I have not written anything in a quite a while. There has been so much to digest over these past few years and indeed, my mind and my patience have been stretched; perhaps to the point of feeling that there are not enough words (and sometimes patience) in the universe to fill it.

It is hard to distil it all down into a few paragraphs, and I apologize for not having accomplished that very well here. But when every corner of the human psyche has been and continues to be revealed, and the collective mind (regardless of resistance) is being stretched to such an extent, being ‘too wordy’ seems forgivable.

So here goes.

Here I am, craving an undiluted experience, one which won’t ‘try to convince me’ it is good or good for me: It will just be.

I do not want something that will insist itself upon me and then subversively punish me for not submitting to its unilateral design.

I do not want something that needs editing, vetting, or sussing out. I do not want something obfuscating, or which makes promises but never delivers. I do not want something that constantly reminds me of the mistakes I am making, or have made, or all the ways I or my work is inadequate.

I need something that frankly, I struggle to define.

I know whatever it is I crave is intangible and immeasurable. In my searches, I came up with this: I crave to know how to bring the matters of Love and Trust back into the world – how to truly stretch the mind – and then, to bond more deeply, through action, with this invisible super glue called Love.

I needed and continue to need something Super Natural.

I crave something involving pure sensations, with minimal mind chatter, boredom, doubt, fear or insecurity, which will act like a cancellation wave to all low vibration distractions. I needed and continue to need something so intense it would and will shock me back into myself, and once there, further defibrillate my senses into new dimensions of feeling, gratitude, satisfaction, health, wisdom and love.

I was and am looking to unify and merge with what I consider to be the Ancient Holy essence of ‘no lie and no try’.

That scratches my itchy brain. That was what I craved immersion in: The extraordinary mystery.

Enter ‘The Iceman’. For those of you who are not familiar with Wim Hof, I invite you to make his acquaintance. A most intriguing man, he chose to transform his crushing grief (the suicide of his wife) into vitality and joy, and by doing so, accomplished what had been previously thought to be ‘physically impossible’. Here is a video of him walking Jordan and Mikhaila Peterson through his breathing technique, and a video interview between him and tennis champion, Novak Djokovic.

Wim Hof demonstrates in real time, the magic of the mind and of transmutation itself. I decided to follow in his inspiring footsteps and began dipping my feet into something I was both entirely uncomfortable and relatively unfamiliar with: Cold.

This was not easy for me. I have Multiple Sclerosis and typically, my right leg feels as if it is submerged in a ‘too big for me’ rubber boot filled with icy slush. If stress is bad, this sensation creeps further and further up my body, resulting in a loss of feeling altogether. This ‘short circuiting’ stems from damaged myelin sheaths and nerves, and feels as if it comes from the inside of my bones but has no specific point of origin; no ‘place’ where I can just rub it back to feeling and warmth. It is very strange and hard to live with.

I did not relish the idea of stepping into very cold water, and potentially submersing my whole body in this ‘no feeling’ feeling. It made little sense to do so. But I thought, maybe if I choose to enter this realm, my systems might receive something of a recharge or reboot. Maybe my choice to do this would make a difference in my outcome. Having choice is fundamental to being human, after all. Without it, we are not really free.

As for my outcome, my choice to enter this new, cold dimension has indeed had a massive and powerful impact on my spirit, mind and body, in that order.

Every time I step into the water, a new but familiar, shockingly distilling set of sensations arises. I sense an unfolding of layers; as if a doorway to a mysterious path has manifested. It is cold in there, but it is also so much more than that.

There’s no lie in there. There is no try in there. There is just me and the pure, clear sensations of this perpetually moving water medium; nothing else exists when I’m out there. The cold is true. The cold is truth. The cold is exactly what it presents itself to be, and it asks nothing of me.

There exists just me and the water, in a strangely mesmerizing relationship, where the flickeringly thin and thick layers of it are as sheeted and limitless as my mind is becoming (as all minds are, when they are unfolded).

There is no wanting to be elsewhere. There exists just me, watching and feeling my feet move, abundantly happy that I can. Feeling my feet touching the sand through the water – seeing this through the wobbly diffraction of the clear water on calm days – until numbness takes over and I cannot feel much at all, there is just me, seeing the dance of the sun in the water. There exists just me, merging with something much bigger than me.

On days like today when the air is cold and the water is big, I can float in her, letting the waves bob me around like kelp. I can let go of control because she’s in control. I can just float in this powerful medium, where magical things happen; where poetry flows, like the words of Atticus: “Holding her was never enough. I needed to melt her into me, to mix our colors like paint, to fuse our atoms and make us one— but that as well would never be enough.”

