In the library

I haven’t written in a while, life has gotten in the way. I’m one of those people who have trouble thinking and writing when my life is up in the air. I feel that, without some kind of anchor, some fixed point that can be the foundation that I can stand and build on, I can’t do anything. Like floating in mud: There’s nothing I can push against. Right now, nothing is constant, and that makes it very difficult to focus on anything fun or just relaxing; there’s just too much I “should” be doing. I know some people thrive under these conditions, but not me. But I have the time, and some things seem like they need to be said, so I’m hiding out in the library and seeing if I can get it down.

Thing number one. A woman has come to my paranormal MeetUp a couple of times. Most of the people ended up avoiding her, because she talks non-stop and spouts every vaguely spiritual factoid and conspiracy theory, from ancient to modern, as gospel truth. I’m sad to say that, while I spent a couple of hours talking to her, I focused almost exclusively on the content of her beliefs, not on why she believed them. I was able to uncover some of her history, and she apparently underwent a near death experience, or two, and other things in her life that have caused her to crack wide open and accept everything that comes down the pike. I seems pretty amazing that she can hold a job, but she does.

Thing number two. A large part of my work is getting people to open up and accept new ideas. Just yesterday I wrote and response to a comment on one of my posts. The comment said, somewhat forcefully, that, since physics doesn’t allow for spirits or the paranormal, they don’t exist. My response was to point out that physics is entirely neutral on the subject. Physics, and science in general, is neither complete nor entirely consistent: New discoveries are being made and old theories are being overturned on a fairly regular basis. And that there are plenty of scientifically recognized phenomena that are not currently explained, Dark Matter and Dark Energy, for example. The scientific method, by definition, says nothing about phenomena that have not explained, or what might yet be discovered. I doubt what I said made any difference to the writer of the original comment, he or she will continue to believe that science “disproves” any possibility of the paranormal, and no amount of logic or evidence will convince him or her otherwise otherwise.

This is a case of the absolutely closed mind. What’s surprising about most closed minds is the utter flimsiness of their arguments. They believe their position is so unquestionable that there is no reason to construct a reasonable argument for their position. Not airtight, mind you, just reasonably logical and in line with current science. Their belief is primary and supporting evidence or logic is not required or even necessary.

What does this have to do with the woman at the MeetUp? Well, the thing is, they are very much the same, only the content of their beliefs is different. They both use their version of science to support their views, and neither one has any interest in any factual errors or inconsistencies in their arguments. But, while serious scientists may roll their eyes at the naivete of the physics guy, the MeetUp woman is “crazy.”

That’s one of the issues of stepping outside of the lines: how far do you step? Being psychic or having paranormal experiences doesn’t mean you can toss away logic and throw all caution to the wind. Yes, researchers have worked out that psychic phenomena don’t play by the same rules as physical ones, but there’s no reason to assume that don’t exist, it means that we must we practice great discernment in what we accept and reject, until we discover what those rules are.

I am generally very circumspect in what I accept, for, once I step outside of personal experience, the waters get muddy pretty quickly. I put a lot of things on the shelf labeled TBD, with varying degrees of prejudice. For instance, I put anything to do with Ancient Aliens on that shelf as “Not Proved,” but, at the same time, I recognized that there are quite a few historic anomalies that have yet to be explained. They also go on the shelf ,as “Unknown.”

In my opinion, the MeetUp woman is suffering from a spiritual crisis and needs spiritual help. A good therapist could help, as long as they don’t try and drug her into acting “normal.” For her, right now, all the barriers, are down, all filters off, and everything is accepted as true. I expect she is a case where solid material worldview has been shattered by an undeniable experience, and now all bets are off. This happens when too much spiritual growth happens too fast, and the person loses touch with the ground. I don’t want to say “lose touch with reality” here, because it’s not about “reality,” it’s about maintaining enough grounding in the common gestalt to be able to communicate and function in daily life. The problem here is that what we consider “real” is more a matter of where you were born, what church you go to, your political party, and your education level, than it is of concrete facts you can measure in a laboratory and we all can agree on. (There are someplaces in the world where not believing in a supernatural being (Allah) might get you hanged.) Our personal and collective concepts of reality are actually made up of an arbitrary hodgepodge of beliefs, assumptions, and some facts, held together with blind faith. While that structure provides some flexibility, and anomalous event of sufficient power can shatter the whole system, leaving the person with no yardstick to use when evaluating new information. Most of the time, the belief structure re-constitutes itself, but some times it can take weeks, months, or even years.

