Two weeks off. They were wonderful. Not too fast, not too slow, not too short, not too long. Perfect.

I'm doing a new 42-day series of meditations. The first twenty-one days end with five minutes of focusing enthusiastically on gratitude. Maybe that influences my sense that the break has been perfect. I did the first today.

After the last blog entry on being in a state of wantlessness, I've since come to realize that what I was truly referring to was a move toward egoless wanting. I still have plenty of desire and wanting, but the shift is now toward satisfying them from a spiritual place.

This doesn't mean all my goals are void of their material counterpart. I realize, for example, that my current state of living comfortably is what has allowed me to explore Reiki and other healing energies. I have the luxury to purchase crystals and books and travel to sacred places because of the material freedom I allow into my life.

Several months ago I took an introductory course on Pranic Healing from Master Co. He took some time at the end to do a meditation on abundance and financial healing. He noted that many spiritual healers often struggle financially because they are holding onto vows of poverty taken in earlier incarnations of growing their spirits.

I am beginning the process of looking for the spiritual connection, the underlying path-inspired purpose of all goals, all desires, all wants. How do my material goals support my spiritual development? They go hand-in-hand. Certainly, there is nothing wrong with a life spent outside the world, separate from materialism, in an effort to grow the spirit. But I believe that at some point, every spirit must learn to live in peace with the material world, without disdain for it, without superiority to it, but with compassion for it.

Learning to work within it, with it.

I am appreciative of the road toward egoless wanting. Now it's time for dream fulfillment. Our dreams are the clues our spirit gives us on how to live our life's purpose.

Almost There

2008 peeks out and I can see, as clearly as the next person, the rays of its dawn on the horizon.

I've never been one for major resolutions. Yet, it's impossible not to reflect and come up with vague notions of what might be better behaviors or objectives when the calendars change. Not that I've ever needed a particular occasion to decide I want to up and change in an effort to make my life better, richer and most importantly, more fun, more peaceful and more joyous.

This year's different. I have an interest in recognizing, appreciating and honoring the upcoming calendar change. It's an undeniable urge. Up until a few days ago I was in a bit of funk about it all because, as clear as it was that things were changing, that I was changing, I couldn't seem to grasp its amorphous form.

It was bothersome to have such a drive to set new goals for 2008 while at an utter loss to identify what those goals might be. In a society that specializes in creating want, here I was not wanting. Worse than weird, I felt wrong for my mental state of wantlessness.

I don't have everything, that's for sure. I've got plenty to dream over, that oceanfront Caribbean condo for starters. But the reality is that even there, to claim it as a true want is a stretch. Do I really want to be responsible for the upkeep of a distant property, checking on it regularly, paying for maintenance while I live elsewhere? Why do all that when I can afford to rent by the day or week what I need when I have the time and interest to be there. I just can't get into owning for owning's sake, participating in the massive consumerist unconcsiousness that continues to wreak havoc on people, nations and our planet.

Not to say that I am not equally twisted up in the web of wanting, it's just that on some occasions, when the light hits an area just so, the glaring stupidity of wanting just because there's something out there I don't have becomes inescapable.

With that on my mind, setting materialistic goals has become all but impossible. At least, for now. I won't deny that it helps that I've reached material goals I didn't expect to years ahead. I'm not rich. I'm not near retirement either. I still work for a living. I still need to work to live.

As it happens though, I mostly love my job. I find it fun and don't hate going and even feel slightly overpaid for the privilege. Maybe I just need a healthier self-esteem so that I'll know that being satisfied with where I live, what I drive, where I go and what I can do just isn't good enough.

Beyond consumerism and materialism there's still plenty I could want. I can squeeze into a size 8, but it's still too snug. I've already known and loved a few soul mates. I could ask for another, but I haven't convinced myself that I'd do anything differently with the next than I've done with the former. In fact, the formers are still friends, so maybe I'm not done with them yet anyway. I haven't learned how to drop all the love just because the relationships changed.

I suffer from a clear case of contentment. I don't know what to do about it. I can only hope it doesn't become so endemic that my resolutions for 2009 end up looking about the same as those I'm setting for 2008.

Be it resolved that I will enter 2008 fully aware that I am in the thick of casting off old skin and putting on a new one.

Be it resolved that I will leave 2008 even happier, healthier and more fulfilled than I entered.

That leaves room for growth and change and maybe a healthy dose of wanting.

Room 227

I imagine myself
on the bed
in room 227,
staring out across the boundless Pacific Ocean,
the loud, clear sounds of crashing waves fifty feet below.

A roar that drowns out pelican calls and seagull shrieks.

