Self-talk and The Sleeping Giantess

Just thinking.............again.
One of my mentors was talking on BlogTalkRadio this morning. And of course, you know me,my thoughts got wildly stirred up. She was giving her views on self-talk. She called it telling ourself "stories."

It got me to thinking.

Our self-talk is a two edged sword. It can either make us or break us.

Yap. Yap. Yap, we have a dozen generations of sneaky little voices inside of us that literally run our life. To be sure, they literally save our life, and along with it they usually ruin a lot of good stuff too. Pop culture calls this ancient cast of orators our "self-talk". But it is broader and deeper than that; and it endlessly goes on and on. Very seldom do we debate it, very seldom do we correct it, very seldom do we even hear it.

Really, now. We are so accustomed to the voices inside of us chirping, admonishing, warning, encouraging, praising and spooking their way through our day that we are totally unaware of them. Is that creepy or what!?

It's creepy.

But who cares if we don't hear them? I like meeting them! I like adding them to my list of people who are self aware.  Seriously.

I care, and I started caring the day I got out of High School. I was given a set of books by my dear ol' Dad and started my voyage inside my head. I started to hear the workings of my own head. And it wasn't long before I began to realize that the thoughts that came out of my skull weren't always that productive.

In college and ever since I made the independent investigation of psychology and religion my main preoccupation. I have never been a television or movie watcher, nor have I been a reader of non-fiction or the Classics; I spent an hour or more almost every day reading consciousness raising books and listening to "higher awareness" tapes. That was 40 years ago and I haven't stopped reading, listening and growing since. And I became acquainted with a lot of the folks in my head. And because of my tenacity to stick to the journey I believe I am way ahead of the game of life because of who I listen to and show gratitude toward, and who I argue with.

It is possible for anybody to do this. The key to the whole process is that it can't be done on a mountain top in a blissful meditation; it has to be done with input from other human beings, the kind of humans who have been where you're at now (wherever that is) and learned how to listen, learn and grow.

Whhhhew, heady process indeed!

The process of learning is exciting. And the process reaps incredible rewards. Hearing our inner voices is crucial to creating a decent, uselfull life.

Reading a lot of self-improvement books and attending a lot of good growth groups has the marvelous, almost magical power to develop the most important skill in the world, which is the skill of hearing our own inner voices.

There are too many people in the world who are self "unaware,"and too many who are under-achieving, under-employed, under-nourished, and under-expressed because they are being led by unheard self-defeating voices. Too many people are dying with fabulous potentials buried inside of them because they were "too busy" to make self-awareness a top priority ....

You have just met someone who for the past 40 years has made it hers. That would be me. Nuri! And I would love to be part of your inner voice explorations!

So ......... Your homework today and the rest of the week, if you should accept it,  is to google "self-awareness" and "conscious-raising" and spend an hour or so each day reading and thinking about what's going on secretly inside of you. Go beyond the "I hate my x-lover" rants. Or the "I want more Chocolate" confessions. Get to the nitty gritty under that stuff. The kind of stuff that says over and over again that your ideas are stupid, your house is a mess, your belly is too fat, you should be more organized, that you are a mess. Give these voices some faces. Watch their mouths in particular. Listen to voices that bury you in excuses; or blame, shame, sadness, anger, pride, joy or fear. Put faces on these various voices. And of course listen to your inner debates. Listen to the voices that insist that you're a victim, like it's your own fault. Listen to all the inner enemies that have you so confused it's no wonder you are an under-achiever, underemployed, under-loved, under motivated, or whatever less-than role you are stuck in.

And post your own personal comment on what you think of this exercise.

It's got me going good today!

I'll tell it like it is! I exist for helping struggling women get their flipping act together! Too many dear, creative, warm, sensitive, ambitious women are out there who are angry, sullen, depressed and feel totally defeated by this economy. I know the feeling! Believe me I do! I went through that low period several times in my life. One was right after I dropped out of University of Minn because family and financial and dating problems drove me over the edge and I couldn't find a job other than bar waitress, and I was never even a drinker. I didn't know one drink from another, and I was just 21. It was the pits. Another time was 13 years later during my separation and divorce from my high school sweetheart who is the father of my 2 precious children. It was in the late '70s and early 80's. That period of depression lasted about 8 years. I was homicidal and suicidal for the first 4 of them. I drank Kahlua and milk every morning; I smoked a pack of cigs a day. I ate shit and nearly died. I drank soft drinks too. But I recovered. Quite nicely in fact. 

For that matter, I am a totally jazzed up woman, all juiced up on natural living and helping other women do something similar, as long as it's creative, positive, sex, durg and addiction free! Zero tolerance for "substance" use and addictions. I am totally against addictions of any kind, and as far as the list of addictions in this world go, I know my stuff. I am not a psychologist, but I have done an enormous amount of reading and I hate to have to break the news to you gals, but anything anything, anything can be used as a drug. Anything you use, think, say or do can be used to mood and mind alter" and turned into a sick silent addiction (or a noisy one, if it's coming from your mouth.) Bla, bla, bla.

 

My recovery is fabulous. I am so jazzed up about the opportunities that exist today for women who want to do something other than live off of welfare, unemployment, disability and food stamps. 

Women have soooo much value hidden down inside of them. Women have been exploited, tricked and held down for so many centuries, and we are so priviliged to be lining in a decade where there are fabulous opportunities to use our hands, our brains and our inspirations to create things and 

wonderful and profitable with their and energy and their love, outside of multi-level-marketing or flipping burgers at BergerQueen, or Junk In the Box. Real women can't live on that sort of thing! That isn't living! That kind of "live" just sucks the wind right out of your sails. 

Never give up on your health.

Never give up on your health.

What is good health anyway?

Lunch Adventures

My lunch can make me or break me. Today my lunch has to make me. 


My lunch saga in six parts ... Can you top this?


