John Steinbeck

“There Are Those Who Must Live In Rooms Of Experience That The Rest Of Us Can Never Enter - Perhaps We Should Quit Trying To Intrude Into These Places, And Simply Learn To Guard The Door.”

John Steinbeck

Page 72 ... Into the Light

On Having and Finding Respect

Respect

This starts with the individual’s sense of self and that sense of self is a by-product of very early developmental experiences.

Its clearest defining qualities are related to time and how time and interaction with affective adults was spent … with those who reflect how that individual was viewed by them during the child’s first 30 to 60 months of life.

It Is True That:

It is a necessity that we must first have respect for ourselves … it then follows naturally … that we next have to have respect for the rules we chose by … which we agree to … and conduct our living accordingly and build our social order around.

On the other hand if we do not have this sense of respect instilled at a very early age then ... it is with great effort and difficulty that we will move through our lives.

Respect is something that is purely experiential … it can be obtained anytime … but first we must know what it is that we are looking for … and then … where it is we must search to find it. 12 Step programs help enormously here as do other self help programs. The book Iron John asks the question “Where is the Key hidden?”

One of life’s conundrums is that sooner or later we get ourselves involved in attempting to make something happen or a series of things happen … herein lies the problem; a necessary ingredient for those things to happen is we need to respect ourselves to accomplish or complete the tasks we have set out for ourselves to complete … now the complexity sets insomuch that for the most part most of us don’t carry the necessary tools to cause the respect to be there because it is not part of our working tool kit … it somehow got overlooked … thus the task at hand that should not have been all that difficult becomes a very difficult task.

The Basics of the concept is:

• A person cannot respect himself unless he knows the truth of himself.

For most the truth about us is lost back in the early beginnings … at times and places where we simply had to begin to pretend to be someone else just to be able to get along in our families of origin That Hurt(s).

It is also true that our every effort is to maintain the lid on this painful thing so that it does not get out and hurt us again. The problem is that (neurotic) defense strategies themselves become more painful than the pain they were masking but our only defense to pain is to build another neurotic structure … mask … false self … to protect us from our pain of our reality.

Finding our lost self-respect is a prerequisite to healing; something a kin to Peter Pan recovering his lost shadow from Wendy’s drawer. Now we have a place to look … and a direction to go in.

Daily Reflection

Made a decision to turn my will and my life over to the care of God, as I understood Him and sought through prayer and meditation to improve my conscious contact with God, praying only for the knowledge of God's will for me and the power to carry that out.

13 On Appreciating Deeper Processes - Past Made Present

EXPERIENCE has taught us that most of us are secretly reliving things that are no longer present in our lives. We are protecting ourselves from demons that are no longer there.

Psychic shadow boxing - again it appears.

It is true that life is a place filled with the weird, the wonderful, and the colorful, and we do have to consider using caution with some things. But we can do it from an adult perspective and see things as they are, not as they used to be.

The demons were real once; that much is true. It just may not be true now.

 

Being Open To The Fact That The Past Is Not The Present

Allows Room For The Soul To Come Out Of Hiding And

To Grow And Mature.

46 On Seeing Simple Truths

EXPERIENCE has taught us that there comes a time in our lives when we must cross barriers or change paths if we are to get on with facing our destiny and change.

This is often referred to as “giving it up,” or “letting go,” or “turning it over.”

But what are we giving up or letting go of?

Simply put long-held sacred cows.

Often we interpret these times of transition, of giving up sacred cows, as difficult, not necessarily because they are, but because we believe they are supposed to be.

If, in our old mind-sets, we have programmed a belief structure  that difficult is a necessary part of change, then the process of change will seem to be difficult. Otherwise, we don’t believe it’s change.

We blend this misconstrued thought into what we have predetermined to be the only route available to the new and different, and we believe that the journey through change has to be difficult.

What If It’s Not?

What If You Just Think It Is?

(Heads up on this one, it is a corollary to you depending on you!)

Lessons on Life: Beginning Middle and an End

There was a man who had four sons.

He wanted his sons to learn not to judge things too quickly.

So he sent them each on a quest, in turn, to go and look at a pear tree that was a great distance away. The first son went in the winter, the second in the spring, the third in summer, and the youngest son in the fall.

