Connected and Committed

JOT Day 26 - Clarity

Some people don't want to ask the question, "OK, but what about that?" and really figure out the answer.

I get that, and that's OK.

But I thrive on that question.

"OK, but what about that? What about that is causing such-and-such? What's going on underneath that's making this so difficult?"

I enjoy engaging in those kinds of questions and their answers because the world is ready to be done with waiting for us to catch up to them.

We actually already know the answers, collectively, but some of us aren't quite ready to grapple with them head on, out in the open.

And that's OK.

I'll keep asking, and sharing what shows up.

Because that's what I do.

 

 

JOT Day 23, 24 - Shifts of seizmic proportions

Continuing along the shift terrain, I'm inhaling material from Suzanne Evans about marketing from the knowing of who you really are, and that is providing some tangible movement into new areas of branding and laser clarity around what-it-is-that-I-do. I'm chaperoning my thoughts and creating new neuropathways with new beliefs, and it's magical, this ride.

This isn't necessarily new information, but because of the particular combination of what I'm thinking about and reading and doing right this minute, I am different, and I'm hearing it differently, and it's changing me.

There are pieces of what I've done up to now in my writing and my website that have been placeholders for this work to arrive, and I know where to take them to the next level. This is powerful and daunting and fun all at once. This year-long JOT project is exactly what's going to help me pull all of these separate entities into alignment.

So, the realizations of the past few days:

1) Don't EVER pull down the radar for those things, people, authors, ideas, events, interests, activities that speak to you. They are out there, waiting to be discovered and integrated into the total package that is you. Expect fallow times to be art of the process and flow of your creative, vibrant life--they are necessary, but the energy and passion will return big time when you allow the contrast.

 2) EVERYTHING counts as potential fodder for joy pullers and resistance toys, no matter how befuddling it might be to you as to why this thing interests you at this point in time. Just sit back and wait for the moment when the uhniverse knocks you out with the reveal.

 

JOT - Day 17 Thought Chaperone Meetup

I tried this last year, wanting to set-up a Meetup group of some kind, and didn't have enough of a focus in order to launch it.

But all that's different now.

Today I created the Thought Chaperone group, intended for those who want to discuss and practice law of attraction skills. Details and more verbiage to come to flesh it out. I have March 8th as the first meeting scheduled on the group's calendar, probably at the local library meeting room. Can't wait to see what casting directors line up with that!

Ergo I am also going to be adding back the Chaperone part of my name to my biz presence on my website and on social media spots, adding a tagline about what that means for those folks who need a little more to go on. 

I also got my receipts and tax info back in line and am ready for the official documents that will start arriving in the mail that will allow me to finish my return.

Now for some joy puller time. There is supposed to be an excellent bead store near me, and I'm going to explore the possibilities.

What joy puller are you engaging in today?

JOT 4,5 - So what? Do it anyway

I looked up some pricing for printing promotional Post-Its and postcards. Very doable, and energizing to my ideas for where performance art, stand-up and public speaking meld. Handouts that will actually get used. More on that later.

And I also spent an entire day in airports retrieving my son for the holiday week. While there certainly was some down time in between flights, typing anything of length and substance on a touchscreen cellphone I find an aversive experience. I guess I'll have to get over that if I'm going to keep up with these posts. The rest of this week will be filled with company and travel, a perfect testing ground for this endeavor. My introversion tends to want my nervous system to shut down when there are lots of people around and all kinds of activity, so I'll be trying to push through all that resistance and do something that I want to have happen anyway.

So what? Do it anyway.

JOT 2,3 - The Follow Through

Let's see--I think I'll first list what it was that I did, and then any processing or insights that come along. Yeah, that sounds good.

Yesterday was day 2 of this adventure, and I had the opportunity to research on the computer for several hours on what it takes to register a small biz in the state I find myself in these days.

And I signed up for access to some video and content that will jumpstart by small biz in sales, building lists and creating content that sells.

At first I was going to name this thing I'm doing Twenty Minutes a Day, but the time thing wasn't in the spirit of how I am approaching this, so hitching my enthusiasm to just one thing, a babystep that I could complete on its own or continue with a long as it felt good, felt like the way to go.

Today, day 3, I'm going to read a bit more in the public speaking books I've gotten so much great energy from.

The holidays present even more of a challenge in terms of making the time to do what it is you've said you want to do for yourself. Family and friends clamor for your presence, and it's easy to just give up on doing something in the direction of where you are going.

So I'm going to hold the space for effortless slots of time showing up for me to be able to do just one thing over the next week when my family will be around 24/7, and report on how that went. It will require some discipline and resolve and some unaccustomed "selfishness", which has an entirely different connotation to it in Abraham vernacular. Unless we decide to do what is important to us, we learn to undervalue what it is we want, which makes us less present for those around us when we are with them, since we're nursing resentment and would really rather be somewhere else doing that thing.

Here's to the new selfishness.

 

Just One Thing (from here on out affectionately referred to as JOT) Day 1

So this is it.

My enthusiasm and decisiveness have reached critical mass at the same time, and so I'm launching a project that I'm fascinated by and a little leary of all at the same time.

Which is good. Perfect, in fact.

One should not begin a process of change that one feels totally relaxed about. Safety brings complacency and boredom to the table, eventually leading to premature retirement syndrome: it just doesn't go anywhere.

It takes some good old fashioned resistance and occasional jolts of fear to make an effort like this recognizable to the ego, and then the real challenge commences.

And just to round out the personas accounted for, this endeavor has momentum and energy behind it that has been building for quite some time, unbeknownst to my conscious awareness until last week.

The timing of it all is a bit puzzling though, since I normally do not indulge in the whole resolution setting debacle at year's end, or beginning for that matter, so I'm not waiting until January 1 to start.

I'm starting today with the Just One Thing initiative.   

Just One Thing, as in pick something and let yourself surrender to the process of moving towards it and enjoying the feeling of the adventure along the way.

Just one thing, and then do just one thing every day that puts you one infinitesimal step closer towards attaining it.

Not 43.

Not a handful.

Just one.

And allow the babystep accumulation to sweep you over the top of your goal, which might very well morph and molt and be something totally different by the time you come up for air.

The goal is really beside the point.

Doesn't matter what it is.

Losing weight.

Dropping the smoking habit.

Exercising.

Eating better.

Cooking more meals at home, and more often with all the members of your family present.

Finding something else to do besides watching television.

Cleaning out the garage/closets/spare bedroom/hallways because we can't walk in them anymore.

Finding a different job.

Deciding to like the one you have.

Finding the love of your life.

Falling in love again with the one you've got.

Putting some time in to learning a new hobby.

Picking one up again that you enjoyed in the past.

Feel better about life in general.

Doing what it takes to officially/governmentally/on-the-grid start your own business.

Practice public speaking/performance art/stand-up at a level you've only dared to sort of think about, sometimes.

I could go on.

There is something about which you might be hovering at the edge of crossing a line in your head about doing/being/having.

And at the moment you choose to follow where it wants to take you, then you're in this thing.

That's where I am, and I'm going to apply this babystep accumulation process to the last two items on the list I rambled on and on about.

And then I want to document that process, here on this blog (Unless I do it somewhere else. Because I fully expect that this ride will take some twists and turns and produce some fabulous, here-to-fore unknowable results that might have it look different than when it started. Hoping so).

To demonstrate what that looks like. That it's doable. That I get what my thought chaperone coaching clients go through because I do it myself, on purpose. That there are levels of blissmongering, and I'm diving in to find out what some of them are.

I plan to label my posts on this topic with "Day 7 - JOT", or something similar, so you can tag along with me and keep pace with where I am in the journey.

I don't plan to comment so much on what I'm doing, which I'm sure I'll do some of, but more about what new way of being this practice is creating for me. What new thoughts I'll have access to, what new experiences I'll savor, what new people I'll meet, what old stereotypes I'll put to rest, what new layers of feeling good about being alive show up.

So here I go--exposed, accountable, vulnerable, and rarin' to go.

Care to join me?

364 days from now there will be roughly at least 1200 hours with which you can look back on from a place of engagement and discovery, or the same ol'-same ol'.

