Back to basics...

What I was doing before seemed to work in terms of generating pageviews. My exposure actually started dropping when I started posting my earlier posts on Your Tewksbury Today. I guess this makes sense. I never did have much success with reposting old posts, and my Quantum Exposed series just isn't generating the type of exposure that I would like.

So I'm back to candid, heartfelt posts centered on simple subject matter, like enjoying the soft feel of a rug beneath naked feet, or allowing yourself to become overwhelmed by the singing of birds or a cool breeze blowing softly against your cheek. I noticed that as I started to get older I lost sight of what it was like to relate to the world through my senses, that I began to exist rather than live in a conscious effort to enjoy the world around me.

I wrote about it, but I never went in and changed anything. Lately, I've experienced much in the way of spiritual progress, but none of it was earth centered, none of it was tethered to practicality. I need to stop searching and start feeling. I need to allow myself to enjoy what I'm doing instead of always thinking aboiut what I'm going to do next.

Quantum Exposed: Wresting Color from the Canvas; 10

This 'House Rule' and others can be found in Dan Millman's book Living on Purpose. I accredit all direct quotations regarding the House Rules to Dan Millman. The subsequent lay analysis is mine.

1. Earth is a school and daily life is our classroom
2. Our teachers come in many forms
3. We learn best through direct experience
4. Failures are the stepping stones to success
5. Lessons reappear until we learn them
6. If we don’t learn the easy lessons, they get harder
7. Consequences teach better than concepts
8. Only action brings ideas to life
9. We can control efforts, not outcomes
10. Timing is everything

While being born on the autism spectrum wasn't my decision, it has brought much color to my life, particularly with respect to my attempts to communicate with my peers. Timing really is everything, as I have learned through depositing nonsequitors into group conversations and presently being brushed aside, a flea, a hanger on...

If you desire to be of service to someone else, you need to work on their schedule, not yours. They own their problem. They encapsulate it in their own consciousness. Learn to listen with your heart for what they need, as without first doing so, you run the risk of being ignored when the optimal time for them to receive that message comes upon you.

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Finding balance by inviting chaos...

I decided yesterday that it was time for a couple of major changes in my life. One of them was to quit smoking cigarettes, as you may have read in an earlier post. The other was to use the weight of this last run at sobriety toward a spirituality based recovery I can both embrace and appreciate. I downloaded time trackers on my phone yesterday for my alcohol and tobacco cessation quit dates.

The apps are very easy to use, and all I need to do is wait. They do all the adding for me.

I have always reached out for something to throw me off kilter, something to focus on, when I feel myself scrambling. Lately, I seem to have no depth of thought whatsoever. I'm quick to anger, hell bent on doing things my way and insisting that everyone else do them that way too.

I need something solid to fight against.

So when I decided at the last minute to purchase a box of nicotine lozzenges at the counter at a local pharmacy yesterday, it didn't surprise me, and the support that I received from the cashier and the woman behind me in line was well received.

I haven't had a cigarette since yesterday.

The brain is a remarkable thing. With focus on a specific challenge, my brain is inviting the rest of my body, and whatever forces I've been trying to manipulate, to return to autonomic function. With all the problems I was trying to solve single handedly I felt as though I'd allocated ten different parts of myself to merely getting by.

Now, with the weight of my entire focus on two very important stressors, I feel like I'm making progress.

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Welcome aboard, whoever you are.

I gave you a pack of cigarettes today, the second of two packs I had purchased in New Hampshire. I've recently been moved to quit smoking and couldn't bring myself to throw them away.

To be honest, the only reason I bought them was because I believed I needed to. I wrote once that old habits are like sparring partners, ever reminding us to align our intentions with what IS, rather than what we want them to be.

We could hate the rain but the rain doesn't know any better.  It is a perfectly lawful and necessary​ exertion of nature. The rain is not our problem. Our emotional response to the rain is our problem, and it will only be lifted from us if we let it go.

Per Request: Spiritual Connections with Total Strangers

Have you ever met someone that you could swear up a wall you've met before, but for the life of you, you can't place them? 

Maybe you're scanning the wrong lifetime for a memory, or you're in the right lifetime but can't place the feeling of comfort that they bring to bear upon you. 