When they had all gone and come back, he called them together to describe what they had seen. The first son said that the tree was ugly, bent, and twisted. The second son said, no it was covered with green buds and full of promise. The third son disagreed; he said it was laden with blossoms that smelled so sweet and looked so beautiful, it was the most graceful thing he had ever seen. The last son disagreed with all of them; he said it was ripe and drooping with fruit, full of life and fulfillment.

The man then explained to his sons that they were all right, because they had each seen but only one season in the tree's life. He told them that you cannot judge a tree, or a person, by only one season,

and that the essence of who they are and the pleasure, joy, and love that come from that life can only be measured at the end, when all the seasons are up.

If you give up when it's winter, you will miss the promise of your spring, the beauty of your summer, and the fulfillment of your fall.

Author Unknown

Lessons Learned From Life’s Experiences

• Have Empathy For The Source Of Your Pain. Who, What, Where, When and Why. There is the strongest possibility that whatever is causing you pain may be reflecting you back to you.

• Rational Thought Won't Work. My rationalization is Biased by my experience. That much is true. My Experience influences my best thinking. Again True. And my rational thinking is pre determined by the aftermath of my experience. Therein lay the Bias. So what makes sense to me might not be either sensible or reasonable, the problem is, it makes sense to me. There are times when I am prepared to fight to the death for those beliefs; that doesn’t make any of those beliefs either True or Right. They are just my belief(s) biased by my experience.

• There Is Something At Work Behind All This And That Is Beyond Me And My Self Centeredness And All That I Can Imagine. A Force far greater than me. Can you imagine that. Imagine something you couldn’t possibly imagine.

• Be Prepared To Re Examine Your Motives And Your Reasons As Well As Your Morals For Doing What You Do. This gets to be interesting when you discover how to use rigorous honesty and apply it to self.

• In Order To Do Your Journey You Will Have To Confront Evil. This is true. It has happened to me several times in my life. It happened at times and in places that one would not necessarily think it would be present but it was. Evil does not have to be coarse. It can be ... but sometimes it is very subtle.

• Never Say Never. Occam’s Razor underscores this sentiment ... “Pluralitas non est ponenda sine neccesitate” … Principle of Parsimony. The precursor to the KISS principle.

• You Can't Change Human Nature. The only thing you can change is Your Mind About Human Nature.

• Human Nature Is The Curriculum Of Life. It Is What You Do With It, That Matters.

With Time Spent On The Path

There Will Come A Time

When You Can Return To The Starting Gate

And

See It For How It Truly Is

For The First Time

“With Eyes Unclouded By Longing.”

EXPERIENCE has taught us -- 175 Missing Pieces

66 On Seeing Clearly

EXPERIENCE has taught us that as we begin to come from a place of deeper understanding, from a place of connection with a Higher Power or with the Way of Things, we may begin to notice that there are several truths quietly at work in our lives.

First: if we try to escape from life’s situations without allowing them to heal or to come to completion, the need for the completion will rise again someplace else in our lives, sometimes changing its form or appearance, but still being of the same necessity: that’s Karma at work in our lives.

Second: there is a thought that seems almost inconspicuous in all this, yet it is probably one of the more important principles in recovery. It also has a Catch 22 quality to it: what we believe is what we will experience, and healing takes place only in our minds, although it seems to manifest itself in other places as other things outside ourselves. When we remove ourselves from a dilemma without resolving it to the soul’s satisfaction, and thereby avoiding the healing process contained in the resolution of that dilemma, we are not allowing the spiritual forces to prevail. What we are doing is simply mood-altering, and that is avoidance. So the need for the process to take place will follow us around like a lost puppy dog from situation to situation. The circumstances will be recreated again and again as the soul attempts to have us resolve these deeper conflicts it perceives as needing completion. This seems to be The Way of Things.

Third: when you try to fix a situation all by yourself and you choose to rely only on yourself and your own resources, know this: You Are In Serious Trouble.

The Way of Things is simply to address life with gratitude in our hearts. To face the tasks that arise on the path before us. Then to ask for the guidance we need. Then to allow the healing to come to us.