Well, to me, it is. I cannot hold the ocean, but she sure holds me. It feels as if I melt into her and our energies mix and our atoms fuse and we become one. And indeed, that is enough.

Every day in the water, I become like water. Moving, still, fluid, not trying to be anything I simply am not. And this process amazes me. I am amazed that I am here. I am amazed that I have not been crushed by the many things that could have crushed me in the old and even cold dimensions. I am amazed by the ocean’s effortless power to bring me into her fold; to allow me to feel and sense instead of think! I am astonished that I don’t feel electrical shocks from the inside when inside the water, but instead, an electrifying cold from the outside, as if indeed, it is rebooting me. Connecting with me: To me, through me, as me.

I am still not sure if it’s my imagination or not, but after doing this for months, and staying in for up to an hour, the sensation of cold is always replaced by a feeling of pleasant warmth. I suppose this could be hypothermia setting in, but acclimatization is a real thing. It works the same way as desensitization, only in the case of cold water therapy, as far as I can tell, it doesn’t desensitize: It re-sensitizes.

Walking or swimming back and forth in it, breathing in and out in a ‘circle’ pattern, brings me right back to my Self; into the warmest parts of my heart. When I exit, I feel nothing extra, nothing trying, nothing lying, nothing dying; just pure stillness and movement in being.

I cannot live in the ocean, unfortunately. I am not a fish. And I notice now that MS flare ups occur when I do not attend to my morning ritual – cold water walking. I only miss my visits when I have no choice but to attend to other matters, but the cold ocean has taught me that my warm efforts are appreciated and worthwhile: That I AM making a difference; that when I am in there, praying for strength, courage, peace, balance and harmony for all beings, in and for all dimensions, all dimensions echo back.

Today, I asked her if she had anything to impart to me. I heard back: Remember that what you anticipate is only that: An anticipation or an idea of what will be. Whatever anxiety you might feel from ‘what it might be like’ is as real as any idea, and reality is not the same thing as ideas plucked from the possibility realms.

What merges ideas with reality is the fact that everything feels the vibrational effect of our actions. As examples, when I stroll through the water in love, or pick up garbage, or give warm greetings to all – due to the Nature of quantum entanglement – everything feels the effects of it, whether I notice or not. Same thing goes for walking around in hate or fear, leaving garbage on the ground, or being an asshole: Everything feels it. Our actions reverberate and they do matter.

We matter, and since matter is just energy in another form, we energy.

The ocean and patterned consequences remind me that eating good food, drinking clean water, engaging in good conversation and human connection, getting exercise, absorbing sunshine, taking water walks, earthing and meditating are all great ways to nourish – arguably – the most important relationship of all: That with health and vitality. The health of the relationship with Self, others and surroundings – with that which only and genuinely wishes for us to be optimally healthy, in all ways – is here for us, always. We have only to recognize it.

The ocean has taught me how to remove the distractions. When they are gone, one cannot help but feel what exists underneath them. The Undiscovered Self: Remembering the mystery and the super natural state of being.

Beyond a doubt, my entire world has shifted for the better since entering the cold ocean. She has taught me more about patience, discipline, healing, sensation, tolerance, gratitude, humility, truth, purity, balance, harmony, strength, courage and love. To immerse oneself in her is to find much more than one’s self; it is to discover that ideas of self are not what self is.

In my experience, who we are is not created or defined by attempts to identify or delineate ourselves. In fact, this only fragments us further. Who we are is what we are when the distractions and impure influences are silenced, and the poetry in our hearts pours forth; where “everything passes and only the truth remains.” ― Fyodor Dostoevsky

Thanks for reading.

Photo Credits

Photos courtesy of Mary Rose

What a horribly maudlin thought.

Sometimes I get angry about it: How did it get like this? How have people become so ill in so many ways? Who is responsible? … recognizing that we all have a responsibility to ourselves …

Lately, more and more, the following question has been forced to the forefront of many, many minds: How could someone – anyone – who is demonstrably not healthy possibly think they have a right to tell another not just how to ‘take care of themselves’, but unilaterally and without any discussion, how to govern their own body?

I would never claim to be an expert on much, but I can confidently say that I am the only one who knows me and my body, mind and spirit (like I do), as I am the one who resides here. Every living being can confidently make this claim about themselves. And for me, while in residence here, I honour this temple as a joyful and serious steward and caregiver of it.

