Gaia Community: source-within's Blog

get yourself FREE, Lee!!!

Sun, 06 Jul 2008 05:31:28 -0000

HELLO, gaia.com! gee, i went away for a few months and zaadz turned into gaia...! zaadz was so sleek and responsive -- and gaia is sooooo sllloooooowwwwww and cluttered! (gee, it would be nice to have a left margin on these blog postings, eh!) i'm not sure i can still operate the machinery here.....

but, let's give it a whirl.....

today i had one of those "aha!" moments ... or is it better called a "duhhh" moment? something that's been staring me in the face for years, and i just now was able to see it...! over the past 30 years i've attracted a bunch of women who were in relationships with men who treated them badly (or who got into such relationships after i met them). many of these women have used me as a shoulder to cry on. they loved to tell me how badly they were treated by their chosen mate. and i would almost always fall in love with them myself, and i would want very much to rescue them from the guys who were treating them so badly. but ... SURPRISE! ... they didn't want to be rescued. they loved the bad treatment. they wouldn't admit it -- but they loved it! when given the opportunity to leave the bad treatment for good treatment, they wouldn't do it!

that always puzzled me tremendously. why would anyone choose to stay with someone who was treating them badly, when someone else was offering to love them and treat them well? i could never see a sensible answer to that -- until today, when i had the shocking realization that, in my relationships with these women, i was doing the same thing they were doing!! their partners were abusing and taking advantage of them, yet the women were still attracted to them. and the women were abusing and taking advantage of me, yet i was attracted to them. in fact, the worse they treated me, the more love i felt for them, and the more i tried to change myself to win their approval!

that's what i finally saw, just today. and i realized why i did it. i don't know that those women kept absorbing the mistreatment for the same reason -- but maybe they did. in my case, it was because i loved the women and i could not imagine them not loving me! i knew i was a good guy, and i always treated them very well, and i could not imagine them not loving me! but the truth was, they didn't. and they treated me badly. and the worse they treated me, the more desperately i wanted to be loved by them, and the more i changed myself, trying to please them!

the more i tried to please them, the worse they treated me (seeing my weakness and desperation, and hating it, surely). finally, they came to hate me so much, they kicked me completely out of their lives (hmmm, i wonder if their partners eventually did the same to them). and, even then, it was the hardest thing in the world for me to let go of them!! wanting so much for someone to love you and see the good in you -- and being kicked out of the game, forced to accept that you don't even have a chance; what could be more painful than that??

ANYWAY, finally i have learned some things from this:

don't hang around people who treat you badly, no matter how much your brain tries to rationalize it. just get away from them, period. they will destroy your health and your happiness -- breaking your heart not only emotionally, but physically! and, if you let them, they will also be glad to drive you crazy!
stop trying to win their love and acceptance; it can't be done.
stop trying to convince anyone (including YOU) that you're worthy of love; just know that you ARE. you were created by nothing but love, as a loving idea, in Perfect Infinite Eternal Spirit; and you were physically manifested, according to that blueprint, by Perfect Infinite Eternal Mind.
you have nothing to prove to anyone. just be yourself. the people who accept and love you as you are -- those are your friends. the people who treat you in any other way -- you're better off without them. don't get sucked into their games! don't get caught in their gravitational fields -- fire your rockets, get yourself out of that poisonous atmosphere!
and, whatever you do, don't take the words of such people to heart !! as the song says: "they'll take your soul if you let them / oh yeah, but don't you let them" (or, as someone so eloquently said, "your opinion of me is none of my business!" : ^ ).

blackbird

Tue, 01 Jan 2008 19:08:47 -0000

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise

Blackbird fly, Blackbird fly
Into the light of the dark black night.

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these sunken eyes and learn to see
all your life
you were only waiting for this moment to be free

Blackbird fly, Blackbird fly
Into the light of the dark black night.

(Paul McCartney / John Lennon)

finding my destiny

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 03:38:16 -0000

the central issue in my life, for the past 2 or 3 weeks, has been my health; i've been experiencing a particular symptom, one that has flared up now and then, all my life. most of the time it's not present; and when it does happen, the longest it's ever lasted before has been 4 days. so, this time, going on 3 weeks, i began to get a little concerned. and, when friends have asked, "how are you?", i've been telling them about it. big mistake!! i didn't really want to tell them, but what else could i say and still be truthful?

so, i told them ... and of course they freaked-out!! almost without exception, they told me i'd better get myself to a medical doctor! and, of course, i explained my reasoning to them: that an MD would just pick some pills for me to take -- and the pills, instead of addressing the cause of the problem, would suppress the symptom of it, which would in fact make the real problem just that much harder for the body to access and heal. that, of course, got them staring as if i'd been speaking Chinese! one of them even insisted that she was TAKING me to see a doctor! i told her to give me 2 more days, to see if i could heal it myself by then; and she agreed.

that was just last night. and this morning, lying in bed, i realized: "hey, wait a minute! no one has the right to give me any such ultimatum -- i'm not 10 years old anymore!!" if people choose to believe in the "medical model", that's fine; but they have no right to impose it on anyone else. imagine the reaction if i told one of them that she would absolutely have to surrender herself to a "witch doctor", and that i would take her there! the fact is, what works for some people does not work for others; what is medicine to one may be poison to another!

the Bottom Line is, our lives are not our own in the first place. we come into this world, and we go out of it, by the grace and with the consent of the Big Kahuna. when it's time for us to go, all the pills and doctors in the world will not be able to keep us here; and UNTIL it's time for us to go, there's nothing in the world that will take us out. and, meanwhile, it's essential that we each follow our own path, be true to ourself, do things in the way that feels right to us! so, let's all just relax and enjoy the ride.... and, from now on, when people ask how i am, i'm just gonna say, "better every day!"

