After dwelling on my poor mood, inspired by not only my lack of writing portfolio but also my current inability to run (damn ankle) and our uncertainty about being able to go on to vacation next week (thanks, Massage Envy, for keeping us in suspense), I decided to listen to Abraham on my way to pick up cat food, Amway connection notwithstanding.
Abraham spoke about our moods, and how our moods reflect whether we're problem oriented or solution oriented, and how solutions don't come when your vibration matches that of the problem.
I gotta admit, from a completely practical standpoint, spiritual influences disregarded entirely, that they've got a point. Who's going to write when she's all mopey about not having written?
Would Richard Bannister have run a mile in under 4 minutes if he only focussed on his near-misses? Somehow he got past the historical evidence of what is, and aligned himself with what could be.
I was feeling better, and as I left Target, I looked down and there was a dollar bill. I picked it up, and drove to Kroger to buy a scratch-off ticket with it.
I did not win.
Happily, I don't really care. If I'd picked up a $100 bill and spent it on 5 $20 lottery tickets and not won anything, I might care a little, but as it stands it was only a wasted stop. Besides, I doubt I would have spent $100 on lottery tickets all at once to begin with, wherever the money may have come from.
So now I'm off to do some focus wheels and rearrange my thinking about writing, and money, and working for the man, and getting time off while working for the man, and whatever else might occur to me before time to go to work.
Friday, April 22, 2011
uncomfortable with my dreams
We had a lovely dinner out with friends last night, starting at Chubby's Tacos, continuing through a tour of our new massage space and ending at Ben and Jerry's. I've known the couple we were out with for a few years; this was Jessica's first true social engagement with them. We got along famously, discussed lying about food consumption and other things dear to our hearts, and plan further engagements over the summer and visiting them after they move to Guatemala (land of avocados and coffee) in August. Good times were and shall be had.
Over ice cream, the conversation turned to ayahuesca, and how both Sharon and I have an interest in having an experience with it. She asked why I was interested, and when she found my answer too vague, asked for an example.
I hemmed and hawed and finally admitted that I wonder if it would help me write.
I used to think that perhaps there was some sort of metaphorical subconscious demon I needed to slay in order to fulfill my dreams of writing, or if maybe there was a piece of my soul that was estranged from me at an early age that I need to reunite with to achieve the same end. Now it's more vague than that, a sort of "maybe it will help," hoping that it won't involve anything too scary. I don't like scary.
Admitting that was as scary for me as any demon I might meet, though. My heart raced, I felt an ache in my chest, I grew quiet for quite a while after my confession. I was moody for much of the rest of the evening after we got home.
I'm not very good at avoiding questions, particularly with friends I trust. Jessica suggested I come up with a stock answer so that I can keep my personal business as personal as I like when it comes to writing. That's probably a good idea.
Meanwhile, I have to wonder why it strikes such terror in my heart to even talk about it sometimes.
I think it has something to do with deciding to write when I was around 9 years old and still having little or nothing to show for it at 41.
Meanwhile, I am working on it. I've gotten up early the last two days and done some line editing of the first two chapters of Ari (the novel I wrote during NaNoWriMo this year). I must admit I'm a little lost about how to go about editing it, making sure the overall story arc is there, the subplots make sense, and that it weaves into a fairly interesting whole.
The Creative Writing MFA at NCSU requires not only a writing sample but letters of recommendation from three people who can speak to my writing and editing skills as well as my academic aptitude. My best bet is to take continuing education courses and rely on those teachers for the recommendations, as well as work on editing so that my novel sounds promising when I send the first couple of chapters to the English department at NCSU.
So this morning I looked up Duke Continuing Education's courses on creative writing, and there's a lovely sounding one . . . that starts in 4 days and costs $190. Why do I find these things at the last minute? I'd like to go ahead and get started with it now; procrastination is never helpful. But I haven't looked at courses at the local art centers yet, so hopefully they'll have something a little more affordable that doesn't start right away. At least I can make an informed decision at that point.
Abraham talks about getting into the Vortex before taking action, and while I'm hardly in the Vortex, I have to say that the thought of taking action, while scary, feels a lot better than the thought of not, which just makes me sad. So I'll count my pennies and keep looking for a doable course, editing a little every day and hoping to get into the swing of it soon.
Perhaps ayahuesca is the key . . .
Over ice cream, the conversation turned to ayahuesca, and how both Sharon and I have an interest in having an experience with it. She asked why I was interested, and when she found my answer too vague, asked for an example.
I hemmed and hawed and finally admitted that I wonder if it would help me write.
I used to think that perhaps there was some sort of metaphorical subconscious demon I needed to slay in order to fulfill my dreams of writing, or if maybe there was a piece of my soul that was estranged from me at an early age that I need to reunite with to achieve the same end. Now it's more vague than that, a sort of "maybe it will help," hoping that it won't involve anything too scary. I don't like scary.
Admitting that was as scary for me as any demon I might meet, though. My heart raced, I felt an ache in my chest, I grew quiet for quite a while after my confession. I was moody for much of the rest of the evening after we got home.
I'm not very good at avoiding questions, particularly with friends I trust. Jessica suggested I come up with a stock answer so that I can keep my personal business as personal as I like when it comes to writing. That's probably a good idea.
Meanwhile, I have to wonder why it strikes such terror in my heart to even talk about it sometimes.
I think it has something to do with deciding to write when I was around 9 years old and still having little or nothing to show for it at 41.
Meanwhile, I am working on it. I've gotten up early the last two days and done some line editing of the first two chapters of Ari (the novel I wrote during NaNoWriMo this year). I must admit I'm a little lost about how to go about editing it, making sure the overall story arc is there, the subplots make sense, and that it weaves into a fairly interesting whole.
The Creative Writing MFA at NCSU requires not only a writing sample but letters of recommendation from three people who can speak to my writing and editing skills as well as my academic aptitude. My best bet is to take continuing education courses and rely on those teachers for the recommendations, as well as work on editing so that my novel sounds promising when I send the first couple of chapters to the English department at NCSU.
So this morning I looked up Duke Continuing Education's courses on creative writing, and there's a lovely sounding one . . . that starts in 4 days and costs $190. Why do I find these things at the last minute? I'd like to go ahead and get started with it now; procrastination is never helpful. But I haven't looked at courses at the local art centers yet, so hopefully they'll have something a little more affordable that doesn't start right away. At least I can make an informed decision at that point.
Abraham talks about getting into the Vortex before taking action, and while I'm hardly in the Vortex, I have to say that the thought of taking action, while scary, feels a lot better than the thought of not, which just makes me sad. So I'll count my pennies and keep looking for a doable course, editing a little every day and hoping to get into the swing of it soon.
Perhaps ayahuesca is the key . . .
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
intrinsic motivation
I read over my last blog entry, and happily it's not quite as dark and hopeless as I felt after I wrote it, then I thought I'd read Abraham's quote of the day to the right of my blog (which only shows correctly in Firefox for some reason, so if you want to read it, Control-A to select the whole page and then you'll be able to see it). Here it is (it changes every day, so I'm cutting and pasting this particular one here):
Daily Law of Attraction Quotation
If we had a child, or anyone, and we caught them doing something inappropriate, we would not amplify it with our words. We would identify what it is we do not want, and then out of it would come the rocket of desire of what we do want, and then we would just visualize, visualize, visualize, until we find peace within our vision. When you make someone and their action the heart of a vision that you've spent time on -- your relationship improves, your experience is better, and they receive the benefit of the experience.
But if you catch them, and see them, and worry about it, and put mechanisms in place to prevent it, now you have not only amplified it, you have now made a commitment that is hooking you both into that, until usually it gets big enough that you break apart, and then you attract others to fulfill that role.
--- Abraham
Excerpted from the workshop in Chicago, IL on Sunday, April 25th, 1999 #42
So I noted the behavior I didn't want to continue and amplified it in my last blog post. My objective is to note the behavior I do want in myself, and amplify that. But the unwanted behavior is so fascinating . . .
I'm listening to Talent is Overrated now, and I'm in the section about business. All the performance books I like have big sections on business, and I'm not really into business, except my own business, which is picking up nicely. (Next on my list: Guerilla Marketing.) His major point thus far is that great talent comes with great work, with specific, directed practice that isn't necessarily the same thing as doing the same thing over and over again. A great football player doesn't get great by just playing football; he runs hills, does leg presses, etc., to give him the advantage he needs on game day.
I understand that. I understand that if I want to become a great guitar player, I need to practice my scales, sightread, and dedicate a lot more time than I currently do to music. I understand that if I want to be a great novelist, or even a good one, a lot of time should be spent writing, rewriting, getting my work critiqued and critiquing my work myself, comparing it to what I consider great writing and analyzing where my writing falls short, working to make it better. Benjamin Franklin had a great method to improve his writing that the Colvin (the author) gives in detail from Franklin's autobiography. It sounds like a lot of work, and it's a little intimidating, but I really think I could do it. The key is getting myself to do it.
And that's where my quest always leads me--wondering where that passion and drive come from, and wondering how to tap into my own. Colvin talks about it in his final chapter, which I'm not at yet, and I'm really curious as to whether he says it's a great mystery or of it gives pointers on how to develop your own passion. I'll keep you posted.
I read Daniel Pink's Drive for the same reason, to figure out how to give myself that sort of oomph, and I came away from the book thinking that it would be great to work for Google, but still unsure how to motivate myself. The reward of doing and growing and learning is greater than the reward of bonuses.
Meanwhile, reading Talent has really given me pause about why I've been reluctant to try to get into an MFA program for writing. I give excuses like not wanting to dilute my voice with others' criticism; not wanting to sound all stuffy and full of myself, like I think some MFAs do, though I have no evidence for this belief. The truth the thought of working hard on my writing and being graded on it intimidates me.
I have no such concerns about critical writing, personal essays or research papers. It's just fiction that gives me the willies, and perhaps that's because it's too dear to my heart to risk failure.
Colvin does point out two characteristics of people who are willing to work hard to get better: self-efficacy (they believe they are capable of doing what it is they're working at), and a belief that their hard work will pay off.