I realize my anger – although very human and in some sense justified – is not actually anger: It is sadness and despair. Both are felt as a result of recognizing the reality behind this strange and hypocritical world – this particular state of the ‘illusion’ we are privy to.

It feels as if a sick, incoherent and detached ideology – akin to an algorithm, in the sense that it doesn’t seem to have any hold or comprehension of the complex inter-workings of the human psyche or even physical aspects of the being as a whole – is telling healthy, conscious beings how they ‘need to be’, in order to align with the former’s strangely unhealthy ideology of ‘health’. This presents everywhere from the ‘news’, the day to day behaviour we emulate, to the unacknowledged centuries of trauma which continue to flow through our veins as cellular memory.

I feel the ramifications ever deeper now … for so long, so unaware of and disconnected from our own internal and externals runtime environments – discouraged from trusting our intuitions, our senses, our feelings, our inner ‘knowings’ and even our immune systems … this is both profound and disturbing.

It is something that needs to be addressed at the deepest levels, and I cannot not see that it is not being addressed properly and to any real avail. Instead, I see and feel a massive abuse of trust, abuse of position, and abuse of not just humanity, but all beings on this planet. Division. Hegelian Dialectic. More fear to replace the old ones.

Why does it feel as if we are being discouraged from thinking about this or going into it in a way that might remediate our individual and collective pain and suffering?

The sense that we ‘are never good enough’, and would be better off if we just had ‘this’ or ‘that’, is pervasive and constant. It has extended beyond the reach of even rational arms.

Where does all this come from?

I see clearly that it is feeding on our energy and attention, and therefore, our time. It is a thieving thing: Stealing time and energy – life – away from a potential, original and inexplicably creative world, in order to tap and funnel it into one which never satiates us in any real way.

What makes us not trust ourselves, to the point of ridiculing and submitting that dear and beautiful part of ourselves which wishes only to curiously explore our own innate knowing and being? Why has this ‘you need more’ narrative taken such parasitic hold of our conscious minds?

Something simply isn’t right here.

We have the power to turn off the ‘wrong’, ‘not serving health’ button, and indeed, if something – in truth – is not serving to actually make us feel good, better or even alive, then it has to be turned off. The quality and nature of our lives depend on it.

Lately, I have spent all my time in a different place. One which initially terrified me and then, after time and examination – internalizing the experience – now exhilarates me to no end. This place has brought me back to the original questions: ‘What am I supposed to do with this? Who am I? Why am I here?’

Tonight, I had an experience that served to remind me how in these questions are the obvious answers: Ones that live inside always.

I was reminded that if ‘you’ are still asking these questions, ‘you ‘ have not yet healed from the illness. Even as ‘you’ have healed so many different elements – the physical, mental and psychological ones’, this is not a ‘that’s it … I made it!’ kind of thing. There are infinite layers to it, and indeed, we are all connected.

The more you learn, feel and experience it, the more you recognize the limitlessness of it.

I am not sure where this piece of writing is going to go or who it will land on, but I shall end for now by reminding myself and whomever might be reading this: The level of compassion and insight one must have to go on this journey – to be here at this particular time of our human, collective consciousness – at this point of awakening, to what and who we truly are, is and must be as incomprehensibly infinite as time and space themselves.

In the realms of health – in every entangled and interconnected realm of health – to not see how horribly traumatized one would have to be to not even be able to admit that they see a problem with the world right now … this is not a light matter, but one which must be treated with healing consciousness and light matter.

I thought to put these questions out there, so that they and everyone inside whose consciousness they echo, know and knows: I hear you.

Photo Credits

Photos courtesy of Mary Rose

Shyness takes over
Heart to heart
Every part feels like glass
Clear, fragile and easily shattered

No matter

In the joy of joint creation
And rolling
And training
And playing
And praying

There is
Here
No roll playing
No toll taken
No goal making
Just soul shaking

Something more
Wanting more
To break more
To break more dull and stale patterns on boring timelines
That once called
So fervently
Greedily
Like a hungry habit
Which needs too much
And wants too little

Not creating new ones
But instead
Seeing that they are already
Already here
Inside the remembering innocence

Familiar senses
Long forgotten
Now remembered
In original Love
For all that is
Prior to thought
Prior to knowing
what thought or knowing were.

Hours and hours of watching these brave waves
These craving days
Training this vertigo
To be still
Could it be?

The best has yet to happen.