I am not well today which is why I made myself a very early, healthy lunch. Today I had lunch at 9 AM. I was really dragging, and even kind of shaky. Sort of like a big ugly hang-over although I haven't had alcohol for a whole lot of years. I had a weird day yesterday.Totally screwy. And screwy weird days can often act just like a drug. 


First of all I will explain something: I like feng sui; I can't seem to get enough of it. I also like my farm; I rarely want to leave it. I love my life-style and I love my peace. But, uh, I broke my "reclusive" period in which I had been alone for a week ripping my closets and storage boxes apart and making a major mess of things and I decided to get away and visit a friend.


This friend, on this particular occasion, was not the right friend to break my fast with. Her house and yard situation is even more busy and cluttered than mine has been lately. On top of that, she talks even more than I do. She drinks coffee all day and I never drink coffee unless I am visiting her. Go figure. Like visiting her is not a big enough drug I go and add coffee to it. Three cups of it as a matter of fact. Then I went out in her yard which was chuck-a-buck with Scotch Broom (a plant known to make people stop breathing, choke up and die;) so I had a blast of my asthma inhaler which I haven't had to use but once the last four months. 


By the time I got behind the wheel to drive my wasted self home I felt a bit like being drunk. Really freaky drug buzzed. Talking really fast and moving rather quickly and jumpy. I have never had a traffic accident, not even a simple traffic ticket so I wasn't worried about that, but maybe I should have been just for maturity sake anyway. Gratefully it was a good ride home, traffic was light, it was 7 PM. 


I ate a plate of spaghetti just before leaving her house; what is this! I am a fresh vegetable freak, I don't do pasta. 


Well, I got home just fine, hopped into bed, watched a movie on my laptop and fell asleep. Woke up at 5 AM and felt like dog poo. In fact I felt so awful I didn't have the clarity or gumption to make breakfast. The only thing that brightened my spirit was the thought of going outdoors and seeing my garden and looking at the sky; those of you who have gardens know that kind of early morning thrill, but lo, this morning the thrill didn't last long. I found a hundred slugs eating away at my collard greens, my lettuce and peas. Ohhhh ughhhhh! 


A stomach wrenching hour of killing slugs. Another thing I don't do is killing! I have feelings about that sort of thing. So I crumbled. I sort of crawled up the steps to my RV and made an avacado/onion sandwich and went back to bed. The avacado was the wrong choice because it felt like cold dead slugs in my mouth. That was an hour ago. I am now back to the land of the living. Sort of. Avocado, onion and a nap will do it every time. Especially if it's on a slice of sprouted grain sourdough spelt bread. 


Your homework today is this. Think back to one of your ugly days and write a short story about it and then send it to 5 friends and tell them to do the same and then they will receive 5 million .... bla bla bla. 


And no matter what, smile, just a bit anyway. 
After all, this is the only life we've got! 
And thank Goodness, things aren't any worse!

Navigating Loss and Disappointment

Haven't really cried for the past 10 years. What's up with that? Too much going on I guess, too much inspiration, too much hope, too much curiosity, adventure, meditation and listening to birds sing. Sigh, sigh, sigh. But as life in my world is just as real as most women's worlds I have had a handful of losses which I haven't taken the time to grieve. I mean really grieve. My reason being that I don't like grieving alone. I used to do that. Could only cry in secret. Then I discovered the miracle and magic of crying in public. Oooooh, me oh my! It all started out with my first encounter with the T word ... THERAPY... ouch, did I just say that? Yes, I did. Did it ouch me? No it didn't. I'm just afraid that it may have ouched some of you! Seems that forEVER there has been a real nastiness around the idea of therapy. As for me I heart therapy. I love therapy. I adore therapy. Therapy makes my skin glow. My hair shine. My heart soar. My tears flow. And my tears make the flowers of my heart bloom and multiply! But for the past 10 years I have left out the tear factor. I kept too busy to cry. 

Last night I cried. I got to thinking one more time about my daughter. I love my daughter. I love my son. My son has been more complicated than my daughter; he keeps it real. My daughter is the opposite, keeps it simple, short and sweet. It's like having a friend who doesn't want you to know her and she doesn't want to know you. I don't know how to deal with that, have always had a huge problem with that, did my darndest  for decades to cope, deal, reason, rationalize, fret, fuss and cry over that. But for the past 10 years no more tears. No more feeling much of anything. Life went on all around me while feelings gradually stopped inside of me. It was okay. I accomplished nice things. I learned nice things, I earned nice things. I said nice things. I did nice things. I gave nice things. I became intensely passionate about bad things; not angry, not sorrowful, not happy, just pleasant or firmly passionate.  No real emotional feelings inside of me. Well, last night I cried. 

Now, don't get me wrong. I do not regret ten years of not feeling things inside of me. I already had a few decades of learning how to let my feelings out, be fully alive, feel what's really inside...deep down in. I suppose you could accurately say that I sort of got tired of it and slowly I shut down for 10 years and got some other stuff down. Hey, I put my extra energy and time to good use! I learned a lot about a lot of good stuff. I grew a lot. I shared a lot. I helped a lot. I experienced passion for "worthy causes" without coming unglued! I spoke out spontaneously about issues of social injustice, destructive discrimination, toxic attitudes, toxic agricultural practices, toxic healing practices, toxic educational system, toxic air, water and art without feeling anger or breaking down into tears. I discovered the difference between being a loose cannon, hot-head vs being a real agent for change. I became more effective advocate for practical education, health and financial empowerment of women.  I slipped into the role of strong, sensible big sister, mother, aunt, coach and mentor. Well,  last night I cried. 

I cried like I wanted to die. Like there was no pain in the world greater than mine. Like nothing in the world could ever restore me to happiness, wholeness and wellness. I cried all night and half the morning. 

