I am tormented by injustice.....
...by the scores of people killed by drunk drivers and their suffering families who have little or no comeback - whose victim impact statement is censored so as not to upset the killer in court...and by the judges who not only fail to send the killer to jail for more than 3 yrs, but often hand down sentences of home detention for less than 2 years.
...by the 38 NZ children tortured and murdered by their own families in the last five years.
...by the manufacturers putting countless poisons in our food and skin products to save money...and the government that knowingly allows it.
...by the government that allows our babies to be used in drug trials and not only fails to inform parents that the drug only holds an experimental license but starts an advertising campaign implying you're a bad parent if you don't expose your child to that drug.
...by the government who passes laws to protect the investments and trust funds of the MPs while taxing every New Zealander 15% to buy the basic necessities of life.
And that's just in my own backyard.
And I am appalled by the people who continue to spout on about how wonderful the human race is and how what I perceive as the world around me is in reality a reflection of how I really feel about myself. And how whatever happens to people...they must have attracted to themselves.
Could they seriously look a child in the eye, who has lost everything to some petty war over nothing but money and oil and tell them they must have thought their nightmare up and made it happen?
How deluded can people be? Are they blind - do they choose not to see it?
Are they deliberately ignoring the sheer quantity of evil in our world? Which is worse?
And what can we do? I understand that dwelling on these things will make a person ill but I think its wrong to ignore that it happens - it supports it, in my mind. A very dear and wise friend of mine said...that you do what you can but you just have to let the human shit that happens fall away from you. She's right. So for self-preservation and the sanity of my family, I can remember and mourn but I have to look past it and leave things at doing what I can, when I can.
I came across this brilliant quote but I can't remember most of it or who said it....kicking myself for that but never mind. It basically said that if you wanted to change things - to change the world - you had to come up with an alternative that made the current status quo obsolete.
I wonder if thats what religion was intended to do.
Saturday, May 21, 2011
Monday, May 16, 2011
The truth about self....
When we come into contact with another being....they too sit within their own universe. The two may influence each other, simply by their vibrations, but in the end what stays whole and sacrosanct within our personal universe is up to us.
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
My take on depression.....
Twice in three days have I been asked about my take on depression. What I think it is and where it comes from - that sort of thing. So I thought I might take a cue from the universe and put this one out there.....
I'm not trained in the ways of the mind in any way - but you'll probably guess that anyway - meh! lol. I know people who are trained but they often seem more screwed up than me so I haven't gone there because I don't know that it helps to do anything much more than avoid what's getting under your own skin.
So anyway...my take....
Everybody has priority circles of importance and they are governed by whatever 'coping' mechanisms we have put in place in our early years. Nobody - and I mean NOBODY - can humanly keep all those souls that matter to them (no matter how much they matter to them) in the number one priority circle all the time. Sometimes circumstance will shift things and the choices left are pretty much the devil and the deep blue sea.
At some point in our childhood, we experienced one of those shifts and we came to know that we weren't in our parents number one priority circle. 'Came to know' - not 'came to understand'. It might have been something simple and innocent like.....'Daddy has to go to work - when the two year old desperately wants them to stay'. Or for the more unfortunate, it could have been something terrible like.....abandonment or a death of a parent or a betrayal. We deal with these moments with whatever tools we have at the time and if you're very young (which you always are) you cannot hope to understand what's going on. That's why many of the coping mechanisms or behaviour patterns that deal with similar situations that remind us of that moment (regardless of whether or not we actually remember it) seem immature and inadequate.
Every time we are reminded thereafter, that we are not in the number one priority circle of those we hold most dearly, it cuts a little deeper because we are still viewing it through our child-mind's eyes - still dealing with it the same way.
If you are unfortunate and it continues to happen to you repeatedly throughout your childhood - it will leave you with a self-worth issue. Eventually you can come to believe that you have little worth. Depression happens when you are reminded of that belief. What we have to do then - is remember that it was never true. That what other people say or do does not have to define us. That we matter - more than we know in many cases. That we can choose to pay attention to the beautiful things in life or the crap. I know what I'd much rather pay attention to.
Understand that everything that lives and breathes is unique to the universe. Everything that lives and breathes has an important place at the very centre of its own personal spiritual universe, regardless of the vessel. And everything that lives and breathes was chosen by the Divine to share all that they have learnt with everything else forever more.
There is no exception to that rule. And nothing ever changes it. No matter what anybody does to you - no matter what is said to you - nothing changes it. It's more constant than taxes.
I'm not trained in the ways of the mind in any way - but you'll probably guess that anyway - meh! lol. I know people who are trained but they often seem more screwed up than me so I haven't gone there because I don't know that it helps to do anything much more than avoid what's getting under your own skin.
So anyway...my take....