Over 100 rooms here,
only this one has an unobstructed, soul stirring view
of pure deep-ocean blue
from the bed.

At just the right angle
I can easily imagine
my self
entirely alone
at sea.

And as I sat imagining
this favorite place, being in Pismo,
in room 227, staring out at the sea,
I suddenly imagined
being there
not alone.

And I cried.

A third party there
talking, breathing
would mean
not being one
with the sea,
not alone
with the sea.

No absolute freedom
to get lost
in my thoughts.

...“So, what’s the big deal?”

I’d try to explain
why I love the room,
why I love the view,
why I need the time
alone with the sea,
away from the world.

What if,
no matter
how hard I might try to explain,
no matter
how many words,
how intense the emotion,
I never adequately convey
what the place,
the room,
the view,
the sounds,
the smell,

the sea means to me.

If I were to invite someone
to witness this place,
share with me
that space,
they might only confirm
no one else I know
feels what I feel,
imagines what I imagine,
or experiences what I sense and believe.

I’d feel
suddenly alone
thanks to the company.

Customary Giving

It is common in some cultures to make a gift of something that has been complimented. I recall seeing most clearly with my former in-laws who brought the tradition with them from Ethiopia. I also recall reading it was prevalent among some other Native African and Native American tribes. It has always felt right to me.

Five or six months ago, I purchased a green tourmaline ring that caught my attention. It's a brilliant display of four slender, beautifully cut, flourescent lemony-lime green specimens. The first few times I wore it, I was a bit self-conscious because it's huge. To be honest, I feared I had crossed over a little early and would soon find it appropriate to wear it with leopard-designed tops, gaudy broaches and super-bright lipsticks.

The constant compliments, especially from guys, let me know it was just my usual disinterest in anything that draws attention, even positive. When I wore to the family Thanksgiving meal last week, I'd become accustomed to folks commenting on it.

My mother, evidently, was seeing it for the first time. She didn't just comment once or twice, but several times. Since I was consumed with when the turkey would be carved, the spread laid and when we'd be getting to the blessing of the food which is the preview to the eating of the food, I answered her questions about it politely and completely, but didn't recall until later how large her eyes had been as she twisted it to and fro round my finger to get a better look.

This morning she's coming over for Reiki and a crystal grid healing. We'd set it up on Thursday. Now that my uncle, an aunt, my grandmother and a cousin have shared their healing experiences with me to others, I'm starting to get requests. Pretty soon I might be ready to accept paying clients. For now, though, I'm enjoying the slow and steady confidence building occuring with healing family and friends.

My mother and I set up the healing session for today...in an hour, actually. Yesterday, as I got dressed, that ring seemed to scream out, clean me and let her have her have me a while.

I'm delighted to share that it didn't even cross my mind to hesitate. I trusted that it must be the right thing to do. It was then that the full measure of her interest last Thanksgiving came to mind. So I obeyed.

Last night, in preparation for such an early session, I was reading up on a few crystals and techniques so I'd make the best use of the session and time. I went and read up on Green Tourmaline since it had heard what I hadn't, that she belongs to my mother, at least for now. Of course, it was spot on for everything going on in her life right now. I feel so blessed that the universe uses me.

As I get ready to offer it her, I'm appreciating why some cultures created the custom in the first place of offering to others what they comment upon enthusiastically. Not just a comment, mind you, but enthusiastic "Wow, that's really, really nice." Sometimes we're just conduits. Things don't have legs. The wind can sometimes carry things to their destination, and accidents can happen where just the right thing falls at just the right time in just the right place to be found by just the right person.

Sometimes, though, we're the angels that move mysteriously to connect others with what belongs to them. Temporary custodians.

Driven to Write 2

I've got two spirits hanging around with me, delightfully so. One is Alice Dunbar-Nelson, though she's been less prevalent in my consciousness than the newest of late, my great aunt Lucinda Gray. Blog readers of the past will know Alice as the early 20th century author, suffragist, speaker, etc. whose life story I intend to eventually tell in either a biography or historical fiction (a novel with close attention to the details of the subject and era.)

My great aunt came to me a few weeks back, while I rested one evening after becoming suddenly tired. While I lay there, I heard the name as clearly as if any voice had used the air waves to transmit the words, "Lucinda." I knew it was the name of the character I'd been toying with starring in fiction for a while. Just that morning or the day before, two characters dropped into my consciousness with great clarity: a grandmother and grandchild.

The name Lucinda was the name of the grandchild. I even recall being my usual self and arguing with the inspiration, "Why would I name a character Lucinda, I don't even like that name." The character assured me it wasn't her first choice either, but the name was non-negotiable. She added that she prefers Cindy and has been called Cindygirl, Lucy on occasion, and that her preference now, for the book, was Luzca.