Then I went outside to tend my garden. That was nice. Half my arugula lettuce and turnip greens were eaten up by bugs. Or so I thought at first. But they weren't bugs. They were slippery, slimy little slugs. So I had to get a cup of salt water and hot sauce and a spoon and sprinkle the hungry little things to death. I mean, not a pleasant thing to do. But I couldn't think of anything else to do. I eat my vegetables. I don't buy them from stores in the summer; I grow them. I share them with people, not slugs. The 40 acres  that I am surrounded by have plenty of leaves and grasses for them to feed on, why eat my vegetables? 

Well, intentionally killing things is just not my thing. It made a pretty strong mark on my psyche. Just the spectacle of the whole thing! Errrrr upppp. Ugh! Well, I couldn't eat lunch. I couldn't eat my afternoon snack. I could however do something useful so I went to the Food Bank and gathered a bunch of stuff to distribute to the "Crossing" (a wonderful place of ministry to the community.)  I dragged the bags of food in, took me 6 trips, in and out, while Bible study was going on... ( I can't rant enough about how enormously I hate Bible study groups!!! But this one was talking about guess what? You guessed it: About people who don't express their feelings, so I just had to sit down and listen. I got reminded that there is a great magical loving spirit surrounding us all that can help us reason things out and really feel loved deep down inside if we let it all hang out and call on the spirit to vibe in our behalf. I had forgotten that for the past 10 years. Seems  like a reasonable thing to do at this point. I think I'll try it for awhile. 

Thanks, I feel much better now. . 

In or Out?

In or Out? Mentors, Life Coaches, Teachers, Community leaders and other professionals ....
people who get paid to "help" people .....

This is not the same world as it was a year ago! We can't take this lightly just because we still have our own careers and our regular paychecks, or our pensions or whatever.....

If we're going to be any help at all to the strugglers of the world we've got to be out in the trenches. Got to feel it in your heart and really understand what the economic downturn has done to people, especially to single women and their shifting roles as workers, providers of services, nurturing,  nourishment, encouragement and other important resources for family and community.

Easy homework for those with regular paychecks: 
Get out there on week-ends to the world of garage sales and second hand stores, shop for 99 cent fashions, see what you find. Strike up a conversation with the woman next to you, ask for shopping advice, ask how the economy has effected her and her friends, parents and her kids. Listen. Above all listen from the center of your heart. Make bargain hunting, asking questions and listening to amazing "non-professional" women your mission every week-end for a few months until your idea of spending and recreation changes within you. Then write a letter telling the world how the experience has changed your outward expressions of assistance and advice. Thanks. Sincerely and truly! I love you. And I want to hear from you! Nuri

Who Cares Anyway?

There is so much to care about it makes my head swim. 

Stuff happens when you're busy doing somethin' else. 

Somebody used our property for a dump long before we took over managing the grounds! 

This is my friend, her truck and her helper hauling a little bit of rust away. 

 I swear I have to cut down on the crap I stumble over every day and the big load of things I care about. A few years ago (actually 30 of them) I got interested in the subject of enabling. I wanted to understand all the ways I was enabling addictive personalities in my family. Well, that information got me into a whole lot of trouble, let me assure you! If you want to lead a more intensely complicated life for awhile just get serious about studying (or re-studying, or refreshing your memory on) the interesting subject of enabling! Wow. Enough to make a grown woman curl up and cry! Be forewarned all you who care about life ..... learning about enabling gives a whole new meaning to Care Management. Managing what we personally do with our "care instincts" is a bugger. A real fat complicated challenge. And before we can fulfill our missions in life it would be a very good idea to get the enabling thing straight! Enabling is a given in life. There is no question whether or not we are enablers. We are all incredible walking, talking, breathing, eating, sweating, pooping enablers plain and simple. It goes with the nature of the beast. We are, therefore we enable. The question of enablement is where, when and how we choose to do this enablement thing. And once we get that down to an art and a science the more elevated issues of enablement arise. We start thinking of more complicated issues such as enablement of healthy habits vs. enablement of not so healthy habits. Mmmmm, and that's where the real fun starts! 

What Were We Thinking!?

When we are young people tell us what to think. By the time we are adults we have very little idea how to use our own brain. We think we are thinking because we function quite well within our society and we are not totally crazy. But in the wide scope of things, we are barely scratching the surface of what real thinking is all about. We are merely rearranging our prejudices and hardening our categories. By the time we are teenagers we are totally aware that most adults are either crazy or just plain dishonest and cruel. By the time we reach 21 we are quite sure who is good, bad, right and wrong. By the time we reach 29 we aren't quite so sure. By the time we reach 39 we are ready to chuck the whole system into the trashcan and start all over again or take some kind of adult education course to help us fit into the system better more uniformly than we have been able to before. Thirty nine seems to be a popular year for major decisions "to stay or not to stay, that is the question". It is around this time that one sees the reality of things that he either feared or that he never even looked at before. Many of us start to have mental battles within ourselves the likes of which we have never had since turning 18, or 21. But now our mental battles include diapers for either our 3rd child, an early grandchild or an aging parent.


Wake-up calls and Epiphanies. To be sure, some people start shaking their Boogyman tree much earlier than age 39; some peeps make big hairy deals of their issues all throughout their early adult hood and by the time they reach 39 they are well on their own to leaning how to erase the thoughts they were taught to think. Think "press 7 to delete this message." Oh how I delight in pressing 7!!!!!! And then I get to read yet another book about eating raw frogs and drinking borax and baking soda in rainwater. Or how to live in an RV in my neighbor's back yard with a compost toilet and one small extension cord for all my civilized energy needs.



Do real men drink designer water?