something else i realized this morning, lying in bed, doing my self-reiki: for these weeks that this "health crisis" has been going, i've been whining about it, and saying, "oh, dear, how come this is going so long, when's it going to stop?" ... and, for at least a year now, i've been looking to "find my destiny" -- as it says in The Alchemist -- (after what i had thought was going to lead me to it, was taken away from me) ... and this morning the light bulb finally came on! my "destiny" right now is to heal this "health crisis" --- DUHHH! no medical doctors, no witch doctors, just me and the Big Kahuna, straightening things out. i've been living with this all my life (guess why -- because a medical doctor told me, when i was in high school, that there was no alternative, that's just the way it would be ... and i was dumb enough to believe him!) -- what a great opportunity this is to heal it once and for all.... and my destiny, at every moment in life, is simply (in the words of Don Miguel Ruiz) to make myself HAPPY! is that simple enough??? i don't need to do anything grand and monumental; just Be Happy, moment after moment after moment!

i'm sure that realization alone started some major healing in me; and i lay there and did more with the self-reiki. in just the past few weeks (hmmm, just around the time that this "health crisis" started!), i've been sent 2 books (The Infinite Way, and Practicing the Presence) written by a "Christian mystic" named Joel S. Goldsmith (thanks to my friend Michael, who is fast becoming a beacon of Johrei in upstate New York!) ... and a book written by a Doctor of Chiropracty and Naturopathy -- Richard Bartlett -- called Matrix Energetics: the Science and Art of Transformation (thanks to Nichijo, friend and spiritual advisor and renegade Buddhist priest). what perfect timing!

Goldsmith speaks in terms of "realizing the Christ" (which he says is never a person, but a state of consciousness) ... and Bartlett speaks in terms of quantum physics (photons and waves and particles, and infinite possible realities) ... and, for a year or so, i've been attempting to use reiki to access what i've been calling "the Source-dimension" within physical matter.... and it seems to me, all these are just different ways of describing the same thing! that really began to sink into me this morning. i was lying there, experimenting with incorporating Dr. Bartlett's method into my reiki session ... when i realized also that this very thing was shown to me beautifully, years ago(!), by a spiritual entity (one of the very, very few i've ever actually seen) named Iris.... Iris had the ability to dematerialize and rematerialize things with just the touch of her hand -- and she did that with my whole body! i was just GONE for a while, the body and the consciousness both...! i thought, at the time, "wow, that's really NEAT!!" but i didn't apply myself to learning how she did it.... now i see that what she was doing was no different than what Dr. Bartlett does. i've been practicing his method since reading his book -- and i don't quite have the hang of it yet! what it really entails is looking at the whole of reality in a different way than we've been taught; seeing everything as nothing but "light and information" -- waves of light, which have infinite possibility until we "collapse the wave" by focusing our attention on a particular outcome ... and our attentiveness itself changes the light from a wave to a particle, and manifests an event in our physical reality!

this is something that's been knocking at my consciousness, intellectually, for some years ... but there's a world of difference between intellectual knowing and Real Knowing (the kind you can actually do things with!) -- and, in this case, i'm still in the intellectual phase. but now i realize how imperative it is to get to the place of Real Knowing with this. it's exactly what i've been working toward with the Source-dimension idea ... and now i have the perfect laboratory specimen to practice on: my current "health crisis"....

believe me, i'm going to be practicing!

i'm feeling much better already....

all is well

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 03:18:19 -0000

that's my new mantra (mantram??) -- ALL IS WELL! who could ask for a better one than that?

i go from oneself (the blue of a particular wave on the ocean surface) to One Self (the deep green almost-infinite expanse of ocean down below) ... and the deep green of One Self is suffused with golden light coming from the eternal Source within....

money-money-money: thank you soooo much, dear Mom, for paying 2 months' rent for me, when i was not able to attract enough money myself....!

thanks to Zeyneb, one of my greatest teachers -- for reminding me that doing anything we totally love = Self-realization!

thanks to myself, for getting back to my daily self-reiki session ("You Are The Universe!"), after countless months (years??) under the delusion that i no longer had time for it (too busy answering emails!!)....

my life is an open book ... not even really MY life ... but Source projecting through me.

i must remember to clean my projection equipment often -- take it apart, clean it in saltwater (ocean is nice) maybe put it in a cloth bag, so i don't lose any little parts! ... then clean in freshwater ... then in sunlight (to dry and purify), then in moonlight (to fill with love).... reassemble, and start the movie!!

the new turtle spot .... yes, honu!! 2 of them (or the same one appearing twice) ... first time, just a head, bloop, out of the water for 2 or 3 seconds, then back down ..... and immediately -- i don't know why! -- in my head came the lyrics (a song from Little River Band, which i've heard probably no more than 3 times in my whole life!)....

"Hang on, help is on its way,
I'll be there as fast as I can,
Hang on, a tiny voice did say,
From somewhere deep inside the inner man."

turtles!! and a rainbow welling-up!!

Thu, 13 Sep 2007 05:13:22 -0000

i've just now come inside, from the beach. just before dark. i was sitting out there, on a rock i've never sat on before, in the whole 4+ years i've lived here.... sitting just a couple feet from the water ... looking at the great ocean ... eating popcorn from my big blue bowl ... thinking about this melodrama that my friends and i are swirling around in, called Life ... and suddenly up popped the head of a dear honu (Hawai'ian sea turtle) --- as if to say, "hey, cheer up, everything is alright...!" then there was another one ... and another one ... and even more. they kept popping up here and there in front of me ... and then, out on the horizon, over the waves, i saw the start of a rainbow....

it was just a little bud of color, coming up from the very surface of the water, among some white clouds. it sat there a moment, and then grew straight up -- vuuuuupppp -- just a vertical "rainpole" ... not very far, compared to a normal rainbow, but it was very interesting -- and, like the turtles, very cheering! one more silent voice saying, "don't worry, everything is alright, you'll see!!" and then it faded away, even though the turtles continued to play for a while....