I liked Luzca and agreed to keep the name Lucinda. A few minutes later I literally zombie-walked to the computer and typed up a few pages that came out in "the character's" own voice.

I'll have to do what I said at some point and outline all the random coincidences that occured over the next few weeks. The highlights include:
*A huge writing pad I special ordered for my classroom arrived on the very day I suddenly felt the urge to start the story boarding, the outlining of the characters. It is indeed a coincidence since the paper was in my car, but I came home, realized I wanted to write and was ready to run out to the office store to buy the paper...and then remembered there was some in the car.
*I have a writing buddy with whom I share works in progress. It had been a while since I sent anything, so I thought the least I could do was flesh out the story's characters and type them up into a spreadsheet of sorts complete with their birthdays, significant circumstances, astrological signs too, and so on.
*I went looking for authentic names of African-American men of a by-gone era and found an old family reunion album. While searching through the names, I stumbled on Lucinda's name. That was when I first learned she was more than a character. There were innumerable details in the "story" that I thought I invented that matched the details in this album I've read no more than once, maybe twice. If twice, a glance through and no serious study because, truthfully, it is my father's side of the family, he died 13 years ago, and I was never ever close to that side of my heritage.
*Then six days after learning Lucinda was real, six days after promising herself and myself that I would indeed get in touch with that side of my family, though I have never in my life extended myself to them and have only been in there presence at my father's funeral and then at my grandmother's three years later, ten years ago and two functions a few years prior to my dad's death at his dignified pleading insistence...I am giving a workshop and am placed next door to a cousin on my father's side. Lucinda wasn't worry that I might flake on calling them, she arranged it to be impossible to ignore them.
*I visited for Thanksgiving and learned that Luzca, Aunt Cindy, was extremely close to my grandmother, and that my father was her absolute favorite of my grandmother's twelve children.

And those are the highlights.

The entry under Driven To Write is the prior blog entry.

I'd love feedback. Please click on comment. It will come to my email first, but then, if you don't ask otherwise, I will post it for anyone to read. Thanks for reading.

Driven to write

Below is the write-up that is the first piece inspired by my great aunt Lucinda. She provided the inspiration and the initial words. I take responsibility for the structure, style and tone.
_____


There is a veil that exists. Most humans never cross it. Not while breathing air, anyway. It takes enough energy, concentration and security to navigate the seemingly all-encompassing reality of this world.

Most folks of most religions can entertain the notion that babies are born with spirits that come from some other place. These spirits may or may not have communed with other worlds, with other spirits, with other dimensions up until they take their first breath and agree to cross the veil, to live only from their senses. The veil is nothing more than a choice to ignore the experiences and perceptions which are not filtered first through the sensory organs we’ve accepted as the primary, if not sole doorway to consciousness.

A handful of babies never fully grasp the contract entered into by virtue of being born, the agreement to deny the immaterial. They continue interacting with their spirit partners, angels and guides, for months and sometimes years. They remain oblivious to their spirit’s faux pas in the land of the breathing.

For most, bright lights grab their attention soon enough, loud sounds distract them. By-and-by they learn to rely on their physical senses like the rest of their incarnate species.

That none of the adults around them see what they see or hear what they hear makes the eventual loss of connection to these others a virtual certainty. There is no one to validate or acknowledge the perception of beings as brightly beautiful as any crystal chandelier with songs more melodic than the greatest classical compositions. Seeking the coos mother bestows on mirrored behavior, the child ceases to see what everyone else appears to be ignoring. “So that’s how it’s done around here," the child asks herself. "We ignore those pesky little non-breathers. Must not be good for anything.”

But in a few rare cases, a defect occurs in a child’s biology. A woman births a child, usually a daughter, who fails to learn how to turn off those other senses, the ones that connect to other beings and other dimensions. It'll pass daughter to daughter to daughter until the line is extinct. These glitches quickly and inevitably extinguish themselves as part of nature’s plan. At least until such time as the conditions are ripe for a world full of them.

It is even rarer to find a male with such a connection. It is as if the Y chromosome permits a greater resistance to whatever neurological functioning enables the mind to release the spirit and soul to traverse the veil, to choose to see without the eyes.

One in ten thousand born will maintain sporadic contact across the veil, most often through random occurence. In one or two of these, the occasional crossing stimulates a conscious curiosity. A fascination is sparked that propels development and tolerance of the extra-sensory world. When a man and woman both carrying the same glitch marry there is a chance for a one in one hundred million human being to be born who is entirely incapable of learning to see a veil between the two worlds--one perceived by the sensory organs and the other perceived by spirit. We call these damiana.

