than we will be free.

But what happens when through certain circumstances, you end up responsible for children again right when you thought you could live your dream of freedom? Well that's my circumstances. I worked so hard to become irresponsible and now I'm responsible, again!

Through no fault of his, my 13 year old grandson ended up in a children's group home. He spent over three years in these places prior to seeing his mother once about two years ago and finally seeing me in December, 2007. Why, you might ask? Well we'll not speak on his mother, not that there is anything that she did wrong, only that her circumstances won't allow her the convenience of keeping contact with her son. Katrina relocated everyone in New Orleans and this caused a separation of many family members and that's what happened in his mother's circumstances. She ended up in one state and he in another.

As for me, my situation deteriorated healthwise and economically a few years back and I also lived in a different state. After I recovered from the trauma of my situation, this took me a few years, I decided to try to be there for the children, there are three of them involved; one in Houston, TX and two in Louisiana. My house went into foreclosure so I went to Houston and spent four months supporting the child there. Than I came to Louisiana to support the two children here. Fortunately, the oldest doesn't need a lot of support, but his 13 year old cousin needed my constant support and attention. Through our efforts together I now have custody of him and he's the reason for this blog on parenting revisited.

Now I have no clue about male children, so this is proving to be an adventure. Not only did I have three female children, I am female as well, so the thoughts that go on in the male mind are a complete mystery to me. Their preceptions, concepts and actions in life have always befuddled me. Add to this the fact that this is an adolescent, two generations removed from mine and a child that has been abused, traumatized, displaced and left emotionally alone for most of his life (my daughter is not the cause of these things) and you can begin to imagine why this is an adventure.

The things that this child has not learned, deduced from his lack of connection or trust with adults, absolute conviction that he knows everything and my lack of comprehension of the whole package has already started creating dramatic confrontations. To our great benefit, he's not a bad child, criminally minded or mean spirited. Nonetheless, we both have a lot to learn about each other and the best means of living harmoniously.

This child was not taught the responsibilites of living in harmony or many of the things we take for granted in fellow humans. Not only this, but he has also never been allowed to direct his own life. In other words, his personality has been stifled and his life has been one whereby someone else has been making his every daily decision for him since birth. For me this is strange and unbelievable. Sadly for me I expect him to have skills and knowledge that he does not have and it creates a conflictual situation more often than not.

For example: This morning we were out cleaning the yard of doggy poop and other messes that the four dogs had made. One of the dogs is his cousin's who is home rarely, the two puppies are his and another dog we're trying to find a home for. I had informed him earlier that he was only responsible for the care and maintenance of his puppies and the other dogs were their owners responsibilities. This being the case he refused to do any work for the additional dogs.

I tried to explain to him that because the owners of the other dogs were not here to be responsible that meant he had to care for them as well because they are living beings and deserve care and attention, no matter who had to do it. Of course he insisted that I had told him that he was only responsible for his puppies and he shouldn't have to care for the other animals. The more I tried to show him that responsibility isn't so cut and dry and often extends beyond what our personal responsibilities to others as well. We ended up in a shouting match!

I informed him since he felt he only had responsibilites for his puppies that he should be responsible for the purchase of their food and that he wasn't allowed to feed his puppies the food I had purchased for the other dogs. As a matter of fact, since he's only responsible for his stuff, than he should also be responsible for the purchase of his own food and could no longer eat the food. I asked him to come inside so we could talk. He knew it was going to be another one of my lectures. As you can tell from this blog I'm very verbose. I requested that he be seated so I could launch into my tirade and he refused to do so. So I placed myself an inch from his face and began. Of course he hated this because it was a space violation. But I yammered away anyway insisting that if he sat as I asked, which he of course refused to do.

My response to him was that stubborn was not his creation, that I'd been doing it far longer than he and that he couldn't out stubborn me so he could go to his room. Fortunately, he went.

Several hours later, having calmed down to my normal civilized self, I went to his room, gave him the lecture of why I have certain expectations of him, what it means to care about others and extend ourselves beyond our normal range of responsibilites and how doing so is indicative of our care and appreciation of others and the things they do for us. I have a great passion for explaning myself to others and he's a captive audience. I closed the lecture with a release clause telling him as soon as he was willing to take care of his responsibilities and extend himself beyond his immediate responsibilites to care for more than his personal ones, he could eat and would be released from the time I'd given him to contimplate all that I had said. After about five minutes he began and completed what I had indicated that I wanted him to do with no problem.

Parenting is really an adventure! One size does not fit all! Learning each child's personality, what works and doesn't work in connecting with them is a treasure hunt and means we have to be constantly seeking ways to reach them and at the same time realizing and accepting the fact that we have to alter our behavior at times as well. Being set in our ways, is not an option! The reward of receiving a positive response from our children brings the greatest of pleasure and adds one more treasure to our chest of riches. I'm determined to make the treasure chest of experiences with this child overflow with the wealth of wisdom for both of us.