This makes total logical sense to me. Logic works well for rearranging my beliefs. I think I might be on to something.
I believe I'm a decent writer. I've seen my writing improve through college courses--I learned more in Advanced Composition back at Harding, with our critiquing groups and Dr. Long's encouragement and criticism, than I have anywhere else.
I know a few areas that I need to work on: Structure and composition--getting from point A to point B logically. A penchant for really long and convoluted sentences which may or may not get my point across effectively. Middles--I know where my story starts and where it ends, but what happens in between I'm fucking clueless about.
I'm willing to work on these issues.
Jessica is an inspiration to me. She has never run regularly, and last week--for the first time in her life--she jogged for 20 minutes straight. She's doing the Couch-to-5k program, and while she bitched unabashedly about how not fun running was in the beginning, she stuck to it and has been bitten by "the bug." She was intimidated by the 20 minute hurdle, developed her own plan to ramp up her training a little more slowly so that her calves could acclimate to the increased time, decided she could do it and then did. She recognizes that she has a problem with her calves tightening up, and when she couldn't figure out on her own how to stop it, she signed us both up for a Chi Running class, which starts tonight. (The class is a few days past due for me, as I did something really horrible to my ankle on my last run and am still limping.)
She's amazing in that way: if she wants to do something, she is a great power to be reckoned with. She plugs away methodically even when she doesn't feel like it. She believes in her ability, and she believes that hard work brings results.
I, on the other hand--well, let me give you an example from my past.
I had always wanted to be able to play guitar. When I was 28, I decided that I would take lessons, even though I hadn't started at an early age and would likely never be an international sensation. I wanted to play well enough to be able to sing at the same time, and I was willing to put in the work. I took lessons for over a year, and one day my teacher, in an effort to praise me for my hard work, told me how well I was doing and how he could tell that I did something that most of the rest of his students never did: I practiced.
I knew that most of his students were teenage boys who wanted to be the next Kurt Cobain, who probably didn't apply themselves at anything and who would probably become bartenders in the French Quarter, smoke a lot of pot and eventually start their own contracting businesses, if they were lucky. I did not wish to be like them. I wanted to be good.
Still, the knowledge that I worked harder at something than someone else bugged me, and my practicing suffered as a result. I never conquered shifting from 3rd to 5th position playing F scales, deeming that one exercise as too difficult, ignoring the many songs and exercises that I'd practiced until I could play them smoothly . . . and eventually quit.
Now, from my new perspective, I wish I hadn't.
Being willing to work hard at something you care about is a reason for pride. It's not the sign of a loser who has nothing better to do; it's the sign of someone who believes in herself and her ability to overcome difficulties. Being able to set aside the urge to jump up and down, screaming "This is the most annoyingly frustrating exercise in the world!"--or at least to sit down and start playing again after the screaming--is a sign of great character, mental fortitude, and other qualities that fathers worldwide try to instill in their children.
I want to be the kind of person who does things even when they're annoying and tedious just to get better.
To bring it back to Abraham, it's a lot easier to do those annoying and tedious things from inside the Vortex. Sometimes it's annoying and tedious to get myself into that place--into a place where I believe my hard work will pay off rather than stymie me completely.
Meanwhile, the idea of starting an MFA program is niggling at the back of my brain. There's actually a pretty good one at NC State, about an hour from my house. What do I need to apply? Three letters of recommendation, which I can come up with even though I've not been active in the study of writing any time recently. A GRE score from the past 5 years, which is a simple matter of scheduling. $65 application fee: doable. A 15 page critical paper; not a problem. A plan for how to pay for the program if I get in: I'll worry about that later, because it's just an excuse to not get to the last requirement. A writing sample of my fiction . . . that would require editing and working hard and committing. And then there's the hard work that comes after getting in; hopefully the massage business would be in full-swing by then.
So . . . that leaves me with editing my work being my first priority, which is hard work. But hard work brings improvement, and a program brings proven methods to practice and get better, mentors and colleagues, and a commitment to actually do what I want to do, much like signing up for the Marine Corps Marathon.
And this is where I'm at today, limping toward the edge of commitment, looking forward to teetering on that edge and learning to dive.
Daily Law of Attraction QuotationIf we had a child, or anyone, and we caught them doing something inappropriate, we would not amplify it with our words. We would identify what it is we do not want, and then out of it would come the rocket of desire of what we do want, and then we would just visualize, visualize, visualize, until we find peace within our vision. When you make someone and their action the heart of a vision that you've spent time on -- your relationship improves, your experience is better, and they receive the benefit of the experience.
But if you catch them, and see them, and worry about it, and put mechanisms in place to prevent it, now you have not only amplified it, you have now made a commitment that is hooking you both into that, until usually it gets big enough that you break apart, and then you attract others to fulfill that role.
--- Abraham
Excerpted from the workshop in Chicago, IL on Sunday, April 25th, 1999 #42
So I noted the behavior I didn't want to continue and amplified it in my last blog post. My objective is to note the behavior I do want in myself, and amplify that. But the unwanted behavior is so fascinating . . .
I'm listening to Talent is Overrated now, and I'm in the section about business. All the performance books I like have big sections on business, and I'm not really into business, except my own business, which is picking up nicely. (Next on my list: Guerilla Marketing.) His major point thus far is that great talent comes with great work, with specific, directed practice that isn't necessarily the same thing as doing the same thing over and over again. A great football player doesn't get great by just playing football; he runs hills, does leg presses, etc., to give him the advantage he needs on game day.
I understand that. I understand that if I want to become a great guitar player, I need to practice my scales, sightread, and dedicate a lot more time than I currently do to music. I understand that if I want to be a great novelist, or even a good one, a lot of time should be spent writing, rewriting, getting my work critiqued and critiquing my work myself, comparing it to what I consider great writing and analyzing where my writing falls short, working to make it better. Benjamin Franklin had a great method to improve his writing that the Colvin (the author) gives in detail from Franklin's autobiography. It sounds like a lot of work, and it's a little intimidating, but I really think I could do it. The key is getting myself to do it.
And that's where my quest always leads me--wondering where that passion and drive come from, and wondering how to tap into my own. Colvin talks about it in his final chapter, which I'm not at yet, and I'm really curious as to whether he says it's a great mystery or of it gives pointers on how to develop your own passion. I'll keep you posted.
I read Daniel Pink's Drive for the same reason, to figure out how to give myself that sort of oomph, and I came away from the book thinking that it would be great to work for Google, but still unsure how to motivate myself. The reward of doing and growing and learning is greater than the reward of bonuses.
Meanwhile, reading Talent has really given me pause about why I've been reluctant to try to get into an MFA program for writing. I give excuses like not wanting to dilute my voice with others' criticism; not wanting to sound all stuffy and full of myself, like I think some MFAs do, though I have no evidence for this belief. The truth the thought of working hard on my writing and being graded on it intimidates me.
I have no such concerns about critical writing, personal essays or research papers. It's just fiction that gives me the willies, and perhaps that's because it's too dear to my heart to risk failure.
Colvin does point out two characteristics of people who are willing to work hard to get better: self-efficacy (they believe they are capable of doing what it is they're working at), and a belief that their hard work will pay off.
This makes total logical sense to me. Logic works well for rearranging my beliefs. I think I might be on to something.
I believe I'm a decent writer. I've seen my writing improve through college courses--I learned more in Advanced Composition back at Harding, with our critiquing groups and Dr. Long's encouragement and criticism, than I have anywhere else.
I know a few areas that I need to work on: Structure and composition--getting from point A to point B logically. A penchant for really long and convoluted sentences which may or may not get my point across effectively. Middles--I know where my story starts and where it ends, but what happens in between I'm fucking clueless about.
I'm willing to work on these issues.
Jessica is an inspiration to me. She has never run regularly, and last week--for the first time in her life--she jogged for 20 minutes straight. She's doing the Couch-to-5k program, and while she bitched unabashedly about how not fun running was in the beginning, she stuck to it and has been bitten by "the bug." She was intimidated by the 20 minute hurdle, developed her own plan to ramp up her training a little more slowly so that her calves could acclimate to the increased time, decided she could do it and then did. She recognizes that she has a problem with her calves tightening up, and when she couldn't figure out on her own how to stop it, she signed us both up for a Chi Running class, which starts tonight. (The class is a few days past due for me, as I did something really horrible to my ankle on my last run and am still limping.)
She's amazing in that way: if she wants to do something, she is a great power to be reckoned with. She plugs away methodically even when she doesn't feel like it. She believes in her ability, and she believes that hard work brings results.
I, on the other hand--well, let me give you an example from my past.
I had always wanted to be able to play guitar. When I was 28, I decided that I would take lessons, even though I hadn't started at an early age and would likely never be an international sensation. I wanted to play well enough to be able to sing at the same time, and I was willing to put in the work. I took lessons for over a year, and one day my teacher, in an effort to praise me for my hard work, told me how well I was doing and how he could tell that I did something that most of the rest of his students never did: I practiced.
I knew that most of his students were teenage boys who wanted to be the next Kurt Cobain, who probably didn't apply themselves at anything and who would probably become bartenders in the French Quarter, smoke a lot of pot and eventually start their own contracting businesses, if they were lucky. I did not wish to be like them. I wanted to be good.
Still, the knowledge that I worked harder at something than someone else bugged me, and my practicing suffered as a result. I never conquered shifting from 3rd to 5th position playing F scales, deeming that one exercise as too difficult, ignoring the many songs and exercises that I'd practiced until I could play them smoothly . . . and eventually quit.
Now, from my new perspective, I wish I hadn't.
Being willing to work hard at something you care about is a reason for pride. It's not the sign of a loser who has nothing better to do; it's the sign of someone who believes in herself and her ability to overcome difficulties. Being able to set aside the urge to jump up and down, screaming "This is the most annoyingly frustrating exercise in the world!"--or at least to sit down and start playing again after the screaming--is a sign of great character, mental fortitude, and other qualities that fathers worldwide try to instill in their children.