Everybody has priority circles of importance and they are governed by whatever 'coping' mechanisms we have put in place in our early years. Nobody - and I mean NOBODY - can humanly keep all those souls that matter to them (no matter how much they matter to them) in the number one priority circle all the time. Sometimes circumstance will shift things and the choices left are pretty much the devil and the deep blue sea.
At some point in our childhood, we experienced one of those shifts and we came to know that we weren't in our parents number one priority circle. 'Came to know' - not 'came to understand'. It might have been something simple and innocent like.....'Daddy has to go to work - when the two year old desperately wants them to stay'. Or for the more unfortunate, it could have been something terrible like.....abandonment or a death of a parent or a betrayal. We deal with these moments with whatever tools we have at the time and if you're very young (which you always are) you cannot hope to understand what's going on. That's why many of the coping mechanisms or behaviour patterns that deal with similar situations that remind us of that moment (regardless of whether or not we actually remember it) seem immature and inadequate.
Every time we are reminded thereafter, that we are not in the number one priority circle of those we hold most dearly, it cuts a little deeper because we are still viewing it through our child-mind's eyes - still dealing with it the same way.
If you are unfortunate and it continues to happen to you repeatedly throughout your childhood - it will leave you with a self-worth issue. Eventually you can come to believe that you have little worth. Depression happens when you are reminded of that belief. What we have to do then - is remember that it was never true. That what other people say or do does not have to define us. That we matter - more than we know in many cases. That we can choose to pay attention to the beautiful things in life or the crap. I know what I'd much rather pay attention to.
Understand that everything that lives and breathes is unique to the universe. Everything that lives and breathes has an important place at the very centre of its own personal spiritual universe, regardless of the vessel. And everything that lives and breathes was chosen by the Divine to share all that they have learnt with everything else forever more.
There is no exception to that rule. And nothing ever changes it. No matter what anybody does to you - no matter what is said to you - nothing changes it. It's more constant than taxes.
Social Conditioning
Now I like to think that I'm hopefully a bit of an evolving soul. I think about how I feel about some things and why. I often try to examine my reactions to things, uncover the source and whether or not it's a valid reaction. I understand that my body is a vessel for me to walk around in - it helps to color my perceptions of my world but it doesn't define me. And I acknowledge that I need to be grateful to my body for its service these many years and amazed that it still has all its fingers and toes intact - no thanks to me. And I like to think that if I actually spot unreasonable social conditioning - I'll think about it.
But this morning, social conditioning snuck up behind me and smacked me round the ears.
Can't say I'm happy about that.
The day had started with a somewhat disjointed flavour - not unsurprising nor unmanageable. The daughter still managed to make it to her kindy by about 10....9 would be better but hey, she's four. I hadn't had any breakfast or caffeine-related substances so my darling husband suggested that he drop me off at a local cafe and I could grab a nice breakfast and read some magazines while he worked on another job. Perfect.
And it was. I walked in, good service straight away and a rather delectable muffin (bacon, brie, rocket & corn) that clearly had my name on it. It was gorgeous too and the coffee was perfect. So I'm sitting there flipping through a magazine feeling perfectly balanced in the world and I just happened to glance over at the next table.
And that's when it struck. BOOM! Instant dislike for a group of perfectly innocent ladies sitting down to their breakfast. Instant jealously. Instant dissatisfaction at myself, my body, society as a whole, doctors who are too posh to listen and the greatest object of insult - my perfect breakfast muffin.
There they were, a group of lovely ladies half my size (and that's the crux of the matter), tucking into the most beautiful (and disgusting) big plate of pancakes - drizzled in maple syrup, covered in passionfruit sauce and topped with sliced bananas and cream. I couldn't believe it. I looked at the few crumbs left on my own plate and felt completely cheated and it worsened when I realised that even if I had the guts to order something like that (which I just wouldn't do in a public place)......it would be eventually spoilt with 'the looks', and the sideways comments and the unsolicited dietary advice from complete strangers.
Why can't I eat like that? I don't know. It wouldn't matter if I could anyway because I have no sense of smell or taste. It would only taste like sugar to me. I don't know why that is either but it makes me very sad. It's been like that for at least a decade and I would love to taste real cheesecake - just a little bit. Or the bacon in my breakfast muffin (its good for texture and the 'idea' that it's delicious but I can't actually tell its there unless I see it). And sometimes I wonder - how much taste difference is there between different cheeses? Or meats? Can you actually tell if you're eating turkey as opposed to chicken? Every time I go to doctor - they give me a nasal spray and say come back in a few weeks. Feckking quacks.