In the worst of this mess
To find it: This isness
Instead of communicating
With a chasing and constant dizziness
Of always wondering
Why there is a sense between me and other of trashy stickiness
And scratchy itchiness
And patchy frizziness
And unfinished business

Between truth and fiction
Why there is an insistence on so many possible timelines
Instead of just the best probable one

This one

The click of a light switch
In a long and darkened hallway
Which may or may not exist
Finds my hand
As I tear down the old cathedrals
Built around me
Which buttressed my hidden memories
And forgotten knowing
With comfort and caging

We are inside of time
And time is waiting outside
For us
To come and play
In the always of now.

I can feel it like warm skin
against my needs
Like winter in spring
Falling on me
Like lacy snowflakes
Lingering softly

Dusting it still
With my tender brush.

This innocence
Lights up new reflections
And shadows fall
In love with that which cast them.

Mary training on beach with sai

Photo Credit

Photo courtesy of  Mary Rose – All Rights Reserved

I suppose this is why we are encouraged to be gentle with ourselves throughout this process; although ultimately, the result is indeed a more centered and balanced state of being, it is not an easy undertaking.

In my experience, the silence of meditation can be deafeningly loud sometimes. All the ‘mind spin’, ‘reasons why it’s a waste of time’, and the lingering habituated cycles of thinking about ‘what else we should be doing’ and ‘how we should be’, has often caused me to have to ‘come out’ because if I didn’t, I would have thrown up or passed out. I think this speaks to the healing process; a purging, in a sense, of all which rises to be acknowledged and addressed and perhaps let go, if it no longer serves us.

Breathing deeply helps. Deep belly breathing I’ve learned hits the Vagus nerve, which stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system, which in turn, invokes a sense of calm. ‘Rest and digest’ mode. Allowing the emotions that might come up to be released through crying helps as well.

What it feels like to me is ‘sitting with woundedness’ and attempting to be there as a loving caretaker, even as the woundedness seems to ‘fight to stay wounded’, and not because it really wishes to stay wounded, but because it is familiar with that. It feels almost like Stockholm syndrome: Like I/we actually developed a loving bond with patterns and habits which have ‘been with us for so long’, even as they damage us.

And when the habitual patterns rise – naming the thoughts, things and perhaps people attached to these ‘wounds’ – it feels as if the wounds become raw again. Like layers coming to the surface.

‘Why am I doing this to myself?!’ I often ask.

‘Because you value yourself that much. You’re the powerful caretaker. You’re the only one who can. You’re the expert on you’, I hear.

And even as it feels like attempting to build a bridge between the ‘no! you can’t change!’ subconscious design, and the ‘yes! you can!’ conscious one, over wounds that roil and boil like hot lava underneath the surface of our conditioning, we are called to breathe through the pain and discomfort knowing that this too shall pass. And once it does, a new neural thread is formed as part of that bridge.

Like a new little bud of hope opens up in the heart on a once neglected tree of we.

I’ve noticed that ‘re-wiring’ my thinking/behavior/tendencies is working.

I have noticed a change in my habits – simple things like always making my bed so I have it to come home to, being more mindful in my communications, in doing dishes, more intrigued by the nature of what is possible, false idea forms and limiting belief systems slowly removed and replaced by true knowing and belief in Self, smiling at people even when I don’t feel like it and having smiles returned, and not minding the ‘small stuff’ so much.

I encourage everyone reading to watch this TED talk, “Why we all need to practice emotional first aid”.

In short, meditation is sometimes transcendent; like I notice an immediate and lasting sense of calm in it. Power in observing what comes up, and not reacting as I have done in the past. But sometimes, it’s not. Sometimes, it feels like doing hours of dirty work only to find more mess the next time. Like, it’s not working. But it does work. It just takes practice and time.

I hope this resonates and/or helps.

Please be gentle with your selves.

Love, light, and luck to you all.

Photo Credit

Photo is pixabay creative commons

I walked through the winter storm, which fell upon us here in Victoria on February 11, 2019, feeling as if the universe was expressing for me things I could not. What a wild thing to share time with a storm that seems to totally get you – but at the same time – doesn’t give a crap about you or your feelings!

Untempered Nature; you’re so learny.

As I walked with a mangled heart – told in far too many overt and insidious ways that I am not good enough – I couldn’t help but see a direct parallel between the harsh, cold words spoken, and the stinging, blustering wind and snow that blinded me as I walked. Both stung terribly and forced my tearing eyes shut as I fought against their icy, prying fingers, wearing me down and tearing me up, forcing me to duck and cover, digging like spikes into that deepest well of fears and insecurities, finding every weakness in my layers.