Whatever the case may be, something about this person strikes you as profoundly perfect, and within minutes, you know for a fact that meeting this person falls directly into it's supremely important place in the choir of vibrations that make up the next lesson on your spiritual journey.

I met someone a few days ago, and our spiritual trajectories have not only crossed but collided. 

It's...I guess it's hard to explain.

It's almost like the Powers that Be have dropped us into a white room together and challenged us to figure out why. I've talked to this person at length over the last few days and and know in my soul that our introduction was no coincidence.

My spiritual velocity has increased rapidly over the last 72 hours, particular the last 12, where we discussed quantum physics, the law of attraction, the state of the Universe being an echo, and many other things of such nature. My chakkras have begun to grow weary of processing massive amounts of spiritual data, and are now clogged.

I can't wait to go to sleep tonight and figure out what my brain has to make of all this by morning (the brains works tirelessly as we sleep). As of tonight, I just wanted to record it.

Sweet dreams.

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Welcome Aboard, Tewksbury!

For the first time in years, my work has appeared as a featured article in a local online newspaper. Several years ago, I was a contributor for the Tewksbury Patch. Some of you may remember that.

I was offered a position as a contributor to Your Tewksbury Today try to get some exposure for this blog, which by the way is free and ad free, and I intend to keep it that way.

I wanted to welcome Tewksbury readers aboard. If you look back through my posts, all my Welcome Aboard posts have been directed to individuals. I've never had the opportunity to address my home town. With spring upon us, I hope everyone is looking forward to new and exciting opportunities to latch onto the life force that spring calls forth from within us.

It's finally here!

I'm particularly fond of a post I uploaded recently regarding my approach to affording readers a basic understanding of spiritual principles, and the avenues into which I've been coralled in order to make that possible: Ground Level with the Groupies. The hyperlink will take you there.

Feel free to chuckle if you feel the urge. I certainly did!

starliper.corey@gmail.com

Back to grassroots fishing...

I'll update this when I have more time but I wanted to record that I've caught the first three fish of the year on a worm and bobber! The rivers are running too fast because of the recent rains but the sunfish are plentiful in local ponds, and a beautiful perch followed my worm all the way up to the shore line, allowing me a full profile of it's brilliant colors.

Fishing has always had a special place in my heart. I don't know why. I remember writing a story about fishing and trying to justify the love that I feel toward it, and I got as far as acknowledging the difference between things real and things imagined (what can be seen above the surface, and what may or may not swim below it) before brushing the story aside as I have so many others.

I think what I enjoy most about fishing is the feel of a fish on my line. I love nature and I love animals, and for the few seconds that I'm engaged in competition with said fish, a proverbial tug of war...

Give me feet to walk upon the shore

     and gills to let me breathe underwater

I feel connected to it. 

I especially enjoy lowering the fish to the water when I'm done taking it off my hook and letting it swim out of my hand. I try to thank every fish I can before releasing it back into the water. Sometimes I forget, most times I remember, because to thank what I catch is proper and good in nature. Neitczhe once wrote that the measure of a society can be judged by how well it's animals are treated. Sometimes I thank my worms too, but there is some speculation as to whether or not worms and fish are sentient (aware of it's own existence) beings at all.  

There is an overwhelming amount of scientific evidence to support claims that cold blooded creatures, fish included, do not feel pain, and that the few fish who do feel pain are not targeted for sport. I spend much of my time catching black bass (small-mouthed bass) in the ravine in Lowell. 

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Approval from others...

Im working on improving not only my self worth but my acknowledgment thereof. I now fully understand that the most that people can feel for me if I do something I'm supposed to do is satisfied. For my friends to see me doing something that goes above and beyond, happy.

But if everyone on the planet were to disappear tomorrow leaving just me, who would I be if all I cared about was approval from others?

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Ground level with the groupies...

I realize that a lot of what I write is high-powered, spiritually off-putting and not exactly the type of material you would happen upon in the Tabloids in the checkout aisle of your local grocery store.

Up until recently, I thought that was a good thing, but I remembered something from Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman, that sometimes the person a step above you on their way up the mountain is in a better position to reach their hand out to you than the guru who sits at the top.