I know what vantage point I'd rather be lookin' from.

 

 

 

plant yourself by the hydrant

 

 

 

 

 

This tree has its leaves still, while others around it are bare.

You'll notice that it's very near the fire hydrant across the way.

It's positioned itself quite nicely in proximity of what it needs.

If you haven't done that for yourself lately, here is your reminder.

Do one of those things that you have identified in the past, or perhaps added into your repertoire lately, as something that makes your heart sing.

Those things that help you move up the emotional scale because they assist in shifting your beliefs about what's true, what's possible, what's real.

Better feeling thoughts become available to you when you do this.

Remember?

I knew you would.

 

the enmeshed lineup of the nomadic jeans

 

It's a process.

Take, for instance, the pair of jeans I put on a few night's ago that I hadn't worn since last spring.

I loved those jeans. They were my constant companion while the temperatures were below 60 degrees. Even though I'd never been a jeans kinda gal, for some reason I started wearing these and wondered what the heck I'd been thinking all those decades.

But when I put them on after a few seasons of disuse, they felt funny because, see, I'd gotten another pair a few months ago that had taken over the number one spot without me really realizing what was going on.

The new ones felt so good and fit so well that I just kept reaching for them in my closet, ignoring the older pair.

So when I finally consciously chose the old reliables again, the difference in how they made me feel was a bit of a shock.

I really wore these, all the time?

Really?

They just didn't fit me anymore, if they ever did. They must have at one time, but not now.

I remember feeling good about them, having fun in them, thinking that I would wear them until they were threadbare.

Kinda like the thoughts we entertain, swirling around in our heads.

Many of them have choreographed the essence of your days for years, showing up by seniority and not necessarily merit.

Thoughts about the products you buy, the television shows you watch, the people you do or don't like, the belief system you hold near and dear to your heart (or not), The Thing That Happened yesterday or years ago.

You might be surprised at how tenaciously you hold on to any one or all of those thoughts, having bought into the assumption that they are true and time-tested and perennially accurate.

Unfortunately, we don't usually get the opportunity of a natural hiatus from those thoughts that would allow us to re-examine them from time to time for worn spots and facets in need of replacement or repair.

Mostly it's circumstances and events that feel like they are from out of the blue, like a punishment from god, like a cross to bear, that contain the grain of sand that irritates the oyster of your heart that produces the pearl that entirely turns your life around in a way you could never orchestrate yourself.

No way.

Go, try on your jeans and see if they still fit you the way you think they do.

 

 

purge in the inbox and the stream

 

Liberation is the theme today.

I unsubscribed to the emails that I am no longer interested in receiving, and I declared my Facebook stream a positive/feels-good-to-me/resonating zone.

And already cyber space is a much more pleasant place.

You get to decide what enters your personal and psychic real estate boundaries.

Even when you don't decide, that's deciding.

Making it a more conscious choice is a baby step in the direction of taking your power back.

Social media is many things, and one of them is a time and energy suck. Being vigilant about the your requirements is takoing your power back, and showing yourself that you keep your promises to yourself.

Those baby steps do accumulate into the critical mass of a shift in your vibe, which means that you're hanging out in a new place on the emotional scale more and more of the time.

Which means new thoughts are becoming available to you, which means you'll start seeing different people and circumstances showing, even if they have the same faces and addresses.

"How does it feel?" - the most effective metrics in the universe one can apply.

And no one knows but you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It all depends on your point of view

Looking out at life through this window changed my perspective.

I felt alive and invigorated.

There are colors, line and texture here that make my heart sing, not to mention the mountains in the background and the handmade olive oil soap inside the store from which this photo was taken.

Some new joy pullers for me. French decorating accents haven't done it for me in the past, but at this juncture and on this day, they did.

I'm changing.

The place I wake up in, the thoughts I think, the body I currently inhabit, the people I encounter, the food I eat, the music I listen to, it's all changing, right now.

Endless unfamiliarity, and I've never been happier in my life.

Going through this much modification to one's daily round could drive a person batty, but I am reveling in the effects and the results.

I've experienced change from two ends of the spectrum.

One end contained big new bold steps that just didn't feel like they belonged to me.

And the other end contains big new bold steps that feel like my name is engraved on them.

When it's a maybe, or a no, the feel is off, and you might as well pack up and start over or hunker down until things shift.

When it's a Yes!, grab the gusto with everything you've got.

It all depends on your point of view. 

The chocolate caper

A few nights ago, I completely forgot about what happens when I ingest some of my favorite Trader Joe's dark chocolate after, say, 3:00 PM.

Without a shred of misgiving, I put those two squares of heaven in my mouth and enjoyed the heck out of them--at 9:00 PM.

And seven hours later, I was still awake.

A simple case of cause and effect, one that I've proven to myself enough times to know that it just isn't worth the pleasure to endure the accompanying pain and thus established the accompanying guideline.

Granted, the following 18 hours or so weren't the greatest I've ever experienced, but they weren't the worst, either.

That, and my total lack of recall on this particular subject, are what's fascinating to me.

I didn't thrash and bemoan my situation, once I realized what had happened--I just rested in my bed, and thought of a few things that were interesting enough to occupy my brain but not enough to trigger an obsession that made me more alert.

I didn't attempt to do anything other than what was required of me the next day.

I have recently begun a new set of living arrangements under which the guideline had not been previously applied, so perhaps that might explain my temporary memory lapse.

Being human is probably the ultimate culprit.

Apparently, in comparison to all the other endless minutae rolling around in my brain lately, it wasn't as important, and I just forgot.

And now I have yet another experience on which to scaffold a remembering.

No beating myself up for a minor transgression into stupidland.

It simply was, I surrendered as much as I could in the situation, which, now that I'm thinking about it, was remarkable and perhaps the reason behind all of this happening the way it did--and now I move on.

Resistance, thy strategy is futile.

I have to want it, and believe it?

Your desire is strong enough, even amidst all that chronic resistance, you still squeak a dream out now and then. While you're asleep you're not resistant. So what you really want and what you really know can often come about in your dreamscape because you're not in there cutting it off at the knees...You've got desires that you're canceling, desires that you're canceling, desires that you're canceling, and when you stop doing that thing that you do as you've learned about pessimism, then you don't let your dream flourish in the way that it would if you'd just stop doing that thing you do.

You claim you are, but you're not exploring every avenue to make it happen because you're still willing to harbor negative thoughts that keep shooting it in the foot. You want it, but it feels like too big of a price to pay--"I have to get happy too? I have to be optimistic, too? I have to have positive expectation, too? Isn't it enough to just want it? I have to want it, and believe it?"

Yes.

When you argue for your limitations, you get out "there" where the solutions aren't. When you argue for your alignment you get in "here", where the solutions and paths are.

Every big thing that's ever happened was dreamed by someone, and the ones that allowed themselves to dream it even in the absence of "evidence" were the ones who found it.

~Abraham, May 2009

~*~*~

Still willing to harbor negative thoughts.

Still willing to buy into the appropriateness of hip cynicism.

Still willing to jump to conclusions whose validity you haven't examined for decades.

Still willing to give more credence to the past than the present.

Still willing to accept that life is supposed to suck.

Still willing to trust in the effectiveness of doubt.

Still stuck in the life that you really don't want.

Do you see the pattern here, the one with you as the commonality?

I'm a thought chaperone. I can help you with that.

Free delivery. And pick-up of the old stuff.

It's raining cats and dogs and all manner of invertebrates out there at the moment.

A particularly splendid ambiance from which to post here, seeing as it's been awhile.

I've been sorta busy.

I moved.

Across several states.

To be with the love of my life.

The third time around.

We affectionately call it 3.x.

It's only been a few weeks, and it feels like we've been doing this forever.

In a good way.

So there is hope for everyone out there who believes that love has
passed them by.

I am discovering it at age 50, and it rocks.

Prime ingredient for it to show up: being cool with it not showing up.

Loving your life the way it is. Enjoying your friends and how you orchestrate your free time, if not your waking hours in general.

Genuinely appreciating the heck out of as much as possible.