I was warned about this kind of thing from the very start of my spiritual education and told stories about people who took on too much. Usually it’s minor, we get sick or we feel emotionally weird for a week or so. But occasionally it’s much worse. I know how it is, once we discover there’s a new world out there, we want to grab it all, as fast as we can, but be careful. Just like jumping into too much physical activity, too fast, can injure you physically, and throwing yourself into school or work too completely and burn you out mentally, too much spiritual growth, too fast, can make it difficult or impossible to function in the everyday world. If this happens, you need to take time to step back from what you’re doing and rest. Take a vacation from spiritual stuff for a little while. I know that this stuff can be very exciting, and hanging “out there” is so much more interesting than going to work, but you need balance. And you need to eat.

Sometimes the event is not the result of anything the person did, it just comes “out of the blue.” Interestingly, most of the time this happens, the incident is suppressed and the person has no conscious memory of it. Their life, personality and feelings can still go sideways, they just have no idea why. It’s only if they go to the right kind of therapist that they recover the memories. Then begins the process of dealing with the trauma, for those memories were suppressed for a reason, but it’s the only way to get their lives back.

This woman’s issue is not about having psychic experiences, it’s about her unquestioning acceptance of everything she reads as absolutely true, with an “all or nothing zeal.” If I was working with her, we would spend some time uncovering the event and what it was about her belief system that fell apart so completely. That, plus some basic spiritual counseling should put her on the path of healing.

I am sad that I didn’t try to understand what was going on with her. I was too busy invalidating all her beliefs to think about it. I have no idea if I could of helped her, without taking her on as a client, but I should have spent more time on the issues and less on the symptoms. Lesson learned.

I have been uncovering several things about myself lately that I really don’t like much, that was just one of them. The main one right now is that, without external validation, and the right kind of pats on the head and kudos, I don’t want to do anything. My job, writing, anything. And, if that wasn’t enough, what was good enough yesterday is not good enough today. “Yeah, but what have you done for me lately?” is always there. Ug. There’s nothing new here, and now that I see it, it’s obvious that it’s been going on all my life, and caused me a lot of trouble at work and in my relationships. I don’t know if this can ever be “cured,” but I have been working to uncover and release hidden beliefs around this, and, now that I’m aware of why I feel like I do, I can mindfully change my behavior, which can’t hurt, and can, hopefully, lead to some more openings.

Heaven Is Real?

I just read “Heaven is Real, But So Is Hell,” by Vassula Rydén. 

“*Heaven Is Real But So is Hell* contains a first-hand account of the supernatural world of God and His Angels and of Satan and his demons. It brings a timely and critical message for our world and ill be one of the most throught provoking books you’ll ever read.” — From the dust jacket.

It’s not meant to be fiction, but it reads like a cross between The DaVinci Code and Constantine, minus all the fight scenes. Being psychic from an early age, Vassula paid little attention to the things she saw until she started writing messages from God and her Guardian Angel. To date, the messages number in the thousands and form the basis of her world ministry to reunite the three branches of Christianity: Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox. Along the way, she has met with the Pope, has been villainized, converted thousands of people, had her writings declared heretical by some church authorities, fully consistent with the teachings of Jesus by others, and has amassed a huge following around the world. Along the way, she has had numerous encounters with Satan and demons and her messages, as quoted in this book, talk a lot of the war between good and evil. To be saved, they say, everyone has to pray unceasingly to God to save them from the influences of Satan, who is around us every day, ready to pounce at any sign of weakness.

I Googled her to find out what’s been going on since the book was written. The book was published in 2013, but the it’s accounts seem to end in the early 1990’s, and I wanted to see other points of view and what’s happened since. As far as I can tell, her battle still continues, with millions pushing for church reform and many, very vocal, opponents that call her every evil thing you can think of and would gladly burn her at the stake or crucify her, if they were able. She’s probably one of the most important religious figures of our time, and you’ve probably never heard of her. How such a large movement merits no mention in any religious or secular publication that I’ve seen is a topic for another time.

What’s important to me about this book is the supernatural parts of the story. This book documents many miracles of different kinds, like instant healing, and other manifestations that occur in her presence. How does this jive with the rest of the world, the paranormal and, most importantly, other religions? The picture her messages paint, is of a very Old Testament theology where you must repent your sins and love God or go to hell. There is no other option. Where does that leave other world religions? As being one of the “outsiders,” someone raised in our Christianized western culture, but not significantly steeped in any particular flavor of “church,” I look at this from a different perspective. As you probably know, I am uncomfortable with demonstrative, in-your-face, Christianity, too many bad memories of suppression, discrimination and hypocrisy, both in the past and the present, I suppose. I realized today that if I shift mental gears and think of it as just another world religion, I can accept it as easily as, say, native American traditions. But when I see the actions of the ugly, bigoted, hateful, self-important Christians around me, I find it difficult for me to be comfortable with Christianity as a force for good in the world. 