A different way to say it: Ouch. Human cruelty sucks. Like the sound of a rusty snowblower rolled contemptuously over nails on a chalkboard somehow, for some reason. The kind of vibe that makes every drum in your body shudder in atomistic disgust like there’s a Portuguese Man-Of-War jellyfish trying to squirm under your hair follicles. Devil level treble on an otherwise smooth and funky bass line.

Anyway, with my dorky SpongeBob pompom hat and my little red gloves with the hole in the thumb, I was geared up with cheery, warm reminders that I have layers between me and the cold ‘it’, and so I opened my eyes and stopped to take a picture.

The water in the fountain at the back side of the Legislature was completely frozen, in this big heap of magical ice. The statues of the birds on top and in front of the fountain – solid and frozen in both stone and time – were covered in layers of soft snow, and the water in the pool beneath the main fountain was glassy and still; filled with chunky clumps of ice and brilliant whiteness. Amazingly, the little sprinklers of water around the ‘main bird’ kept shooting upwards, defying gravity and the icy temperatures, and they sounded almost as if they were giggling with delight. So I giggled too.

I found a lovely union there: Between the stillness of the frozen fountain water and the likewise feeling in my heart. Between the standstill wingspan of those stone cold birds, and the time-stopping callousness of some stone-cold words. Between the high velocity, stinging, movement of the wind and water and the equally blinding and blurring thoughts that swirled around my head. In the deepening snow which owned my path and pushed me to create a channel in that deepness, I walked away from the temporary snow castles of berating assholes in my mind, and towards the grounded fondness of my true Self which is Kind.

I walked slowly through the storm and smiled at every face I passed, until I reached my old and reliable friends – mostly dead poets and philosophers – those who pondered the esoteric things which take up most of my ROM n RAM, and within these walls and pages and data-banks, I found a book which rightly left hooked me right in the brain.

I will share a passage from ‘Of Peace of Mind‘, by Lucius Annaeus Seneca.

“The position in which I find myself more especially (for why should I not tell you the truth as I would to a physician), is that of neither being thoroughly set free from the vices which I fear and hate, nor yet quite in bondage to them: my state of mind, though not the worst possible, is a particularly discontented and sulky one: I am neither ill nor well. It is of no use for you to tell me that all virtues are weakly at the outset and that they acquire strength and solidity by time, for I am well aware that even those which do but help our outward show, such as grandeur, a reputation for eloquence, and everything that appeals to others, gain power by time. Both those which afford us real strength and those which do but trick us out in a more attractive form, require long years before they gradually are adapted to us by time. But I fear that custom, which confirms most things, implants this vice more and more deeply in me. Long acquaintance with both good and bad people leads one to esteem them all alike. What this state of weakness really is, when the mind halts between two opinions without any strong inclination towards either good or evil, I shall be better able to show you piecemeal than all at once. I will tell you what befalls me, you must find out the name of the disease.”

I don’t know what to call the disease. But perhaps it stems from the honest search for wellness itself, in a world which ceaselessly insists on punctuating what’s ‘not good enough’, and pushes us to behave like wanting, selfish ingrates, or like metaphorical ‘dragon-chasing’ addicts, rather than encouraging us to simply be at peace with who we are and what we have. For real, I mean. Not like something we can buy online for just $9.99; like a lost flock of wired-in, ‘easy button’ search engines; gateways to an endless stream of immediately gratifying nothingness and inevitable failed attempts to fill the high-level void with low-level things we don’t even know we don’t really want.

I am certain of little, but to be able to walk through and trudge a path, and smile at the other – at the dis-ease itself – at one’s Self, amid and despite the storm and onslaughts of human coldness, is to heal the dis-ease.

Also, if others don’t think we’re good enough, that’s a reflection on how they see themselves, not on those they project their words onto.

So blessed be the storm; for it reveals to us exactly who we are.

Photo Credit

Photo by Mary Rose – All Rights Reserved

I feel compelled to write again: About the fact that the peeling away of the layers of us – all that might have served (artificial?) purposes – the ‘we must do such and such in order to ‘be a successful part of it” – is nothing short of a double edged sword.