And not focusing on the topic whatsoever. When They say it will show up when you're not looking, They know what They are talking about.

Of course, this advice applies in most areas of desired change in one's life. Get busy being a happy person, and the waves of vibes around you will amass in the upper registers of the emotional scale to such proportions that the universe can't help but start drop-shipping the good stuff to you.

Because you let it in.

It's been hanging out, waiting for the crucial tipping point to be reached.

And viola!

Free delivery. And pick-up of the old stuff. It gets carted away, never to be pondered again.

Well, there might be a few rogue musings bandied about, but once you get a handle on this process, you won't worry about it any more.

And wouldn't that be just about the most amazing thing you can imagine?

I'm a thought chaperone. I can help you with that.

like coins in an empty Altoids tin

Yesterday there was a distinct clamoring going on in my head, a definite yammering of epic proportions.

It almost literally felt and sounded like the rattling of coins being shaken inside an Altoids tin.

The offending objects were thoughts that don’t serve me. Nothing of any import or note, but they were so offensive that they were immediately identified and a spotlight of sorts shown on them for the gremlins that they are.

I was literally bored and disgusted with them and couldn’t understand why they were still hanging around after a moment or two of repeating them in my head.

Of course I know why–I’ve repeated and indulged in that kind of gossipy, mundane, he-said/she-said kind of thought so many times in the decades I’ve been alive that my casting director had no choice but to fling some more my way.

I am thrilled to consider that this shift in my awareness will signal a shift as well in what is available for me to think now. Less and less trash, more and more substance. Baby steps in that direction accumulate to critical mass.

Then later in the day I was considering a situation and felt unease around it and again was brought to awareness of what the heck I was doing.

I waited it out and refocused on something else, and received manifestation this morning of that work. This is visceral evidence of thought as matter moving through me differently, and demonstrating the results.

If there were a machine that could make that kind of xray, it would be astounding for folks to be able to witness their own alignment, or misalignment, and then proceed from there as they saw fit.

I wonder how many would want to know?

Would you?

You'll thank yourself for practicing if you start now

The colors have begun changing. It's fall.

Have you noticed?

Have you spent any time lamenting where the summer went?

Hopefully it wasn't more than ten seconds' worth. That's how long it takes to activate a vibe that follows you around like a newborn duck imprinting on a human being. Very hard to shake off.

How about refocusing on the good stuff to come?

And if you can't think of anything good, how about considering the fact that that strategy does not serve you?

You might not be accustomed to making the best of things,  but you learned how to make the worst of them. Same effort on the other side of the fence.

And the results you get will knock your socks off.

Granted my favorite season is this one, so I get to practice this skill in the winter.

No moaning and groaning going on then, is there, come January 27th or so?

You'll thank yourself for practicing  is you start now.

shake that snowglobe

I'm recuperating from my high school reunion.

Lots of fun and a very late flight back home made for a very dull girl the last few days.

Small price to pay for bliss, however.

And I'm out of hiding now.

Today I handed in my resignation letter, so I can speak freely about moving to Minneapolis next month, the start of a new adventure.

I haven't been this excited since I left The States for a job in Italy way back in another lifetime.

When I compare the two situations, there are many similarities, and some differences.

Both situations came about because of a dream I tenaciously would not let go of. It played in the background of every moment of contrast that reinforced the awareness of what I didn't want, and only became more and more entrenched with every rocket of desire I set off while thinking about the having of it.

There was much moving around in the upper registers of the emotional scale both times that assisted in entrenching the good vibes and pulling the experiences to me sooner rather than later.

And of course, in each circumstance the universe knocked itself out with details and wonderful sernedipity while fulfilling my order. There is no way I could have conjured on my own with my puny imagination what transpired to get me where I went or where I'm going.

I hear my money will be accepted at most retail establishments in the Twin Cities.

My passport won't need a visa that requires sitting in an office every year to get a special stamp for me to live and work there.

And I won't be wondering “Is that all there is?” this time around. At 24 I seriously wondered if life had any more dazzle, any more surprises, and more inspiration left for me once I had attained what I said I had dreamed of for years.

At 50, the prognosis for the future is stellar.

I know there's enough, and there's always more.

Here's to new adventures.

How is yours coming along?

resistance is futile. and not very smart.

 

I'm finding that my body wants me to slow down.

It has some integrating to do.

Major life changes require a different pace, a softening of the demand we put on ourselves.

More naps, a lessening of activities that require attention so our minds can wander and process their end of the deal.

So I sit and meander and process and stare out into space with a mandate to do so.

Like this little guy on the plane in the seat in front of me.

It was probably past his bedtime when he got to his seat, but he made do with what he had.

We played dueling headphone jacks, and lots of peek-a-boo.

He had fun, and so did I.

Resistance is futile. And not very smart.

So let in the allowing. Let in the slow. Let in the fallow for a time.

Soon enough all kinds of new things will be creating themselves and inviting you up for the show. All those desires you've had over the years, they'll be manifesting in ways that your puny human imagination could never dream up on its own.

Thank goodness the how isn't our job. Handle the what, and the universe takes care of the details when we get out of the way.

I'm off to eat some fabulous zucchini chocolate cake.

Resistance is futile.

burrs and slime on the horizon

http://www.geograph.org.uk/

So I’ve been thinking.

Which can be dangerous, for a few reasons.

But ’ve been thinking. This contrast that I’m aware of, this bog of burrs and slime, it might just be a very good thing, an indicator of how things have shifted energetically and that instead of having a set point of overwhelm, doubt or worry on certain things, I’m merely irritated, frustrated and impatient now.

And this irritation is a big change from the worry/doubt/overwhelm vibe. It’s different, and it’s in my awareness so I notice it more, for the moment.

So that’s my new story and I’m sticking to it.

I’ve done the work and I’ve moved.

I’ve chosen a better feeling thought often enough over the last good long while that the law of attraction is bringing me different thoughts now that match the new vibe instead.

It feels different, and pretty soon it will feel normal, and then I’ll move on again.

As for all the blissmongering I’ve done over the past few years, that conscious work has contributed mightily to this shift. And just because I can’t maintain it every single minute doesn’t detract from who I’ve been able to be before, or who I’ll be able to be in the future.

The only way there’s a downside is if I allow myself to get discouraged about being human, and give up. If I choose to cut off the supply of good feeling stuff out of despair, then I lose.

And that ain’t happenin’.

For one thing, it’s not true, this assumption that things won’t get better.

My resistance-ridden ego would like for me to think that way, but I’ve proven to myself that it’s not true.

Falling back on my conditioned, learned, even socially encouraged way of thinking is certainly an option.

But boy, does it suck.

like that

 

http://ow.ly/2hvkP

I look around and take stock of where I'm not.

Hello. When I do that, I miss the opportunity to enjoy what's going on in front of me.

Like the kid who was amazed I knew his name and wasn't too thrilled about it. A few days later, he came back into my classroom to just stand around and hang during passing time until the bell rang.

Like the meltdown I talked my son through stepping away from the edge of ever so deftly.

Like the enraptured joy on the face of a one-year-old's savoring of pretty shiny things on another woman's fingers.

Like the shift in my solar plexus I can feel when I manage a baby step in the direction I want to go from frustration to mere pessimism, causing my casting director to shift everything that's waiting in the wings offstage for me in that direction too.

Like putting together some lime green and fuchsia bracelets that make my tan pop and my inner design goddess happy.

Like dropping yet another load of things that could be better used by others at the Salvation Army.

Like knowing things are going to be amazingly crazy busy and good in a few months and I will look back on this "fallow" time with some wistfulness.

Like that.

I know who to be about it

That's me, alright.

A little blurry, cuz things are moving so fast.

But in a good way.

Looking straight ahead.

Observing, scanning, inhaling, devouring, absorbing, savoring, reveling in.

Appreciating the contrast, that produces a desire, that launches preferences to my cosmic casting director, who stands with his clipboard of people, circumstances and events in the wings, choreographing them all on the stage of my life according to how I choose to feel in any moment.

He's a busy guy these days.

When I remember to work my joy pullers and my resistance toys, I get to new places of "getting it".