Where I’m coming from is that Christianity is just one spiritual option. I know, theists of every stripe don’t like that, but it’s the only thing that makes any kind of sense to me, in a just universe. On the other hand, if the Gods are out to get you, it really doesn’t matter what you do, you’re screwed anyway. For that reason, I choose the philosophy that things aren’t really all that bad, the evil is something we put in the world, not the other way around. I know many people can’t conceive of a world without Satan, but that’s not my world. Why that is, is a discussion for another time.

The thing is, “miracles” don’t always occur in a Christian, or even religious, context. The paranormal happens every day, all around us. The research by Rupert Sheldrake, Dean Radin, and many other scientists show that the paranormal is, indeed, more “normal” than “para.” Think for a minute what would happen if this research was accepted my mainstream science, what would it mean to the religious if everyone could work a miracle in the same way that anyone can write code? then all the saints and miracle workers, throughout the ages, would be nothing more than garden-variety psychics, more more “blessed by God” than Madam Zolla, the medium. If “anybody and do it,” no God necessary, then what happens to religion? Of course, religions are about much more that miracles, but most of them depend on them for their legitimacy. 

My view is that these messages are focused primarily on Christians, if other pick up on it, great, but their purpose is not to convert the world, but to try and unit the fractured and bickering sects of Christianity. Overall, Vassula’s message appears pretty much the same as what Jesus said 2000 years ago, yet the authorities are fighting it just as hard now as then. Time will tell if her effort does bears fruit. But, if you’re from another spiritual tradition, you should be aware of what’s going on. These messages and miracles are very real and are very powerful, within their contexts. There are lessons here for every tradition about letting your personal and cultural biases and preference rewrite whatever spiritual messages you are exposed to into something “comfortable.” 

I don’t believe that miracles and contact with non-corporal entities is only limited to some religious or spiritual context. It’s possible that we’re on the cusp of a spiritual transition that makes religious preference akin to the choice between iPhone and Android. Where God is accessible to anyone who cares to look, without going through gatekeepers that tell you what to believe and how to believe it, and, maybe, on the way we will finally get over our stubborn insistence that “like me” equals “good,” and “not like me” equals “bad.”

Alex Malarkey

Today I’m finishing up “The Boy Who Came Back from Heaven.” I can say that I have mixed feelings about this book. The book is the true story of Alex Malarkey, a boy who had his spine severed at the base of his skull in a auto accident. Although that type of injury is presumed to be fatal, he survived. He remains a quadriplegic, but he has no brain damage and recovered his ability to speak. Way beyond what doctors expected. During the accident he left his body, witnessed many things that occurred where he was not physically present, and then spent a week in heaven while his body was in a coma. After he woke up he sees angles often, and many explicable things happened around him in the time after his accident.

My feelings are mixed because of the point of view of the book. Even though I was raised in this “christian” society, I have seen way too many hateful things done “in the name of Christ” and way too much hypocrisy to be comfortable with the language of this book. I’m sure it’s aimed squarely at Evangelical Christians, because it will turn off pretty much everyone else. Phrases like “our God is awesome” border on paganism, at least according to the theology that I’ve learned, that there is only one God. Are they claiming the one-and-only creator of the universe as their very own, and nobody else’s? Alex mentions the Devil frequently as well.

That said, there are many events in this book that are not explainable by medicine or science, and I’m sure that every non-religious public figure, and most conservative religious, will write write them all off as coincidence, selective memory, hallucinations or anything else that makes them comfortable. I’ve read Christian theologians arguing against any kind of “direct influence” of God in todays world. “Small” miracles are acceptable, but big, bold, blatantly supernatural things are just not how God works.

Near the end of the book, Alex Malarkey received what’s called the Christopher Reeve operation, that would allow him to breath on his own. This case received so much publicity that there were front page stories in the local newspapers. Kevin Malarkey noted that an editor had removed all references to God from the statements they’d made. I find that interesting, but probably not for the reason you might think.

We live in a secular society, enforced by the Constitution. But for most of our nation’s history, Christianity has gotten a free ride, in terms of getting it’s practices and views inshrined into the customs and laws of these United States. What other religion has all it’s major events made into national holidays? “In God we trust” printed on our money. Christian prayers at governmental events. During the Kennedy era, there were jokes about how silly it was that we could have a Catholic president, (as opposed to Protestant) These things have changed in may way over the past 50 years, but we still hear, way too often, that “We are a Christian nation.” And that, in practice, “Freedom of Religion” only applies to Christians, as they fight to get their “Christian” principles back in the law books.