PEACE

Fri, 13 Jul 2007 13:09:10 -0000

"I like the way your sparkling earrings lay
Against your skin, it's so brown
I wanna sleep with you in the desert tonight
With a billion stars all around
I gotta peaceful, easy feelin'
I know you won't let me down
'Cause I'm already standin' on the ground...." *

dear BJ ----

another lightning-bolt of realization hit me, this afternoon as i was taking a break from scrubbing the floor ... went down to the park and lay in the sun, and ZAPPP! --- suddenly came to peace with myself about this whole woman-thing...!! the first peace i've had since that one magic moment -- you know the one -- last August, in L.A. with you.... there in the park today, the feeling of THAT washed over me again, and everything crystallized for me to see, and i decided i would put it on the blog.... everyone who reads it will almost surely think i've gone totally crazy, and maybe i have -- but they don't know what i felt and saw that night, lying there, watching you sleep ... and at least it's a peaceful craziness, if i AM crazy. but i feel i've BEEN crazy for almost the past year, crazy without you, and revving my engine the whole time, feeling trapped and lost; revving my engine, trying to go somewhere or do something, anything that would make me feel better; anything that would make life livable again. i feel i've BEEN crazy, and have now come back from there, just this afternoon! back to a feeling of peace. a weird one, by any normal standards, but it's a feeling i can live with (and we both always said we were weird, anyway)....

what's REALLY weird is that, in the past year, i've taken up your idea that i should find another woman for myself! after telling you, over and over, how crazy that was.... i knew, from almost the very start, that you were the one for me; i told you that, over and over (every time you tried to find a replacement). i told you, i didn't even want to LOOK at another woman, or to THINK about one; that you were the one i'd been waiting for all my life.... why was that so hard for you to believe? oh, but you did believe it, that was in fact what scared you, because you knew yourself that it was true, that you and i were MADE for each other. and, precisely because we were, you wanted to rebel against it...!

the whole universe answered both our prayers by bringing us together -- and it was so perfect and so beautiful, you couldn't stand it, you had to run away...! no, that's not being fair to you: the bottom-line was, you simply had (or felt you had) so many obligations to other people, so many complications, so many people pulling and pushing you in so many directions -- demanding your loyalty, brainwashing you, sucking your energy -- there just was no space in your life to fit me (or anyone else) in. so, you said your prayer, you were given exactly what you asked for ... and then you realized there was no way you could accept it! there was just no place for me to fit!

still that doesn't change the love between us. please remember, that's the only thing that's real, and nothing can ever change it. not even your refusal to feel it now. the love is still there in your heart -- and i totally understand why you shut off the feeling of it. i know that was the only way you could keep even a molecule of sanity, when we were forced to separate and you were being pulled in so many directions at once; that was the only way you could go on living at all, or so you felt: by killing your feelings for me (and maybe even your ability to feel anything at all)....

BUT ... the love is still there in your heart, and it always will be. and one day you will be able to allow yourself to feel it again. the obligations and complications will eventually be taken care of, and the brainwashers and energy-suckers will lose their hold on you -- and your love will come to life again. you will have gone through whatever changes you needed to go through, in order to be ready for me; and i will have done whatever i needed to do, in order to be ready for you; in order to better provide for us....

do you remember that book you loaned me, The Alchemist ? (that's a rhetorical question; i have no doubt you remember it!) it was actually preparing us for what was to come in our own lives: the guy meets his perfect mate at the oasis; he knows she's the one; she knows he's the one; but they also know (or is it only she who knows, and she tells him? -- i forget) that it's not the right time for them, that he must go and "find his destiny" before he can come back and be with her. and so he does....

"I found out a long time ago
What a woman can do to your soul
Ah, but she can't take you anyway
You don't already know how to go
I gotta peaceful, easy feelin'
I know you won't let me down
'Cause I'm already standin' on the ground...." *

well, BJ, that's you and me. we've had our first meeting at the oasis; we've found each other, but now we need to do some things separately before we can be together again; and we're doing them....

those visions you had, and the dreams -- where we were together (and happy!) as very old people.... those were not hallucinations; your psychic abilities are much too sharp for that. you were seeing our future, that's all. you saw those things too many times, and they were too real, for them to be meaningless. the day you were driving (in L.A.!!) and you saw the 2 of us, as old people, crossing the street in front of your car! and it was so real that you actually stopped the car, to keep from hitting us!! you were seeing our future. and maybe we don't get back together for 20 more years! this is not the first time this possibility has occurred to me; not even the 2nd or 3rd or 4th or 5th, or umpteenth time. and i haven't liked it, the thought of having to wait so long to see you again, to hold you, to hear your voice.... but today in the park, it didn't seem so bad. better in 20 years than never!!

this, of course, is where everybody really decides i'm kookoo! "geez, LOOK at this nut -- pushing things 20 years into the future, in order to avoid admitting that this thing is finished!! come on, Jack, give it up! let go, move on, get a life!" i know they're saying that; if i were them, i'd be saying the same thing! BUT ... they don't know what i know, because they were not there to feel what i felt and see what i saw, that night with you in L.A. the night i was watching you sleep (well, i was always either watching you sleep or waking you up to make love, because i could never sleep when i was anywhere near you) and suddenly my heart opened up -- just wide open! -- and a whole big river of LOVE came pouring through it and over your sleeping body, completely engulfing you. i felt that river pouring through my heart, and i could even see it as it washed over you -- and it was the most beautiful and magical feeling i've ever had. remembering it, later, it occurred to me that that was the very moment when i became truly married to you....

so funny, because we both had such total intolerance for the idea of being officially married; there was no way we could have done that. and yet we vowed we would never leave each other; we would spend the rest of our lives together; and, when these lifetimes were finished, we would leave here together!

you made those vows to me, and i'm holding you to them. and i realize that we HAVE never left each other. physically we have, but that's all. you've been with me all the time -- even when i managed, for a while, to kill MY feelings for YOU. you were here even then, and my feelings grew back -- and so will yours for me.

i realized today that what has been driving me crazy is my pretending that we're NOT married; my trying to find another woman. as crazy as this may sound, there really is not another one for me! you are the one -- and we were married, by that river of love pouring through my heart. how can i pretend otherwise? i've tried, and yes, that's what has been driving me crazy! in the past months, i've tried to picture myself being with 4 other women. the first time, i got actually, physically ill, immediately (just picturing it). the other times, not ill, it just didn't happen. only one of them was even close -- and then SHE rejected ME; but i realized today, even if she hadn't, i couldn't have gone through with it.