Put another way:

Round Pegs Square Holes.

Larger Mallets

Simply Don’t Work.

67 On Seeing Clearly Perhaps for the First Time

 

EXPERIENCE has taught us that when we cover our pain with cognitive insights we lose sight of what really needs to happen for us to heal or to come to a place of spiritual completion.

It is a fact that most people are well into their recovery processes before they truly begin doing the “feeling work.” For some it takes years to come to this place. Unfortunately, some never reach this place within themselves. The search for cognitive insight into why is often the culprit that keeps most lost in their private little prisons avoiding the feelings they need to process in order to escape the prison walls that confine them.

They are both their own gatekeeper and keeper of the keys.

There Are Signs, Posters, And Slogans That Are Put On Walls At Some Of The Various Recovery Group Meetings, And One Says:

 

THINK

THINK

THINK

Translated, This Means:

After Three Thinks, Give It Up

You Will Only Hurt Yourself.

 

68 On Seeing Clearly Perhaps for the First Time

 

EXPERIENCE has taught us that all who enter this territory of willing exploration and recovery have to, sooner or later, put down their devices of mood alteration.

These devices may be some variation on chemical or substance use, or they may be activities that we do as part of our daily rituals, or they may be people with whom we are in relationships. Still, they are devices that we use either overtly or covertly to mood-alter, and they stand between us and our escape from the prison of our minds.

The Key Is Always In The Hand Of The Seeker.

69 On Seeing Clearly Perhaps for the First Time

EXPERIENCE has taught us that the process of no longer using any mind-changing, mood-altering devices (chemicals, or otherwise) can induce a twisted form of thinking for the first while. This twisted form of thinking sets into motion a false belief that the worst is over (this is called the pink cloud effect) and that all our problems are fixed.

Not true, but . . . well, not really true is a better way to try to describe it. If we really stopped and thought about it, not really is not even close to the truth of the matter, but we have taken a step in the right direction, finally. More land mines up ahead, though.

The truth is, life’s conundrum has just changed faces. It just sits there in another form, waiting, like a huge, silent demon, waiting and wanting to control everything in our lives that it can.

Quietly It Waits.

. . . You Stumble . . .

. . . It Stirs And Smiles . . .

Yet Again.

Systemic Maturation

Systemic maturation occurs both in the healthy functional family and the dysfunctional family. These stages are called The Early Phase, The Middle Phase and The Late Phase.

The Early Phase:
This is the time when new families form boundaries, rules, regulations and rituals to govern themselves. The healthy family establishes boundaries to meet the needs of the family members. The dysfunctional family establishes boundaries to meet the needs of the Prime Stressor and the family as a unit. Accommodation rather than cooperation is the primary factor. I live my life adjusting to someone else’s problem.

The Middle Phase:
This is a time of consolidation. In the dysfunctional system, this phase is marked by the necessity of commitment to the family and a growing consistency of regulatory behaviour according to the family. It really boils down to each member of the family being there for the family but the family not being there for them. It is during this stage that dependency behaviour(s) of the Prime Stressor is reinforced. The family consistently meets the needs of the Prime Stressor/and the system ... at the expense of the needs of the individual within the system. Members of the system get abandoned with everyone home. During this phase there is strong resistance to either growth or change. New rules and norms form around how the family can operate. These become the rules of the road within the system. Everyone adapts:

The family adjusts their thinking to make the unacceptable acceptable. This is not healthy, but it is the norm and acceptable because it has been sanctioned by the system to define their Way of Doing Things. Acceptable according to the rules developed by the family to cope.

The Late Phase:
It is during this phase that the legacies for future generations form. The way of things for the family system becomes the customs and rituals especially at celebratory times of the year. Co dependent families experience this phase with the most difficulty. With the progression of the dependency cycle severe health problems begin to arise and the family resists the need for change and becomes more rigid in their ways. As the family tries to cope with the crisis of the moment they are totally unable to prepare for their future and more importantly they have never considered facing the demons of their past.

Recipe for Sanity

Only by discussing ourselves, holding back nothing, only by being willing to take advice and accept direction [can] we set foot on the road to straight thinking, solid honesty, and genuine humility.