In this climate, it’s understandable that editors might not want to appear to fan the flames by publishing too much “faith in God” stuff. That could make it appear that they are endorsing that point of view. I find that a little surprising, considering that this is rural Ohio, but, perhaps, they hoped that the story would be picked up by the national new services and they didn’t to come off as bible thumpin’ hicks. I thought the idea of object news is to report what happened and what people said, not to edit it to make readers more comfortable. Isn’t that censorship?

These editors appear to be treading a thin line. But I think what’s really going on is more subtle: Our society is so afraid of anything non-materialistic that even articles were religion plays a central role need to be “sanitized” to remove anything “supernatural.” I suppose there’s a certain amount of sense in that, since all of the three major world religions claim exclusive rights to God’s grace and any miracles that come from that. I find it endlessly amusing that the media of our culture are just as afraid of Jesus, as they are of UFOs, ghosts, spirit mediums, channeling, and paranormal events and research in general.

Now I’m going to throw my own interpretation on what Alex Malarkey reported. From my point of view, the boy Alex’s descriptions of heaven and other events are very childlike, and very much suit the Sunday schools lessons aimed a six-year-old, which he was at the time. I’m not saying that’s where he got his information, I’m saying that the message and information was expressly tailored for a six-year-old.

This is my interpretation of views outside of this reality: What you see is expressly aimed at you, personally. It’s adjusted for what you can accept and are comfortable with. While NDE experiences can seem very different, they do have commonalities that link strictly Christian experiences to completely new-age pagan ones. And there is the strong implication that there is some intelligence orchestrating how these experiences play out. In Alex’s case, it’s clear that the message was aimed squarely at the Evangelical Christian community that he is a part of, while Dr. Eban Alexander’s NDE, for example, was notably non-Christian and clearly for a different audience.

I have never be comfortable with the idea the “God is running everything.” I get this message from every corner of the faith spectrum, but I always have assumed that it’s all about my own intension and “natural laws” of the extended reality. I’m beginning to question my assumptions. One thing I do think is true, is that the realty beyond this one is unknowable, in the sense that it can’t be expressed in this one, and all attempts to do so are bound to express only a fraction of what’s there. Like trying to explain what life is really like to a subsistence farmer in Africa. You may think he understands, but you know that what may look like heaven to him is anything but. Every description of the afterlife will express only a small fraction of the whole picture, and it will be ripe for misinterpretation. It could very well be that there are “natural laws” in the extended reality that push us toward a peaceful and loving world society, or it could be an intelligence that is pushing for that goal, using every tool at its disposal. There’s probably no way to definitively know, short of crossing over. I don’t believe that the afterlife is Christian, Muslim, Jewish or whatever, but it’s the essence from which the core of all these religions sprang.

As uncomfortable as the language of this book makes me feel, I believe there’s a message there for me. I think I need to be a little less judgmental of these views and really try on the idea that, while I’m responsible for my life, I’m not the only one who has input, and it’s Ok to ask for help. That’s difficult for me, especially when the helper is a nameless, faceless, being of unknown origin and providence. The quality of my meditation have changed markedly, in the past few months, and this might be where they are leading.

P.S. I have been reading the articles about Alex Malarkey recanting his story and saying the book had “substantial inaccuracies.” You never know what to make of these types of stories, they play so well into our cultural narrative that you can never be sure where they may have come from. It’s clear his story elicited considerable anger from certain conservative parties, sales of the book were lagging and the message was being “reinterpreted” in certain quarters to suit various agendas. It’s possible it’s all fiction. It’s also likely that the book interpreted parts of the story in ways the rest of the family was not comfortable with. It’s known that Alex and Beth Malarkey (his mother) had grow extremely uncomfortable with the types of attention they were receiving as a result of the book, so, perhaps, recanting looked like one way of getting out of the spotlight. It’s even possible the fractions within their church were putting pressure on them to recant. In any case, we will probably never know for sure. It’s been said that if Jesus showed up today, conservative Christians would label him a dirty, socialist liberal, undermining the Christian/American work ethic and family values by helping the poor and forgiving prostitutes and sinners, just as the authorities of Jesus’ own time did. As in all articles of faith, judge for yourself. The material world will be no help.

Friends and Changes

This week I continued my education by starting in class in Ericksonian hypnosis techniques at HCH Institute. I found out right away that it’s a bit different than I thought, and it takes a lot more skill and practice than I realized. Frankly, I don’t think a four week seminar is going to teach me anywhere near enough to use it well. I expect that I’ll end up with a good idea of what I need to practice and some resources to explore further. 

