Rediscovering Music

I've loved music for what seems like forever. It's very rare a day goes by that I don't listen to at least a few tunes. It's hard to imagine a lifetime without music.

I did a brief period when I was a kid learning to play piano..but that was a lifetime ago.. I've forgotten almost everything. How to read music, keep time, etc.

But music has somehow become more to me over the past several years. I still like a wide variety, but I tend to listen to a more mellow mix.

A lot of chants and songs from the UU hymnal.

I use to listen to music because the beat and the words fit my mood. But now It's something deeper than that. It's spiritual, it moves me.

Something that I'm finding is that I don't have as deep a contempt for other religions as I use to. I've come to the realization that all religions are striving for deeper meaning of life. Granted some in very fucked up ways but still.

Anyway, if you can get beyond all that and past what one calls God, Goddess, Greater power, whatever. There are songs/messages that are worth contemplating.

I am trying to relearn music. I want to eventually play guitar (considering I have two). But I'm starting out with the piano again because visually and mentally it's easier for me to do. Likely because it was what I learned on. I'm rather excited that some of it is starting to come back!!

I never understood people who are so into art, music, etc. But I'm starting to. These are mediums that are conductive to self expression and interpretation. It's not important that others understand, or like what you're doing. It's your expression. Of course it's nice (and often profitable) if you create something that everyone "gets" or relates to.

Anyway I'm excited. It seems I maybe figuring out my spiritual path. Now if I can get the rest of my shit in order ;)

Law of attraction

A friend suggested I read The Secret. I gave it the college try but, it was a bit to hmm preachy..mystical.. can't exactly describe it. I gave it my 20% test. If I don't like what I'm reading to start with, I commit I won't give up until I've read at least 20% then re-evaluate. Sorry but it just wasn't doing it for me. The logic makes perfect sense.. it was just all the filler.

Anyhow. I found another book at the library called The Law of Attraction Plain and Simple. Much, much better. It also has exercises. Helen and I have been going through them, a step an evening and it really clicks. I'll be the first to admit it's counter intuitive to how I think. It's one of those things you go "looks good on paper but it'd never work in the real world".. See there you go thinking negatively again!!

Anyway with me it's one of those things I know is true subconsciously, but my conscious mind doesn't believe.

Basically you are trying to retrain yourself to think of things in a positive light instead of the negative.

I know this works. It's how I survived college. I told myself I would be the first in my family to graduate college and I would do so with honors. I left no room for argument. This was on the subconscious level. On the conscious level I was busting my ass and worrying to death. But I must have believed it because it worked. After graduation I was like WTF was that!!

I guess my point is that it works. Trick is doing the exercises, saying the affirmations, thinking positively, until it becomes automatic to your subconscious.

I'm working on getting back to that place. It's very difficult for me. I suppose I'm a rather sensitive person as to all that goes on around me. I mean how am I going to make a positive thing out of the tornado that killed 130+ people and left many homeless in Joplin last week?

I'm very willing to keep working on this though because in the past few days I seem to be in a better mood.. Things aren't pissing me off as much.

I'm also hoping it will help me get my shit together and focus on the future. My mind is going in a thousand different directions and I don't know which one to choose. One day this one seems the best, next week it might be something entirely different. Sometimes I wonder If I'm not crazy!!

Anyone that knows me will likely say "certifiable".

Anyway I see I've written a book again!! I haven't been posting much lately but when I do I make it worth while!!

Love & Light,

Don

Change

(The Lion King)

Rafiki: "Oh, change is good"

Simba: "Hey, what did you do that for?" (hit on head by Rafiki)

Rafiki: "It doesn't matter, it's in the past"

Simba "Yea but it still hurts"

Rafiki "Ah yes, the past can hurt"

Looking back over this past year, there have been a lot of changes in my life. Mostly good, though a lot that inspire me to reflect on my previous outlook on life.

A lot of it comes back to life experiences. I was very shy when I was younger and got bullied in school. I was always very timid in relationships and usually got dumped when the next best thing came a long.

These experiences left me very bitter; I lost faith in humanity. I had no desire to interact with people on anything more than a civil passing acquaintance, and kept it as short as possible.

I've operated in this defensive/withdrawn state for close to 25 years. I'm no closer to my dreams, I'm only bitter, lonely, and likely a bit cynical.