Extra Simple Living

I spent the morning watching a bunch of "simple living" videos on youTube. Mmmm. Very interesting and certainly inspiring. I already took the simplicity plunge many years ago. Lived in my van with 2 kids for 6 months while touring the USA. That was back in the '70's. Then in the '80's I lived with friends on a variety of yachts and leaky cargo boats in the Caribbean. In the '90's I lived in a little one room BWI house with a big balcony where I cooked, painted, entertained and slept in my hammock. In '00's I lived in various places with various friends in their well equipped houses and shared their kitchens, baths, laundry rooms, yards and garages (for 7 years) and in the last 3 years I have lived in my own 30' RV in a rugged little forest. It's all been good. I like living with people and paying rent. Choosing positive easy going, semi-messy peeps is the key to the whole deal! Making good agreements in the beginning and continually asking for and giving clear  polite feedback throughout the experience is a must, And paying rent a few days or weeks in advance every month is always good! Be a giver and a doer of good deeds!

Below find a video with a cute gal who has wise and interesting things to say about simple living. So she has a guy. We SSs can do it better without one.

Criteria of Reasonable Certainty of No Harm.

                                                           Story to be written later.

44thousand heretofore secret documents.

Here's My Little Dance for You! Me and Uncle Leo.

Personalize funny videos and birthday eCards at JibJab!

Nuri ... Carib Ancient Reserve Exclusive.

Story by Samantha Hodge. 

Nuri One Heart was the acrilic painter who first acquainted me with the magic that time can weave in a vat of fermented pineapple.

I was 24 and working in a pub on St. Thomas when a rep from Bloomingdale's came in for a Pina Colada and quest for the best artist on the island.  Having been cheered that year by hundreds of happy beach combing, wind surfing x-pats, locals, seasoned tourists and various other party people all of who owned at least a half dozen hand screened and hand painted Nuri-Shirts there was no question in anybodies mind who had spent more than 24 hours on any of the islands who the best Caribbean artist was! Nuri indeed! Painter, Screener, Employer, Wholesaler, Civil Right's Activist, Environmentalist, Sobriety Sister Nuri! Now you can see a large collection of her vintage Caribbean t'shirts marketed as "Carib Ancient Reserve Exclusive"= Nuri-CARE.

My association with Nuri was one of the only associations with an artist that I truly admired and enjoyed. Nuri wasn't and still isn't just an artist who feels warm fuzzies while painting and covering the earth with paintings. She is a painting and selling maniac with major globe-healing passions. Her actions follow her beliefs like surfers follow the waves.

Like people, fabric arts don’t necessarily improve with age. You could argue that musty vintage sarongs, tea-stained old French lace and the peaty, rambunctious blue jeans from the island of Martinique, for example, are preferable in their fiesty youth, but I find that "Nuri-Shirts and Other Arts" from the Caribbean region get classy like aging people ought to: with tenderness, nostalgic grace and a little spunk tossed in. While some of the more eccentric edges may soften, an aged acrilic painting on a cotton t'shirt grows in complexity as it mellows. Each color tends to reveal some previously undetected nuance of character, as if you're getting to know a person who, drawing on a richly lived life, always has another story to tell.

Sorry, that's really sentimental. Good spirited art does that to a person.

Anyway, Tuesday night I sat down with the Bloomingdale ambassador who visited St. Thomas with her agenda to flinch the freakiest island artist who so prolifically showered the islands with colorful clothing and wall art for more than 19 odd years.  The impending opeining this fall of two crates of the most charming wash-and-wear art this country has ever seen, namely The Nuri 40 Year Old Fermented Pineapple Line. One shirt will be sold for around $900. Another will be sold for $600. And the prices go up and down from there. The  majority of shirts will be sold for prices more managable for people with more slender budgets, such as $30. $50. and $75.oo. Copies of the musty vintage shirts will be printed on brand new x-lg white cotton t'shirts and wontonly sold for jazzy prices such as ($22. each, or 5 for $96.) So don't despair; you too can have a piece of Fermented Pineapple. And furthermore, as a treat for winners of a contest to find the Caribbean's 50 best fathers a beautiful hand-signed Commenerative t'shirt will be shipped to each of the  participating dads... all you have to do is write a little blog about them and dear ol' Nuri One Heart will send a special shirt with an appropriate, personal, uplifting message on it to each of them  (Update: contest link to be announced.) BTW, all proceedes from Nuri One Heart sales always go to supporting her activities to rehabing single women who reach out to her for art and survival training.

Choosing Our Tribes

There are so many tribes to be part of it boggles my mind. Tribes influence us. Tribes have a way of "getting into" us while all the while we think we are getting into them! In fact tribes get "into us" the very minute we hear their pitch. And by pitch I mean tone of voice, their kind of music, facial expressions, color and style of clothing, home furnishings, toys.... All these things influence our choices of who we like, what we want to spend our mental energy on, our physical energy on, our time on and our money on. Adolescence is the time when we tribal choices become most volatile. Meaning our feelings about the world and our place in it are so intense at that age. And because of the impact that our feelings have upon us our entire future is influenced.Do we dislike certain aspects of own family (our first "tribe")? Our own culture? The neighborhood we came from? Other ethnic groups? People of various religions? Or non-religious people? Our gay classmates? Our non-gay classmates? People who are blind, or non-blind? Deaf or non-deaf?  If we could just get over some of the deep adolescent feelings (perhaps buried, hidden) that we harbor  regarding various people or the quirky characteristics of other people I think our lives would be incredibly different. It's downright impossible to start out adult life with a clean slate regarding how our past impacts our social choices, work choices, sexual activity, music, food, clothing and spending choices. I think it's important to explore our choices and our reactions to various people and situations before settling into any one style or group, close friends or sexual partner. That's why adolescence is such a spectacular, glorious, exciting time! The whole world is open to so many of us! Granted, there are many young people who do not have much choice in these matters, but the path I have blazed for myself has led me to people who do have choices, and the rest I support through tithing and offerings.I wasn't always comfortable with the fact that I couldn't snatch people out of abject poverty, complicated family abuse or addiction situations, severe physical, emotional and mental challenges; but because of the various "therapeutic tribes" that I sought to explore, I was able to design a way of operating in my life that makes sense to me and makes me feel good about what I do with my love, my time and my money.