When I don't, I feel like crap.

Until I remember again.

So what If things suck for a minute, or a hundred?

I know what to do about it.

Who to be about it.

And that has tons more legs than staying stuck in resentment.

I've noticed.

some days belong to the crisis psycho pirate

I'm not sure what this plant is called, or what that amazing blossom-to-be will eventually be. Those curvy almost tentacle-like tendrils possess shades of the wild thang that eats people in Little Shop of Horrors, but they are quite beautiful at the same time.

We all have that dual personality disorder goin' on in every moment. Just depends which one we choose to activate; consciously or knee-jerk, they show up either way.

Some days the dolphin side takes over, the part of us that remembers that life is supposed to be fun and that play will net us more of what we want than any amount of manipulation or self-denigration will ever produce. Those graceful, gentle creatures handle moving back and forth between two realities with ease and skill. Breathing air has its cool aspects, and breathing water is home. Both work, and options are good.

And some days require allowing the crisis psycho pirate a few drama-filled scenarios to get the pull of resentment and fear out of our systems. Cooler heads may prevail, but a heart that needs to express some rage and frustration will have its day; planning for it saves so much wear and tear on the body/mind.

Ceramic dishes sent spinning into concrete works just fine, as well as screaming inside your car at the top of your lungs, wailing on a pillow or a mattress with a wiffleball bat, or plugging into the music that never fails to pull you into a new head space.

Whatever it takes, you know? 

And if you're anything like me, giving in to the pirate takes some doing.

Aren't I supposed to be all serene and shit?

I'm a thought chaperone.

I don't do that drama thing anymore.

Well, guess what. We're humans still walking on the planet. We need to acknowledge that we experience the gamut of feelings that are in the dictionary, and then let them go. Pretending that they aren't there is so old paradigm, and so doesn't serve anyone in the process.

Perfectionism breathes life into the pirate.

circuitry of happiness

I never thought I'd say this, but....

With the power of my retrained brain, the one whose routing I've been chaperoning for a few years now, I entertained a new thought today.

And the conjuring of it went further along on its neuropathway than it ever has before.

I sent out a message in a bottle that the thought should think about what it would be like to be totally in the moment. Unguarded. Certain of a smooth, flowing, ease-full existence.

And it did.

It went beyond mere suggestion and imagery.

It actually embraced the circuitry of happiness.

Even living as a blissmonger such as I do, I've not been there before. Not like this.

Not able to soar up the emotional scale so high that the glass ceiling I'd built above it melted such that I didn't notice.

As with any shift in perspective, this will take some integrating, some getting used to, some pondering.

For a few days.

And then the newness will wear off, the novelty will fade, and the state will just be normal.

This I can handle.

Inspiration, satisfaction and communication spiraling out of control

 

Franken-bike

It's a vicious circle.

First this horrible thing happens, which leads to this wretched person having this negative reaction, which makes it impossible for that thing to happen, which dominoes into another diabolical level of calamity, which makes the original horrible thing more entrenched, which...

Stop.

Take a deep breath or two.

Yes, vicious circles can have a resigned air about them of the expected, the relentless and, perhaps, even the deserved.

Which is exactly what makes them keep showing up.

Inspiration, satisfaction and communication spiraling out of control--why don't circles like that get initiated more often?

Why do their more brutal brethren seem to target us with such regularity and with such skill?

Delicious circles don't grace our psyches simply because we've been trained to forget what brings them about.

We learn how to accept, value and trust other's preferences before our own.

During our formative years, this inexorable familial, scholastic and religious erasure process is so pervasive and so ubiquitous, we lose sight of the fact that we even have preferences, lest we be judged as “selfish”.

Which is quite fascinating, given the act of our capitulation serves someone else's selfish agenda.

Delicious circles are what start to show up when we relearn to honor our preferences, make decisions based on them, and trust ourselves again because we consistently deliver on our promises, to ourselves and to other people.

None of this need be deportment that provokes civil unrest and general mayhem, contrary to the argument the powers-that-be like to advance in such discussions.

Controlling others from a place of fear of what will happen otherwise doesn't seem to be producing the intended results. In fact, just the opposite occurs. Have you noticed?

Interestingly enough, this practice of being caught up in delicious circles requires the same vigilance, fortitude and effort that maintaining the vicious variety does, only the payoff sustains and enhances the world, rather than diminishes and detracts from it.

May the circle be unbroken.

you gotta wanna

"This mental attitude is our personality and is composed of the thoughts which we have been creating in our own mind; therefore, if we wish a change in conditions all that is necessary is to change our thought; this will in turn change our mental attitude, which will in turn change our personality, which will in turn change the persons, things and conditions, or the experiences with which we meet in life.

It is however no easy matter to change the mental attitude, but by persistent effort may it be accomplished; the mental attitude is patterned after the mental pictures which have been photographed on the brain; if you do not like the pictures, destroy the negatives and create new pictures; this is the art of visualization." ~ Charles Haanel, The Master Key

"Sweeping, definite, gentle, persistent." ~ John Randolph Price

~*~*~

It is no easy matter to change our mental attitude.

Charles knew it way back in 1912.

John knew it in the 80s.

You know it, right this minute.

This minute that likely has some vague, or perhaps very distinct, nagging thought rolling around in the bowling alley of your mind, this thought that keeps showing up and that you keep giving credence to.

You think this thought, even though you might have done some other thinking that arrived at the conclusion that it really didn't serve you to think that thought any more.

You get what your contribution is, on some level, to the undesirable relationships and circumstances in your life, and you genuinely want to do something about that.

You wish that nagging thought would just go away, and it doesn't just go away.

Well, it can't, because you've thought about it and activated it enough that it's going to be around for awhile, just like the cigarette smoke on your clothes and in your hair after you leave the bowling alley.

That's where John's advice comes in.

"Sweeping, definite, gentle, persistent."

That other thinking, the one where you realize that the first thought doesn't serve you and that you want it to leave--it's got to be sweeping, definite, gentle and persistent.

That other thinking has to be of similar weight and proportion and size to what you are training it to take the place of.

Ponder for a moment how many times you have thought the nagging thought.

Given that we think upwards of 60,000 thoughts a day, the actual number of times could be quite staggering.

That's the precedence you're working with here.

You gotta wanna enjoy the freedom from that nagging thought so much that you are willing to put at least as much effort into that other thinking as you have the nagging thought.

It's only fair.

Sweeping, definite, gentle, persistent.

Of course that nagging thought didn't start out to be the gargantuan bugger it is today.

It started out small, very small, and accumulated power a little bit every day.

It relied on the measly influence of negativity to make its way to the top, too.

And you've got a much more effective tool this time around, if you choose to use it.

Positive thought.

Choosing to go this route will give you palpable, tangible evidence that you are making headway, every time you feel the relief that will come when you make the effort.

Relief equals power. Moving up the emotional scale one rung at a time gives you your power back.

And the amount of time necessary to reroute your thinking won't take as long as you've been mired in that nagging thought.

Could be decades we're dealing with there, right?

It will take as long as you decide it will take.

You just have to listen to that small voice in your head that constantly reminds you that there's supposed to be more to life than THIS.

You've just gotta wanna destroy those negatives, rearrange those pixels, regrind the holes in the bowling ball.

You gotta wanna feel the relief, feel good more of the time, feel in charge of your life.

You gotta wanna.

large, dark, slowly lumbering bovine

Whilst driving back to the city last weekend, on a stretch of still-mostly-rural road, we happened upon a meandering group of cattle dangerously near the highway who had discovered that the gate that usually enclosed them was now, well, miraculously not.

A very large, dark, slowly lumbering bovine was well within ten feet of passing automobiles, several of her compatriots close behind her at the moment we crossed paths, animal and human.

Looking through the rear window as long as I could, I envisioned how not pretty that scene could become, and quite soon.

Not unlike the havoc our thoughts can wreak, once the gates of our conscious focus have been compromised.

Thoughts are tricky like that.

We think them, and they seem to take on a life of their own, as if they were the ones running the show.

The locus of control does remain with us however.