just for the benefit of people reading this -- who are saying, understandably, "CRA-ZEE! CRA-ZEE!" -- let me say, there are very, very, very few things i KNOW; but this happens to be one of them. and i'm not the only one who has known it. there was Mrs. A. there was my friend in Yuba City, and your friend in Tarzana. there was my friend in Serbia. there were the Tarot readings (yeah, i know, some people will think those alone are cause enough to have me put away!). there were the Little Sparkly Guys (uh-oh -- bring on the straitjackets!).... oh, by the way, i know you had a LOT to do with this latest friend entering my life -- the one who just happens to see little sparkly lights around HER eyes ... and who just happens to gaze into my face the same way you did, and then to say (just as you did), "you're so cute!" what do you suppose are the odds against THAT happening "by chance" ??? i know you sent her to me, and she's a wonderful person, and she and i match in so many ways it's phenomenal (definitely another not-by-chance happening!), and i love her dearly -- but she and i are friends; you and i are married! please, just remember that.

so, that's what it comes to: we're married, you and i -- through this lifetime and beyond. the moment we made those vows, they were etched into every particle of every universe that has ever existed, or will ever exist -- and i'm holding you to them! you said you liked to be given orders; well, that's my one and only order to you! (just kidding -- you gave the order yourself when you made the vow!)

isn't it funny -- so many people stand up and put their hand on a bible, and solemnly swear, "...for better or worse, richer or poorer, till death ... etc." -- and what they really mean is: "as long as it's convenient, or till someone more attractive comes along...." and you and i, we don't have the piece of paper, but we made the vows for REAL. we spoke them from the heart, with every star in the heavens as a witness. now, physically, we have to be apart for a while; you have to do some things, i have to do some things; and, when the time is right, we'll come back together. whether it's weeks or months or years, it doesn't matter. that's what finally settled into me this afternoon, and brought me this great feeling of peace....

"I get this feelin' I may know you
As a lover and a friend
Then this voice whisperin' in my other ear,
Sayin' I may never see you again

"But I gotta peaceful, easy feelin'
I know you won't let me down
'Cause I'm already standin'
Yes, I'm already standin'
Well, I'm already standin' on the ground" *

__________________________________
* (Jack Tempchin, "Peaceful Easy Feeling")

a revelation

Mon, 09 Jul 2007 22:25:25 -0000

"You are a child of the Universe
No less than the trees and the stars
You have a right to be here
And whether or not it is clear to you
No doubt the Universe is unfolding as it should."
-------- Max Ehrmann

you know how it is: you work and work at understanding something, and you seem to get nowhere. then, when you stop even trying to understand it, and you try to get the whole subject out of your mind(!) ... there comes a moment when, POOF -- the answers to all your questions are suddenly revealed!! and they look so obvious, you can hardly believe you didn't see them in the first place!

well ... last night came my moment of revelation about why so many women reject "nice" guys, and are pulled like a magnet to the ones they describe as "bad" or "macho" or "powerful" or "irritating" or "challenging".... (and, even though their own rationale is that they believe "nice" guys will be boring in bed, i see now that the reality goes wayyyy deeper than that, even if that belief were realistic in the first place!)

my previous feeling had been that some women chose men who didn't treat them very well, because they had a low opinion of themselves; because they felt they didn't deserve to be treated well. now i see, it also goes deeper than that....

what i saw last night was that this phenomenon is rooted in our very earliest experiences, in how we were treated by our parents. not surprising at all -- one of those life-revelations that has been "hiding in plain sight" all the time, only some of us (DUHHH!) have not been able to see it!

i was looking, before, everywhere else for the solution to this mystery. i had even thought, "well, you know, a lot of people are into witchcraft -- even a lot of people you would not suspect of it -- and maybe these "bad" or "powerful" or "macho" guys are actually putting spells on these women!!" and then i thought, "well, even if they are (and yes, probably some of them are!) ... the magic spell only works on someone who is willing to accept it...."

Take me on a trip upon your magic swirling ship,
My senses have been stripped, my hands can't feel to grip,
My toes too numb to step, wait only for my boot heels
To be wanderin'.
I'm ready to go anywhere, I'm ready for to fade
Into my own parade, cast your dancing spell my way,
I promise to go under it.
(Bob Dylan / "Mr. Tambourine Man")

well, hey, fellas -- if you're doing the magick spells, you can save yourself the trouble, they're not even necesary! no, it goes DEEPER than ritual magick.... and it's not just that women are falling for these men; on the other side of the coin, men are falling just as well for women who treat them badly. and it goes back to how our parents treated us....

it's well known that men are attracted to women who are, in significant ways, like the man's mother; and that women are attracted to men who are like the woman's father. but, go even a step farther, and you will see that we may choose as a mate someone who, in important ways, is a replay of our childhood experiences with BOTH parents.... it goes beyond male/female aspects.

for example: a person (whether male or female; call this person A) who grew up feeling deprived of parental attention, or feeling never able to be good enough, or to do things well enough, to please the parents -- and if these feelings have not been resolved by the time the person chooses a mate -- will indeed choose a mate who acts sufficiently "parental", so the other person can have another go at being the "child" and, hopefully this time, winning the "parent's" love and approval...! (of course that will never happen, because love is not something to be won, it has to be given as a gift, for no reason whatever! but maybe the person can learn that from the relationship, and then can stop seeking the love and approval ... and then may indeed be given it!)

and it's amazing, what different people we become, when merely relating to various people in our lives! for example, when A (above) is relating to a friend (someone who treats A as an equal) -- or even when relating to people in general -- A comes across as very confident, self-reliant, self-determining. in fact, A may often give advice and direction to others (and good advice, at that!).... AND THEN ... in the presence of a person who triggers just the right childhood memories, by acting "parental" in just the right ways ... person A becomes someone else entirely!! on a very basic, energetic level, the whole identity changes -- the self-determining person disappears in the blink of an eye; becomes the "child" again, totally subservient and devoted to the new "parent" ("yes, Dear, whatever you say -- your wish is my command!").... the "child" is reborn, and happily (even with great relief!) surrenders all decision-making to the new "parent" -- because this re-creates the unresolved situation, and puts the "child" in place for another attempt at winning the love and approval that was previously denied....