 

Repeat Often

Another Truth Ego vs Spirit and Miracles

The Ego clings to the past in the present and fears the future.

Where as:

A Miracle/Spirit releases the past in the present and gives us back our future.

A Dream Oct 24th 2011

It was a perfect room, straight lines, sparkling clean, with everything in its place.  Not a single plant, animal or human being were in the room except for John Lennon. He sat behind a large wooden desk and I stood in front ... facing him as he told me in an assertive yet nice way... he said, "I want nothing around me that knows me as nothing!"

The Focus of My Thoughts . . . for the next while will be

Once my perception is disengaged from the domination of the preconception and my personal interests, it is free to experience the world as it is and to behold its inherent magnificence...

Perception of the miraculous requires no faith or assumptions. It is simply a matter of paying full and close attention to the givens of life, i.e., to what is so ever-present that it is usually taken for granted. (Michael Stark and Michael Washburn. “Beyond the Norm: A Speculative Model Self Realization”  Journal of Religion and Health Vol 16 No.1 pp58-59)

The true wonder of the world is available everywhere, in the minutest parts of our bodies, in the vast expanses of the cosmos, and in the intimate interconnectedness of these and all things.

We are part of a finely balanced ecosystem in which interdependency goes hand-in-hand with individuation.

We are all individuals, but we are also parts of a greater whole, united in something vast and beautiful beyond description.

Perception of the miraculous is the subjective essence of self reali-zation, the root from which man's highest features and experiences grow.

Self realization is born and matures in a distinctive kind of awareness, an awareness that has been described in many different ways by many different people.

The mystics, for example, have spoken of it as the perception of the divinity and perfection of the world.

Dr Richard Bucke referred to it as Cosmic Consciousness; Buber described it in terms of the “I-Thou relationship”; and Maslow gave it the label “Being cognition.”

We shall use Ouspensky's term and call it the Perception Of The Miraculous. “Miraculous” here refers not only to extraordinary phenomena but also to the commonplace, for absolutely anything can evoke this special awareness provided that close enough attention is paid to it.

Once perception is disengaged from the domination of preconception and personal interest, it is free to experience the world as it is in itself and to behold its inherent magnificence ...

Here is a little homework of consideration and observation. Divide the month up into even days and odd days ...

 

On Even Days consider the following using the guidelines that are suggested.

 

So why is it I do what I do?

 

Now as I consider why it is that I do what I do ... know this!

• Every step toward understanding loosens the grip of conditioned experience and its resultant fear on my point of consciousness.

• With each new insight, I will gain a glimpse of what creation really is.

 

• Each glimpse increases my creative power until the balance between my mind and the ego is tipped in the mind's favor.

 

• When that happens, progress is rapid indeed.

The source of much of our unhappiness is the Failing or Failed relationships with those who are important to us: with our spouses, parents, children, friends and colleagues... their lack of conformity to how we imagine they should be.

Herein lay the problems most relationships will suffer during the course of their existence. It is not so much that the relationship is flawed; it is more that the individuals bring to the table a series of unmet needs and personality bruises that stand in the way. It’s not a couple’s problem. It is individual problems that were there long before the couple met that stands in the way... unfinished business from years ago.

The symptoms of unhappiness are widely variable and are often seen as mental illness. M Scott Peck makes the observation that most if not all human mental disorder is structured in an individual’s inability to face their legitimate suffering.

Most personality disorders are defence strategies gone sideways, but they become ways of dealing with life and they leave each of us wanting.

The Reader and The Door

Noticing, Simplicity and Truth

AVAILABLE AT http://www.amazon.com/

What you will see on the next four or five pages are observations made on the principles of Noticing, Simplicity and Truth.

I would like you in your groups to read it, first to yourself and then aloud within your groups.

Take your time.

Then before you discuss it amongst yourselves get your thoughts down on paper . . .

Write about it …

Then Discuss It Within The Confines Of Your Various Groups …

Then we will have all the groups discuss and share.

On Seeing Simple Truths

EXPERIENCE has taught us that this path of looking more closely at ourselves, although certainly not easy, is truly the only route by which we can at last leave behind the cruel invisible prison walls created in our childhood exploration of our humanity.