I think I might go have another shot at getting one to actually to do their damn job. Fat prejudice must be killing alot of fat people because all doctors seem interested in doing, if you're more than a foot wide, is test you for diabetes and high cholesterol. Neither of which I've displayed in the many times I've been tested by the way. But hey its only fat people right? When they die we can just put it down to fat - we won't look at the years of yoyo dieting that destroyed their metabolism causing an inability to actually digest or process their food properly, the diet pills that degraded the heart muscle, the artificial sweeteners that were neurotoxins and resulted in lesions and strokes, or the depression or the ...or the... or the....plethora of reasons as to why an obese person really kicked the bucket. People just aren't interested - unless it's happening to them. And fat prejudice must be the last legal prejudice, I guess.
But really none of this is the issue. I feel bitter. I feel cheated. But the truth is I'm doing it to myself. I remember somebody saying years and years ago, 'Another persons opinion of you - is none of your business'. It pissed me off at the time because I really didn't understand it but I think I have a glimmer now....
If you understand that you are the single most important thing in your own spiritual universe, then what someone else does or says in theirs has no bearing on you unless you allow it to. Sometimes it takes a moment to remember these things.
Breathe out. Look at something beautiful. And settle back into your own universe. Excellent.
And that is why blogging is good for me. Ha.
But this morning, social conditioning snuck up behind me and smacked me round the ears.
Can't say I'm happy about that.
The day had started with a somewhat disjointed flavour - not unsurprising nor unmanageable. The daughter still managed to make it to her kindy by about 10....9 would be better but hey, she's four. I hadn't had any breakfast or caffeine-related substances so my darling husband suggested that he drop me off at a local cafe and I could grab a nice breakfast and read some magazines while he worked on another job. Perfect.
And it was. I walked in, good service straight away and a rather delectable muffin (bacon, brie, rocket & corn) that clearly had my name on it. It was gorgeous too and the coffee was perfect. So I'm sitting there flipping through a magazine feeling perfectly balanced in the world and I just happened to glance over at the next table.
And that's when it struck. BOOM! Instant dislike for a group of perfectly innocent ladies sitting down to their breakfast. Instant jealously. Instant dissatisfaction at myself, my body, society as a whole, doctors who are too posh to listen and the greatest object of insult - my perfect breakfast muffin.
There they were, a group of lovely ladies half my size (and that's the crux of the matter), tucking into the most beautiful (and disgusting) big plate of pancakes - drizzled in maple syrup, covered in passionfruit sauce and topped with sliced bananas and cream. I couldn't believe it. I looked at the few crumbs left on my own plate and felt completely cheated and it worsened when I realised that even if I had the guts to order something like that (which I just wouldn't do in a public place)......it would be eventually spoilt with 'the looks', and the sideways comments and the unsolicited dietary advice from complete strangers.
Why can't I eat like that? I don't know. It wouldn't matter if I could anyway because I have no sense of smell or taste. It would only taste like sugar to me. I don't know why that is either but it makes me very sad. It's been like that for at least a decade and I would love to taste real cheesecake - just a little bit. Or the bacon in my breakfast muffin (its good for texture and the 'idea' that it's delicious but I can't actually tell its there unless I see it). And sometimes I wonder - how much taste difference is there between different cheeses? Or meats? Can you actually tell if you're eating turkey as opposed to chicken? Every time I go to doctor - they give me a nasal spray and say come back in a few weeks. Feckking quacks.
I think I might go have another shot at getting one to actually to do their damn job. Fat prejudice must be killing alot of fat people because all doctors seem interested in doing, if you're more than a foot wide, is test you for diabetes and high cholesterol. Neither of which I've displayed in the many times I've been tested by the way. But hey its only fat people right? When they die we can just put it down to fat - we won't look at the years of yoyo dieting that destroyed their metabolism causing an inability to actually digest or process their food properly, the diet pills that degraded the heart muscle, the artificial sweeteners that were neurotoxins and resulted in lesions and strokes, or the depression or the ...or the... or the....plethora of reasons as to why an obese person really kicked the bucket. People just aren't interested - unless it's happening to them. And fat prejudice must be the last legal prejudice, I guess.
But really none of this is the issue. I feel bitter. I feel cheated. But the truth is I'm doing it to myself. I remember somebody saying years and years ago, 'Another persons opinion of you - is none of your business'. It pissed me off at the time because I really didn't understand it but I think I have a glimmer now....
If you understand that you are the single most important thing in your own spiritual universe, then what someone else does or says in theirs has no bearing on you unless you allow it to. Sometimes it takes a moment to remember these things.
Breathe out. Look at something beautiful. And settle back into your own universe. Excellent.
And that is why blogging is good for me. Ha.
Monday, May 2, 2011
Monks in the Snow...
The things you think about at 1 in the morning! Pondering on a few things at a time....that seemed to bring together an idea that whenever its presented (as is has been in the past) tends to produce something almost fearful because it almost borders on madness. Or does it?
I was talking with a friend a couple of nights ago about the banning of home natural remedies and how alarming it was. She made a comment about all the energy forms of healing coming down the spiritual grapevine and maybe thats why so much of it was coming through....