I want to be the kind of person who does things even when they're annoying and tedious just to get better.
To bring it back to Abraham, it's a lot easier to do those annoying and tedious things from inside the Vortex. Sometimes it's annoying and tedious to get myself into that place--into a place where I believe my hard work will pay off rather than stymie me completely.
Meanwhile, the idea of starting an MFA program is niggling at the back of my brain. There's actually a pretty good one at NC State, about an hour from my house. What do I need to apply? Three letters of recommendation, which I can come up with even though I've not been active in the study of writing any time recently. A GRE score from the past 5 years, which is a simple matter of scheduling. $65 application fee: doable. A 15 page critical paper; not a problem. A plan for how to pay for the program if I get in: I'll worry about that later, because it's just an excuse to not get to the last requirement. A writing sample of my fiction . . . that would require editing and working hard and committing. And then there's the hard work that comes after getting in; hopefully the massage business would be in full-swing by then.
So . . . that leaves me with editing my work being my first priority, which is hard work. But hard work brings improvement, and a program brings proven methods to practice and get better, mentors and colleagues, and a commitment to actually do what I want to do, much like signing up for the Marine Corps Marathon.
And this is where I'm at today, limping toward the edge of commitment, looking forward to teetering on that edge and learning to dive.
Friday, April 8, 2011
what is the law of attraction? is it real?
Whenever I get worried about money, I make jokes--a few too many jokes--about winning the lottery.
I buy scratch off tickets--not a ton of them, but $5 here and there.
I throw in the occasional PowerBall ticket.
I start reading samples of books on my Kindle app about how to win the lottery.
I get really restless about going to work at the McSpa, gripe about it endlessly and lament how little they pay.
Jessica pointed this out to me the last time it happened, and asked if I had enough money to make the mortgage that month, because the last time I had gone a little lottery crazy I didn't, and ended up paying late fees and catching up, which really hurt financially.
She is observant.
Abraham would say that I shouldn't tie my hopes to one possible source of income--that I should focus on the money I want and feel that I already have it and not worry about where it comes from. I'm not really sure where else a sudden influx of funds might come from that would allow me to invest more fully in our own business and pay off my debts, but maybe it's due to lack of imagination.
Actually, I do have an idea. In my dream world I'm a successful novelist. It would help if I worked on my novel, though, and there you have it.
Proponents of the law of attraction and other it-can-only-be-true-if-you-believe-it philosophies often point to Richard Bannister, and how everyone believed that a mile couldn't be run by a human in less than 4 minutes. Bannister convinced himself that it was possible, accomplished the feat, and soon several other runners also broke the 4 minute mile barrier.
The question is, if you really believe it can happen, can it really happen? Or is it only that if you really believe it can't happen, that belief stops you?
Skeptics point out druggies who jump off of roofs because they really believe they can fly, ending up with broken bones or worse. If I believed I could fly, I would try lifting up off the ground. Much more impressive. Plus, that's how Sally Field did it, and she's pretty awesome.
What's interesting here is that, thanks to Wilbur and Orville, we can fly. Maybe not without a lot of accoutrements, but it's doable. Hell, my friend Chris is getting his pilot's license, and if he can fly . . . well, you get my point.
And then there's the issue of synchronicity. When we think about something a lot, do we really get more of that something, or do we just notice what's already there more? Would I have found a digital piano and an air compressor in a giveaway pile across the street if I hadn't been listening to Abraham?
On a slightly different note, would I have won $100 in that first scratch-off if I hadn't felt so lucky that day?
The overall attitude that Abraham promotes, you gotta admit, is good. Appreciate what you have, hope for better. The danger is that people (at least, I do) concentrate on the hoping for better and end up living in a fantasy world trying to make that real by just believing, not taking action if they're not in the Vortex, trying to minimize their own pain by pretending it's not there.
If you listen carefully, Abraham doesn't promote that. But you have to listen carefully.
Abraham says: Get into the Vortex, and then take action. Well, that's just common sense. If you're grumpy when you make a difficult phone call, your grumpiness is likely to show through and mess up the communication. If you're convinced you can't run a 4 minute mile but try anyway, chances are you won't make it. Sometimes I find that taking action when I don't feel like it gets me closer to the Vortex, though.
Abraham says: It is possible to be in the Vortex and to be in pain. It ain't easy, but it's possible. This only comes up when Abraham clears up past assertions that people have taken too far.
I should put some sort of transition sentence here, but I don't really feel like it. So there.
So what is it that I believe, and how can I change what I believe?
I believe I could write really good novels. I have no past experience with this, though, so I lean toward believing that I never will because I never have. I hear my father's voice taunting me about cleaning my room without being punished beforehand.
It's not my dad's fault, though, if I don't do what I want now. It's my own fault, but finding fault doesn't inspire me to change. It only discourages me.
I've only rarely benefited from an, "Oh, yeah? Well I'll show them!" attitude. I'm more likely to delve into creativity when I see someone else's and realize that I, too, can do that.
So . . . my belief is that creating my own reality is an active process. A process of encouraging myself, of believing that something's possible, of believing that the universe is a more or less benevolent place, and that shit happens, sometimes for the better, sometimes not. And, most importantly, that getting off my ass is a part of the creative process.
Belief is powerful.
My mom believes that I'm going to burn in hell for leaving the church and that lesbianism is why I left the church. I believe that arguing with her about that is only going to bring frustration and alienation. So it sits where it sits.
I also believe that if I believed that I could really make a living writing, I'd just do it. So should I convince myself that I could make a living writing, or should I convince myself that it doesn't matter whether I make a living at it or not? Or should I just force myself to write? I gotta admit, I really loved National Novel Writing Month. Loved writing every day, even if it wasn't the best work I've ever seen. Loved having a common goal with Jessica. Loved turning the television off to get our word quotas in. Loved sitting on the patio and typing away, like I am now, with a cup of coffee and a couple of spastic dogs distracting me. So why does it take a challenge like NaNoWriMo to get me to do it? (And why isn't there a National Novel Editing Month?) Why does it take signing up for a marathon to get me to run regularly?
But the real question is, how do you go about convincing yourself of anything without first doing whatever it is that you want to convince yourself is possible? Can I do anything like that without some sort of external prodding, like committing to NaNoWriMo or signing up for the Marine Corps Marathon?
Of course, it was I who committed to it, so it was an internal prodding more than anything.
I've signed up for online writing courses and it's not quite the same. Maybe there's a lack of adrenaline or something.
The workings of my own mind are pretty fucking convoluted. Sorry to bring you into my thought processes, but that's what this blog is for.
I like the idea of hypnosis to change my beliefs. Perhaps I should work on the belief that I need an external constraint to do what I want. Or perhaps I should invent external constraints to get me there.
I don't need guitar lessons to practice guitar, but I practiced a lot more when I took them. I don't need a marathon on the horizon to jog regularly, but it sure makes it more likely that I won't skive off on exercising.
The funny thing is, I really think I hate deadlines, but they seem to work wonders for me.
And what does that have to do with the Law of Attraction? It's that it's mostly about beliefs, and I believe that my beliefs hold me back. Maybe if I didn't believe in the power of beliefs that would open up more possibilities for me, except that I can't seem to let go of that belief, or of any other belief that I'm convinced I have.
No, wait. I have let go of beliefs. It was scary and liberating to let go of the belief that I'd go to hell if I let go of church--particularly the church I was raised in. And I did that through logic, a sort of a self-imposed cognitive therapy that I muddled through not really meaning to. I didn't want to let go of my faith, but I ended up having to.
I do want to let go of my ambivalence, my labile self-confidence, and I have all sorts of tools in the form of self-help books and hypnosis recordings with which to do it. The thing is, I want to push a button and upload the ability, a la The Matrix, yet I want to have the satisfaction of working through it on my own as well.
I am writing myself in circles, and bringing you with me. Do forgive. Standing on the outside, you probably see me much more clearly than I can.
I search for a higher perspective with which to see myself, but realize that I'm still holding onto the old one.
Perhaps enlightenment is the letting go of all beliefs.
I wonder what that would be like.
I buy scratch off tickets--not a ton of them, but $5 here and there.
I throw in the occasional PowerBall ticket.
I start reading samples of books on my Kindle app about how to win the lottery.
I get really restless about going to work at the McSpa, gripe about it endlessly and lament how little they pay.
Jessica pointed this out to me the last time it happened, and asked if I had enough money to make the mortgage that month, because the last time I had gone a little lottery crazy I didn't, and ended up paying late fees and catching up, which really hurt financially.
She is observant.
Abraham would say that I shouldn't tie my hopes to one possible source of income--that I should focus on the money I want and feel that I already have it and not worry about where it comes from. I'm not really sure where else a sudden influx of funds might come from that would allow me to invest more fully in our own business and pay off my debts, but maybe it's due to lack of imagination.
Actually, I do have an idea. In my dream world I'm a successful novelist. It would help if I worked on my novel, though, and there you have it.
Proponents of the law of attraction and other it-can-only-be-true-if-you-believe-it philosophies often point to Richard Bannister, and how everyone believed that a mile couldn't be run by a human in less than 4 minutes. Bannister convinced himself that it was possible, accomplished the feat, and soon several other runners also broke the 4 minute mile barrier.
The question is, if you really believe it can happen, can it really happen? Or is it only that if you really believe it can't happen, that belief stops you?
Skeptics point out druggies who jump off of roofs because they really believe they can fly, ending up with broken bones or worse. If I believed I could fly, I would try lifting up off the ground. Much more impressive. Plus, that's how Sally Field did it, and she's pretty awesome.
What's interesting here is that, thanks to Wilbur and Orville, we can fly. Maybe not without a lot of accoutrements, but it's doable. Hell, my friend Chris is getting his pilot's license, and if he can fly . . . well, you get my point.
And then there's the issue of synchronicity. When we think about something a lot, do we really get more of that something, or do we just notice what's already there more? Would I have found a digital piano and an air compressor in a giveaway pile across the street if I hadn't been listening to Abraham?