It's our choice to allow them to run rampant, willy-nilly, hither and yon, bounding along the downtrodden trail they've enjoyed unbridled access to for decades.

We are equally capable of reigning them in, closing the gate, and requiring some obedience training skills be exercised.

It just seems impossible for us to envision thinking any other way about that thing, or that person, or that situation.

Or nearly so.

Some of us do still have a shred of hope left even after decades of implanting not so good results into our psyches, which makes nearly-impossible much more manageable than strictly-impossible.

When my nearly-impossible cows get loose in the world here in this little slice of heaven I'm simmering in lately, I pull out my thought chaperone tools and apply them liberally to myself until I slide ever so delightfully into, "Oh, it is so done," mode.

I'm beginning to enjoy the palpable sensation of relief so much that I almost look forward to enduring the contrast that brings it about.

Or nearly so.

There is of course the strategy of hanging out in the pasture rather than mulling over whether the gate is going to open or not.

Skip the middle man.

pull ahead and press the help button

I was driving through the Chicago area recently and saw this sign at one of the toll booths.

This is the closest thing to a user manual for modern life that I've ever been able to find.

A few days later I was driving with the aid of a GPS device for the first time.

As someone who could be labeled as geographically challenged if I believed in labels, this experience was truly life-altering. For the first time ever, it was virtually guaranteed that I would make it to my destination (this one in a new-to-me place) and back without getting turned around, wasting time or questioning my ability to reason.

Orientation on this plane of existence takes on radically opposite frames of reference in my head. Maps are simply upside down. If I think I should be going right, I might as well just go left to save myself the hassle of having to turn around and do it anyway five minutes later.

This miraculous gadget could be rescuing my behind on a regular basis, and I marveled at how I hadn't even considered purchasing one of these doohickeys of my own before.

Hmmmmmm. That dismissal, that skepticism--it felt so familiar.

Oh yeah. Like the degree to which people in general resist trusting their own emotions and the vital information that is available from them.

It is so ingrained in this culture to go along to get along that we don't even notice anymore when our desires are ignored, when what would make us happy seems impossible, that it's actually an option to have what we want.

That would just be selfish.

Actually it requires huge amounts of accountability and self-discipline, which often get interpreted as selfishness, but I digress.

I remember a time when I couldn't name the emotion I was having, I'd buried them all so deep in an act of self-preservation, or so I thought.

I remember how difficult it was to relearn to trust myself and my decision-making process. Nothing had turned out for me up until that point, so why should it now?

I remember thinking that it was a waste of time to think about, much less follow, my dreams.

I remember not understanding how I might successfully navigate my day-to-day and my year-to-year.

But I did figure out how to tell what emotion I was having, and why, and what it was telling me. And I did relearn to trust myself to be true to myself  with what was important to me. And I did decide that not following my dreams would mean simply that I had gotten busy dying instead of living.

One of the amazing things about a GPS? It automatically begins to recalculate your route when you change your mind about where you're going.

It doesn't say, "Sorry, you said you were going there, so you're stuck with that decision now."

It objectively points the way to the new destination, no judgments, no second-guessing your motives.

Just like our emotions. If we'd let them.

Go ahead. Pull ahead and press the help button.

the patio

 

The patio.

The perfect place to be reading The Master Key System by Charles F. Haanel.

Another dead white guy with wisdom for me.

Like this:

It is because all the religions, sciences and philosophies with which the world has heretofore been familiar have been based upon the manifestation of this energy instead of the energy itself that the world has been limited to effects, while causes have been ignored or misunderstood. For this reason we have God and the Devil in religion, positive and negative in science, and good and bad in philosophy.

"This energy" being the kind that creates worlds. Yours. Mine.

Thought is energy, and energy is power.

Power, mostly to change your mind.

This law of attraction and manifesting business is pretty much about changing your mind.

You manifest in every moment. Do you like what is showing up? If the answer is no, then find a reason to begin changing your mind a little bit every day.

The reasons are many, but they have this one thing in common: you are doing it for yourself, no one else.

Your reason could be found in religion, or science, or philosophy.

Doesn't matter where. Just find it. It's been waiting for you.

It feels like taking your power back, without making anyone else wrong. There is relief, and a new space to live from.

Like the patio. 

it is so very, very good

So the thing is, being happy doesn't feel anything like I thought it would.

I thought I might be launching somersaults and fireworks and squeals of delight every minute or so.

But I'm not.

It just feels, sort of...normal.

Like the next logical step.

Of course this is happening now.

The ubiquitous sugar high is absent, and in its place--knowing what is, and eagerness for what's next.

There are no places in my body that harbor unease or the desire to hold back.

And it is so very, very good.

some little clue to the meaning of the universe

The physical beauty of the Keshiri was difficult to resist  but Vestara knew she would not be one of those who succumbed to it. She was utterly devoted to the Force, to her studies, to practicing and training and honing her skills until her body quivered with weariness, until she was drenched in sweat, until she crawled into bed and slept the dreamless sleep of the exhausted.

And now this Ship had come, and she did not care about anything else.

Again she felt the cold perusal, and shivered. Ahri's arms tightened about her, mistaking the gesture for physical chill.

You sensed me.

I-I did, she sent back through the Force.

She was being...examined. Appraised.

You seek to become a Sith Master. To harness the power of the dark side.

I...I...

Vestara straightened to her full tall height atop Tikk's back and deliberately banished her childish hesitancy. Never mind that she had never before beheld a spacefaring vessel--never even seen the diagrams and schematics that were purported to rest inside the forbidden hull of the crashed Omen. She was of the Tribe, the daughter of a Sith Saber. She was exceptionally strong in the Force and knew it.

And the Ship--Ship itself, not its pilot, she realized now it had no pilot, not yet--was testing her. She would not shrink before its probity.

I do . I shall. I am Vestara Khai, daughter of a proud heritage. I have what is necessary to command the dark side and bend it to my will. To use it for the good of the Tribe, and the People.

For the good of all Sith, Ship suggested.

She nodded automatically, though even as she did so she realized the vessel couldn't see her.

Except that it could. Or rather, she realized, it could sense her agreement in the Force. She felt it approve and then withdraw. Without the coldness of its presence in her mind, she somehow felt bereft, but she refrained from seeking it out again.

At that moment, as her gaze wandered from Ship to the throng of Sith crowding around it, in that sea of dark robes she saw a pale blond head turn in her direction. It was Lady Rhea, one of the members  of the Sith Circle of Lords, and her blue eyes were fixed upon Vestara. Even from this height, Vestara could see that Lady Rhea's eyes were narrowed, as if she was considering something.

Slowly, Vestara smiled.

Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi: Omen  by Christie Golden, p. 45

~*~*~

'Actually," I told him reluctantly, "I have always agreed with the idea that we have a sin nature. I don't think it looks exactly like the fundamentalists say it does, 'cause I know so many people who do great things, but I do buy the idea we are flawed, that there is something in us that is broken. I think it is easier to do bad things than good things. And there is something in that basic fact, some little clue to the meaning of the universe."

..."Of course, but that really should tell us something about the human condition. We have to be taught to be good. It doesn't come completely natural. In my mind, that's a flaw in the human condition."

Blue Like Jazz, Don Miller

~*~*~

The great thing--no, one of the great things--about being able to look at life through the lens of possibility is the plethora of examples of how that might work that are available all around me, in every moment, that shine in the most unlikely places.

Even books about the dark side.

Even books about the flawed human condition.

What's fascinating about the dark side is that, for the dark side to be attractive at all, someone has to be in a lot of pain for relief to arrive from that sector of the universe. All its promise of power and domination only appeals to those who perceive themselves as powerless and dominated.

I'm guessing that things look good for Vestara to experience initiation into the fold in the story, something she desires and deserves to have. She can participate in the dark side and it doesn't have to affect me or what I desire. Where I'm at on the emotional scale most of the time, our worlds won't overlap or intertwine at all unless we choose to stick our noses in each other's business intellectually, or more importantly, energetically.

And actually I'm inspired by her dedication to go after what she wants. She doesn't hesitate. She rises to the occasion of opportunity like a fully realized female and allows herself to go toward who she's been  becoming.