What’s really tricky about the Ericksonian technique is that you don’t have any direct feedback from the client. I always had the impression that the Ericksonian practitioner was pretty much, ‘flying blind’, but that’s not it at all. What the practitioner is really doing is constantly modifying his script, based on subtle physical queues from the client, and intuition too, I suppose. The trick, of course, is learning to read those queues and also having a ready supply of things to say, at your fingertips. That may be my biggest challenge.

At the break, I got to connect with two friends from previous courses. That was very cool cause I feel very close to them.  It would be nice to see them more often, but I’m getting that would not be the best idea right now. Which leads me to thinking about relationships again.

I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll ever really ‘get’ relationships, especially with women. I suppose that I don’t worry about my relationships with men because it’s easy to take ‘em or leave ‘em. It would be nice to have friends to hang out with, but I know if I know what that means. What do these thinks look like from the inside? I don’t know. I do know it feels really awkward to ask anyone to hang out or get a beer or something. “Hanging” always ends up feeling awkward, unless there are other people there, or there’s some definite purpose for the meeting. The whole idea of “dating” just feels weird. I think my issue comes from the fact that, when I was younger, dates were all about sex, and now that has be pushed way to the background I have no idea what to replace it with. 

I think my problem revolves around not being any good about having friends. I’ve spent most of my life getting people to like me. Now that I don’t really care about that any more, what else is there? I expect that I will, eventually, meet the right people with the right personalities and enough common interests that we have things to do together. I have spent so much of my life being the significant other, the plus one, the friend, the hanger on in somebody else’s group, that I never found, or built, a place for myself. A place where I was me, not somebody’s attachment. Finding those groups and building those relationships takes time, especially at my age. On of the blessing of my age is that time passes quickly. Days, weeks, and almost months, go by before I notice them. So, waiting isn’t really all that hard. 

My life is so much more positive now and good things keep coming my way, so I have high hopes that “this too shall pass.” That the present difficulties and awkwardnesses will work themselves out. I’m only focusing on those few things I have to do, like work, taxes and finding a place to live, and letting everything else be a game. I psychic told be recently that I need to stop worrying so much about making the “right” decisions, decisions that will last me another 20 years. I can kick back, relax, cruz, have fun and take my time. It’s still hard to completely let go of that feeling that I need to fix and solve everything right now, but it’s important that I do. “Marry in hast, repent in leisure,” applies not just to marriage.

I’ve spent a lot of time “trying on” different kinds of relationships in my meditations. I find that everything I imagine doesn’t work very well when placed in the context of my real life. I think that’s telling me that my fantasies are a bunch of crap, and reality, when it shows up, will be something very different. So I don’t know what to expect and that’s a good thing. Life would be a lot less fun if I knew everything ahead of time, good and bad, so let’s raise a cold one to the unexpected. My it keep us on our toes and nimble of mind and heart.

What Do I Believe?

The following is a excerpt from “Into the Light” by John Lerma MD (http://www.amazon.com/Into-Light-Afterlife-Pre-Death-Experiences/dp/1564149722). This is from a chapter titled “Father Mike,” who was a 78-year-old, retired, Catholic priest who was well respected and had been president of a Catholic university. He was in the hospice unit to live his last days, diagnosed with terminal cancer. At this time, Dr Lerma was working at that hospice unit, caring for the terminally ill and making their last days as comfortable as possible. This section deals with the final minutes of Father Mike’s life:

“As I arrived at the hospice unit, the lights on the hospice floor were flickering on and off. There was an incredible sense of peace in the midst of the chaos that was occurring. Several nurses and my secretary were present. They had rushed me there to experience an inconceivable event. Every time the lights turned on and off, little feathers fell from the ceiling, drifting down as if they were snowflakes. One fell in the hand of a nurse and disappeared. As soon as they fell, they disappeared. Father Mike’s call light was going off and on. His door, which had been closed when he died, was now open. The secretary and one nurse saw a bright light shining from his room. They thought the lights were coming back on, but the bright light was radiating from his body or bed., Out of that light came this bright sphere that floated out of his body and circled the bed about three times before it soared out of the closed window. Less than a minute later, the lights came back on, it stopped raining and all the feathers disappeared. We all had goose bumps.”

I’ve tried to write this piece several times now. Each time I ended up ranting about the people who refuse to accept the evidence of the paranormal, in all it’s different forms, and I didn’t like that. I kept rewriting it, but it still didn’t feel right. Then I finally got it: The real question is, do I believe it? And the answer is, <ding> I’m not 100% sure that I do. Sure I have my intensions, but can I really accept that feathers can just appear out of nowhere and then vanish?