Dads under glass

My father was a professional photographer, an organic gardener, a builder, an inventor, an outdoor adventurer, an avid reader of how-to and self-help books. I grew-up with books and hands-on experiences and adventures. I grew up in a small, safe town surrounded by lakes and forests. We did a lot of summer camping, played a lot of winter sports, made our own box kites which we flew in the spring, spent week ends shopping in the city for school clothes in the fall. I spend my after-school hours in our family photo studio which was filled with photo lights, cameras, friendly customers and a very efficient high volume photo lab. My dad was a genius. He never said so, but he totally reinforced in all of his children that we were! I believed I was. I wasn't so sure about my siblings, because the truth of the matter is that all great minds do not think alike! If they did, we wouldn't have a lot of choices now, would we!? It is good that the world is full of many practicing geniuses. 

Dad was a hard task master. Perhaps yours was too. If you had a vivacious demanding dad, you know what I mean. Sometimes it was pretty awful and I hated him for many years. (I understand him better now that I have raised children of my own and understand the many issues of being a human and a parent at the same time! 

Dad immersed himself in a lot of wonderful activities and adventures. He exercised his left brain as well as right brain. He combined art with a good head for business. He expressed creativity, ingenuity, discipline and productivity. He was also an efficiency expert. 

Although he was an incredible example for me throughout his life right up to old age and I got incredible training from him, he was extremely short on warm fuzzy skills. I got those skills and examples from my mother's side. Both of my parents were religiously and politically wild. From atheist, to Christian, to Unitarian, to Spiritualism and even Sufism. It is hard living up to my parent's expectation of me! 

Can you identify with any of this as a backdrop for your life? What was your father like? How did your father influence the way you think, feel and do things? 

Your homework this week is to think about the things that your dad was into while you were growing up. Think about the things he could do well and what he believed in. Did he jump around from skill to skill, cause to cause, belief to belief or did he have a handful of those things and never changed much? 

How did your dad's example influence your expectations of men?

If you didn't have a dad around you can make one up for yourself now if you want. I can help you draw one up if you want. Message me and let's talk!

Controversies Unlimited

Most of us want peace and happiness in life, but here we are walking around, working, playing, eating and sleeping in a world that is loaded with so much conflict that it's hard to stay focused on what we really want out of life. Some of us were told that life is a game and that it is our intentions that have attracted the events that occur in our lives and that there are no victims. Well, mark me down as someone who spent a lot of here years trying to believe that kind of logic. I followed the books and tapes as best I could since the 1970's, but I just couldn't get it right. I really believed  for months on end that peace would settle over my home if I was just have total peace within myself. Well, I found that agenda totally impossible. In fact all hell broke loose. Kids went wild. Husband walked all over me, my parents brought all their troubles to me and my siblings treated me with disrespect and I eventually exploded and broke down  like a stretched out old rubber band. Snap, and it ouch! it hurts! I had to battle everyone to define my boundaries. Anybody who says that healthy family life can be groomed with soft, smooth, sweet talk must be living on some kind of grass friendly cloud, or have their head stuck in some kind of liquid that I don't know about. Maybe they've been drinking too much water or something. I am truly sorry that I can not believe those people anymore; Lord knows I tried and that I would much prefer to be wrong on this subject. 


I feel much better believing that their is a combination of forces all around us to help us through the mazes of life. All we have to do is seek wisdom. 


Maybe wisdom comes from the ancestors and their peculiar cellular memories still lodged in our genes. Added to that it could be all the old Prophets, angels, elementals, totems, muses, saints and sinners that lived before us and promised themselves that they would show us the way if was the last thing they did. Now they are all dead and doing their best to help us guide our lives from the foggy mystical realms that they live in, still hoping that we would listen up and follow good advice. Who really knows for sure what causes us to succeed or fail in life. And who is to know what success or failure is anyway? Aren't we all playing in a world that keeps changing the road signs and the rules of the road every day?  We are told that the wisdom is within ourselves so we should trust ourselves and yet when we do just that we fall on our faces, or we hurt the ones we love the most. 

If  you want to know one of my most scandalous secrets, I am toying with the idea that I and a few others just might be from some of those families whose ancestors came from Mars and they adapted to the games of this world and I didn't. I think this might be why I just simply was never able to see things the way most people see them. It is only lately since spending some very long dark years of my soul that I have gathered enough support for my serious doubts as well as strange hopes that I have felt the inner peace that so many wise-guys talk about. I don't feel particularly wise myself, I just don't have the inner turmoil anymore. I know enough to understand why people say and do things that hurt, cripple or kill other people and I know a few ways to stop some of the hemorrhaging and hunger of children. To be sure, I still feel horrible about all the slavery and other suffering in the world, but I personally have peace about myself and the unexplored territories I am traveling. Which is such a relief to me. I finally feel rich and free when it comes right down to it.


I am happy to be exploring new territories all the time because I learned long ago that trying to follow other people's trails led me to other people's gardens and I wanted to search for food and beauty of my own. I learned I had to blaze my own trail and then I learned that I had to get ideas and help from others but nobody could do the real work for me. Yes, I love books and tapes and podcasts and videos that guide me.  


Yes, I think the world is a great place with a lot of wonderful people. I also believe that it is a miserable place for some people and that a lot of us are messed up, double thinking, circular reasoning and ill informed, delusional and deceptive. That's all. I believe there are enough apathetic, angry, half dead, heartless people out there who deliberately try to hurt others. I believe that we are born into a world where we are unreasonably manipulated, coerced, black-mailed etc to think, say and do things that are destructive to ourselves and others. And that the best we can do is to grasp the fact that the only way to find peace and strength to go on is to continually help others to find their own peace and strength too.... And when you can do that, it is true bliss. 