There's much to admire here, more than what's available to the standard feminine action figure personas that populate the mainstream super hero shows my son watches.

And the notion that we have to be taught how to be good, well, I'm here to perform contaminated belief supply procedures on the layers of unexamined beliefs in that soft underbelly.

Generations of children have been conditioned to slowly but systematically reject who they really are in order to gain very conditional approval from those grown-ups who appear to have things figured out here on the planet.

The result is a huge spiritual backfire, this pounding square pegs to fit into round holes.

That's what is broken in us, once we buy into the idea that we need fixing.

And no one who claims to has much of anything figured out here on the planet that I can see. We keep making silent agreements to continue supporting ideas that don't work, en masse.

That little clue to the meaning of the universe?

Hello.

I knew it wasn't only me

Still, I knew, because of my own feelings, there was something wrong with me, and I knew it wasn't only me. I knew it was everybody. It was like a bacteria or a cancer or a trance. It wasn't on the skin; it was in the soul. It showed itself in loneliness, lust, anger, jealousy, and depression. It had people screwed up bad everywhere you went--at the store, at home, at church; it was ugly and deep. Lots of singers on the radio were singing about it, and cops had jobs because of it. It was as if we were broken, I thought, as if we were never supposed to feel these sticky emotions. It was as if we were cracked, couldn't love right, couldn't feel good things for very long without screwing it all up. We were like gasoline engines running on diesel.I was just a kid so I couldn't put words to it, but every kid feels it...From a very early age our souls are taught there is a comfort, and a discomfort in the world, a good and a bad if you will, a lovely and a frightening. There seemed to me to be too much frightening, and I didn't know why it existed.

~from Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller

Indeed.

Our souls are taught these dark places.

Or rather, our minds are conditioned to believe that these dark places are truths worthy of being attended to, deserving of investment of our time and energy.

Our souls, however, never buy into this crap.

They do not buy into the "truth" of dark places.

They merely continue to hold vigil for other truths becoming more self-evident as time goes by and we get tired of maintaining this charade that's been handed down to us.

This weekend, if you are going to be around people from your past who helped validate those dark places, try something new. When the thoughts you learned to practice and turn into your beliefs start churning around in the ruts of your neuropathways, try this new thought instead:

"It's not my truth in this moment, anymore."

Because it's not.

Give it a try.

It's exactly how the dark "truths" got a foothold in your mind in the first place.

Pick another truth to focus on.

The one your soul knows.

happy happy joy joy

contamination of the belief supply

Our disrespected environment, our edumacation lockstep delivery system, our political stagnation process, our empty religious practices, our fake food product industry, our lack-focused marketing mindset--all of the worst of these aspects of our culture stay in place because of a contamination of the belief supply. We stay asleep collectively under the silent agreements we make when we continue to buy into the power these mirages of civilization have over us.

It's not true.

Start telling a different story that begins gathering new textures of thoughts to you that eventually shift your beliefs over time about what is possible.

That's how it's done.

bliss and a ton of crap

This personal transformation business is fascinating stuff.

Popular culture tends to characterize the process with images of sublime serenity and blissful contemplation.

Anyone who actually engages the process however knows that before, during and after that blissful state arrives, there is a ton of crap to continuously dismantle and unlearn.

Some of that skewed perspective we attribute to ourselves initially came from others, and then we constructed more elaborate endless-loop thinking on top of that fine start.

Reorienting to what is actually true about who we are is much like the painstaking scraping layers of paint from the side of a building or the surface of a piece of furniture.

It's hard work, to the extent to which we buy into it needing to be that way, but makes for a much more hospitable foundation on which to apply the new colors and textures we consciously want.

It means learning new behavior and taking responsibility for it, which humans tend not to do gracefully or willingly, generally putting it off until circumstances are such that we see we have no other choice.

It means no longer being able to stop the blame buck anywhere else but right here for what is showing up in our lives over and over again.

It means sitting with really uncomfortable stuff and realizing that we aren't going to die because of it.

This personal transformation business is fascinating stuff.

Vibrational marketing

Vibrational marketing ala Abraham.

lizard brain, required high and collapse

When the lizard brain kicks in and the resistance slows you down, the only correct response is to push back again and again and again with one failure after another. Sooner or later, the lizard will get bored and give up.

~Seth Godin

Phase Three You've gone through two of the three phases of excitement and now it pays off. You hit pay dirt. Phase Three is where you lay out a plan and roll up your sleeves -- without the high, without the crash, but with the clarity and steady energy that makes things happen.

You won't have that energy unless you collapsed when you were supposed to.

-Barbara Sher

~*~*~

What I absolutely adore about the universe is that there are enough techniques and practices that get invented and floated around over the centuries that can apply to wherever you are in your spiritual/self-help evolution. Someone else has been there before and has scattered the bread crumb wisdom you can glean from their experience.

Seth, I love you to death, I really do, but when you describe pushing back with failure as "the only correct response" to make things happen, I agree to a point, but something is missing.

Same for you, Barb. Your work has made a huge difference in my life as well, but a high automatically followed by a collapse as required meandering to bringing ideas to life? There's something missing there too.

What I've come to count on in my process of emerging from merely permission existing to full out permission living is that there are always rogue, errant and woefully inaccurate beliefs underlying my inability to shift my thinking, which is what keeps doubts and fears in place and new ideas from being allowed their due quicker than they usually get access at Chez Today.

I would surmise that Seth has supreme unshakable confidence in his ideas and in his ability to navigate the world with them successfully, hence his technique works for him. He processed and discarded the pesky beliefs early in the game that might have kept him caught up in the permission existing that he so eloquently bashes and tweaks and prods every day. The education, publishing and marketing worlds are rampant with those beliefs, and we need his shining light of other-options-are-available.

Barbara engages resistance with everything she has, and her techniques embody the powerful tools that humor and accepting what is can be. But the repertoire of effective mechanisms to move away from existing and into living is much broader than to simply wait out the resistance that will definitely come up because the beliefs that trigger them haven't been examined and approved with a #5 sticker.

When we opt in to permission (ours) living, we choose not to be limited by beliefs that no longer serve us. We say yes to living and loving and playing and working in the manner that is right for us, criteria that have nothing to do with meeting anyone else's approval.

This is not anarchy. This is not blatant disregard of other people's feelings.

This is maintaining healthy boundaries, something this culture does a pretty good job of ignoring in its knowledge transmission to its populace through education, religion and other institutionalized thinking.

The folks who require us to get their approval don't know what healthy boundaries are because of this conditioning, and operate from the totally selfish perspective that they might accuse us of should we dare to live the way that makes sense to us.

And round and round it goes.

Resistance thrives on that churning, have you noticed?

Lizard brain too. Fight or flight kicks in, and away we go.

Boredom and collapse might indeed be what the doctor ordered: boredom with belief transmission that serves a select few, and the subsequent collapse of that belief system upon recognition of it by everyone else.

While that revolution takes place and builds momentum, we can be discovering our tribes, supporting our linchpins, and humoring at our resistance.

Like Seth and Barb said.

But get that #5 sticker from yourself.

my god, she found it

Depression is not only a result of inner punishment we inflict on ourselves for daring to think of inner freedom. It is also the result of despair, born of the inner knowledge of disloyalty to self, and waste of one's self and one's real assets over a lifetime of capitulation to inner tyranny. Fortunately as I shall explain when I discuss compassion, if the battle is engaged and sustained, spontaneity often wins out, because the great proclivity of most human beings is toward healthy growth, in the service of taking ourselves, our needs, our assets and our real hopes and desires seriously.

Unfortunately, this is often not evident because we suffer from the pressures of an impossible cultural value system of which both we and our parents are victims.

The combination of inner and outer pressures makes extrication from this vice extremely painful and difficult and requires considerable motivation.

...The struggle for a compassionate life includes nonjudgmental acceptance of all aspects of self, regardless of, and usually as a stand against, familiar and cultural value systems that are designed to obliterate pieces of ourselves. Unless we know and fight for our sacred right to be human, we invariably find that at least in some measure we live in a state of inner terror. Unfortunately, many of us have been terrorized for so long and so effectively that we no longer know what constitutes being human.