Then we started going to Witchcamp!! The first year there was very difficult. Being born and raised in a Baptist backwater town, having only studied paganism as solitaries, it was a bit overwhelming to see strangers being so friendly, so "hug hug, kiss kiss" with one another and welcoming to newbies. This did nothing for my social awkwardness. But somehow, I knew, If I could get past my bitterness and fear, that this was home. Something I could relate to and that would make life worthwhile and make sense. The second year was much easier we already knew a few people there and hung out with them. I even wrote some poetry and read it in ritual!!

Last year was my third year and was the best yet. I reconnected with old friends, we did a lot of ritual work together and deepened our friendships. I went against my own gut instinct of being reclusive and made a point to be an impromptu mentor to new campers. I took a bards path, It was large (30+ people) in a 13x13 tent. And we're suppose to dance and write and vision and share these experiences.. How fuckin scary is that? But I survived. I vowed that by the end of the week I would meet and try to remember everyones name.. I talked to everyone, And remembered most of their names.

By the end of the week I was so tied to the energy, I couldn't imagine how I'd ever return to the muggle world. I always leave camp with such good intentions of how I'm not going to let anything effect my good feelings, and I'm going to keep it going, that usually last until I get home. This year was different though. I vowed to try and remain open to new ideas, to keep pushing my boundaries. While I'm still cautious, I am more receptive to differing points of view and to meeting new people.

We've been going to the local UU sunday service and the pagan group for a few months now and it's great. I don't yet feel the close-knit community feeling I get at witchcamp. But It is good to have some other folks to share with. I think it's mostly me.This area (midwest) is very conservative, so one is often, by necessity, very closeted.

One of the things I so love is that UU and pagan group are not just talk talk talk like some of the meetups we've been to. Talk is great but sometimes you need to act. In the short time we've been there we've done a march for peace, there is food drives for local food pantry, we did a stand in for solidarity with the local Islam center. Just a great bunch of people.

Something that I've discovered is that you don't have to out yourself to do this "good work". Often people assume if you're doing good you must be a christian… whatever. I might have been hung up on that in the past. Why bicker over it. Good work is good work no matter. And the work, to me is THE point.

The more I get involved with these actions, the more I want to do. I'd love to go into the peace corps… education is all that holds me back, and yet not really, there is a lot you can do right at home. Better the world one community at a time.

My biggest issue now is where to start. There is just so much to do, one can easily get stuck in the mire of all the catastrophe going on around us. How do you decide what's important to you, or do you? Is it selfish to look to what's important to you? Maybe not decide, just jump in where help is needed.

I'm trying to get it all sorted in my mind, not an easy task with all the clutter. I've several ideas but I need to sit down and write it out.

With the recent death of my father-in-law, it's really hit home.. I'm 37 and I'm no place I want to be, doing nothing I want to do. Most of the men in my family have died around 40 from heart issues and I'm right there with high BP, bad diet, and little exercise. My old demeanor keeps coming through, "who cares about anything, you'll be dead in a few more years".. Maybe, but If those next few years could be productive, it would be life well spent, and would certainly fade those old wounds.

So while I may talk like I don't give a shit about dying, truth is I'm scared shitless by the idea, not of dying, but of not doing something worthwhile while I'm here.

Jack Savoretti said it best:

"'Cause it's not where you go when you die
It's how you live when you're alive
Who you touch and how you feel it

And it's not about the time that you have
It's how you cry and how you laugh
Who you love and how you mean it
And do you mean it"

I've also found things I'm looking for appear when I need them… Kind of scary for a newbie but I'm not going to question it. Just use it well

For instance: I've been studying about staring a farm/market garden sort of endeavor. I get so excited about the endeavor. I'm certain it's something I could excel at.. Then I start thinking about how much it will cost, and how I could never get a loan, and I don't have any experience. And I try to think of solutions to the problem.. I might think or ask out loud.. what do I need to do to to overcome these obstacles and get to where I need/want to be?

Suddenly a 2 books appear on the library shelf :

"Stop overreacting: effective strategies for calming your emotions"

"The one thing holding you back: releasing the power of emotional connection"

Just sayin

Blessed Be

Why is Organic so Exotic?

It seems there is a lot of misconceptions/myths about organic gardening/farming.

There's the idea that organic is a fad, something for the uber rich food snob, and so on.

We're so use to foods out of season, foods trucked in from half way around the world. Foods genetically modified, foods picked before they're ripe then irradiated.

And somehow we think this is the only way to feed the masses. The only way to continue farming.. Getting bigger or getting out. The death of the small farm and the local economy.