So I'm sitting there thinking away thoughts like - 'could this really work that well? could it actually replace surgery eventually? Then drugs and herbs and the like would not be required at all - would they? etc etc'.... I remembered seeing people on various articles on TV and in the media who had healed themselves when the doctors had said, 'not a chance'. So I start thinking, 'if you can do it by accident - can a person do it deliberately?'
That brought to mind a documentary I saw on Buddhist monks who can deliberately change their body temperature. There was a story about a monk who decided to stay and finish meditating when it began to heavily snow and in his meditation he prevented the snow from settling on him. This attracted a couple of scientists who went scientifically monitored some Tibetan monks while they sat drying wet clothing (that had been draped around their bodies), with their own body heat....and wallaaaa......clear evidence of deliberate use of mind over matter.
Ok, then I'm remembering another friend with his book that details the psychological causes of things, such as diseases and even things like when you repeatedly crush a certain finger. Quite an extraordinary manual and when you hear what the psychological reasons are for something - even though it makes you squirm a little - you generally have to agree.
And, on a slightly different tangent, I start musing over an old Sumerian legend - very close to the story of Adam and Eve. How a god created two people who lived in the garden of the gods and how they ate of a forbidden fruit and were made to leave. The interesting piece for me is the discussion between the gods concerning these two people. It was said that they must be made to leave before they ate of the second tree, the tree of immortality, and then became 'as the gods'. If the eating of the first tree created a psychological awakening into self-awareness, perhaps the second tree would also cause a psychological change....a realisation of how much of our bodies we could actually control. What if the so-called tree of immortality didn't gift immortality persay but gave the awareness that we have more 'power' than we realise. Could the story be a metaphor for the true stages of human spiritual development?
And there it is.....humankind has mulled over this idea for thousands of years. We know that mind over matter is a fact. The question is.....how far could we take it...how much could the human mind really be capable of.....and if people like the Buddhists monks in the snow can do something like deliberately raising their body temperature and slowing their heart rhythms down - why would they stop there? What would stop them from literally telling their bodies not to be sick - not to age? Perhaps somewhere in the world - there are people who have managed that....could it really be possible?
How scary is that?
Just a little light reading on the monks
http://www.openbuddha.com/2004/07/14/scientific-study-of-tibetan-meditation/
I was talking with a friend a couple of nights ago about the banning of home natural remedies and how alarming it was. She made a comment about all the energy forms of healing coming down the spiritual grapevine and maybe thats why so much of it was coming through....
So I'm sitting there thinking away thoughts like - 'could this really work that well? could it actually replace surgery eventually? Then drugs and herbs and the like would not be required at all - would they? etc etc'.... I remembered seeing people on various articles on TV and in the media who had healed themselves when the doctors had said, 'not a chance'. So I start thinking, 'if you can do it by accident - can a person do it deliberately?'
That brought to mind a documentary I saw on Buddhist monks who can deliberately change their body temperature. There was a story about a monk who decided to stay and finish meditating when it began to heavily snow and in his meditation he prevented the snow from settling on him. This attracted a couple of scientists who went scientifically monitored some Tibetan monks while they sat drying wet clothing (that had been draped around their bodies), with their own body heat....and wallaaaa......clear evidence of deliberate use of mind over matter.
Ok, then I'm remembering another friend with his book that details the psychological causes of things, such as diseases and even things like when you repeatedly crush a certain finger. Quite an extraordinary manual and when you hear what the psychological reasons are for something - even though it makes you squirm a little - you generally have to agree.
And, on a slightly different tangent, I start musing over an old Sumerian legend - very close to the story of Adam and Eve. How a god created two people who lived in the garden of the gods and how they ate of a forbidden fruit and were made to leave. The interesting piece for me is the discussion between the gods concerning these two people. It was said that they must be made to leave before they ate of the second tree, the tree of immortality, and then became 'as the gods'. If the eating of the first tree created a psychological awakening into self-awareness, perhaps the second tree would also cause a psychological change....a realisation of how much of our bodies we could actually control. What if the so-called tree of immortality didn't gift immortality persay but gave the awareness that we have more 'power' than we realise. Could the story be a metaphor for the true stages of human spiritual development?
And there it is.....humankind has mulled over this idea for thousands of years. We know that mind over matter is a fact. The question is.....how far could we take it...how much could the human mind really be capable of.....and if people like the Buddhists monks in the snow can do something like deliberately raising their body temperature and slowing their heart rhythms down - why would they stop there? What would stop them from literally telling their bodies not to be sick - not to age? Perhaps somewhere in the world - there are people who have managed that....could it really be possible?
How scary is that?
Just a little light reading on the monks
http://www.openbuddha.com/2004/07/14/scientific-study-of-tibetan-meditation/
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