Compassion and Self-Hate: Am Alternative to Despair by Theodore Rubin

I found these quotes the other day in an old notebook from 2001.

It was one of the first references I had seen made by someone in a culturally sanctioned healing profession that described exactly what it felt like inside my body to be feeling what I was feeling, and why I was feeling that way, and what I could do about it, that made sense.

There's also a journal entry near this excerpt:

"So an ongoing plan to beat this bogus self-loathing and get on with why I am on this earth. I was talking to K. and couldn't quite articulate what keeps me from this. What came up was not giving myself permission which is a round about way of getting to the point. Anyway. Bombarding my psyche with affirmations I guess would be good to continue. Although that doesn't seem to have been very effective thus far. Why don't I think that I am worthy of good things? Is my upbringing devoid of approval so encompassing that I am unable to rise above it? It doesn't make any sense. I am capable, I have things to contribute to the world, so what's the hold up?

Don't know."

~*~*~

And another:

"Lots of old patterns reigniting, lots of learning, I hope. One, that I am ambivalent about wanting to be wanted or wanting to be loved; I'd prefer the latter but the former is so ingrained, it's amazing how automatic the reflexes are, immediate: "Why doesn't he want me?" and "Why aren't I good enough?" instead of "What kind of man is he," and "Would he be good for me?"

But I am learning. I have no idea what I'm replacing old patterns with, but I didn't know what I was doing when they were first created either...

This time I could step outside myself at times to catch a glimpse of what I was doing, what I was choosing to make happen. At one point I remember thinking, I am choosing to be this blissed out, why couldn't I choose that all the time, and not based on the opinion of someone else? What would that be like? What positions would I need to get off of? Or not? What negative energy zappers could I let go of?"

~*~*~

This version of me from nine years ago, I so appreciate her hanging in there and not giving up on figuring out the why and how to change what I was living in my head.

She made this amazing life that I'm living now, outside of my head, possible.

She kept looking for clues, for people, for techniques, for bodies of thought, for practices, for something that made sense of the inner tyranny, and the equally tenacious knowing that there was more to life than waking up in the clutches of it every day.

The knowing wouldn't allow her to give up.

And she found what she was looking for.

My god, she found it.

Peace of mind. Contentment. Knowing, on a cellular level.

The keys to that kingdom are different for everyone, but they all hang from the same ring.

Have you claimed yours yet?

permission living. yours. opt in.

Four years ago this week, I embarked upon a potentially pivotal phase of my life in a relationship that I thought at the time was the be-all and end-all of relationships.

Not so much.

The person that I was back then learned quite a bit from that experience and has moved on to morph through probably, I don't know, at least seven or eight personal transformations since then.

If I had stayed in that relationship, I would have been fully engaged in permission existing.

Other people's permission.

And merely existing. 

I opted out, because I knew that wasn't possible anymore, even back then.

Instead, I was heading for permission living.

Mine.

I opted in, finally.

I crossed that line in my head, the one that holds us back from being who we really are.

I said, "Yes," instead of "Maybe".

Epiphanies erupted.

Shackles fell away.

It was quite the revelation, really.

Scary, yes. Angst-ridden, yes. We humans love to torture ourselves with shift remorse as well as buyer's remorse.

This permission to be who we are, in our skins, that we dream about doing someday, we regain it in every moment, until it builds up to critical mass and becomes a platform from which to operate rather than the tenuous scaffolding it must start out as.

I celebrate my scaffolding and the angst, because it got me to the glorious knowing place I'm in right now.

No way around that process.

Opting out of permission existing.

Theirs.

And opting in to permission living.

Yours.

Click that button.

close encounters of the important kind

The 30th anniversary edition of Close Encounters of the Third Kind showed up in my dvd player this weekend. A true testament to Mr. Spielberg's storytelling powers, my son was compelled to continue watching after the first few minutes in spite of his Aspie nature to resist all things new and unpredictable.

With two dvds of special feature material in addition to the movie itself, there were interviews galore of cast and crew members reminiscing about their amazing experience with the phenomenon that became this movie. I especially enjoyed the perceptions and impressions of the now 30-something Cary, who played the painfully cute three-year-old Barry who disappeared through the kitchen doggie door. The stories about the process Steven went through to elicit the responses that resulted in the facial expressions in that little boy are truly heartwarming. No child actor was harmed in the making of that film.

Whether one believes in ufos or not, this film embraces many levels of belief and magic and possibility, especially how certain notions just will not let us go. Richard Dreyfuss's character, Roy, experiences a close encounter and is subsequently consumed with figuring out what this thing means, because he knows "it's important." 

It struck me while I was watching that those little voices in our heads, the ones that call us back to our dreams when we'd really rather be living our "normal" lives, are exactly that insistent and that important. An idea or project or relationship or cause that we launched in our minds decades ago or just last week awaits becoming real on this plane too.

Sometimes it waits patiently. Sometimes it can get downright clamorous in order to get our attention focused on it again rather than the television, or the kids, or the thing at work, or the distraction of the hour.

This thing that needs to be expressed will not be denied.

It might feel like a burden, some insufferable albatross around our necks, this thing that is unshakable.

We might try to drown it out with various substances or activities of choice, becoming numb to it and to the rest of life.

We might try to figure out a safe way to allow it to come to fruition and not screw up the supposed order we've orchestrated in our day-to-day.

We might insist that we know better than it does.

But deep down we know that's a lie.

Deep down we know that the folks who manage somehow to find their way to befriending their nagging dream are miracle workers. Sometimes we call them wack-jobs or crazy people, rolling our eyes at their deviation from the silent agreement this culture requires of us to slog through our days doing what we "should", what's "right", what's expected.

What we didn't expect was that who we really are would get lost somewhere along the way.

And then, there we are, dealing with that little voice again saying, "Go on. Find out. It's important."

At one point Roy is asked by the lead ufo scientist why he risked life and limb to be there where the action is, what it is he wants. "I just want to know that it's really happening."

Go on. Find out.

It's important.

crack me open 1.1

So rockin' this mantra thing has been quite a ride lately.

In case you missed the 1.0 original post, here's a recap on the mantra: "Crack me open, universe. I'm making room for what doesn't serve me to be washed away; take over that vacated space with what does, please."

It's been humbling and ecstatic and rough and sublime, all at the same time.

Sort of like life is anyway, but with a purpose, a direction, an intention, a reason for the commotion, and a framework in which that commotion makes sense.

Which is more than I can say for the first four decades of my life.

Lots of commotion, not much purpose.

Well, that's not true.

If it weren't for all that previous commotion and the preferences it triggered in me, then this stretch of the journey wouldn't be the satisfying culmination that it is.

It's never too late. Ever.

For anything.

It's hard to believe that though, in the throes of seemingly directionless commotion.

I didn't either, at the time.

But part of me did, and never gave in to the confusion.

I didn't buy that it was supposed to define my life.

Nope, didn't ever totally buy into that concept.

And now here I am, veritably basking in a harvest of peace of mind that just won't quit.

That's not to say that there aren't periods of time in my days where frustration, irritation, clenching and gnashing take up residence on occasion.

But when they do, I know they are temporary placeholders.

On a cellular level, I know this.

Just like I knew back then that there had to be something more to life than a daily slog through hell.

Now, within a relatively short length of time of liberally dosing an apparently negative situation with a perspective borne from sporting new lenses from which to see, I'm free to choose differently.

Didn't have that option available before. I knew it was there, but my old lenses didn't make it available.

Choosing differently, thousands of times, instead of choosing the same, thousands of times.

Eventually it leads to basking.

I am a thought chaperone. I teach people why and how to get better at owning which pathways their 60,000 thoughts a day travel.  

Which beats the hell out of the daily slog.

zero grams of high fructose corn syrup

About this time 24 years ago, I was a convalescent, flat on my back.

I was recuperating from plastic surgery following a motorcycle accident in which it appeared a ghost melon ball utensil had scooped about that much flesh out of my lower left leg, just above the ankle.