On a slightly different note, would I have won $100 in that first scratch-off if I hadn't felt so lucky that day?
The overall attitude that Abraham promotes, you gotta admit, is good. Appreciate what you have, hope for better. The danger is that people (at least, I do) concentrate on the hoping for better and end up living in a fantasy world trying to make that real by just believing, not taking action if they're not in the Vortex, trying to minimize their own pain by pretending it's not there.
If you listen carefully, Abraham doesn't promote that. But you have to listen carefully.
Abraham says: Get into the Vortex, and then take action. Well, that's just common sense. If you're grumpy when you make a difficult phone call, your grumpiness is likely to show through and mess up the communication. If you're convinced you can't run a 4 minute mile but try anyway, chances are you won't make it. Sometimes I find that taking action when I don't feel like it gets me closer to the Vortex, though.
Abraham says: It is possible to be in the Vortex and to be in pain. It ain't easy, but it's possible. This only comes up when Abraham clears up past assertions that people have taken too far.
I should put some sort of transition sentence here, but I don't really feel like it. So there.
So what is it that I believe, and how can I change what I believe?
I believe I could write really good novels. I have no past experience with this, though, so I lean toward believing that I never will because I never have. I hear my father's voice taunting me about cleaning my room without being punished beforehand.
It's not my dad's fault, though, if I don't do what I want now. It's my own fault, but finding fault doesn't inspire me to change. It only discourages me.
I've only rarely benefited from an, "Oh, yeah? Well I'll show them!" attitude. I'm more likely to delve into creativity when I see someone else's and realize that I, too, can do that.
So . . . my belief is that creating my own reality is an active process. A process of encouraging myself, of believing that something's possible, of believing that the universe is a more or less benevolent place, and that shit happens, sometimes for the better, sometimes not. And, most importantly, that getting off my ass is a part of the creative process.
Belief is powerful.
My mom believes that I'm going to burn in hell for leaving the church and that lesbianism is why I left the church. I believe that arguing with her about that is only going to bring frustration and alienation. So it sits where it sits.
I also believe that if I believed that I could really make a living writing, I'd just do it. So should I convince myself that I could make a living writing, or should I convince myself that it doesn't matter whether I make a living at it or not? Or should I just force myself to write? I gotta admit, I really loved National Novel Writing Month. Loved writing every day, even if it wasn't the best work I've ever seen. Loved having a common goal with Jessica. Loved turning the television off to get our word quotas in. Loved sitting on the patio and typing away, like I am now, with a cup of coffee and a couple of spastic dogs distracting me. So why does it take a challenge like NaNoWriMo to get me to do it? (And why isn't there a National Novel Editing Month?) Why does it take signing up for a marathon to get me to run regularly?
But the real question is, how do you go about convincing yourself of anything without first doing whatever it is that you want to convince yourself is possible? Can I do anything like that without some sort of external prodding, like committing to NaNoWriMo or signing up for the Marine Corps Marathon?
Of course, it was I who committed to it, so it was an internal prodding more than anything.
I've signed up for online writing courses and it's not quite the same. Maybe there's a lack of adrenaline or something.
The workings of my own mind are pretty fucking convoluted. Sorry to bring you into my thought processes, but that's what this blog is for.
I like the idea of hypnosis to change my beliefs. Perhaps I should work on the belief that I need an external constraint to do what I want. Or perhaps I should invent external constraints to get me there.
I don't need guitar lessons to practice guitar, but I practiced a lot more when I took them. I don't need a marathon on the horizon to jog regularly, but it sure makes it more likely that I won't skive off on exercising.
The funny thing is, I really think I hate deadlines, but they seem to work wonders for me.
And what does that have to do with the Law of Attraction? It's that it's mostly about beliefs, and I believe that my beliefs hold me back. Maybe if I didn't believe in the power of beliefs that would open up more possibilities for me, except that I can't seem to let go of that belief, or of any other belief that I'm convinced I have.
No, wait. I have let go of beliefs. It was scary and liberating to let go of the belief that I'd go to hell if I let go of church--particularly the church I was raised in. And I did that through logic, a sort of a self-imposed cognitive therapy that I muddled through not really meaning to. I didn't want to let go of my faith, but I ended up having to.
I do want to let go of my ambivalence, my labile self-confidence, and I have all sorts of tools in the form of self-help books and hypnosis recordings with which to do it. The thing is, I want to push a button and upload the ability, a la The Matrix, yet I want to have the satisfaction of working through it on my own as well.
I am writing myself in circles, and bringing you with me. Do forgive. Standing on the outside, you probably see me much more clearly than I can.
I search for a higher perspective with which to see myself, but realize that I'm still holding onto the old one.
Perhaps enlightenment is the letting go of all beliefs.
I wonder what that would be like.
it's been a while
It's been a while since I've written here--just over a month, in fact. I must confess, it's partially because I suffered a severe disappointment regarding the world of Esther and Jerry Hicks.
Abraham speaks of Jerry having a business that he enjoys, and, out of curiosity, I googled Jerry to see what it might be. No results. So I went to the internet's most trusted source of biographical information, Wikipedia, and read up on them as a couple. Jerry's business, as it turns out, is Amway.
Amway.
Why, Jerry? Why?
Sigh.
So I tried to justify it in my mind, tell myself that Jerry isn't Abraham, that maybe pyramid schemes are ok in the greater cosmic order, that maybe there's something more about Amway that I don't get, but . . . well, I just don't get it. So I'll leave it at that, and blog away anyway.
Many things have happened in the world of faithy since last I posted. We got the space on 9th Street and are seeing clients there pretty regularly now. We got listed on the Duke employee discounts page and received a number of calls and a handful of new regular clients as well as a few one-time clients thanks to that, which is good because I managed to break not one but two computers, and Apples aren't cheap to fix. $404 for a wine spill on Jessica's MacBook after I had decided to fix the computer I'm typing on (which I didn't break, but I got for free so I figured it was worth fixing), and I'm still holding off on buying the $64 screen to replace the one I stepped on for my netbook.
We have reviewed our policy and procedures for where to leave our computers and liquid beverages and have come up with some workable solutions.
Meanwhile, I've been entertaining myself with Tal Ben-Shahar's The Pursuit of Perfect on Audible. It's quite good--he tells the story of his journey toward "optimalism" (the pursuit of the best given the circumstances you're in) from perfectionism (I think we all know what that means), and gives some helpful tips on how you, too, can become healthier and happier in that way. (My Amazon associates thingy isn't accepting my request to add a link here, so just know that it's out there.)
It's interesting. I hadn't really gone looking for a book on perfectionism; I'd just heard good stuff about Ben-Shahar and wanted to hear what he had to say. I must say, though, that he still sees the world a little bit like a perfectionist, in a bit of an either-or way. You either subscribe to Plato's perfectionistic philosophy, or Aristotle's realistic philosophy, and there is no in-between (at least, that's the way it sounds to me). And while he still pursues inner peace, he seems to doubt that it can truly exist; he seems to believe that inner peace means no suffering, and we wouldn't be truly human without some suffering.
My philosophy is that you can suffer and still have inner peace. (Interestingly enough, Abraham mentioned something along those lines in a seminar I was listening to a couple of weeks ago--you can be in pain and be in the Vortex at the same time.)
Evidence of my greatest growing experience, in fact, came years ago, when I was newly out, and broken-hearted again over some woman who wouldn't have me, and I could feel the pain in my chest and my fingers that comes with disappointment and self-questioning, and I knew that that pain was better than the numbness I had felt for years when I denied myself, denied my true feelings and questions about life and god and sexuality. I cried, and loved the feeling of crying, loved the feeling of pain that I had, loved that I was able to acknowledge it and loved that it meant that life's joys would be felt more sharply as well.
It wasn't a masochistic sort of thing. I didn't want the pain to go on unnecessarily, and I was pretty miserable in the process, but I had my first taste of true inner peace with that: peace in knowing that pain is only pain, and that it would pass, and in the meantime only someone who is truly alive can feel it.
Ben-Shahar speaks of that, particularly of the idea that greater pain opens greater possibilities for joy, but he doesn't equate it with inner peace, which is where I differ.
In Herman Hesse's Siddharta, Siddharta only reaches enlightenment when he embraces suffering and joy all at once. So I admit I didn't come up with the concept, but it rings true to me.
So that's there. I also listened to Biocentrism by Robert Lanza and Bob Berman, which I think would have gone better had the narrator not sounded a bit like Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation. He's a brilliant man who has lived a fascinating life, but the narration sounded a bit condescending and I would have liked to have heard the author read it for more authenticity. Really interesting concepts about consciousness, the nature of time and the origin of the universe which still, though, leaves the question, "Where did consciousness come from?" Of course, perhaps consciousness can't find its own origins because of the nature of consciousness.
Next on my list is Geoff Colvin's Talent is Overrated, if you're curious. I really enjoyed Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers, and apparently this one is a more practical guide to developing your own skills toward success at whatever you want to achieve.
Next up: thoughts on the nature of the law of attraction. I think this post is long enough.
Abraham speaks of Jerry having a business that he enjoys, and, out of curiosity, I googled Jerry to see what it might be. No results. So I went to the internet's most trusted source of biographical information, Wikipedia, and read up on them as a couple. Jerry's business, as it turns out, is Amway.
Amway.
Why, Jerry? Why?
Sigh.
So I tried to justify it in my mind, tell myself that Jerry isn't Abraham, that maybe pyramid schemes are ok in the greater cosmic order, that maybe there's something more about Amway that I don't get, but . . . well, I just don't get it. So I'll leave it at that, and blog away anyway.
Many things have happened in the world of faithy since last I posted. We got the space on 9th Street and are seeing clients there pretty regularly now. We got listed on the Duke employee discounts page and received a number of calls and a handful of new regular clients as well as a few one-time clients thanks to that, which is good because I managed to break not one but two computers, and Apples aren't cheap to fix. $404 for a wine spill on Jessica's MacBook after I had decided to fix the computer I'm typing on (which I didn't break, but I got for free so I figured it was worth fixing), and I'm still holding off on buying the $64 screen to replace the one I stepped on for my netbook.