You don't gift a video game console with 15 buttons on the game-paddle to someone who can't walk and chew gum at the same time. There were five buttons on the original Nintendo game pad...(the cursor, start, select, A and B). 

This blog is about a practical approach to spiritual living, and if people can't get their arms around everything I'm talking about, I'm not being very practical.

So here's a good topic, you ready?

Facebook and apps like it, especially those with instant messaging, are, to some, nearly as addicting as cigarettes. Who texted me? Who should I text next? Where are they? Why aren't they mentioning me in their posts? Why is my blog not getting enough hits? This meme is amusing. This fits me. This doesn't. So and so had so and so for breakfast, maybe I should, too!

What happened to the days when you couldn't get ahold of someone unless they were home? Whatever happened to the days when people picked up the phone no matter what they were doing instead of letting it ring off the hook because they didn't want to talk to the person on the other end?

I recently unfriended every single one of my friends on Facebook and blocked everyone in my phone whose attention I could not draw without texting them first. Now, I'm no longer tethered to my phone...so what am I doing on the computer?

Addiction...addiction...addiction...

 See you on Facebook! starliper.corey@gmail.com

Wherever I'm going with this, I'll probably end up somewhere different...

It usually happens that way with writing. Often, I sit down to express my frustration with things, only to realize that I've written my way out of whatever problem I'm having at the time.

It kind of irks me, actually.

I mentioned on Facebook that the virtue of greatest importance to me right now is patience, but I don't think that touches finely enough upon what I feel I really need. Yes, patience is important, but it falls a quick second to...my foremost urgency.

I think what I really need is clarity.

I've had overwhelming anxiety over the last few days, both on and off medication prescribed to me to slow things down. I think a lot of it stems from having to guess which shoe is about to drop. You could drop a grain of sand into my life right now and it would leave a crater you could probably see from the moon.

Sometimes I get the 'crawls.' The only thing I can relate it to is nicotine withdrawal where you feel like you're about to crawl out of your skin. Sounds become louder, colors brighter, and all you want to do is sit in a dark room and avoid the rest of humanity. If my stomach had a mouth right now, it would be as dry as a bone, thirsting for resolution. If my brain had ears, it would be scrambling desperately to cover them.

I want to believe, despite much evidence to the contrary, that things in my life will soon begin to slow down, but I fear I'm the only one who would understand why they seem to be moving so quickly. 

I just don't have the emotional energy to go into it all.

Not where I wanted to end up, but not exactly where I was going, either. 

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The Forever Bridge

When I asked the Universe to help me lose weight, I was not expecting to be taught a lesson in humility, compulsion and bad judgment.

I turned down a very wrong path this evening...no, literally, a wrong path.

The river is raging right now and it's beautiful out. I thought I would rig up, sit down at the boulevard and fish. Rising water, fish live in the water...gotta be onto something, right?

No bites at the boulevard.

So in my infite wisdom I decided to park on the opposite side of the river, cross the bridge, walk along the highway and find a spot along the boardwalk--whose entrance I've half-heartedly been searching for since last summer--via a break in the fence I had seen on the way back from bowling tonight.

Break acquired, I started, pole in hand, along the river. I saw an official looking sign on one of the trees.

DROWNING HAZARD, RAPIDLY RISING WATER.

No bells, no whistles. Not until it was far too late to turn back.

About a quarter mile through weeds and thorns, it finally hit me...I had a ten foot tall barbed fence on my left, and a raging, rising river on my right.

Shit.

Should I turn back?

No, I kept thinking. The water wasn't rising all that quickly and I figured where there was one break in the fence, there would, at some point, be another.

And there was.

I emerged from behind the fence, relieved, and decided that I would turn around and walk back along the highway to my car, this time in safety.

The only problem was I was now coralled into a construction zone , this time between two ten-foot fences approximately five feet apart. I wasn't too fond of the fact that I was now trespassing but I literally had nowhere else to go.

Seriously, officer, all I want to do is get out.

Finally, I cleared the construction zone and very legally, adamantly, excitedly, headed down to the river bank having finally found the entrance to the boardwalk. I would get to fish this evening after all.

Yeah, no.

I cast a couple times, got a wicked tangle and finally decided to pack it in. I was relieved that all I would need to do was cross the next bridge and start the long walk back to my car on the opposite side of the river.