The surgery was not cosmetic. It would allow me to continue walking on the planet, since the tissue wasn't growing back on its own from said melon ball scoop.

All of this occurred in Italian, on the boot-shaped peninsula where I was living a few lifetimes ago. The surgery was beautifully performed by a medical professional trained in the U.S., and my convalescing was beautifully orchestrated by several nuns from various places around the world, most of whom spoke no English but cooked up some awesome grub and changed bed linens like nobody's business.

One in particular fairly bubbled over with enthusiasm for the service she had been given the opportunity to offer; I think she was from Poland, and I remember looking forward to her whistling, her very wrinkled face and her focused intention on my healing. I always felt better when her shift came around, even though we couldn't communicate with the spoken word.

During that time I was at a crossroads in my young life, figuring out what might come next.

I knew that it would entail going back to The States, but where, and doing what? I had no idea.

One evening in the middle of recuperating from the surgery, I started making lists of what needed to get done in order for me to fly back across the pond when my ticket said I was, and what it might look like when I got to where I was going. A sugar high of desire took over and I couldn't sleep, I was so jazzed about the process. List after list after list was compiled and fawned over. That state lasted for several days, and while it probably helped propel me from my hospital bed back into real life a little sooner than I might have otherwise, it didn't really serve me.

That memory popped into my head last night as I was pondering yet another crossroads in my life, nigh these 24 years later. And it occurred to me that the kind of desire that I've come to label as the sugar high kind just wasn't a part of the picture this time.

You might be asking yourself, what exactly is a sugar high desire?

It's something or someone that feels like a dream come true, but really can't be yet because you haven't lined up with believing you can have it. And you don't want to see that because the sugar running in your system feels so much better than the numbness that was probably there before, which is a prerequisite to the sugar high happening in the first place.

It feels like rocket fuel in your veins. At some point the sugar inevitably burns off and the ungroundedness of the situation becomes woefully apparent, because you couldn't see it until that moment, since you were busy enjoying the sugar high.

A sugar high is a great improvement from numbness, and is part of the process of recovering how to feel, for those of us who grew up stuffing our emotions until we didn't know how we felt about anything. But some of us get stuck there, experiencing safety in faux emotion, and we don't move on to life with the real thing.

We don't move on to the knowing-I-deserve-those-dreams part.

Somehow I've learned to recognize the sugar high for what it is, and I continue to practice saying, "No, thanks," to circumstances that feel that way and pursue situations that still feel authentic after meeting the no-sugar-high criteria.

After a lot of hard work and believing I deserve my dreams, I now know that I do. This place I'm in now, several decades later, feels authentic.

Grounded.

Real.

There is no corn syrup on the label.

Not only do I know that I deserve what I want, I know that not allowing myself to have that--playing small--serves no one, least of all myself.

Everyone around me benefits from my knowing what I deserve, and my acting from that place. The ripple effect across however many degrees of separation there are between you and me is astounding.

You prove this to yourself every time someone on the street or in a store simply smiles at you, perhaps for no reason.

Feels pretty darn good, doesn't it?

Imagine a world where maybe even thirty percent of us have remembered how to allow ourselves to live the kinds of lives that make our hearts sing.

The ripple effect from that tsunami of bliss would feel pretty darn good, too.

Government-sanctioned policies would topple from their own overweight.

Citizens would create effective, empowering communities and services to take their place.

People might not ever learn what a sugar high feels like, because they wouldn't learn to stuff their pain.

Can you imagine a world like that?

Can you imagine your world like that?

I can.

Zero grams of high fructose corn syrup.

Tuesday afternoons make a big difference

I turned 50 recently.

More frequent AARP mailings are testimony to that fact.

What genuinely marks the occasion for me however is the profoundly pervasive feeling of anticipation and wonder and awe at just how incredible being alive on the planet can be.

When I turned forty, I felt like my life had really begun, finally. I started making choices that reflected who I wanted to be and where I wanted to go. Ushering in this newest decade, the bar has been raised and the possibilities fully engaged. The dreams that I dreamed for myself and kept alive, experienced as hopes and wishes, are part of my reality now. I'm proving to myself on yet another level what focus and intention bring about when we allow them to.

The subterranean work that went into that effort was sizable. Fists were pounded on table tops, and groans of frustration were set free into the atmosphere plenty of times. There is no way around the investment of time and energy and committing to a process that in the beginning seems nebulous and inchoate at best, unfathomable on the worst days.

But really, what else have you got goin' on a Tuesday afternoon that's worthy of your attention?

Sometimes that's what it all comes down to.

Crossing that line in your head, moment by occasionally endless moment, til you've got thirty or forty or fifty candles lit up in front of you.

Tuesday afternoons make a big difference.

crack me open

I've been using this mantra lately--"Crack me open, universe."

Putting my energy into not pushing-against is what made this phrase hop into my head.

It's a version of let go and let god, I suppose.

I've wanted to get to some new awarenesses, new emotional set points, new platforms from which to create. You know, have something different in my experience than what I've usually gotten.

The old ones, well, I've out-grown them to the point of being bored with them. And they are so tedious.

There's another phrase that people use in this situation--"Be careful what you wish for."

The beliefs you hold around what you wish for are what color the version that shows up, not what you wish for. If you don't believe you're worthy of it, or that you don't deserve it, or that someone else will go without if you get what you want, then you do indeed need to be careful.

This crack-me-open strategy apparently went beyond all that. And I've not been disappointed in what the universe has arranged for my energetic entertainment.

Notions I've practiced over decades are coming up for serious review, and I'm experiencing shifts in ways that I wouldn't have been able to conjure on my own mortal time.

The process continues, and my life will most likely be unrecognizable to me.

And that's the whole idea. 

I'll leave the bread crumbs out for you

Thank you, Irreverand Diva Carla for supplying me with this most excellent resource--an interview from NPR with Rick Hanson, the co-author of Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, and Wisdom. I've only been listening to the download for 20 minutes or so and am already pleased as punch about the work this man and his colleague have been doing to explain the link between the bread crumbs that wisdom traditions have been leaving for us for millennia, and what happens in our physical bodies when we follow those bread crumbs.

Evidence. It's not necessary for everyone. Some people arrive at this kind of information without fanfare and without angst. It just is.

Some people need to hear what qualifies as "proof" many, many times over before it sounds "real".

Maybe this material will serve that function for you.

And when you're ready to do something about it, when you've crossed that line in your head and heart, contact your neighborhood Thought Chaperone for some expert guidance on how to finally pull it off.

I'll leave the bread crumbs out for you.

IgniteDetroit #1 @Blissmonger

I had the distinct privilege of speaking at the first IgniteDetroit experience in 2010. My talk focused on my being laid off the previous year, and how my distinctive point of view made it possible for me to embrace it as an opportunity rather than a tragedy, something all good blissmongers know how to do. Of course that all ties in to being connected and committed to ourselves first so great relationships and other awesome stuff can come our way. Enjoy.

 

An Unnumbered Grouping of Days of Resistance Toys

If you aren't yet familiar (gasp!) with what Resistance Toys are, enlightenment awaits.

Go ahead, we'll wait until you get back.

~*~*~

Given my dislike of even a vague directive to conform to a list of objectives, I am launching the 'An Unnumbered Grouping of Days of Resistance Toys" campaign.

When I feel like it and when I am inspired with an idea, which is happening fast and furiously these days--hence the campaign--I will be posting a new Resistance Toy that has been created by me and perhaps road tested by other blissmongering types who like that sort of thing.

To celebrate creativity.

To have a ton of fun.

To crack myself up.

And to inspire you to create your own. Once you get the hang of it, Resistance Toys are everywhere, just waiting to lend their transformative talents to your life-enhancement efforts.

I'd love to post images of what you create too, if you are so inspired to send them, or add a link to their existence on the web to a comment below (this does NOT mean you, scum-sucking spam bottom-dwellers).

To get things started, here is a reprise of the one that jump-started this whole wacked thing in the first place:

Intrigued by what resistance toys can do for you? Check out the e-book here.

And if you are drawn to work/play on those pesky beliefs that dredge up the efficacy of Resistance Toys on a 'go-deep" level, contact me.