We become free by transforming ourselves from unaware victims of the past into responsible, responsive individuals in the present. People who are aware of their past have processed and accepted it for what it is, and are thus able to live with it.

The irony is that most people do exactly the opposite, even those who profess most loudly that they are on the path. Without realizing that the unprocessed past is constantly determining their present actions, most people avoid learning anything meaningful about their history. They continue to live their lives in the state of their repressed childhood roles, ignoring the fact that these situations no longer exist, except in the mind of the beholder. They continue to live with the old and repressed assumptions; they continue the posture of fearing fears and avoiding dangers that, once real, have not been real for a long, long time.

Psychic shadow boxing

Fighting a fight I can neither win nor protect myself from. Why? Because that was then and this is now and it is not here now.

We now know that people are driven by these unconscious memories, repressed feelings, and unfulfilled needs, and this state of affairs determines nearly everything they do or are willing to attempt to do or fail to do.

Life is something that happens while I’m busy doing something else.

Statement of Truth

A truth once gained is the loss of innocence.

The processes of self-inflicted denial and delusion are like old, warm, woolly sweaters that we wore to protect us from the cold, harsh, hostile world we live in. When the truth is revealed for what it really is, those old familiar sweaters can never go back on over our souls and fit properly as they once did.

The innocence of our childlike ignorance is lost the moment we come to understand that we do not rule the universe or any of its inhabitants, no matter how hard we might try.

Much of the human condition of suffering hangs on seeing or not seeing this simple truth; for suffering is a state of mind, not a condition of existence.

To begin a soul-searching journey is to begin to take our rightful place in this universe. There are requirements, one of which is that we must come to terms with this simple truth or forever be bonded to a hell of our own making.

Freedom from the bonds of our past is freedom from the bonds of our own way of thinking. Thus, freedom from the prison of our own minds is freedom from the process of resistance, from a demon called against.

The walls of the prison of our own minds and all the processes contained therein are always made up of us against something.

Our very survival seems to be at stake.

This process is always filled with resistance and deep-seated fear.

But

Experience Has Taught Me

That as I give over my need to be against, my need to hide, then I will naturally merge with all that is 

The Way of Things.

Observations about People with bumped and bruised Souls

1) We have to guess at what is normal.

2) We have difficulty following through with projects.

3) We lie when it would be just as easy to tell the truth.

4) We judge ourselves without mercy.

5) We have difficulty having fun.

6) We take ourselves very seriously.

7) We have difficulty with intimate relationships.

8) We over react to situations over which we have no control.

9) We constantly seek approval

10) We are either super responsible or super irresponsible and or swing back and forth between those polarities.

11) We feel that we are different from other people.

12) We are extremely loyal in the face of overwhelming evidence that we should not be.

13) We are impulsive and as such we tend to get ourselves locked into situations or circumstances or courses of action without giving due and proper consideration to the outcome or the possible consequences. This impulsivity leads to confusion, self-loathing and a loss of control over the environment. As a result Bumped and Bruised people often spend excessive amounts of time cleaning up messes they get themselves into.

 

From An Adult Point of View

available in PDF format at neiltubb@shaw.ca

The business of trying to achieve a sense of self/power in one's adult life can (but doesn't have to be) become an obsessive/compulsive expression of childhood neediness and unmet needs that stems from deep core belief structures. In the more extreme circumstances, this is expressed as personality disorders that can be coupled with addictions, obsessions and compulsions.

When one reaches out into life for adult relationships, the relationships so formed become a sounding board for buried pain and the repressed core issues. That is when all hell will break loose.

So it follows that if one only tries to resolve the relationship problem(s) in the present moment and the core belief issues are never dealt with ... that is, they remain quietly in the deeper and darker recesses of the mind, they will rise again at another inopportune time to keep the individual from having the very thing they want ... a loving relationship with another human being.

What one has to do is: take hold of what they are doing in the present ... have a real good look at it ... then come to understand that they are being driven by parts and places of their own past ... then come to terms with knowing they can act differently ... and finally, understanding there are deep forces at work here when our basic needs are not being met ... then begin the process of meeting those needs from the adult perspective and not the child's.