this even accounts for that phenomenon -- which had mystified me for eons! -- of a person meeting someone new, and whose immediate reaction is negative (one of great repulsion, even!) ... and then, the next thing you know, the 2 of them are married! this, we all know, is a staple of Hollywood movies -- and it happens in real life, too! it happens this way: on first meeting, the person is repelled because the other person triggers the memory of that unresolved childhood issue. the first instinct is to flee, because the memory is a painful one, and we instinctively avoid pain ("been there, done that, got the T-shirt, don't need another one!"). but then, a little later, some part of our consciousness says, "hmmm, you know, this could be a great opportunity to get back into that painful issue and resolve it -- and then be a lot happier! so, at first we flee -- i include myself, because i now realize i've done this several times, though not in a romantic context -- and then we come rocketing back to that very person, like an iron-filing feeling the pull of a magnet! (and, in fact, it is a good thing, because it gives us a way of resolving our previously-unresolved issues!)

so, dear Phillip, this is why guys like you and me are being told -- by the "experts"! -- to play the "game" of pushing women away, not treating them as equals, keeping them in suspense as to our true feelings about them ... and, most definitely, NOT to be "too nice" or too loving toward them! these rules are geared precisely for attracting women who have the aforementioned unresolved parental issues -- and, the sad thing is, those women are the great majority of the female population. (likewise, in fairness, we must admit that similarly-wounded men may account for a similar percentage of the male population.)

so, Phillip, it's good that we get dumped by these women; they're not the right ones for us! the ones we're looking for are those who have resolved their childhood issues, and who are ready for a mate who is, first of all, a friend and equal -- someone who will meet them halfway, who will allow and encourage the woman's own autonomy and freedom and growth; who will not tell her what to do and when to do it (not even if she wants him to!). and, as you and i have found out by personal experience, those "meet-me-halfway" women are few and far-between (most want to be either "parent" or "child", rather than an equal partner).... anyway, take heart, we will either attract one of them, or we won't! : ^ ) either way, at least we can stop driving ourselves crazy trying to attract the other ones....

AND ... IN THE END ... everything works out perfectly, just as in all the fairy-tales. each of us attracts exactly the people and events that can help us the most (even when the outcome may be something we never dreamed of!). we are always just where we need to be, doing just what we need to be doing ... and, as long as we're true to ourselves, we all end up winners....

ahhh, Max -- please say again what you said before; you said it so well....

"You are a child of the Universe
No less than the trees and the stars
You have a right to be here
And whether or not it is clear to you
No doubt the Universe is unfolding as it should."

yes. thank you so much!

"How Fast is Too Fast?" & "The Middle Way"

Thu, 05 Jul 2007 11:10:50 -0000

well ... after ages and ages ... there's a new MacroBlog entry: How Fast is Too Fast? / The Middle Way....

and ... you may like to check the Bulletin Board, for news of big energetic changes on planet Earth, throughout July and August -- especially on July 7 and July 17...!!

no games

Tue, 22 May 2007 18:05:13 -0000

Give a little bit
Give a little bit of your love to me
Give a little bit
I'll give a little bit of my love to you
There's so much that we need to share
Send a smile and show you care....

some of my friends have been trying to coach me in how to get a mate. i greatly appreciate their desire to help me -- but, invariably, their advice centers on the belief that getting a mate is a "game". i don't like that, it doesn't feel right to me. i feel that getting a mate is a very sacred thing, and that it should also be a very natural thing. try as i have, i really cannot accept it as a game, requiring strategy and calculation and deliberate intrigue.

when i was a child, i had a recurring dream -- both waking and sleeping -- of being with my perfect mate. we were inseparable, we did everything together, we were like one being; and we fit together perfectly naturally. we were totally genuine and transparent with each other. the notion of manipulating our partnership with any kind of a game, never even occurred to us -- just as we never thought of trying to make water flow uphill, or make the sun move backward in the sky. everything was natural and perfect between us.

naturally, that's the kind of relationship i've been looking for, ever since. i've been looking earnestly for 30+ years. i've been offering my heart, over and over -- putting it up on the chopping-block, saying openly, "i love you" -- and having it handed back to me with big pieces chopped out of it. i've been told, many times, that's not the way to play the "game" of love! -- and yet i've persisted in doing it my way, because i've never been able to accept love as being a "game", i've never been able to be other than genuine about my love.

i've been rejected for being "too skinny"; for being "too nice", "too easy" (oh, yeah, those are the BIG ones!); for not having a nice enough home, in the right place; for choosing not to have a car; for not having enough money. here's an exact quote, from one who rejected me (after telling me, for months, that i was the best thing that had ever happened to her, and promising to spend the rest of her life with me): "it's all about money! everything is money!!" (she was lamenting this "fact" -- offering it as the "reason" she could not spend the rest of her life with me, after all -- she was lamenting it, but she was not willing to take a stand against it, to make her life about something more than money!)

so, lately, my friends have been telling me how to play the "game"; how you've got to play hard-to-get; how you've got to push the beloved away, got to run the other direction, got to make her chase you, got to make her wonder how you really feel about her; make her afraid that you DON'T love her, that you couldn't care less about her; make her feel she has to WORK to get your love! telling someone straight-out that you love them and want to be with them is romantic suicide; it makes you "too easy"; women want someone who is a CHALLENGE, someone who irritates them a little, someone who needs "fixing" (i've been told this by women themselves!).

and here's the topper: a guy who is "nice" too much of the time, considerate, cooperative, gentle, peaceful, pleasing -- he's the guy who gets rejected before he even gets out of the starting-gate. no, he's not even allowed to get INTO the starting-gate!! automatic reject! and the reason is: women believe that such a "nice" guy will be boring in bed! scout's honor, this was told to me by a woman who is a dear friend! where do women learn such things?? (and, of course, they spend their lives automatically rejecting such guys, so they never have a chance to find out the truth of us!)

I'll give a little bit
I'll give a little bit of my love to you
So give a little bit
Give a little bit of your time to me
See the man with the lonely eyes
Take his hand, you'll be surprised....

my dear mother herself once told me that i would never have a woman until i had the money to "support" (which meant "buy") one! this was such a disgusting idea, i absolutely could not face it. for years i denied that such a thing was even a possibility! but i saw it in action, and i finally had to accept it. just lately, i've seen it happen with someone very close to me -- and i feel that the final-allowable piece of my heart has now been cut out. i can't bear to put my heart on the chopping-block ever again; if one more piece gets chopped off, it will be the end of me. and i can't bear to see one more woman sell herself to the highest bidder, and call it "love".

so -- i'm making my stand. i'm going to stand here, centered in myself, being nothing but myself, not playing the "game" of love. i'm going to be as natural, as true-to-Self, as genuine, as transparent, as i can be -- come what may. i'm going to give my love, freely and totally, to anyone i choose -- and people are just going to have to deal with it! if that's too real for them, and if they run away, i'll be sorry to lose their company -- but that's just the way it will have to be.

it's time for those old games to end. the New World is being born, right now, right here, under our feet -- and it's a world of honesty and authenticity, a world of transparency; what-you-see-is-what-you-get; the end of secrecy and manipulation and game-playing; time to be totally real and simply natural. this New World will not tolerate the old games.

oh, yeah, the times they are a-changin'...!