We have reviewed our policy and procedures for where to leave our computers and liquid beverages and have come up with some workable solutions.
Meanwhile, I've been entertaining myself with Tal Ben-Shahar's The Pursuit of Perfect on Audible. It's quite good--he tells the story of his journey toward "optimalism" (the pursuit of the best given the circumstances you're in) from perfectionism (I think we all know what that means), and gives some helpful tips on how you, too, can become healthier and happier in that way. (My Amazon associates thingy isn't accepting my request to add a link here, so just know that it's out there.)
It's interesting. I hadn't really gone looking for a book on perfectionism; I'd just heard good stuff about Ben-Shahar and wanted to hear what he had to say. I must say, though, that he still sees the world a little bit like a perfectionist, in a bit of an either-or way. You either subscribe to Plato's perfectionistic philosophy, or Aristotle's realistic philosophy, and there is no in-between (at least, that's the way it sounds to me). And while he still pursues inner peace, he seems to doubt that it can truly exist; he seems to believe that inner peace means no suffering, and we wouldn't be truly human without some suffering.
My philosophy is that you can suffer and still have inner peace. (Interestingly enough, Abraham mentioned something along those lines in a seminar I was listening to a couple of weeks ago--you can be in pain and be in the Vortex at the same time.)
Evidence of my greatest growing experience, in fact, came years ago, when I was newly out, and broken-hearted again over some woman who wouldn't have me, and I could feel the pain in my chest and my fingers that comes with disappointment and self-questioning, and I knew that that pain was better than the numbness I had felt for years when I denied myself, denied my true feelings and questions about life and god and sexuality. I cried, and loved the feeling of crying, loved the feeling of pain that I had, loved that I was able to acknowledge it and loved that it meant that life's joys would be felt more sharply as well.
It wasn't a masochistic sort of thing. I didn't want the pain to go on unnecessarily, and I was pretty miserable in the process, but I had my first taste of true inner peace with that: peace in knowing that pain is only pain, and that it would pass, and in the meantime only someone who is truly alive can feel it.
Ben-Shahar speaks of that, particularly of the idea that greater pain opens greater possibilities for joy, but he doesn't equate it with inner peace, which is where I differ.
In Herman Hesse's Siddharta, Siddharta only reaches enlightenment when he embraces suffering and joy all at once. So I admit I didn't come up with the concept, but it rings true to me.
So that's there. I also listened to Biocentrism by Robert Lanza and Bob Berman, which I think would have gone better had the narrator not sounded a bit like Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation. He's a brilliant man who has lived a fascinating life, but the narration sounded a bit condescending and I would have liked to have heard the author read it for more authenticity. Really interesting concepts about consciousness, the nature of time and the origin of the universe which still, though, leaves the question, "Where did consciousness come from?" Of course, perhaps consciousness can't find its own origins because of the nature of consciousness.
Next on my list is Geoff Colvin's Talent is Overrated, if you're curious. I really enjoyed Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers, and apparently this one is a more practical guide to developing your own skills toward success at whatever you want to achieve.
Next up: thoughts on the nature of the law of attraction. I think this post is long enough.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
excitement on the horizon!
Today--well, yesterday . . . Wednesday, anyway (it's nearly 5 am and I seem to have come down with insomnia) Jessica put in an application to get a space on Ninth Street for our massage business. It's just one room, but is expandable and is actually within our price range. In fact, it's cheaper than renting a crappy room from a salon was, and it's ours.
I've had a lot of flux in my potential jobs. I found one, and then didn't get any appointments there, then I found another, and haven't gotten any appointments there, and now the first is finally running the Living Social coupon she's been talking about for over a month, so I just made myself available there. Meanwhile, I've been fantasizing about how cool it would be to work in a place that doesn't do facials (I'm sorry; I just don't get facials) and lets me wear whatever nose jewelry I like.
I have a broken netbook (I'm typing this on a very old notebook that has keys falling off and a mostly impotent battery, but that works) and Jessica's old PowerBook, also broken, and I thought since I'd be fixing my netbook I might as well ask around to see if I could get the PowerBook fixed. I've fantasized about having my own Apple computer and this is much cheaper than buying a new one, not to mention will let me know if I like them at all before investing in one.
So we bicycled to Ninth Street (which, by the way, is arrived at by a much hillier route than one might expect) and saw a "Office for Rent" sign in the window of the computer repair place. On a whim, we asked how much rent was and what kind of spaces were available.
We're very excited now.
So now my job is to keep track of how much money I make and as soon as it's more than I make at Massage Envy, I get to be in Durham full-time. I'm imagining that happening very soon, and happening in jeans with a hoop in my nose rather than a stud.
But this isn't just about visualizing what you want and imagining it yours. It's about allowing, with being ok with who you are and where you are.
After two blog posts about being ok with where you are, Jessica pointed out that bitching about my job isn't really being ok with where I am. So I cut that shit out, and worked pretty fucking hard on having a good attitude instead of bitching at myself about bitching about stuff. Honestly, I think I'm doing pretty good with the bitching, but it really knocked me for a loop to realize that my complaining had as much an effect on Jessica as it does--that I was complaining as much as I was.
I'd been pretty good, had been working on my attitude for months, and felt myself slipping (you could probably tell from my blog posts) into less-than-abundant thoughts, and felt very uncomfortable about the slipping. So I was pretty on edge about my attitude/vibrational setpoint/whatever you want to call it to begin with, and to have it pointed out to me that it wasn't just my emotions that I was affecting--that it affected the woman who means so much to me--well, it shook me pretty thoroughly.
I'm not saying that I want to change my attitude just to make her happy. That would be silly. There's nothing more irritating than someone who wants nothing more than to appease you, and nothing more awesome than someone who is strong and independent, who could live without you but doesn't want to. Does that sound weird? I guess if someone really feels like they need you they'll stick with you no matter how miserable they are with or without you (like being addicted to heroine or crack), but if someone only wants to be with you and loves being with you, they're much less likely to be miserable to begin with, much less likely to blame you for their bad moods, and much more appreciative of your good moods and the good times you have together (like being really excited about going out for sushi).
Ok, the parenthetical analogy above is a little weak. Maybe a better one would be that I could be satisfied with living in Detroit, but having the chance to live in Paris--well, there's no competition. I'd choose Jessica over anything else way faster than I'd even choose Paris over Detroit.
I try to be that for her--always encouraging and happy no matter what she's going through. Not frivolously happy if she's having a bad day, of course, but patient and holding on to my picture of her as a strong, capable woman. And she is a strong, capable woman, no matter how she felt temporarily through the weirdnesses she's been through this past year. She's thriving in spite of huge life changes, and I can't say how proud I am of her. I think it confuses her when I say that she's not in charge of my happiness but I am, and I certainly don't recommend saying that I'm not in charge of her happiness, because I've tried that and it just comes out completely wrong. Completely. Trust me.
But honestly, what's worse than knowing that you got not only yourself in a bad mood, but your lover too? And what's going to get you both out of a bad mood at the same time?
She's not perfect--no one lives up to the version of them that's in your Place Where All Is Ideal (aka the Vortex), but it's not anyone's job to live up to that.
And while I know that I could live without her if I needed to, I can't imagine why I'd ever want to. I won the girlfriend lottery, and I'm hanging on to that winning ticket.
I blog about Jessica a lot. I hope she doesn't mind. I haven't really asked lately. It's possible you're wondering why this is my Law of Attraction blog and not my Jessica is Awesome blog. There are a couple of reasons for that. The main one is that if I'm being as full of joy as I can on purpose, then she's the absolute best place to start for that because she's the best thing in my life.
The other is that she is proof that the Law of Attraction works. Every day she does something or says something and I think to myself, "Wow, I always wanted a girlfriend who does/says that sort of thing." And here she is, not because I went on a huge hunt for the ideal girlfriend, but because I allowed her into my life.
Ok, time to find something else to do to entertain myself until I get sleepy or she wakes up. Probably not a good idea to drink wine to make myself sleepy after 5:30 am . . .
I've had a lot of flux in my potential jobs. I found one, and then didn't get any appointments there, then I found another, and haven't gotten any appointments there, and now the first is finally running the Living Social coupon she's been talking about for over a month, so I just made myself available there. Meanwhile, I've been fantasizing about how cool it would be to work in a place that doesn't do facials (I'm sorry; I just don't get facials) and lets me wear whatever nose jewelry I like.
I have a broken netbook (I'm typing this on a very old notebook that has keys falling off and a mostly impotent battery, but that works) and Jessica's old PowerBook, also broken, and I thought since I'd be fixing my netbook I might as well ask around to see if I could get the PowerBook fixed. I've fantasized about having my own Apple computer and this is much cheaper than buying a new one, not to mention will let me know if I like them at all before investing in one.
So we bicycled to Ninth Street (which, by the way, is arrived at by a much hillier route than one might expect) and saw a "Office for Rent" sign in the window of the computer repair place. On a whim, we asked how much rent was and what kind of spaces were available.
We're very excited now.
So now my job is to keep track of how much money I make and as soon as it's more than I make at Massage Envy, I get to be in Durham full-time. I'm imagining that happening very soon, and happening in jeans with a hoop in my nose rather than a stud.
But this isn't just about visualizing what you want and imagining it yours. It's about allowing, with being ok with who you are and where you are.
After two blog posts about being ok with where you are, Jessica pointed out that bitching about my job isn't really being ok with where I am. So I cut that shit out, and worked pretty fucking hard on having a good attitude instead of bitching at myself about bitching about stuff. Honestly, I think I'm doing pretty good with the bitching, but it really knocked me for a loop to realize that my complaining had as much an effect on Jessica as it does--that I was complaining as much as I was.