Feeling Good About Love

Love is everywhere. Love is what holds the world together. But not all people who claim to be full of love are...... Sad to say it, but he word "love" is the most highly misused, manipulative word in the history of language. Many people advertise themselves as being loving when they simply want to use others for their own advantage. While I am a fervent believer in the reality of love, the necessity of love, and the power of love my job in life is to love is to keep the lambs from being led to slaughter. I know that's an old fashioned metaphor, but I think you get the point.  The point is I am passionate to the point of pulsating with raising the consciousness of the world regarding this issues. It's a biggie for me. 

We are born to love and be loved. 

Our deepest reality is love. 

We are born to tingle with love.

And to love is to protect!

We are born to embrace the world with gusto! 

To rock, 

to roll, 

feel, 

think, 

dream, 

soar, 

run, 

leap, 

explore, 

gather, 

hunt, 

honor life, 

plant seeds, 

nourish our bodies 

our minds, 

our souls, 

to draw, 

to make music 

and to sing and dance and laugh and cry! 

Most of us have been taught that all people have genius within them and that all people are special. 
I am a special genius; 
and so is every one else! 
And this means you! 
Yes, you are a special genius!

We are born into a world of love. It is love and commitment that has held the world together. It is apathy and greed and revenge, which are the opposites of love, that has torn much of the world apart. But here we are in spite of those unloving things. Out of the loving hands, words and hearts of family, friends and strangers we were given much .... there is so much goodness all around us to cause us to tingle right down to our toes all day and all night! In fact it is this tingling, which we take for granted, that keeps us alive through the devestating, destructive, disasterous, disappointing days of our lives. Many of us lived through hell and came out the other side with at least a shread of what makes us "us".  Energy can not be killed.  We are energy, vibration, e-motion.  


(Not to get religious on you here; I want you to be free to interpret our existence in any way you choose to interpret it; so in universal terms would you not agree that it is safe to say that "love" energy is what has caused our existence? Can we use that concept to cover this topic, please?) And go a step further to say that if we don't step up your understanding of what "love" energy is all about we are in for a very bumpy ride ahead. And what many of us did in order to survive (psychologically and physically) as children may have worked reasonably well as children but if we continue use the same modes of operation those modes are going to kick us in the buns as adults. 


Nobody tells us that when we are kids in school. Our teachers insisted that whatever they are teaching us is the stuff that is going to get us through life. The same teachers are still thinking that way; which is why I am not the least bit keen on listening to most teachers or most adults! Sorry to say. Therefore it follows that I am not in agreement with most schools. How down-right sad! A nation full of people and institutions that drag the whole process of thinking and flourishing to a snails pace. 
As adults, young ones or old ones, we need to constantly be rethinking what we believed yesterday about love and accomplishment, love and success, love and friendship, love and health, love and money, love and sharing, love and learning. The big truth is we need to examine whatever we were taught every day of our lives and determine it's validity and usefulness in our interactions with ourselves and others today and each day forward. 


We are born curious. 
We are born artists. 
We are born creative.
We are born risk takers. 
We are born adventurers. 
scientists, 
analysists, 
diagnostitians, 
stratagizers, 
gamblers, 
experimenters, 
thinkers, 
seers, 
listeners, 
touchers, 
feelers, 
conduits, 
trensmitters 
impacters
and lovers. 


This is just the short list of who you are. These are the things that make life good, not your house, not your yard, not your car, your clothes, your hair and make-up, your furniture, your grades in school, your degrees or cirtificates, although we can love all of those things, they are not what is going to get us through life and death issues. It is our cleverness, our creativity, our impact on others and all those other things I have just listed that are going to get you through to the end when you leave your body and drift off to the next land designed for more advanced stages of living. 

Sustainable and Successful.

This is a picture of me 3 years ago on my first visit to Seattle. I post it here because I have been thinking of visiting Seattle again real soon and I encourage myself by looking at this picture and I remember the little park in Pioneer Square where this picture was taken. The man-made water fall behind me was such a refreshing addition to the Square. I am so glad that I took this picture because looking at it evokes the same beautiful, refreshing feelings I had that day.

Your homework this week is to set aside a couple of hours, get out that old box of photos of yourself, meander through them and look deeply into the eyes, the smiles, the moods, the thoughts and the feelings in the hearts of the beautiful woman that you were then and still are. Remember how much you looked forward to the event and experience you were having the day the picture was taken. Think about how precious that moment was..... and when you feel the fullness of that experience flash forward and think about how precious this very moment is also. Sometimes, the best way to appreciate the moment is to linger awhile in past memories and wallow in the warmth of who you were then in younger days. My life has been very greatly enriched by allowing myself to linger in old memories of a younger me. A lot of healing has come by seeing how tender and yet how strong I was; how eager and yet how trepidations I was. How awesome and yet how ordinary my experience of myself and other people was. And the list goes on and on.

Be tender, be strong, recognize that you are huge banquet of abilities and possibilities. Let yourself feel some of the feelings you have blocked. If it is uninhibited joy, feel that. If it is sorrow, feel some or all of that.If it is too scary make an agreement with yourself to "feel" a super feeling immediately after feeling the "difficult" feeling for precisely 2 minutes or 3 minutes. By all means don't scare yourself into a freaky attack! And yes, remember always: You do do do have control over your feelings!!! You are the boss. Whenever you feel it is safe to spend a whole day exploring the feelings of sorrow, or anger let yourself do so. But by all means call a halt to it well, well, well before bedtime. Have a warm cup of tea, read or listen to something inspirational. snuggle up with your favorite blankie and pillow and bask in your love for yourself for awhile.

.......

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Old Age can be grand, or it can be pitiful. It all depends upon how you feed your mind, 

body and soul throughout your younger years. 

......................................

..............