Give a little bit
Give a little bit of your love to me
I'll give a little bit
I'll give a little bit of my love for you
Now's the time that we need to share
So find yourself, we're on our way back home....

dancing in the rain

Fri, 11 May 2007 07:40:36 -0000

"Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass...
It's about learning to dance in the rain."
-------- unknown author

"Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free,
Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands,
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves,
Let me forget about today until tomorrow...."
-------- Bob Dylan

"The Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences. When love and hate are both absent everything becomes clear and undisguised. Make the smallest distinction, however, and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.

"If you wish to see the truth, then hold no opinions for or against anything. To set up what you like against what you dislike is the disease of the mind.

"When the deep meaning of things is not understood the mind's essential peace is disturbed to no avail.

"The Way is perfect like vast space when nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess.

"Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject that we do not see the true nature of things.

"Live neither in the entanglements of outer things nor in inner feelings of emptiness.

"Be serene in the oneness of things and such erroneous views will disappear by themselves."

. . . . . . . .

"The more you talk and think about it, the further astray you wander from the truth.

"Stop talking and thinking, and there is nothing you will not be able to know."
-------- 3rd Zen Patriarch, Sengstau

TATTOO !!!

Sat, 05 May 2007 16:38:15 -0000

i've never had any desire for a tattoo ... but i'm really beginning to wonder if i SHOULD have one: if i should have the following, tattooed somewhere on my skin -- the back of the hand, maybe? -- where it will naturally be in my view almost all the time: my one big lesson in this lifetime:

just Be Here Now,
live every moment without expectation,
take whatever Life gives you, and make Happiness out of it!!!
and, even when Life gives you something so miserable
that you can't find a grain of happiness in it,
then go inside yourself and create your happiness there...!
... and radiate that happiness out to the rest of the world ...

maybe i should have it on my forehead also, as a public service to everyone else!

Happy Me!! (thanks, Nina! : ^ )

What's Love Got To Do With It?

Mon, 30 Apr 2007 05:11:52 -0000

He roller-coaster, he got early warning

                                                He got muddy water, he one mojo filter
                                                He say "One and one and one is three"
                                                Got to be good-looking 'cause he's so hard to see....

What's Love Got To Do With It?

EVERYTHING!!

it's so nice to have someone to share one's life with, even for a little while! and, when we love someone -- when we feel our true oneness with "another" -- that person can get us to do things we would not do otherwise! activities we have not done for decades: dancing, swimming, eating new foods, and also foods we have eaten before, but not in such a long time that we have forgotten their very existence!

what a delicious thrill, to rediscover the taste of anise seeds -- and to discover how amazingly good they are when incorporated into your homemade sourdough bread (made with freshly-ground-by-hand whole wheat flour, and whole barley and millet and sweet rice)! and, to rediscover licorice -- wow!!! -- real licorice, made just from molasses, wheat flour, licorice extract, and the extracts of 18 herbs.... and to discover, for the first time, the subtle taste and the fun texture of spring-roll wrappers made from only rice flour and tapioca flour: circular, plate-size, thin and translucent creations; brittle as plexiglass initially, but becoming soft and rubbery when soaked in a bit of water for a minute; soft and rubbery, and easy to wrap around all sorts of fillings ... chopped veggies, beans, miso, seaweed, sweet potato, you name it....

i've been greatly blessed to share my life with such a person for the past 3 weeks; a dear and special person who came to visit me, from halfway around the world; from Denmark, to France, to L.A. to Hilo.... whose only contact with me, before, had been via email and instant messenger (and, of course, that precursor to the World Wide Web, the human psychic internet).

how nice, and how remarkable, that such a person would travel so far ... enduring, on the way, a cold night and a biting-insect attack at the London airport ... and arriving here to brave 3 weeks of my primitive lifestyle, including house-ants and cockroaches and (worst of all) mosquitoes (whose greatest pleasure is dining on the blood of newcomers!), and a mouse named Rudy! to come so far, to endure all that, and to re-kindle the spark of life and love in me -- a spark that was nearly gone, after an emotional devastation 8 months ago....

so, Dear One, thank you so much ... for all the gifts you've brought me ... for all you've taught me! thank you for freeing me (even if just a little) from my self-imposed cyber-slavery. thank you for reminding me that there are such things as sunrise and sunset ... heartfelt hugs ... kisses on the cheek ... straight talk and honesty ... and that meals may consist of more than 2 items, and do not have to be consumed while standing at the kitchen sink : ^ )....

i thank you so much, for your love....

And, in the end,

                                                                    The love you take
                                                                    Is equal to
                                                                    The love you make....

what if...?

Sat, 14 Apr 2007 22:19:14 -0000

what if...

...we just decide to feel as if everything in our lives is already perfect --

-- because really it IS....!

reiki and the sly man

Fri, 16 Mar 2007 02:38:18 -0000

wow!! -- here's a new reiki site, by a guy named Karma Tsering, in Paris, France ---- Reiki and the Sly Man / Remembering the Self....

it's clear that Tsering has a real understanding of what reiki is all about. his reference to "the sly man" relates to the teachings of Gurdjieff -- and he uses those teachings in conjunction with reiki, in his own quest for Self-realization....

Do We Need a Publishing (R)Evolution?

Tue, 13 Feb 2007 01:33:54 -0000

It's a question worth asking. I offer the following story, in favor of a Yes answer:

I've been doing Reiki since 1991, and initiating others into it since 1999. In the fall of 2002, one of my students, in Moscow, wrote to say that she had shown my Reiki manuals to a publisher there, and that the publisher would like to publish them as a book (with my student doing the translation). This was a possibility that had not even occurred to me; but I was delighted by the offer. I immediately set about going through the manuals, to re-write them into a book that would appeal not only to people already doing Reiki, but to a more general readership as well.