It feels, at once, like an exciting unfolding of something new and real and original and innocent – like a return to that which we loved and were before the conditioning algorithms of ‘this is what you should be in order to be liked, worthy, successful, etc’ – but it also feels like … it’s as if the ‘knowing yourself’ thing goes hand in hand with a willful self-exclusion from everything comfortable, familiar, and reliably ‘safe’ … that one is imposing the suffering and exclusion that comes with ‘separating oneself from one’s programmed identity’, and therefore, responsible for all that follows (even if it’s something as simple as choosing not to be a part of social media … or something as complex as choosing to believe that one can heal all dis-ease within oneself, by having the courage to continually understand that one’s adopted and learned identifying parameters are NOT the definitive be all, end all of who one truly is.)

Regarding everything from how to meditate, how to eat, how to live, how to be successful, how to be happy, to social media, and regarding the possibility that we can take responsibility for ourselves, instead of existing in a kind of ‘someone else will do it; someone else must validate/see me’ mentality, the choice to not accept the parameters of impossible expectations – to be ourselves, but ‘not that way’ – ironically, brings out True Exposure of Self.

The irony has a metallic taste, and it can make us feel as if we are being pitted against ourselves. Blame, shame, game; what’s your name?

In a world obsessed with definitions and titles and appearances, who are we? Who are we when no one’s watching?

When we choose to know ourselves, truly and with stoicism, persistence, gratitude and confidence, the old conditioning fights harder to win us over. It’s voice becomes louder and more insistent: That we can’t ‘win’ at life if we choose not to ‘play’ within the impossible parameters established for us. And what kind of regular person would have the audacity to think their way of being is better than ‘the norm/popular/established way’?

Who are we when no one is watching?

What ambiguity lives in the mystery. What strength we must summon to stand up to the lies of convenience.

In short, it’s not all flowers and sunshine. Which is why I am going to go outside and absorb the flowers and sunshine prior to writing more.

Because this process … it requires a kind of confidence and fortitude which I admit, does not come easily to me. And I feel the need to apologize if I have ever made it seem as if it’s as easy as hitting an easy button.

I take comfort in having sounding boards and support. Thank you to those who feel me.

I also take comfort in the natural things because they are like I wish to be, underneath this ineffable, flowering process. They just are. They don’t even have the ability to need or ask to be anything other than what they are. The sun doesn’t care if we choose to feel its warmth on our skin, and the flowers don’t care if we see their beauty or taste their lovely aromas. To even personify such things with qualities we humans cling to .. it puts things into perspective. And as the layers peel off, we need that. Like air. Because this process .. it’s one of the most difficult things to put into words, because it’s the same and different for every single one of us.

It’s lonely bloomin’ into an only human.

Doctored Agents of Change, Dr. Strange patience yield; repeat cycle bargaining, to find more truth revealed.

Repeat pattern comforts the habit’s caress, to heal what’s been found in our own only-ness.

One. Life. As a human.

Photo Credit

Photo courtesy of Mary Rose  – All Rights Reserved

A surfer paddles out, and amid many possible waves (which are immeasurable in quantity, and independent of the surfer), she keeps paddling, focusing singularly on catching the probable best one. If she persists, her chances of finding it increase. And even if it’s not the ‘best one ever’, the ‘best one ever’ for that day – and every day – exists, all the time, for her to discover.

This is akin to our thought processes: There is a best one in every circumstance, every day. Even if it’s one revisited from a prior day while riding the wave of today, we have the choice to limit the possibilities (the ones which might not align with best outcomes), and then, from the ones which made it through the discerning selection process, we are better apt to choose ones which serve our focus.

But we must remain focused on that which serves to assist, not hinder. We have the ability to shift from the fearful and unpredictable sense that we are playing A navigator in an overwhelming, infinite realm of possibilities, where feeling ‘spun’ is par for the course, to a more predictable one, where we are THE navigator in a decisive field of probability, where the aforementioned ‘spin’ naturally aligns with homeostatic balance.

With finer ‘tune-ability’, established by denying access and entertainment of ‘cacophony data’ (the spin cycle of indecisiveness and a lack of faith that we can navigate effectively, both of which stem from ‘chosen’ cognitive dissonance), we discover the sound of one hand clapping being made by The Internal Natural Selector, with higher level ‘entropic skills’ and a higher level of discernment. And in that, we become the watcher of what is watched and the healers of what calls for healing.

In summary, all input data gives us an opportunity to make better decisions which can in turn, result in better outcomes. As for that which may be intentionally omitted by Self and others, in the end, it’s irrelevant, because the probability that the intention behind these omissions stems from that which is misaligned, is very high. And that’s not what we seek to focus on. Is it?