Some people seem to be in a mad rush to deplete the world's resources, people constantly in search mode. And in our search we use up our life juices only to end up alienated from our neighbors and everyone else including ourselves ... and in stress.

Our Neighbors

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Our stressed out self. 

- Honoring Our Own Journeys - The Uncensored Versions -

Journeys, journeys, journeys. Everyone is a journey in her own right. Waltzing through life on one hand and stumbling around on the other. Seems too often the one hand doesn't know what the other hand is doing or where it's actually headed. We think we know. But in the long run most of us barely have a hint. Somehow I think that it takes a whole lot of years of conscious and super-conscious effort to understand even a fraction of our corner of the world out.

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Issue-fatigue

I have issue-fatigue this week. Issue-fatigue is not my cup of tea. I like my tea with gobs and gobs of honey, and my biscuits spread with butter. I gotta get away for awhile. My situation is starting to get on my nerves. It's finally been warm enough to cook and eat outside, but it's also very messy situation inside as well as out doors. I've been digging out of my winter mess, washing tables and dishes that accumulated over the winter when it was too cold to keep up with all the domestic chores. For the first time in my life I relied on paper plates and cups for my everyday use, but still there was a mess of stuff to wash outdoors. 

My issue-fatigue is mostly because of the demands on my time. While I am not about letting other people's sickness make me sick along with them it is sure hard for me to resist helping someone when I have so much and they have so little and they seem ready to die for lack of attention. Here's this week's story.  

My colleague is my land-lord. We live peacefully under separate roofs on his property. I in my 30ft RV and he in the top floor of his house. He's a super expecaladocius genius. And as geniuses go, is quite short on a few other life-saving and life-enriching skills. He has a few other colleagues that are on the same par with him. I was hired to be part of a project because I have to admit I fit their strange equation. Each one of us has a genius in our own way and each of us is sorely lacking in some major area. He has a special lady friend who floats in an out of his life between her affairs and homelessness. She is attractive and charming to men, high maintainence with serious health problems. The kind of woman-girl you'd like to wrap up in a blanket and carry her home to mother to help make her well and wonderful. My colleague did just that last summer. She was suffering some pretty serious domestic abuse at the hands of her brother who rescued her a few months before that from another abusive situation. Seems as though she has gone through this sequence of house hopping from one abusive rescuer to another for the past 20 years. She is in her mid 40's now and so ill she stayed upstairs all day and all night not even walking her little dog. My colleague did that for her. Yes, I worried about her and my colleague confirmed my worries that she was doing very poorly as well as fighting a lot with him, not eating, passing out, and not sleeping at night. He did have to pick her up off the floor one day and carry her to the car and rush her to emergency. My fear was that she would fall down the stairs while he was gone and die and nobody would know until he got home. Not wanting to get involved with something I was not qualified to do but afraid that things could get real messy I encourage him to send her my way for a sisterly talk and see if I could help him convince her to seek professional services. Sigh! 

The social service community everywhere in this country is frustrating. The welfare system is a bit of a mess. Substance abuse treatment is dicey. Nutritionists are poorly educated. And this dear woman has let herself go for so long it now looks like she is going to die any minute. We talk. And we talk again. And I take her shopping and out to lunch. And gradually after a couple of sister-dates a week she is starting to use her food stamps more wisely. She knows a lot more about nutrition than anybody I know. Seems she learned a lot from her Seventh Day Adventist Church buddies. She buys real food now and starts to do real cooking instead of shoving a box dinner into the microwave. Social Services came and whisked her away last week and put her in an apartment all by herself and now things are less stressful around this place. But as far as I can see, putting a sick woman into an empty apartment all on her own doesn't seem like a smart thing to do. 

I ask myself several times a day, is this any of my business? Am I just a bothersome old lady? 

And yet I keep insisting that my garden is all I care about right now. It's spring, I say. Time to plant. We have had no more than 3 days without rain, cold and excessive icy wind. I want to get naked and dig in the dirt. My colleague is always gone, our yard is surrounded by 40 acres of thick bushes and trees. No one can see me and I am free to do as I like ... being a freak for nature and an artist and a practitioner of singing as loud as I can and all that kind of stuff.  But my heart is heavy whenever I think of this dear stranger who crossed my path for so long and is now somewhere out there in the shabby part of town living all alone. Strange world this is. 

I am not from this planet. My people are from Mars. It's my ancestors  fault. My parents weren't informed as to why they were here. Every cell of my body reminds me that this planet needs some drastic intervention and I have done my best ever since I was a kid to learn how to get it right. I seem to want to have fun more than the people around me. It also appears that I like peace and quiet a lot more than most people. Oh, don't get me wrong I love a noisy restaurant, a noisy concert, a noisy airport, car race, swap meet. I just like quiet forests a lot more! I like passionate attitudes; I enjoy my friend's rantings. I even dig their anger. I just don't like the vengeful, thoughtless kind of noise. I quit. I really just quit. It's not that I insist on quitting, or that I try to quit, or that my head tells me I have a right to quit, or that I ought to quit. I just quit. Like a car that stalls along side of the road and won't start up again no matter what you do to get it to go. It waits till the quiet and cool of the evening when nobody is around and starts up on it's very own. If you've ever had this happen to you, then you know what I am talking about.   

I once attended to the needs of victims of a serious car crash one dark night in the desert. I pulled 2 people out of their smoking car, got blankets to cover them from my camper, talked calmly to the truck driver who collided with them, drove 25 miles to an open diner, set my kids at a table with $5. for breakfast, went back to my camper and collapsed with severe stomach cramps and couldn't move for 2 hours. My kids were so scared they actually sat and talked quietly for the entire time.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4k6d6J0_mdU


I just watched a video on youTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4k6d6J0_mdU

exposing the monster oil companies and their destruction of the Amazon and its people!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4k6d6J0_mdU


What an outrage! That's why I didn't own or drive an automobile for almost 25 years! Now I am getting old, a bit frail and tired so I bought a little truck and I use it on very special short missions. I'll be damned if I will support monster corporations any more than I absolutely have to!