I'd been pretty good, had been working on my attitude for months, and felt myself slipping (you could probably tell from my blog posts) into less-than-abundant thoughts, and felt very uncomfortable about the slipping. So I was pretty on edge about my attitude/vibrational setpoint/whatever you want to call it to begin with, and to have it pointed out to me that it wasn't just my emotions that I was affecting--that it affected the woman who means so much to me--well, it shook me pretty thoroughly.
I'm not saying that I want to change my attitude just to make her happy. That would be silly. There's nothing more irritating than someone who wants nothing more than to appease you, and nothing more awesome than someone who is strong and independent, who could live without you but doesn't want to. Does that sound weird? I guess if someone really feels like they need you they'll stick with you no matter how miserable they are with or without you (like being addicted to heroine or crack), but if someone only wants to be with you and loves being with you, they're much less likely to be miserable to begin with, much less likely to blame you for their bad moods, and much more appreciative of your good moods and the good times you have together (like being really excited about going out for sushi).
Ok, the parenthetical analogy above is a little weak. Maybe a better one would be that I could be satisfied with living in Detroit, but having the chance to live in Paris--well, there's no competition. I'd choose Jessica over anything else way faster than I'd even choose Paris over Detroit.
I try to be that for her--always encouraging and happy no matter what she's going through. Not frivolously happy if she's having a bad day, of course, but patient and holding on to my picture of her as a strong, capable woman. And she is a strong, capable woman, no matter how she felt temporarily through the weirdnesses she's been through this past year. She's thriving in spite of huge life changes, and I can't say how proud I am of her. I think it confuses her when I say that she's not in charge of my happiness but I am, and I certainly don't recommend saying that I'm not in charge of her happiness, because I've tried that and it just comes out completely wrong. Completely. Trust me.
But honestly, what's worse than knowing that you got not only yourself in a bad mood, but your lover too? And what's going to get you both out of a bad mood at the same time?
She's not perfect--no one lives up to the version of them that's in your Place Where All Is Ideal (aka the Vortex), but it's not anyone's job to live up to that.
And while I know that I could live without her if I needed to, I can't imagine why I'd ever want to. I won the girlfriend lottery, and I'm hanging on to that winning ticket.
I blog about Jessica a lot. I hope she doesn't mind. I haven't really asked lately. It's possible you're wondering why this is my Law of Attraction blog and not my Jessica is Awesome blog. There are a couple of reasons for that. The main one is that if I'm being as full of joy as I can on purpose, then she's the absolute best place to start for that because she's the best thing in my life.
The other is that she is proof that the Law of Attraction works. Every day she does something or says something and I think to myself, "Wow, I always wanted a girlfriend who does/says that sort of thing." And here she is, not because I went on a huge hunt for the ideal girlfriend, but because I allowed her into my life.
Ok, time to find something else to do to entertain myself until I get sleepy or she wakes up. Probably not a good idea to drink wine to make myself sleepy after 5:30 am . . .
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
being ok with where you are, part deux
I'm waiting outside the lawyer's office while Jessica and her husband sign the papers selling their house. For some reason I've always loved the bittersweet feeling of nostalgia, and while it's been sad for even me to go into their nearly empty house and think of my memories there, not to mention hearing their stories and imagining how they feel, somehow closing this chapter and making it officially a memory is sweet in that weird bittersweet nostalgic way.
Is that strange? It's sadder before it's actually over, and when it is, it's a relief.
We're always shooting for that feeling of relief--that feeling of ease, that "this is where I am" that is definitive, not in flux. Uncertainty keeps me out of the vortex more than almost anything.
So after my "I'm really trying not to bitch" post, trying to figure out how to be ok with where I am, I listened to a workshop from last year in Phoenix. The entire workshop, it seems, was about how to be ok with where you are. Ended relationships, uncertain financial situations, and health issues all illustrated Abraham's main point: to be ok with where you are, you don't have to pretend that you're not bothered by your circumstances; instead, take the being bothered as an assurance that your inner self has already become the solution to your problem, and accept that gladly.
The most poignant example was of a man who had been in pain for years. People would tell him he looked like he was in pain, and he would deny it aloud, while knowing all the while that he really was. Abraham pointed out that you can be in pain and in the vortex at the same time; the key is to be ok with it, and to take the pain as a signal that your cells are asking for healing. Denying and pretending to not be in pain only discourages you in the long run, making it harder to be hopeful or better. Acknowledging that your cells are calling out for greater health reinforces that greater health is already real in your vortex, and all you have to do is allow it.
Denying that you're hurt by your lover's departure only makes the hurting more acute. Realizing that that hurt is only your separation from your inner being, who already knows what you're looking for in a lover, makes it easier to come to terms with that sense of betrayal or guilt.
Denying that you're financially up shit creek is just a recipe for financial disaster.
So my aim is to take the signs of discomfort as evidence that better stuff is waiting for me in my vortex. New contacts, job interviews and ideas for making extra money are lining up in the physical world, which is further evidence for me to dwell on. My life is pretty fucking beautiful even if I don't eat out or shop the sales as much as I like.
And I got a Tardis coffee mug for Valentine's day, and a lover who knows me well enough to pick out cool presents that I really dig.
Is that strange? It's sadder before it's actually over, and when it is, it's a relief.
We're always shooting for that feeling of relief--that feeling of ease, that "this is where I am" that is definitive, not in flux. Uncertainty keeps me out of the vortex more than almost anything.
So after my "I'm really trying not to bitch" post, trying to figure out how to be ok with where I am, I listened to a workshop from last year in Phoenix. The entire workshop, it seems, was about how to be ok with where you are. Ended relationships, uncertain financial situations, and health issues all illustrated Abraham's main point: to be ok with where you are, you don't have to pretend that you're not bothered by your circumstances; instead, take the being bothered as an assurance that your inner self has already become the solution to your problem, and accept that gladly.
The most poignant example was of a man who had been in pain for years. People would tell him he looked like he was in pain, and he would deny it aloud, while knowing all the while that he really was. Abraham pointed out that you can be in pain and in the vortex at the same time; the key is to be ok with it, and to take the pain as a signal that your cells are asking for healing. Denying and pretending to not be in pain only discourages you in the long run, making it harder to be hopeful or better. Acknowledging that your cells are calling out for greater health reinforces that greater health is already real in your vortex, and all you have to do is allow it.
Denying that you're hurt by your lover's departure only makes the hurting more acute. Realizing that that hurt is only your separation from your inner being, who already knows what you're looking for in a lover, makes it easier to come to terms with that sense of betrayal or guilt.
Denying that you're financially up shit creek is just a recipe for financial disaster.
So my aim is to take the signs of discomfort as evidence that better stuff is waiting for me in my vortex. New contacts, job interviews and ideas for making extra money are lining up in the physical world, which is further evidence for me to dwell on. My life is pretty fucking beautiful even if I don't eat out or shop the sales as much as I like.
And I got a Tardis coffee mug for Valentine's day, and a lover who knows me well enough to pick out cool presents that I really dig.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Being OK with where you are
There's a certain weirdness in my mind about allowing. A dichotomy between what I want and what I'm already happy with.
You can't get away from wanting to grow--wanting new stuff, new experiences, new relationships--yet the best way to allow that growth is to be really happy with where you are, which, in my mind, almost means that it's not ok to want more. If I were really happy, I think, I'd just stagnate and never move on to anything new. This can't be farther from the truth, yet I have a hard time wrapping my mind around the actual truth--that by accepting where I am I open myself up to all sorts of new possibilities.
It's fucked up.
Our society is inundated with stories of people who were never content, who used their discontent to drive themselves to new and better highs. At least, that's the story we tell. Men who have fought their way to the top at the expense of their personal lives, who never learn to be happy with what they have--this is a universal tale that generally ends in tragedy, leaving a legacy of urine collected in jars (who was that? Hunt? somebody help me here), insinuations of pedophilia (thank you, Michael Jackson), or feeling they are above the law (thank you, politicians everywhere).
We'd all rather be happy, but for some reason in this scenario happy = poor. I know plenty of unhappy poor people. We look at the apparently happy rich people and wonder whether they're truly happy (Oprah springs to mind).
So my work is to untie this convoluted mess in my head and choose the truth that works for me.
Anything that you believe is true, by the way. If you believe that men are womanizing scoundrels, or that the world is out to get you, or that we're all tiny insignificant specks, you'll see evidence all around you.
It's partially Law of Attraction--like attracts like, and you get what you think about. I think it's also, though, our inherent desire to be right. We look for evidence to support our beliefs, and if we believe all mechanics are crooks, we'll remember the $130 oil change and forget that nice guy who stopped to help when our car broke down.
I don't think we should go through the world with blinders on, but what's the point of dwelling on crap that only holds us back?
Edison (who wasn't nearly as cool as Tesla, by the way, but he works for this example) could have focused on how many dysfunctional light bulbs he'd made and grown discouraged. Instead, he saw every failed experiment as a step closer to success. We can see his work as maddening, but considering how long it took him, I think he saw it as more of a game. Nobody could try that many times and think of it as drudgery.
I'm not advocating locking onto a goal like a pit bull on a mailman; rather seeing your work as a game--seeing life as a game--not to be won or lost, but to be played.
I lead a rich fantasy life. Yesterday while jamming along with Grand Funk Railroad, I couldn't help but imagine myself as a rock star, and wonder what my life would be like if I'd pursued that goal from an early age. There is a tinge of regret there, which I try to avoid, and which is why I'm thinking about being ok with where I am. Maybe it's silly to think I could have been a rock star--it's a common dream--but it's one thing I felt passionate about when I was a kid.
Malcolm Gladwell, in The Tipping Point, says that 10,000 hours of practice brings us to mastery, citing examples like The Beatles and Bill Gates. Can you imagine doing anything for 10,000 hours without being passionate about it? Or while feeling like it's drudgery the whole time?
There are plenty of things I could feel passionate about, but fear and frustration make me wary of caring that much. These are not Vortex-y feelings, obviously. And when I do have Vortex-y feelings (hope, joy, love), the thought of investing time and energy into such projects sounds fun. The process sounds fun, rather than a drive toward a certain outcome.