What the naysayers are forgetting is that, prior to WWII most everything was grown organically. Granted they didn't call it that, but they did use cover crops and other soil building and conservation methods. There wasn't many (if any) fertilizers/pesticides/herbicides.

The world population is much larger today than yesteryear, but there's still no reason we can't feed everyone. We've got to get back to local community, bartering goods and services,etc.

If we hope to survive and heal the planet for future generations, we must think and act sustainable. We need family farms and not agribusiness. Open pollenated seeds and not GMOs and terminator genes and patents on seeds.

We need to cut back on our wants and concern ourselves with our needs. We need to abolish the capitalist system, with its ever growing consumption addiction, need for more hours to buy something that will make our life better, until the next new thing comes along. We need to treat each other and our environment with the respect deserved and stop the exploitation.

I am 110% sure that we could accomplish this in a short period of time (say 10-20 years) we could be a self-reliant society once again, far less dependent on oil. It would take retraining, lets face it, America is a service industry now. There is very little know-how left.. we've outsourced it.

Would it be easy.. no.. we've become lazy as a society. We work in the abstract and not the mechanical. We'd have to get off our ass and learn what a hard days work is.. You'd be working harder but you'd be working smarter (and likely less hours).. Instead of working to make Joe Smuck rich, you could work to make your life better as well as you're community and the world. What could be more satisfying than that?

In short Organic is not Exotic.. It's sustainable.. It's a paradigm shift to be certain. One who's time has come.

The original meaning of Mother's Day

You can read the entire article here

So you think mother's day is all about buying flowers, candies, etc for mom eh? If you do, don't feel bad, you are in the majority.

Here is an excerpt from the above article:

The women who originally celebrated Mother's Day conceived of it as an occasion to use their status as mothers to protest injustice and war. In 1858, Anna Reeves Jarvis organized Mother's Work Days in West Appalachian communities to protest the lack of sanitation that caused disease- bearing insects and polluted water to sicken or even kill poor workers. In 1870, after witnessing the bloody Civil War, Julia Ward Howe—a Boston pacifist, poet, and suffragist who wrote the "Battle Hymn of the Republic"—proclaimed a special day for mothers to oppose war. Committed to ending all armed conflict, Howe wrote, "Our husbands shall not come to us reeking with carnage. ... Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience."

For the next three decades, Americans celebrated Mother's Days for Peace on June 2. Women political activists of this era fought to end lynching and organized to end child labor, trafficking of women, and consumer fraud. In their view, their moral superiority was grounded in the fact of their motherhood.

When Anna Jarvis died in 1905, her daughter, also named Anna, vowed to honor her mother's political activism by creating a national Mother's Day. The gift card and flower industries also lobbied hard. As an industry publication, the Florists' Review, put it, "This was a holiday that could be exploited." In 1914, Congress responded and proclaimed the second Sunday in May to be Mother's Day.

Companies seized on the holiday by setting out to teach Americans how to honor their mothers by buying them flowers, candy, or cards. This outraged Anna Jarvis the daughter. When florists sold carnations for the then-exorbitant price of $1 a piece, she began a campaign against "those who would undermine Mother's Day with their greed." But she was hardly a match for the flower and card companies. Soon, the Florists' Review announced, with a certain triumphant tone, that it was "Miss Jarvis who was completely squelched." And they were right.

Different way of thinking

Terence McKenna - Culture is your Operating System

There are many ways of thinking about things. A whole lot of how we think about things are based on our beliefs, social norms, etc.  So how do we  see other point’s of view?  I don’t know.. but there area some interesting ideas out there.

Terrence Mckenna’s idea that we need to get back to in touch with the shaman idea, has a lot of merit to it. I’m not sure if the drugs are necessary, though they may get you there far quicker. I think it’s more a state of mind, getting into your headspace,  be that through ecstatic trance or whatever. It’s different for each person.

I find that I can get into headspace if I’m relaxed and doing some breathing exercises. I’m beginning to be able to see better when listening to guided meditation. I’ve yet to be able to get to where I can let my mind go and let it experience what it will.

Being able to do this is important. I don’t know what’s out there, but I think that within “the collective unconscious” lies the answers to many unknowns as well as solutions to major problems. Imagine if we could connect with the Gaian mind, would we see a solution to the environmental, social, etc problems? or would it be more subtle, something we have to discern using our “higher” knowledge and our ordinary reality knowledge.

Food for thought