Please stay tuned.

Photo Credit

Photo is pixabay creative commons

It can be very tricky to navigate the sounds of it; like attempting to hear the sound of one hand clapping amid a cacophony of them.

Enter cognitive dissonance: Intuitively knowing what’s true or best, but choosing to ignore it.

Cognitive dissonance is experienced when our desire for truth alignment, consistency and understanding are not being met. Whether consciously or not, this inability to discover cohesion between words and actions (choosing to feed an immediate gratification cycle, despite the known damage it causes), is not really an inability to discern, but rather, a choice not to.

It’s a choice to deny oneself access to alternative (and often times, better) options. This is done to prevent ‘the fear’; fear of having to deal with losing that which offers familiar and reliable outcomes, in the great unknown.

But there’s another reason cognitive dissonance can visit.

Oftentimes, we are challenged to discover cohesion between words and actions in others, when there is none to discover. For instance, if pertinent information is intentionally withheld, this directly affects one’s ability to trust, and more importantly, to make sound decisions (and, again, this is typically done to satisfy a need for both immediate gratification, and fear avoidance), which further imposes a sense of ‘this doesn’t feel right’-ness. Yet we remain, seeking discovery.

Cognitive dissonance occurs in these cases because the need for immediate gratification (from all contributors, in different ways, and for variable reasons) is heavily encouraged (hit the easy button!) and naturally, very strong. So strong, in some cases, that it can supersede, override or ‘sound drown’ consequential truth. This imbalance is transmitted on an intuitive level, the effects of which are misalignment. This in turn can manifest in a number of ways: As anxiety, confusion, repeat spin cycles of the same old ‘mother-clucking bird noise’ in both your head, and demonstrably, in the form of others who feed the cycle, or even, as dis-ease. Oh dear.

MS: You post-dated letters with a burden of proof … are you trying to communicate my denial of truth?

Our power to choose our own and best outcomes are therefore determined not just by our own ability to invoke the former power, but also, by those we choose to share time and space with. (This is why Trust is huge.) So, as we bear witness to selected and selective versions of us, chattering away in our minds, like a flock of clucking birds in a word-cage, we must indeed be very selective.

I feel comfortable saying that the measure of a system as a whole can be considered ‘perfect’, aligned or at equilibrium state, when certain, precise conditions are met.

Analogy exercise time: Think of your thoughts as the conditional parameters which determine the atomic and molecular alignment within your thermodynamic system; as the ‘arrangers’ for the constituent parts of your whole, working body; as that which can preserve energy (for optimization), and maintain homeostasis and optimal health and wellness, within your ride, within your house, within your body.

Does this mean it’s possible to send some thought letters back to my MS? (I’ll refrain from making a joke about the letters my bird brain would like to send.) Indeed. Is it probable I will do so? Indeed.

Possibility is qualitative (subjective, as it may or may not happen), whereas probability is quantitative (a mathematical measurement of how possible something is or isn’t). Example: It is possible to eat well; it becomes probable when one chooses to repeatedly do so. Another example: It is possible for one to heal oneself by addressing the discord inside, on a cellular level, and sending back harmonious feedback; it becomes probable (likely) that one will heal oneself when one chooses to repeatedly do so.

Our thoughts and actions are like this: A constant stream of input and output possibilities, which must be appropriately and selectively entertained, prior to being fed into the probability loop.

What shall I choose to offer as harmonious feedback in response to the dissonant MS letters? Let’s see.

Dear MS: I heard and hear you. Now hear me. Your encrypted message has been decoded, and my operating system has been enhanced and rebooted as a result. Thank you for the reminder that this was necessary. Now, I release you from service, as the lesson you provided has served me greatly: To better understand discernment, and how to be more gentle, kind, loving and selective with my letters and words inside the communication process. Sincerely, MR.

Maintain course. Maintain focus. Keep thoughts sound.

Photo Credit

Murmuration – by AJC1 on flickr – Some Rights Reserved

While reading, allow yourself to see every detail within the words. And when finished, keep returning to the peace you created in your mind space. Go there often, with full-throttle imagination and an open heart.

Imagine yourself sitting in a peaceful place. Sunshine on your skin. A warm breeze. Soft ground. Natural sounds. The sound of your breath. In and out.

Breathe in and out, deeply into your belly, seven times. And each time you breathe out, with a smile on your face, say the words, ‘Thank you’.