Know This

Every accomplishment starts with the decision to try

from Understanding Me While Being We (page 59-61)

There Is No One Need

That Is Greater Than Another Need

There are times when an individual may feel a greater need from one aspect or another ... just so they can recover a sense of balance in their personal world.

We are all driven to fill these needs one way or another. It is the undercurrent of all our behaviours. These needs will be met by either a positive approach or negative approach ... When I use a negative approach it will be to my detriment ... and often at someone else’s expense ... When I approach this from a positive place it causes me to invest in me and thus causing a growth. It then follows that I am invested in me ... and this investment in me creates growth from within ... socially, psychologically, spiritually, emotionally ...

• From the front door ... positive ... the only expense here is to me ... this is my investment into me.

• From the back door ... negative ... I do this at the expense of others ... I invest in me by a negative approach.

Research asserts that 95% of all relationship problems are the misguided efforts of people trying to achieve a sense of self/power. The business of not having a sense of power is a learned phenomena and usually experienced initially early on in life. Now the classic aspect is that once learned, this misguided effort transfers into our Deep Core Belief Structure. That behaviour claims its place in Our Way of Doing Things. It then quietly moves forward with the individual into their adult life and slowly and deliberately wreaks havoc in their life ... (called the Adult Children Syndrome) ...

The business of trying to achieve a sense of self/power in one's adult life can (but doesn't have to) become an obsessive/compulsive expression of childhood neediness and unmet needs that stems from deep core belief structures. In the more extreme circumstances, this is expressed as personality disorders that can be coupled with addictions, obsessions and compulsions.

When one reaches out into life for adult relationships, the relationships so formed become a sounding board for buried pain and the repressed core issues. That is when all hell will break loose. So it follows that if one only tries to resolve the relationship problem(s) and the core belief issues are never dealt with ...that is, they remain quietly in the deeper and darker recesses of the mind, they will rise again at another inopportune time to keep the individual from having the very thing they want ... a loving relationship with another human being.

What one has to do is: take hold of what they are doing in the present ... then come to understand that they are being driven by parts of their past ... then come to terms with knowing they can act differently ... and finally, understanding there are deep forces at work here when our basic needs are not being met ... then begin the process of meeting those needs from the adult perspective and not the child's.

Note: In negative approaches to finding needs satisfaction, one of the most common indicators is that it is being done at someone else's expense ... “if he would only” or “if she could just” ... someone else is the brunt of my pain ... the reason why I can’t ... the hurt and pain is about transfer and counter transfer. This one is very important to understand.

If a child can't find the sense of power to identify themselves as an individual, then they will be on a life long journey of attempting to establish that Sense of Self as an adult. One of the inherent problems in this is that it is the child's needs that are in question not the adult ... Hence the Adult Children Syndrome. It can and usually does become a very ugly tread mill to be on.

By understanding the drives for SURVIVAL, POWER, LOVE, BELONGING, FREEDOM and FUN in people, we become more conscious of the need for our world to be a Quality World of our choosing.

STATEMENT OF FACT: Know this; the vast majority of people who appear to be in adult bodies are in fact those who have not, nor do they intend to make the jump to adulthood because of fear. They do not know how to muster the power to make the emotional and psychological break from their parents and the power that their parents had over them.

from The Door

Five Simple Tools


Guided Imagery ... is a way of understanding and employing the language of the unconscious mind ... Thus it follows that it can help reprogram the deeper mind for more effective living and can help us better understand its output the moment illumination comes forward.

Affirmations ... a closely related tool to guided imagery ... Affirmations is a way of reprogramming the unconscious Idea and Image processor ... how we see things ... through mental and verbal repetition of the ideas and images we want our minds to accept as input.

Relaxation/Meditation ... is a feature designed to induce what medical science calls the relaxation response. This is the incubation period... a time where the non conscious mind works a problem in its own way.

Dream Work ... takes us right into the heart of the deeper mind’s processer ... the deep consciousness ...”and shows us how to mine for and bring back the nuggets of wisdom we find there ... Start A Dream Journal .