The Blazing-Breast Mission.

This is the day to start a new life, one good idea at a time!

This colorful picture is a section of one of my labors of love often called a painting. I call it a mandala. I read somewhere that the face is a perfect mandala. The face is actually a lot of things, full of energies totally beyond conscious comprehension!  This youthful person reflects incredible powers through those eyes! Look deeply into them and see the depths of your own soul; your most tender, elusive dreams, your sadness, your precious love and compassion, your private demons, your ego-death, your inner angels and find yourself surrounded with constant rebirth and renewal!

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Remember this: We are all beautiful flowers of the same garden.
....

I talk obsessively about the most important things in life. Always looking for others who do the same thing!

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You are a Superheroine and probably don't even know it. I am, and I know it. If we combine our powers, we can start a Superhero Meet-Up Group and take over YouTube – then the world. And then we can branch out into outerspace. Unlimited possibilities.


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Perhaps you wonder what extraordinary ability you embody. Until the day that you post me a story about yours, I will tell you about mine.

I warm the world with my hot little left hand.

My left hand is measurably warmer than my right.

There are lots of people in this world who are chilly, some downright cold; and if I can extend my warm hand to chilled humans then I must. It is an official calling – just like Wonder Woman.

I have a personal mission to counteract all the chilly people who lack warm personalities and souls. Night and day (mostly day), I fight the chilling spread of icy attitudes. A few touches from my hand –and that’s it! ... a painting, a verse, an essay, a video, a hug on film! It’s easy for me, it might be just as easy for you. Eventually with the right attitude anyone could be doing it; even children!

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Aspects of any painter's character is reflected in their work. Paintings are full of symbols of one kind or another; paintings are reflections of the sub-conscious frozen in time on a canvas or paper. Many painters sooner or later display a style that is uniquely their own. The rest of us keep skipping around from pillar to post bringing our more aspects, more thoughts, more moods of themselves and the world as we see it.


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Figuring Health Out.

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I just got to thinking something weired about religion. ((Again.)) The church broke in two back in the 16th Century during the reign of a 9 year old named Kind Edward V1. He died at age 15 of syphilis. Pretty young to be so harshly punished for having being taught that he could have his way with teen age girls. Or was he being used and exploited by older desperate women? Whatever the case, religion was in the hands as well as the minds and voices of some pretty dicey people those days. Aren't those the same folks who had the money to learn to read and teach the Scriptures to the world? The ones who wrote the hymns and common prayers? In my studies of that period of history there was a lot of booze going around. It's only sensible to assume that most of our religious beliefs and traditions were started by a lot of out of control sexual predators and half potted pissed alcoholics. All this speculation aside, I truly do love Jesus .... and all the other Prophets that God sent to straighten up the people around the world in ancient times. Just sayin' what I'm thinkin"......
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Lyrics to "I Get Out" :
{Singing Chorus}
I get out, I get out of all your boxes
I get out, you can't hold me in these chains
I'll get out
Father free me from this bondage
Knowin' my condition
Is the reason I must change

{Verse 1}
Your stinkin' resolution
Is no type of solution
Preventin' me from freedom
Maintainin' your polution
I won't support your lie no more
I won't even try no more
If I have to die, oh Lord
That's how I choose to live
I won't be compromised no more
I can't be victimised no more
I just don't sympathize no more
Cuz now I understand
You just wanna use me
You say "love" then abuse me
You never thought you'd loose me
But how quickly we forget
That nothin' is for certain
You thought I'd stay here hurtin'
Your guilt trip's just not workin'
Repressin' me to death
Cuz now I'm choosin' life, yo
I take the sacrifice, yo
If everything must go, then go
That's how I choose to live

{Pause}

{Singing rest of Verse 1}
That's how I choose to live...
Hehehehe, awhh
No more compromises
I see past your diguises
Blindin' through mind control
Stealin' my eternal soul
Appealin' through material
To keep me as your slave

{Singing Chorus}
But I get out
Oh, I get out of all your boxes
I get out
Oh, you can't hold me in these chains
I'll get out
Oh, I want out of social bondage
Knowin' my condition
Oh, is the reason I must change

{Singing Verse 2}
See, what you see is what you get
Oh, and you ain't seen nothin' yet
Oh, I don't care if you're upset
I could care less if you're upset
See it don't change the truth
And your hurt feeling's no excuse
To keep me in this box
Psychological locks
Repressin' true expression
Cementin' this repression
Promotin' mass deception
So that no one can be healed
I don't respect your system
I won't protect your system
When you talk I don't listen
Oh, let my Father's will be done

{Singing Chorus}
And just get out
Oh, just get out of all these bondage
Just get out
Oh, you can't hold me in chains
Just get out
All these traditions killin' freedom
Knowin' my condition
Is the reason I must change

{Singing Verse 3}
I've just accepted what you said
Keepin' me among the dead
The only way to know
Is to walk then learn and grow
But faith is not your speed
Oh, you've had everyone believed
That you're the sole authority
Just follow the majority
Afraid to face reality
The system is a joke
Oh, you'd be smart to save your soul
Oh, when escape is mind control
You spent your life in sacrifice
To a system for the dead
Oh, are you sure...
Where is the passion in this living
Are you sure it's God you servin'
Obligated to a system
Getting less then you're deserving
Who made up these schools, I say
Who made up these rules, I say
Animal conditioning
Oh, just to keep us as a slave

{Singing Chorus}
Oh, just get out
Of this social (?)
Just get out
All these traditions are alive
Just get out
Superstition killing freedom
Knowin' my condition
Is the reason I must die
Just get out
Just get out
Just get out
Let's get out
Let's get out
Knowin' my condition
Is the reason I must die
Just get out