Your eyes are closed in your mind, but open as you read this. Thought bubbles begin to surround you. See it in your mind. Some are big, some are small. You’re sitting there, in that beautiful secret place, and every thought that arises finds its way into a safe, cozy, warm thought bubble. Let them be encased, one by one, by their own bubble, swirling and twirling with delightful rainbows, and then, let them float away.

Until in your mind’s eye, you see nothing but yourself, surrounded by a blank canvas.

You are travelling from the realm of thought bubble forms, to that of no thought forms at all. Your imagination will take you there.

Take as long as it takes.

In a moment, it will happen. And then, your blank canvas in your mind’s eye – free from all those thoughts that had fun floating to the surface and away – will begin to paint itself.

With you in the center, your blank canvas paints ever greater details of this beautiful space you hold. With the imagination engaged, and without the distractions of the thought bubbles, which have gently floated away – free to entertain themselves outside of you, you are free to discover what exists inside.

Paint your picture with all the lovely colours of you in the center of you, surrounded by light, peace and Love in this beautiful landscape you now hold and behold. Pull from your imagination; every detail.

You might see a brightness growing from a source that seems a million light years away – coming from everywhere and nowhere at once – amplified by your third eye.

Stay there. Until all the thought forms and projections which do not serve to maintain this peace, evaporate. And keep painting. Whatever pictures make your third eye smile.

Paint a picture of peace in there. Your lovely, private and safe landscape. Derive your vision straight from the imagination. And let it be. As beautiful as peace itself.

Photo Credit

Photo is pixabay creative commons

Here’s a ‘not news’ news flash: We all hear talk in our heads. It’s our consciousness sifting through the massive amounts of data which is being called to process.

We hear ourselves thinking – entertaining dialogue within our imaginations – all day and even night. Some of it’s fun. Some of it’s not. Some of it’s useful. Some of it’s not. Some talk to themselves in the mirror in order to get a clearer understanding, because doing so provides both audio and visual input from a most trusted source (you :), to assist; to validate the thoughts one wishes to focus on, as opposed to those one would prefer to stop entertaining.

It’s something I’ve done myself on occasion; ‘talking it out’ with the person I have the closest relationship with. Who will always guide me aptly, with honesty, integrity and love. With subject matter that might be preferable to keep to oneself (that which often whispers most loudly), it stands to good reason that such inner content – while in conflict, anyway – is best handled (and honoured) in privacy. Sharing it with Self – hearing it out loud – is not only a quick, private and effective way to ‘let it be heard’, but more importantly, to obtain sound feedback.

That which whispers loudest tends to also be more persistent than the things which are ‘already figured out’. And I’ve noticed the uncomfortable ‘mind spin’ tends to seep in at times when we are most vulnerable. Tired, hungry, lonely, having had a bad day, etc. Perhaps because the resonant frequency of that which seeks attention, trapped within our cellular memory, is also vulnerable. Like speaks to and hears likewise.

This is why – to get back to the origin of this piece – meditation is so important.

This series is about focusing on that which serves our Greatest Outcomes; that which allows us access to the ‘level up’ timelines. This involves addressing that which is on repeat cycles in our minds; that which has perhaps been forgotten, ignored or pushed down, even with good reason. It’s also about addressing our collective amnesia, to get a better understanding as to why it is so challenging to move past the past; to escape the roller coaster ride of conditioning, repeat patterns and past timelines.

Understanding how to navigate this (in essence, how to manifest a higher, multidimensional experience, even if this perspective exists only in the power of the imagination), is as important as why we should. Invoking the imagination – being able to use this power to visualize anything – is not only an apt means of ensuring health and wellness, but also allows for an infinitely more interesting and fulfilling life than what our limiting cycles offer.

As you read this, whether you care to see things in terms of linear timelines and three dimensional forms, or in terms of infinite timelines and quantum dimensional possibility, please bear in mind that hearing yourself hear yourself – even if it sounds like it’s not you spinning stories in there – is totally normal. And I encourage you to talk it out with your most trusted source: You.

It can be a heavy process, but it can also be extremely fun. Even funny.

Meme:

Me: Will someone help me with this!
Also me: No, no not like that! Here, just let me do it.

Reach in. Pull relatable thought. Visualize it. Make it real. Keep it real.

Keep a light heart, and an open mind.

The next chapter will elaborate on what has been said here. It will also include a visualization exercise, designed to enhance your higher sensibilities.

Stay tuned.

Photo Credit

Photo is pixabay creative commons