This now brings something into focus. There is an idea in the psychological world that everyone and every thing you dislike or hate, is part of yourself that you can’t accept. You then project it out onto people or things in the world, both separating yourself from it and unconsciously hoping that destroying it will purge it from your psyche. If that is true, then my issues with hypocrisy and abuse of power stem from my own fears and tendencies in those areas. Guess what? It turns out that I don’t have to look too long to see the truth of that, which some recent incidents have made all too clear. This leads me to the next question: What do I do about it?

I’ve been watching some Abraham-Hicks videos on YouTube. These are about a woman named Esther Hicks channels an energy that calls itself Abraham. (It took me a while before I figured that out.) Usually I don’t watch, I just listen. He/She can be very entertaining, though, at points, I sometimes I wonder why everyone is laughing so hard. (Maybe being in a seminar for 8 hours makes you a little punch-drunk?) Anyway, most of her talks center about manifesting, abundance, getting what you want, the life you want, you get the idea. I listen because these talks resonate on a very different level than someone like Tony Robbins, and give me the idea that there’s something there, if I can just wrap my head around it. In pondering/meditating while listening, the question came up about knowing who you are and what you want. At that point, I realized that I don’t know who I am.

Isn’t that a strange thought? How can you not know who you are? When I looked, I mean really looked, I could see that there is a significant part of me that I don’t have access to. It’s just an indescribable something, that is just there, and it’s completely impervious to my usual techniques to getting a handle on it. I am getting that I need to meditate in a new way to deal with it and move to the next level. I need to get out of my head, with it’s logic, language and symbols, and into something more abstract. Forget what I have been taught and practice just be with certain “concepts.”

I have spent a good portion of my life stripping away layers of conditioning and expectation, a process that has steadily accelerating over the years. At first, it was no big deal. It just made me feel better about stuff and my life better as a whole. But, as I continued, my personality and outlook began to shift. The changes were subtle at first, but over time my tastes began to change, and, eventually, I became profoundly dissatisfied and my choices led to a wholesale life restructuring. That’s a fancy way of saying that I left my career and my marriage, got a new place to live, new job and new friends. Not really on purpose, but things just happened when I realized that I could do that any more.

At this point, it seems like the process has removed most of my cultural conditioning and expectations, those “shoulds” and “should nots,” along with the fears of what will happen if deviate from the norm. I have lost a lot of comforting beliefs and rituals about the world and my place in it. But, at the same time, I have become a lot more open to new ideas. Most people cloak their skepticism in science or faith, but we all know that the simple truth is that they’re mostly worried about “what will people think?” While I wish I was completely free of that, I’m not, but I am about 90% less worried about it than I used to be. I get now that I can never be who a really am, until I can stop pretending to live up to someone else expectations. Make no mistake, we are all pretending, one way or another.

Do I believe that those paranormal things actually happened, really? Yes I am, and I’m willing to take all the flack that that engenders. What about everything else in “Into the Light?” (It has a very Christian focus) I still have very negative feelings around terms like “God,” “Jesus” and “faith.” Probably because I constantly hear those words used to justify the most hateful, hurtful and destructive actions and I can’t understand how anyone would want to be associated with the awful things that are said an done in the name of “God’s Love.” That aside, I can deal with the idea that these concepts have just as much claim to legitimacy as ghosts and guides, so I shouldn’t toss them out due to personal prejudice.

In reality, (funny to say that in connection with the paranormal, but, oh well) all “supernatural” forces are conceptually the same, whether you’re talking about God on high or the things that go bump in the night, and all evidence needs to be evaluated and considered. The waters around these phenomena are muddy enough already, there’s no point in making it worse by buying into artificial distinctions. It’s a good idea to keep my mind open all aspects of the paranormal, for that is the only way to ever begin to draw any kind of comprehensive understand of what’s going on, and what are the implications for everyday life. Then, perhaps, I can stop being upset by the compulsive skeptics.

“Who are you going to believe? Me, or your own eyes?” —Groucho Marx

Watching Paint Dry

I expect this to be a short post. I’m going to kick around my ideas about free will, karma and fate.

I one of my MeetUps, the other day, the other person there said that once a true psychic predicts something, it’s preordained fact, it will happen and nothing can change it. He didn’t believe in free will at all, apparently. (He wouldn’t directly answer that question, but he sure implied it.)

I find that so sad, to believe that you are locked into a meaningless existence that you can’t change. (I could say a lot of things at this point, about people using karma, fate or psychic predictions as way to avoid responsibility for their actions and as an excuse to not lift a finger to change anything, but that’s not the point. At least I don’t think it is.)