“Self, I have a problem, Dream, here let me show you ”

Journaling ... gives us the opportunity to express the deeper mind at the conscious level on a daily basis ... It allows me to see me eventually... “With Eyes Unclouded By Longing ”.

 

Rinpoche Around the Corner

Lama Guendun Rinpoche:

 

Happiness is not to be found with many efforts or will

But is here, nearby, in your relaxing and surrendering.

Don't worry; there is nothing to be done.

Everything that comes up to your mind has no importance because it has no reality.

Don't conceive any attachment for it.

Don't judge yourself.

Let it be.

Let it come up and down without changing a thing.

It all vanishes and begins again, endlessly.

Nothing but the quest for happiness prevents us from seeing it.

It is like a rainbow that one is always chasing without ever reaching it.

It is because it has no existence.

It has always been here and goes with you all the time.

Don't believe in the reality of experiences, good or bad.

They are like rainbows.

Because we want to grasp what is not to be grasped,

We exhaust our strength in vain.

As soon as we relinquish our hold, space is here, open, welcoming & comfortable.

So, do enjoy it.

Everything is yours already.

Stop searching.

Don't go into the jungle to look for the elephant that is quietly waiting for you at home.

There is nothing to do.

There is nothing to force.

There is nothing to desire.

And all comes by itself.

From the Mahabharata, the great Indian epic:

A line from the Mahabharata:

"What is the most wondrous thing in the world, Yudhisthira?"
And Yudhisthira replied, "The most wondrous thing in the world is that all around us people can be dying and we don't realize it can happen to us."

Quote from a long time friend

"Lessons learned: Time heals all wounds, never be afraid to jump into the unknown, nothing is as bad as it seems, and you can re-invent yourself as many times as you wish."

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep, loving concern.

Beautiful people do not just happen.

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Thoughts on 9/11

We are at a place of conjunction of spirit and an anniversary point of fate, reason and lack of understanding.

Sept 11th is one decade since our world became lost in the egocentric desires of philosophies that are diametrically opposed.

Here is the problem ... Everyone works for God ... but most have no spiritual connection. Most are of the opinion that they are deeply spiritually connected and their form of spiritual connection is all there is.

Now it follows that: if I don’t have a way to talk about my deep seated emptiness ... then I will act it out in some form ... I will act it out ... I will act it in ... or ... I will transfer my pain and what I believe are its causes onto something or someone else and then attack them for it; hence the crusades, Hitler’s Germany and every other bit of silliness that was acted out in the name of God by men who had ulterior motives hedged in grandiosity.

If only we could see what we are really up against ... rather then what it appears to be ... God is not a Muslim, nor a Catholic and the list goes on and on ... God is not anyone of them, but all of them are an extension of God.

There is not one of us who are more special than anyone else.

The actual evidence of me being special in God’s eye is that I am here having this experience in the first place.

If only we could settle with this thought as being truth, just image how the world would change.

Neil Tubb Victoria 2011

Entertainment One Oh One

It is written someplace or other that time reveals all too all who have the patience to wait for its passage. But sometimes the pain is too great, sometimes the need to find out “Why” is so strong that one has to push at life and find the answers more quickly. Some of us are content to wait, and some of us are not.

During the mid 1930's, Mahatma Gandhi was travelling through India, campaigning for the freedom of India from the British Raj. He had been jailed a decade before by the British, and when he came out of prison in 1933, he brought with him a single broken spoon and bowl. He ate, washed, and basically did everything out of this one set of utensils. Someone in his following noticed that he was doing so and felt that there was great meaning behind what he was doing, and so they began to do so also. This cult grew and grew, and the philosophy of the “One Bowlness of Life” developed. Now the key here was that no-one had asked Gandhi why he did so. No-one had taken the time to come to the understanding of the Why's and the Where to Fore’s of his practice. One day, it was reported, one brave soul finally asked why Gandhi was living so to speak from one bowl. Now you have to understand that the group had grown over a period of six or so months to encompass several thousand persons. Gandhi replied to the young student that “It was Easy to Keep Clean;” nothing great, nothing deep, just a very simple practice that made life an easier place to be.