It just happened that my situation at the time was perfect for confining myself to a room, where I did nothing, day and night, but work on this book (with breaks for eating and sleeping, and getting outside for a short time every day). That's what I did, and, in about 3 months, the book was finished. In the process, I had done a considerable amount of research, meditation, and experimentation, all of which had added significantly to the comprehensiveness of the material, beyond what my original manuals had been.

The backbone of all this, and the most salient feature, was that much of the material was based on information from a group of centenarian Reiki Masters in Japan, who were not associated with the official Reiki organizations there, and who had been taught by Mikao Usui himself (the founder of what had later come to be called Reiki), in the early 1900s! This material was dynamite -- shattering much of the accepted history of Reiki, and giving quite a different picture of Usui's method than what the world at large had been taught, for 30 years, as Reiki!

This material had come to me from an English Reiki Master, who had learned it from another English Reiki Master, who had received it directly from the aforementioned group of centenarians in Japan. It was truly dynamite, and it was known only to a very small number of people; and the 2 English Reiki Masters (as well as the Japanese Masters) had no desire to spread it beyond their own students!

I informed the English Master who had given the material to me, of the Russian book offer, and he gave his blessing on my proceeding with the project. In Moscow, my student was dealing, as my agent, with the publisher. Time passed, and the book was supposedly ready for the press -- but the publisher was now changing the agreement; instead of paying us royalties, he was now intending to pay a flat fee (of $600, in fact!) for publishing the book. I said "No, thanks" and my student/agent took the manuscript to a 2nd publisher, who also showed immediate interest. Again, the publication was supposedly arranged ... then months went by, with nothing happening, no further word from the publisher. Finally, my student/agent retrieved the manuscript from that publisher and took it to a 3rd, where it was again welcomed.

Meanwhile, it had occurred to me, since I now had this very comprehensive Reiki book, full of dynamite material from Mikao Usui's original students -- material which was in no other Reiki book anywhere (as far as I knew) -- that the American publishers of Reiki books would surely be standing in line, salivating, at the prospect of getting their hands on such a book!

I chose, for the honor of receiving this submission, the publisher of what was then my favorite, published, Reiki book -- and sat back to await my acceptance letter. I was a little disheartened when told not to expect a decision for many months, and when encouraged (more than once) to send my proposal to other publishers while I was waiting. That sort of gave me a clue that these folks were not interested -- and yet, how could they not be? It was beyond my belief!

Eventually they made their disinterest officially known to me; and eventually I made a submission to a 2nd publisher -- with the same expectation, and the same result. Then I figured -- as shocking as it was -- I would just have to get very businesslike and methodical about the process of finding a publisher. I started looking for either a publisher or an agent, in fact; scouring the web for submission guidelines. And what I found made me literally (no pun intended) disgusted! Whether agent or publisher, the guidelines were the same -- and it was truly all I could do to believe what I was reading! One after another, here's what they were saying:

Before an agent or publisher would deign to read a paragraph of my manuscript, they expected me to do and agree-to the following:
-- design a 2-year promotional campaign for the finished book;
-- travel around the U.S. for those 2 years, at my own expense, doing public appearances on behalf of the book;
-- and, oh yes, I was to contribute financially to the publisher's own promotional budget for the book (one set of guidelines went so far as to name a suggested amount for this contribution, which was: a minimum of $10,000)!!

I truly was having trouble believing my eyes! I remembered seeing information about so-called Vanity Publishers, years earlier -- the people who would publish anything you wanted, as long as you paid them to do it -- and remembered these Vanity Publishers as being a lot less expensive! Now, what I was finding looked exactly like Vanity Publishers, only they were more expensive, and they were the so-called Mainstream, Big-Time Publishers!

After reading these same guidelines for about the 6th time, I was so disgusted, I could not go any further. I decided, if the book never got published, that would be preferable to subjecting it to the realm of prostitution. I figured, eventually some people in Russia would be able to read it; and I decided to make an ebook version of it myself, which would be available on my website.

By the time I got the ebook made and available, it was 2005 -- over 2 years after the book was originally due for publication in Russia. Now, the Russian edition was still in limbo, but at least there was a paperless English-language version.

Now, 2 years beyond that -- surprise, surprise! -- the Russian publication still has not appeared; but the ebook is in its 7th edition, and has been downloaded over 2,000 times. It has also garnered praise from Reiki Masters around the world. One such Reiki Master, in Turkey, thought so highly of it that she herself offered to get it translated and published there. This has now come to pass, and An Exploration of Usui Reiki and Beyond is now available in Turkish (titled USUI REIKI - Kapi, Derinlik ve SIR) ( for some reason, that link is not working; the URL is
http://www.hermeskitap.com/dukkan/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=23558 ).

A certain Reiki Master in Iran read the ebook and made the same offer; though, as of now, the fate of the Iranian publication is unclear.

The point of this little tale is that while, in some places, it seems that books are still chosen for publication on the basis of their content -- in the good-old U.S. of A., at least, that is apparently rarely the case now. Here, books are more often pimped to the highest bidder, period. One set of bidders are the authors of the books themselves(!) vis a vis the publishers, and another set are the publishers vis a vis the bookstores! This situation predominates not only in the U.S., but at least in Britain as well: here's an eye-opening article from The London Times of May 30, 2006....

Personally, I'm quite happy with just the ebook, which has several advantages:
-- no physical product to be hauled around or shipped or stored;
-- I'm able to make it myself, as elaborate as I like, with no one else changing as much as a comma;
-- I can easily update it, whenever I have material to add, or changes to make;
-- it's available to many more people, all over the world, than a paper book would be, and at a much lower cost;
-- I can give 15% of the income to the photographer, and 5% to the artist who made a logo for the book, and still have 8 times as much for myself as I would receive with a standard publishing contract!!