Let’s take karma. Call it what you will: “What goes around, comes around,” or “What you do unto others will be done unto you:” Who and what you are today is the result of what you did in the past. The classic version of karma says that you work your way up from low life forms, (bugs) to higher, (humans) and then you work your way up the social classes, through good deeds and spiritual enlightenment. But poor choices will put you in a worse condition next time around. My biggest problem with this is it’s only a short step from “You get what you deserve,” to “I’m well off, so I must deserve it, and he’s poor or lame, he must deserve it also, so there’s no reason to have compassion for the less fortunate, it’s their own fault. Ouch! There are other tweaks to the idea of karma, but I don’t buy any of them for they all have suffer from the same problem of saying that your lot in life is, in one way or another preordained. You realize that this idea comes from a culture with a ridged cast system, you can see why this belief would be popular among the upper casts to give justification for the subjection of the lower.

The concept of Fate makes me equally uncomfortable. Here, your life is planned out and you’re just along for the ride. You don’t get to make any choices, because, no matter what you do, everything will come out the same. In other words, no free will at all, just a illusion of free will. To me that says that nothing you do matters: You don’t deserve any credit for any success or blame for failures. It’s all just a video game where, no matter how you play, you always end up in the castle, marrying the princess, like it or not. One thing that fate never makes clear, is who or what decides you fate in the first place? Who writes the script that you are living out and how is it done?

So, with fate, you are just a robot, playing out a script, but with karma, your actions can actually have some meaning, but only in another life. They both seem born out of static societies and designed to keep them that way by telling all the classes the things are supposed to be the way they are, do don’t rock the boat.

What I do believe in? Well, I believe that we come into this life with certain goals, talents and challenges, that we chose for ourselves. What we do with those is up to us. All that I’ve read, heard from my clients, and from fellow practitioners, tells me that the biggest problems we have in life, tend to come from not working towards our goals. It’s not because we don’t achieve them, it’s because we’re not working on them. That’s an important distinction. If, when all is said and done, we don’t achieve our goals, there is no punishment involved. it can mean the we choose to take the lesson over again, perhaps tweaking the parameters a bit to have a better chance of success. Or because we did partially get it, so that part of the lesson needs to be changed.

Repeating the same lesson until we get it can look like karma. But it’s neither punishment or reward, and more like retaking a class you didn’t do well in. And it’s important to remember that our human values of wealth, social class and the importance of being human verses a cat or a dog, are completely meaningless outside of this existence. Your station in life really has nothing to do with your “past performance,” because you can chose anything you want, when you’re planning your life from the other side. It’s all Monopoly money. Beautiful, ugly, plain, healthy, sick, weak strong, smart, dim, all the same. It’s like playing D&D, you pick your characters’ attributes and play the game. When the character dies, you pick another set and go at it again. Most of us have lived so many lifetimes that it all blurs together, all the matters is the experience and the wisdom gained.

Which brings us back to free will. Without the ability to make meaningful choices, we have no reason to exist, we are no more than little robots running our programs. I believe that it’s up to us to make the meaningful choices to discover and honor purpose, overcoming our challenges in the process. I find that is the only way to achieve true peace and a sense of accomplishment. I found this especially difficult because it really seems that I wondered quite far from my path, and it’s taking some wrenching changes to get my self heading in the right direction.

That sounds quite different than how it actually went down. What happened was that I was waking up, bit by bit, and making changes on the inside. Over time, I noticed that parts of my life didn’t fit any more, like outgrowing your clothes, I eventually found it impossible to continue on doing the same things, on the outside. I ignored it as long as it could, but I reached a point where I could no longer adjust, and I had to break the old paradigm, resulting in those wrenching transitions I mentioned. Transitions that I’m still weathering. It’s easy to look back and see how necessary certain trial were and how getting through them seemed the inevitable result of your efforts, but it sure doesn’t look that way when you’re in the middle of the mud, up to your neck in alligators and swim’n for the shore.

I sure wish I had a magic marker that would tell me I’m on the right path, but I don’t. as strange as my life seems at times, I’m getting that it’s only going to only get weirder, in ways that I’m not comfortable speculating about in public just yet. The possibilities are exciting, but I’ve noticed that every jellybean comes with some broccoli. To put that another way, every opportunity and insight comes with a price: responsibilities and obligations. I’m seeing now that no responsibilities means little freedom to do and be what you want. Take on more responsibilities and you get more freedom. I’m speaking in general here, because simple taking on obligations can easily tie you up rather than give you freedom. True freedom requires some personal responsibility, and taking on some obligations, and, if you don’t you soon lose that freedom. One way or another.

I want my freedom, but I’m still balking and squirming at the accompanying responsibilities. My insight for today could be that I’ve spent most of my adult life avoiding responsibility. I wanted the perks but not the obligations of being in charge of my life, and that painted me into the corner that I’m trying to get myself out of today. I wonder if the paint is dry yet?