We tend to over complicate our lives just for the sake of the “supposed” understanding of it. It just muddles and muddies the waters even more, the more we think about, and it has been found that if you set your mind hard enough to work on a problem it will always give you an answer, “not necessarily the appropriate one,” but an answer none-the-less, just as that small group in India did when they tried to understand what Gandhi was doing, when all they had to do was ask.

It supposedly allows the so called secrets of life to percolate to the surface, to be examined and adapted into the day and my “terrible dailyness" of my life and its' passage through time.

and that much is true

You don’t have to know what the future holds ... to know what needs to be done ... and that much is true

Its Coming

Basic Ingredient for Self

There seems to be four aspects of human interaction that are the essential for spiritual growth.
These are For, At, To and With.
These four basics essentials are:

Being responsible For someone

Being responsible At someone

Being responsible To someone

And

Being responsible With someone

These sound similar but in reality are miles if not universes apart in application.
If each of these components is not properly utilized and an appropriate balance maintained between them, then the basic bulwarks of life 101 simply will not work. It follows then that what I offer out into the day-to-day world will always come out twisted somehow, no matter how hard I try, no matter what my intent. What I do with someone, what I do for someone and what I do at or to someone are the basic criteria for my own spiritual growth. Why, because as I do  with, for, at and to  then I am in fact making an offering to myself of similar proportions and intent. If I do this with wounded intent then ... no matter what I do it is off the mark. The trick to the whole thing is, knowing how to bring the four aspects into balance. Most of us have no idea what to do with “WITH”... hence the lack of balance.


It is something like fueling your car. Put in first grade fuel and you generally get first grade performance, but if you pee in the gas tank, you will be lucky to get off the starting grid.

The Last Piece of Advice I got before I was Born

Warning

At

Times

This Path Way Can Be Slippery

And

The Water Deep

Alex the Flying Frog

Once upon a time in a tiny town, there lived a family with a pet frog named Alex. The family lived a modest comfortable existence on what they earned working at the Wal-Mart but always dreamed of being rich. "Alex!". They exclaimed one day, "We're going to be rich! We're going to teach you how to fly!" Alex, of course, was terrified at the prospect: "I can't fly, you idiots....I'm a frog, not a canary!" The family, disappointed at the initial reaction, told Alex: "That negative attitude of yours could be a real problem. We're sending you to special classes”. So Alex went to a three day seminar and learned about problem solving, time management, and effective communication...but nothing about flying.

On the first day of "flying lessons", the family could barely control their excitement (and Alex could barely control her bladder). The family explained that their apartment building had 15 floors, and each day Alex would jump out of a window, starting with the first floor and eventually getting to the top floor. After each jump, Alex would analyze how well she flew, isolate on the most effective flying techniques, and implement the improved process for the next flight. By the time they reached the top floor, Alex would surely be able to fly. And, of course, the family would be rich, proud and fulfilled. Alex understood that the fate of the entire family depended on her success.

She pleaded for her life, but it fell on deaf ears. "She just doesn't understand how important this is..." thought the family, "but we won't let nay-sayers get in the way."

So, with that, the family opened the window and threw Alex out (who landed with a thud).

Alex tried many different techniques for dissuading the family and became very proficient at manipulating, cajoling, using humor and persuading but to no avail (she had read somewhere that the light bulb had to want to change?). The family continued and Alex tried her best. But try as she might, she couldn't fly.

By the seventh day, Alex (accepting her fate) no longer begged for mercy...she simply looked at the family and said: "You know you're killing me, don't you?"

The family pointed out that Alex's performance so far had been less than exemplary, failing to meet any of the milestone goals they had set for her. With that, Alex, said quietly: "Shut up and open the window," and she leaped but, taking careful aim on the large jagged rock by the corner of the building. And Alex went to that great lily in the sky.

The family was extremely upset, as their project had failed to meet the single goal they set out to accomplish. Alex had not only failed to learn to fly, she hadn't even learned to steer nor had her productivity improved when told to "Fall smarter, not harder".

The only thing left for the family to do was to analyze the process and try to determine where they had gone wrong. After much thought, the family smiled and said: "Next time.... we're gonna get a smarter frog!" Tiny-town is incapable of change or insight – only expectations for others to make them feel OK.