The cynic in me, the part that likes to be right, thinks that the Vortex is just a trick to get me to do what I've always wanted to do. It's a different kind of control than Christianity--which got me to not do things I wanted to do--but a controlling trick nonetheless. Things won't magically come to me when I'm happier, I think. I will have wasted all this energy on just being happy, and will end up less happy when I wake up from this dream because I'll realize nothing magically came when I was happy. A more substantial, lasting happiness will come after years of drudgery and misery and hard work.
Which is nonsense, I know, but I latch onto it like--well, like a pit bull onto a mailman.
I know what Abraham would say if I spoke to them about it. "Stop telling that story. Tell the story the way you want it to be."
So what's my story? I am acutely aware of my false beliefs, which will or won't make it easier to replace them with new ones? No, that doesn't really help.
Go to my usual story of life is good in general, girlfriend is amazing and wonderful, etc? Jessica is, of course, always amazing and wonderful, and that does help, but it doesn't change the way I think about money and success. In a way, it both helps and hurts--I feel like I can do amazing things with her, yet I feel bad for not having done them already because I want to be amazing for her. (She says I already am, which really does make me feel good.)
I feel like it's a problem to be solved, which sometimes is fun and sometimes is frustrating. I'd like to rewrite the code in my brain, download success software a la The Matrix and start fresh without having to police my thoughts.
And yes, I know, the more I focus on this problem the more real I make my lack of solution. On the bright side, when I do allow the solution it should be a HUGE one, because of all the fine-tuning I'm doing on the problem.
So now--now I focus on the solution. I think how nice it will feel to let myself be who I really am, to not beat myself up for not letting myself be me. To look around my life and really appreciate the beautiful-ness I already have. Now I tell my new story, the story I want to tell.
I've spent way more than 10,000 hours living, so I must be really good at it. And I must love life, because that's a lot of time to spend on drudgery. And, actually, I definitely do love life, not just provable by the default that I'm still here. Life is fun. It's where we enjoy cool stuff like music and intimacy and coffee. It's full of new experiences, like joining a pool league and finding a new author. So, yeah, I definitely love life.
No matter what I do, I'm generally good at it pretty quickly. Nursing, massage, grammar . . . making chainmail . . . . So if I can figure all that shit out, some of which is more fun than others, I can figure out whatever I need to. Rather, whatever I want to. And what I want is an amazing and full life, which I pretty much have in fits and starts, rather than just wandering through wondering what the hell's going on, which I do less and less.
And I want to appreciate what I have, which I do. Nothing worse than an ungrateful bastard who can't see the really cool stuff that's already there. And my life is full of cool stuff--friends coming over for movies, lots of hobbies and cuddling at home and on the go, music everywhere I turn, audiobooks and paperbooks and ebooks, and a really cool jacket that everyone compliments me on that I got for $25. Big things and little things and they're all good.
And I'm good.
You can't get away from wanting to grow--wanting new stuff, new experiences, new relationships--yet the best way to allow that growth is to be really happy with where you are, which, in my mind, almost means that it's not ok to want more. If I were really happy, I think, I'd just stagnate and never move on to anything new. This can't be farther from the truth, yet I have a hard time wrapping my mind around the actual truth--that by accepting where I am I open myself up to all sorts of new possibilities.
It's fucked up.
Our society is inundated with stories of people who were never content, who used their discontent to drive themselves to new and better highs. At least, that's the story we tell. Men who have fought their way to the top at the expense of their personal lives, who never learn to be happy with what they have--this is a universal tale that generally ends in tragedy, leaving a legacy of urine collected in jars (who was that? Hunt? somebody help me here), insinuations of pedophilia (thank you, Michael Jackson), or feeling they are above the law (thank you, politicians everywhere).
We'd all rather be happy, but for some reason in this scenario happy = poor. I know plenty of unhappy poor people. We look at the apparently happy rich people and wonder whether they're truly happy (Oprah springs to mind).
So my work is to untie this convoluted mess in my head and choose the truth that works for me.
Anything that you believe is true, by the way. If you believe that men are womanizing scoundrels, or that the world is out to get you, or that we're all tiny insignificant specks, you'll see evidence all around you.
It's partially Law of Attraction--like attracts like, and you get what you think about. I think it's also, though, our inherent desire to be right. We look for evidence to support our beliefs, and if we believe all mechanics are crooks, we'll remember the $130 oil change and forget that nice guy who stopped to help when our car broke down.
I don't think we should go through the world with blinders on, but what's the point of dwelling on crap that only holds us back?
Edison (who wasn't nearly as cool as Tesla, by the way, but he works for this example) could have focused on how many dysfunctional light bulbs he'd made and grown discouraged. Instead, he saw every failed experiment as a step closer to success. We can see his work as maddening, but considering how long it took him, I think he saw it as more of a game. Nobody could try that many times and think of it as drudgery.
I'm not advocating locking onto a goal like a pit bull on a mailman; rather seeing your work as a game--seeing life as a game--not to be won or lost, but to be played.
I lead a rich fantasy life. Yesterday while jamming along with Grand Funk Railroad, I couldn't help but imagine myself as a rock star, and wonder what my life would be like if I'd pursued that goal from an early age. There is a tinge of regret there, which I try to avoid, and which is why I'm thinking about being ok with where I am. Maybe it's silly to think I could have been a rock star--it's a common dream--but it's one thing I felt passionate about when I was a kid.
Malcolm Gladwell, in The Tipping Point, says that 10,000 hours of practice brings us to mastery, citing examples like The Beatles and Bill Gates. Can you imagine doing anything for 10,000 hours without being passionate about it? Or while feeling like it's drudgery the whole time?
There are plenty of things I could feel passionate about, but fear and frustration make me wary of caring that much. These are not Vortex-y feelings, obviously. And when I do have Vortex-y feelings (hope, joy, love), the thought of investing time and energy into such projects sounds fun. The process sounds fun, rather than a drive toward a certain outcome.
The cynic in me, the part that likes to be right, thinks that the Vortex is just a trick to get me to do what I've always wanted to do. It's a different kind of control than Christianity--which got me to not do things I wanted to do--but a controlling trick nonetheless. Things won't magically come to me when I'm happier, I think. I will have wasted all this energy on just being happy, and will end up less happy when I wake up from this dream because I'll realize nothing magically came when I was happy. A more substantial, lasting happiness will come after years of drudgery and misery and hard work.
Which is nonsense, I know, but I latch onto it like--well, like a pit bull onto a mailman.
I know what Abraham would say if I spoke to them about it. "Stop telling that story. Tell the story the way you want it to be."
So what's my story? I am acutely aware of my false beliefs, which will or won't make it easier to replace them with new ones? No, that doesn't really help.
Go to my usual story of life is good in general, girlfriend is amazing and wonderful, etc? Jessica is, of course, always amazing and wonderful, and that does help, but it doesn't change the way I think about money and success. In a way, it both helps and hurts--I feel like I can do amazing things with her, yet I feel bad for not having done them already because I want to be amazing for her. (She says I already am, which really does make me feel good.)
I feel like it's a problem to be solved, which sometimes is fun and sometimes is frustrating. I'd like to rewrite the code in my brain, download success software a la The Matrix and start fresh without having to police my thoughts.
And yes, I know, the more I focus on this problem the more real I make my lack of solution. On the bright side, when I do allow the solution it should be a HUGE one, because of all the fine-tuning I'm doing on the problem.
So now--now I focus on the solution. I think how nice it will feel to let myself be who I really am, to not beat myself up for not letting myself be me. To look around my life and really appreciate the beautiful-ness I already have. Now I tell my new story, the story I want to tell.
I've spent way more than 10,000 hours living, so I must be really good at it. And I must love life, because that's a lot of time to spend on drudgery. And, actually, I definitely do love life, not just provable by the default that I'm still here. Life is fun. It's where we enjoy cool stuff like music and intimacy and coffee. It's full of new experiences, like joining a pool league and finding a new author. So, yeah, I definitely love life.
No matter what I do, I'm generally good at it pretty quickly. Nursing, massage, grammar . . . making chainmail . . . . So if I can figure all that shit out, some of which is more fun than others, I can figure out whatever I need to. Rather, whatever I want to. And what I want is an amazing and full life, which I pretty much have in fits and starts, rather than just wandering through wondering what the hell's going on, which I do less and less.
And I want to appreciate what I have, which I do. Nothing worse than an ungrateful bastard who can't see the really cool stuff that's already there. And my life is full of cool stuff--friends coming over for movies, lots of hobbies and cuddling at home and on the go, music everywhere I turn, audiobooks and paperbooks and ebooks, and a really cool jacket that everyone compliments me on that I got for $25. Big things and little things and they're all good.
And I'm good.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
What the world needs now is a little classic rock
The last few days I've taken short car trips and not felt the need to hook up my iPhone to listen to my own music or Abraham seminars. I was muddling through financially (generally the topic that brings me out of my happy feeling place; unfortunately it can't be avoided altogether), and on the radio comes Nirvana, Soundgarden, Queen, Led Zeppelin, Pearl Jam, Tom Petty . . .
In my moment of looking for a feeling of relief and wondering if the only place I might find it is inside a temper tantrum or by being hit by a car--when looking for the next logical step and wondering if winning the lottery is ever the next logical step--I found my Vortex on the radio.
When I was in therapy in New Orleans, I told my shrink that I should design therapy for people with ADD. I get bored a little too easily to stick with one method for more than a few weeks, and in my plan there would be exercises that the therapized person would do until he/she lost interest, then move on to the next one.
I'd been enjoying The Alphabet Game (see previous post) for some time, and made a variation in which I just go through the alphabet naming things that make me happy (lots of foods and places to visit: A is for apple pie and Alaska, for example) instead of happy emotion words (like Alignment, Appreciation, Allowing, Basking, etc.) which I'd burned out on after a few weeks. There are only so many K words, for example (Knowing, Kindness . . . Kite-like flying on a wave of good feeling?), and lack of variety breeds stagnation in my head. Boredom is not a Vortex-y feeling. Trying to come up with a new M word during a massage session, I had a client turn over before I did the back of one of his legs, and he ended up with a lot of neck work, which I hope he appreciated.