The thing is, many readers still prefer paper books -- especially on subjects such as Reiki. And, in most of the world, most people still do not have computer access. So, we continue to need paper books. And, clearly, we need a better system for their publication.
__________________________________________

thanks to Carol Adler, of Dandelion Books, for asking me to write this -- and for having some excellent ideas for the (r)evolution....

the cure for heart disease

Thu, 08 Feb 2007 15:37:24 -0000

yes, indeedy, here it is! i awoke this morning knowing it!! no need for "scientific" studies and all that baloney; i awoke with a clear, direct knowing of this; as clearly as i can see that the sky is blue. and it's another one of those cases where the truth has been "hiding in plain sight" all the time. (actually, that's EVERY case; the truth is always "hiding in plain sight", just waiting for us to wake up and see it!)

anyway, the cure for all heart disease is, very simply....

H A P P I N E S S

what a shock, eh?

if we dig through all the illusions of veins and arteries and cholesterol and plaque, and muscles and molecules, and all such malarkey ... we see that the real cause of any heart dis-ease is nothing but

u n h a p p i n e s s

and that -- DUHHHHHH -- the cure for it is, of course, merely to get

H A P P Y !!

the thing is, it has to be REAL happiness, it can't be fake happiness. and the way to get REAL happiness is to go inside ourselves and take a real, truthful look, and find whatever is in there that's causing us to be UNhappy ... and then correct it.

this means actually making
C H A N G E S
in our life!!

and, once they're made, our happiness comes back, and the heart is healed....

just like magic.

soul-mates ??

Wed, 07 Feb 2007 18:33:26 -0000

it seems to me, we each have a bunch of soul-mates ... and we may often be surprised by who they turn out to be....

in case you can't read the text under the picture (above), here it is:

PHOTO COURTESY OF DAVID W. GILMORE JR. / U.S. Air Force

Comforting embrace

"Air Force Chief Master Sgt. John Gebhardt, of the 332nd Expeditionary Medical Group at Balad, Iraq, cradles a young girl as they both sleep in the hospital. The girl's entire family was executed by insurgents; the killers shot her in the head as well. The girl received treatment at the U.S. military hospital in Balad, but cries and moans often. According to nurses at the facility, Gebhardt is the only one who can calm down the girl, so he has spent the last several nights holding her while they both sleep in a chair."

the reiki book is now in TURKISH!!

Mon, 05 Feb 2007 07:17:20 -0000

yes -- in case you've been waiting and waiting to read An Exploration of Usui Reiki and Beyond in Turkish ... your prayers have now been answered! here's the scoop:

USUI REIKI, Kapi, Derinlik ve SIR
publisher: KoÅŸulsuz Sevgi YayÄ±nlarÄ±
ISBN: 9944-55691-2
222 pages
(available via the link above)

clear days!!

Tue, 30 Jan 2007 03:45:03 -0000

we've been having them lately in Hilo -- beautiful blue sky greeting me as i awake and look out the big window! and they're all the more beautiful, coming after the days of r a i n and g r a y....

Mr. Chainsaw was here today, after a rather long absence. he was chainsawing, this morning, and the wind was blowing fiercely (very rare for here!), and both of those things were making me feel very tense and hurried; i was answering emails, and i felt as though someone were chasing me down a chute, at full speed, into the teeth of a roaring buzz-saw!!

Michael had recently reminded me of something i had learned years and years ago: when something is bothering you, instead of trying to escape it, BECOME it! -- and it will no longer bother you. i had first learned this when living in apartment buildings and dealing with the noise -- er, 'music' --from neighbors' stereos; and i had used it successfully there, and also, a few times, in cases of great physical pain. i was able to 'become' the music, and the pain, and i discovered, once those things were not separate from myself, they disappeared from my awareness!

i tried to use that procedure today, with the noise of the chainsaw ... and finally did succeed fairly well; but i must say, it was more easily done with the loud music and the physical pain! i think it was at least partly because both of those were constant -- whereas the chainsaw noise was off-and-on, without even a pattern of off-and-on-ness. starting and stopping with no predictability -- so i would become the noise, and then it would be gone, which would startle me into realizing that i really was NOT the noise ... and then it would start again, and i would have to become it again, etc....

about 4 hours of this was all i could take, and then i shut off the computer, had a quick lunch of avocado and dulse and parsley and grains, rested for a few minutes in the rocking chair -- finally got myself to slow down from what had felt like a-hundred-miles-an-hour all morning -- and then set out on the bike for downtown Hilo.

it was early afternoon, still under the great blue sky, and i was suddenly feeling wonderful and free and expansive and thoroughly HAPPY! and this old song came along -- from way back in the 1960s -- and i was singing it and singing it as i rode along....

i grew up with this song, and have always felt a certain 'corniness' about it -- and i have to say, on looking deeper into it, there's really nothing corny about it at all; in fact, i was quite taken today by the profundity of it! if you can exorcise the ghost of some half-blotto Las Vegas lounge-lizard singing it, and just sing it to yourself, as if it's the first time you've ever heard it, and get into what it's really saying ... you just might be surprised at the depth of spiritual truth in it!! i was amazed today, to think that a pair of popular-song writers, 40 years ago, would have understood that everything we see in our world is truly a projection of some aspect of US! the only way they would have known it was to have experienced it themselves; and then they put it in a song; and then people like me heard the song and thought it was 'corny', and even made fun of it ... and, only 40 years later, had experienced enough of Life ourselves to see that this old 'corny' song was in reality a gem of Self-realization!!!

here it is (lyrics and music by Alan Jay Lerner & Burton Lane):

On a clear day
Rise and look around you
And you'll see who you are

On a clear day
How it will astound you
That the glow of your being
Outshines every star

You'll feel part of
Every mountain, sea and shore,
You can hear from far and near
A world you've never never heard before

And on a clear day
On a clear day
You can see forever and ever and ever and ever more.

and ... here are some recent photos of Hilo....

is nothing sacred to a chainsaw man??

Sun, 14 Jan 2007 19:22:40 -0000

here it is, Sunday -- my very favorite day -- and Mr. Chainsaw is back, to disrupt Mother Nature's peace again.... how did we ever live without this guy?? : ^ )

what he -- and my landlady, who hired him -- may not have figured out yet is that one man with a chainsaw and machete is no match for The Jungle! especially in the rainy season, when he's prevented from chainsawing for days at a time, The Jungle can grow faster than he can cut it down...!

DUHHHH. i wonder how much money the landlady will spend finding that out....