Yeah, no.

There was, of course, a bridge, but I would have needed to scale a ten-foot wall with a fishing rod in one hand in order to start across it.

I knew that there had to be a climbout at the next bridge because I had seen people emerging from it in my travels, but it just seemed so far away. I was tired. My feet hurt, and it seemed that I was making no progress whatsoever. No matter how fast I walked, I never seemed to get any closer to that goddamn bridge.

I dubbed it the Forever Bridge for that reason.

A mile later, I began the 1.5 mile walk back along the river on the opposite side. When I arrived at my car, I packed my fishing rod into my trunk (relieved that despite fishing in the dark I had managed not to lose the lure I started out with) and drove the route to see how far out of my way I had gone to find a spot that wasn't there.

2.9 miles.

I should hope that future fishing endeavors will be less emotionally intense or physically demanding. I will, nonetheless, be back at the boulevard as the warmer weather approaches.

See you on Facebook! starliper.corey@gmail.com

What is my religion?

It has been brought to my attention recently that the pendants I wear represent conflicting views. So let me explain.

Let's start with the Pagan Star (pentacle):

The five points of the Pagan Star represent the five senses. The resultant pentagram in the middle represents the soul/self, and the circle around it connecting all five points represents eternity (the present moment).

In short, the pentacle is a complete representation of all aspects of our earthly existence. Our soul perceives the world with the five senses, and the reality from which we can perceive at all is encapsulated by eternity. 

Benevolent representation of the pentacle. Note the pentagram in the middle. The fact that the bars overlap eachother is symbolic of the reality that everything in the Universe is connected in some way.

The inverted pentacle represents the relatively new ideology of Satanism, about which I admittedly know very little, except to say that the Biblical Entity of Satan is not present in Satanist ideology because Satanists are primarily atheist. I do know that Laveyan Satanism is a hedonistic ideology, built on the belief that if something feels good, it's acceptable. Some 'Satanic' communities worship the Biblical Entity and wear the inverted peantacle as a sign of the Anti-Christ, when in reality the pentacle came into existence long before the birth of Christ.  

Why do I wear the Crucifix if I'm not Christian?

Christ was a leader in his time, charged (responsible for) with the task of spreading love, forgiveness and compassion in a time when people knew very little about the world that they lived in, let alone about living amongst each other with the values that he taught. Whether or not Christ was the Son of God is up for debate, and that debate was the cornerstone upon which Christianity was founded. Whatever the case may be, I find Christ to be the most perfect representation of the man that my heart wants me to be.


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Back...now where the hell was I?

Ah, yes, Chapter 3. 

After an emotional journey down some dark passage ways I've emerged learned but bruised. My writing seems to lack the clarity that it did before, and there lingers about me a fog so thick that all I can do is feel my way through my daily routines. Nonetheless, I'm sober, rested and waiting to see where things land before making any major changes.

I'm using my staff more often than I did before, blessing all living things in my room with it at the beginning and end of each day.

Needing to connect once again to the spiritual current, I've decided to align my intentions with those of the Universe. You might relate that to merging onto a spiritual highway. If the Universe really is an echo and we have far less control over our mind than we do our actions, we need to act our way into good fortune. Does not an object at rest tend to stay at rest?

If all we do is flail helplessly ten feet from the shore, we shall drown amidst the troubled waters of a raging tempest, when all we need to do is put out feet down and realize that it has been our own panicked attempt to control things which has troubled the waters in the first place.

Our emotional and practical leverage in any situation depends largely on our ability to see things for what they are rather than what we immediately perceive them to be. Our finite minds perceive the world through filters that each of us have crafted over the years. No two of these filters alike, because no two of us have lived the same life, but there are certain things that we can do to lift enough of that filter to gain a practical understanding of what to do next.

One of those things is to just calm down.

Refer to one of my earlier posts, Access to the Spiritual Current for a deeper understanding of this reality.

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Sorry I've been away...

Bear with me for just a few more days. I need to get back in touch with the side of myself that yearns for spiritual knowledge. I want to be there for others, but if I'm not there for myself, all I'm going to do is spread the wrong message.

Be well. See you soon.

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