I still do the Alphabet Game during sessions almost every day--it's good for long moments of silence--but in the in-between, it was only lifting my mood so much. Say a word a few too many times and it loses its oomph.
Corralling my thoughts can be hard work sometimes, and I'd been thinking about just resting from it and turning to mindless computer solitaire games (which I do plenty enough as it is) and finding relief there. Problem is, it's not so much relief as numbness, which I'm not sure is much of an improvement over irritation and impatience.
The radio reminded me that happy thoughts are everywhere. You don't have to manufacture them from scratch. Open your ears and eyes and sing at the top of your lungs, dancing around in the driver's seat for the entertainment of your fellow commuters.
This morning I discovered that the amount of taxes I paid last year is less than what I was hoping for in my refund. Grumbling, I turned on the radio, and Grand Funk Railroad was just starting their cover of "Some Kind of Wonderful."
(Lyrics stolen from lyricsfreak.com)
Which is why J always stands for Jessica no matter which game I'm playing. :)
In my moment of looking for a feeling of relief and wondering if the only place I might find it is inside a temper tantrum or by being hit by a car--when looking for the next logical step and wondering if winning the lottery is ever the next logical step--I found my Vortex on the radio.
When I was in therapy in New Orleans, I told my shrink that I should design therapy for people with ADD. I get bored a little too easily to stick with one method for more than a few weeks, and in my plan there would be exercises that the therapized person would do until he/she lost interest, then move on to the next one.
I'd been enjoying The Alphabet Game (see previous post) for some time, and made a variation in which I just go through the alphabet naming things that make me happy (lots of foods and places to visit: A is for apple pie and Alaska, for example) instead of happy emotion words (like Alignment, Appreciation, Allowing, Basking, etc.) which I'd burned out on after a few weeks. There are only so many K words, for example (Knowing, Kindness . . . Kite-like flying on a wave of good feeling?), and lack of variety breeds stagnation in my head. Boredom is not a Vortex-y feeling. Trying to come up with a new M word during a massage session, I had a client turn over before I did the back of one of his legs, and he ended up with a lot of neck work, which I hope he appreciated.
I still do the Alphabet Game during sessions almost every day--it's good for long moments of silence--but in the in-between, it was only lifting my mood so much. Say a word a few too many times and it loses its oomph.
Corralling my thoughts can be hard work sometimes, and I'd been thinking about just resting from it and turning to mindless computer solitaire games (which I do plenty enough as it is) and finding relief there. Problem is, it's not so much relief as numbness, which I'm not sure is much of an improvement over irritation and impatience.
The radio reminded me that happy thoughts are everywhere. You don't have to manufacture them from scratch. Open your ears and eyes and sing at the top of your lungs, dancing around in the driver's seat for the entertainment of your fellow commuters.
This morning I discovered that the amount of taxes I paid last year is less than what I was hoping for in my refund. Grumbling, I turned on the radio, and Grand Funk Railroad was just starting their cover of "Some Kind of Wonderful."
I don't need a whole lots of money,
I don't need a big fine car.
I got everything that a man could want,
I got more than I could ask for.
I don't have to run around,
I don't have to stay out all night.
'Cause I got me a sweet ... a sweet, lovin' woman,
And she knows just how to treat me right.
Well my baby, she's alright,
Well my baby, she's clean out-of-sight.
Don't you know that she's ... she's some kind of wonderful.
She's some kind of wonderful ... yes she is, she's,
She's some kind of wonderful, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeahhh ...
When I hold her in my arms,
You know she sets my soul on fire.
Oooh, when my baby kisses me,
My heart becomes filled with desire.
When she wraps her lovin' arms around me,
About drives me out of my mind.
Yeah, when my baby kisses me,
Chills run up and down my spine.
My baby, she's alright,
My baby, she's clean out-of-sight.
Don't you know that she is ... she's some kind of wonderful.
She's some kind of wonderful ... yes she is,
She's some kind of wonderful, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeahhh ...
Now is there anybody, got a sweet little woman like mine?
There got to be somebody, got a, got a sweet little woman like mine? Yeah!
Can I get a witness?
Which is why J always stands for Jessica no matter which game I'm playing. :)
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Pivoting and Intuition
I'm giggling. Blogger warned me that I'm at a site with possibly questionable content. I tagged this blog as adult because I like to say "fuck" a lot and I'm not sure what the cut-off for adult content is. I had to agree to be ok with being offended to post today, and it makes me giggle.
Pivoting, or "taking the bounce," was previously a mystery to me. I think I have it figured out now.
I was bitching to myself last week about how I hate not having money, and then it occurred to me that, instead of telling myself that I feel rich--which is what I usually try when feeling particularly broke and which only works part of the time--I might try telling myself that I love having money.
I thought back to when I got out of college (the second time) and had my first real income. I crunched the numbers and realized that I could spend a whole hundred dollars on books every month. I had a book budget! Glory be! I soon bought my first computer--a Compaq with a built-in TV tuner (now I have a TV with a built-in RGB input)--a copy of Quicken, and the greatest joy in my life was paying off credit card bills and balancing my checkbook perfectly every month.
I thought about how fun it is when things balance out and there's money left over, how nice it is to see something on sale and be able to just buy it, and instead of lamenting that that wasn't the case at the moment, I just felt the feeling of being financially balanced.
Interestingly, I got lots of tips over the weekend, an old debt was paid to me earlier this week, and--best of all--I have a promising new job that actually pays 50% commission plus tips (normal massage wages) rather than the drivel that's offered to me at the McSpa. I start next week, and I'm envisioning full schedules and fat paychecks now.
Coincidence maybe, or Law of Attraction. Whatever the pull, I'm glad I felt better, and I'm glad more money is on its way.
Meanwhile, Jessica handed me a book her dad gave her years ago, entitled The Complete Idiot's Guide to Making Money through Intuition. As you can see, it is no longer a best-seller, going for a whopping one cent at Amazon. I'm reading it now--well, not right this second, but I got through a good bit of it today--and I'm finding it eerily similar to Abraham's emotional guidance system advice. Eerily.
It's a fun read so far; some of the examples are better illustrations of intuition than others. Mostly, though, it makes me think of all the times in my life that I've gone with or against my intuition and what resulted.
Relationships with men, for example, always gave me a funny feeling in my gut, and here I am gay.
Finishing nursing school filled me with dread, while the thought of running off and working for the Alabama Shakespeare Festival (high falutin', I know) sounded fun and hopeful. I couldn't justify it to anyone else, though, so I stuck with nursing, and it was years before I could go to work without feeling trapped by that choice.
Religion, of course--I know you've heard about it already, but for most of my young life I spent hours of my time and volumes of journal entries convincing myself that the way I was headed was the right way, while all along I had a sinking feeling in my gut that it was all wrong.
My favorite example, of course, is having the feeling that I should stop and buy a scratch-off lottery ticket after leaving Jessica's house one morning and winning $100. I've tried to repeat the experience without having that same urge, and I'm lucky if I break even.
So in addition to my regular journal, where I jot down ideas and do focus wheels, my positive aspects journal, and my magical creation book, I'm starting an intuition journal. Do they still make Trapper Keepers? And are they available in pocket sizes?
Pivoting, or "taking the bounce," was previously a mystery to me. I think I have it figured out now.
I was bitching to myself last week about how I hate not having money, and then it occurred to me that, instead of telling myself that I feel rich--which is what I usually try when feeling particularly broke and which only works part of the time--I might try telling myself that I love having money.
I thought back to when I got out of college (the second time) and had my first real income. I crunched the numbers and realized that I could spend a whole hundred dollars on books every month. I had a book budget! Glory be! I soon bought my first computer--a Compaq with a built-in TV tuner (now I have a TV with a built-in RGB input)--a copy of Quicken, and the greatest joy in my life was paying off credit card bills and balancing my checkbook perfectly every month.
I thought about how fun it is when things balance out and there's money left over, how nice it is to see something on sale and be able to just buy it, and instead of lamenting that that wasn't the case at the moment, I just felt the feeling of being financially balanced.
Interestingly, I got lots of tips over the weekend, an old debt was paid to me earlier this week, and--best of all--I have a promising new job that actually pays 50% commission plus tips (normal massage wages) rather than the drivel that's offered to me at the McSpa. I start next week, and I'm envisioning full schedules and fat paychecks now.
Coincidence maybe, or Law of Attraction. Whatever the pull, I'm glad I felt better, and I'm glad more money is on its way.
Meanwhile, Jessica handed me a book her dad gave her years ago, entitled The Complete Idiot's Guide to Making Money through Intuition. As you can see, it is no longer a best-seller, going for a whopping one cent at Amazon. I'm reading it now--well, not right this second, but I got through a good bit of it today--and I'm finding it eerily similar to Abraham's emotional guidance system advice. Eerily.
It's a fun read so far; some of the examples are better illustrations of intuition than others. Mostly, though, it makes me think of all the times in my life that I've gone with or against my intuition and what resulted.
Relationships with men, for example, always gave me a funny feeling in my gut, and here I am gay.
Finishing nursing school filled me with dread, while the thought of running off and working for the Alabama Shakespeare Festival (high falutin', I know) sounded fun and hopeful. I couldn't justify it to anyone else, though, so I stuck with nursing, and it was years before I could go to work without feeling trapped by that choice.
Religion, of course--I know you've heard about it already, but for most of my young life I spent hours of my time and volumes of journal entries convincing myself that the way I was headed was the right way, while all along I had a sinking feeling in my gut that it was all wrong.
My favorite example, of course, is having the feeling that I should stop and buy a scratch-off lottery ticket after leaving Jessica's house one morning and winning $100. I've tried to repeat the experience without having that same urge, and I'm lucky if I break even.
So in addition to my regular journal, where I jot down ideas and do focus wheels, my positive aspects journal, and my magical creation book, I'm starting an intuition journal. Do they still make Trapper Keepers? And are they available in pocket sizes?
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