The Big Empty

Dealing with loss.

I’m finding that the most difficult thing to deal with after divorce, is the hole that is left where all the “stuff” used to be. In any loss, there is stuff you miss and stuff you are all to happy to see gone. But once it is gone, you have a large blank spot in your life that needs filling. Sure, it’s tempting for me to drink, or binge watch TV, hide in books, or find other meaningless things to fill my time, but I need to face the fact that the time is now empty, and I, sooner or later, will build a new life to fill it.

To be sure, most of that time was filled with time-wasting stuff like TV, and Facebook, and going out just so we don’t have to stay in, so much of what is gone had no real value. But the real point was that I wasn’t alone. There is a lot to be said for not being alone. That part is a loss.

My central issue here is that I never really had a life outside of my family. I was always nervous about meeting people and having friends, so I mooched off of my spouse for friends, family and social time. All of those disappeared after we went our separate ways. Fortunately, for the few years I have been cultivating a life outside of my marriage. It’s almost as if i knew what was coming and I was practicing my “me” skills. Learning to have relationships and be somebody other than “husband” and “dad.”

Reviving my interest in theater was a good idea. I met a lot of people, and, thanks to Facebook, have managed to remain in contact with a few. I miss theater, but my schedule doesn’t allow me to do it any more. Perhaps later I can come back to it. But I find it’s the people and the doing that I miss, not the performing so much. Starting my business also forced me to meet a lot more people, and I find that I like meeting new people. I used to hate it, but I guess that’s a part of me that has changed over the years.

I also notice that I don’t expect much from the people I meet. I used to invest so much in each relationship, no matter how casual, and be angry and disappointed when the dedication wasn’t returned. I was also deathly afraid of the “wrong” relationships. I’m not quite sure what that means now, but I had to stay away from certain people, at any cost. Maybe it had something to do with my fear of becoming “hooked” somehow, so I needed to only hang out with “safe” people, who I didn’t care about so they couldn’t hurt me. Much. In the process I avoided anyone I much actually care for, or worse, might care for me. Which brings up a huge difference that I’m having to deal with: I have no idea how to have a close relationship where I’m not hiding and playing manipulation games. I learned how to have casual friendships, but I don’t know what anything else would look like now. I afraid of what dating might look like because I don’t want anyone getting attached to me while I’m in this state. Or maybe I’ve just haven’t met anyone I want to date or hang out with on a more that a casual basis.

The thing is, I’m in a transition. I keep wanting it to be over, transitions are a process and I’ve just got to let it happen. The say the life’s a journey, not a destination. What I’m going through now is part of my perpetual process of change. I certainly don’t want to be stuck where I am and say “Stick a fork in me, I’m done!” But I can’t help being nervous about no knowing where I’m going to end up, or when. That’s the nature of the beast, but I don’t have to like it much. I know I’ll look back on this time and I’m sure it will make fodder for a good story, but do I have to live through it? Big transitions are like adventures, they’re great things to happen long ago to someone else. It’s called something else when it’s happening right now, to me.

I’m actually surprised to find that I like my new job. In the past four months I’ve made more friends than in the last 20. Sure the pay is tiny and the hours kinda suck, but I like the idea of having virtually no responsibility. Especially compared to what I used to have to worry about. I just show up, do my time, and go home. I’ve learned to keep myself busy, most of the time, so time actually passes fairly quickly. I generally like talking with customers, some can be real jerks, but others are great. The worst cases are those that are letting themselves in for a world of hurt or want to do something just plain illegal, (violating building safety codes) but they “know” what they are doing and you’re not going to talk them out of it. I just tell myself that I’m not responsible for them and let it go. Something that would have been downright impossible years ago.

Right now, the biggest blank I have to fill is, what do I do when I’m not working? I have a lot of free time on my hands and my living arrangements don’t leave a lot of options, other than going out. I’m spending a lot of time looking at houses, doing more reading, and spending more time at the library. I’ve asked for more hours at work, partly for the money and benefits, but also to fill my time. When I was young I resented every minute of work, I’m not sure why, and couldn’t wait to get home. Even if it just meant sitting alone in a cold room. Now I prefer work to being alone: at least I have people to talk to who know my name. Oddly I take comfort in that, at the same time wondering how so many of the other employees know my full name, when we’ve never been introduced and it’s not on my apron. Ah, one of those little mysteries of life. You know what? I don’t want to know, cause that would just take all the fun out of it. It doesn’t really matter anyway, what I really like is the fact that they take the trouble to do it. It makes me feel noticed, like I matter. A little. Isn’t that what life is all about? What is success for, if you don’t matter to someone?