…

It’s tough to inhabit the space between worlds while still anchored in the limiting illusion of time and space. Damiana are not lost souls. They are not homeless. Their problem is that they easily inhabit too many homes. Just as comfortably as their eyes perceive the brown of a pear, their tongue revel in the juices beneath the lip tingling texture of its rough outer peel, just as effortlessly, they perceive the vibrant energy emanating from the picked pear their peers perceive as lifeless. The worst of them commune with the pear to ask permission before consuming or moving it. In a word, they are crazy. They are perceived as crazy.

And that’s where I come in. Not just me, but all spirit guides, ancestral or otherwise. Just as they are standing at the edge of this great abyss of groundless living, we blow a gentle wind that pushes them over the edge into a freefall that ensures their eternal freedom, their independence of thought and the resulting certainty that they will complete their life objective.

***


There is a veil that exists. Most humans never cross it. Not while breathing air, anyway. It takes enough energy, concentration and security to navigate the seemingly all-encompassing reality of this world.

Interacting with the various forms and beings whose homes are chiefly in dimensions beyond the third is a mind trip. Drugs are the most common route, though a handful of these have the unpleasant side effect of ripping a permanent tear into the veil, making it impossible for the crosser to live wholly in any dimension. Holding on to the experiences that follow a chemically induced crossing is difficult. What was momentarily experienced as accurate glimpses into another world dilute over time to become left over delusions sprung from hallucinogenic moments.

The result is greater faith in the world of the five bodily senses. Dabbling in crossing the veil wreaks havoc on our tenuous sense of security, making concentration on earthly matters all but impossible afterwards. Life can become uncomfortable.

The discomfort and unfamiliarity then too easily breeds ignorance. Ignorance too often begets false feelings of superiority. The fear and ignorance of what lies on the other side of the veil leads many to believe that their flesh-filtered experiences are more real, more significant, more of God than angels, spirits and the rest of the unknown. Human consciousness, trapped in a prison of linear thought, filtered through the prism of fear and doubt, is reality.

Dimensions are simply a reflection of where we place our consciousness. Like the ventriloquist who throws her voice behind a ball one minute, under a table the next. Consciousness can be thrown into a dot, into a line, into a human form, into a thought form or directly into Heaven. Crossing the veil, moving through dimensions is nothing more than shifting consciousness from one location to another. Be the dot. Be the line. Be your form. Be now. Be here.

Consider time travel this way. The popular mediums of science fiction almost always depict it as via an elaborate technological contraption. Mind, body and presumably soul are all simultaneously transported elsewhere: To the same world, just at a different point in time. Linear forward or linear backward are the only options. In the rare instance that time is not a closed linear system, only human choice in human form provokes change, for better or worse, depending on the plot.

When is the world ever changed in fiction by the mouse that chooses to forego the cheese in the trap, preferring a slightly lengthier sensation of hunger to the fate that befell the housemate, rotting ten feet away, his nose one-quarter inch from the prize. The exterminator is eventually called. The assistant flirts with the neighbor. Children are born. A few move. A town is founded three hundred miles away, a new sport created, a new contraption invented for the new sport, acres of timber felled, trillions of gallons of fossil fuels burned. The choice of a mouse changes the lives of all. Though, yes, it was a human who set the trap, who called the exterminator. Nonetheless, the mouse has his part…and spirits, and angels and thought forms have theirs. Humans are not the sole players.

Time is not solely linear. Time travel requires only a heart tuned in to the rhythms of the universe...and the will to do so. It is our heart-directed consciousness that is capable of traversing time and space. The physical body is no more likely to cross time than the chair, couch, ground or other object on which you sit or lay reading. The physical body belongs to the physical world and is bound by physical laws. The only vehicle capable of interacting with any other dimension, time included, is the spirit. The spirit is boundless: Unbound by linearity or sight or sound or a room or a body or the present. Spirit is all present, all dimensions. Time is subject to the dictates of spirit, not the other way around.

***

In Heaven, we have a motto: “It’s no one’s job to save the world. If everyone would do the job they’re assigned, live their best life, the world wouldn’t need saving.”

*********

Luzca is real

What a story. It turns out that Luzca is the true spirit of an ancestor. A great-aunt to be specific who was named Lucinda Gray. Before I found her information in an old book tucked away in a drawer for over ten years, I'd already made the primary characters of the novel she is inspiring her and her grandmother who was to be clearly called GranGrae. Turns out GranGrae is Gran Gray and real too.

Gran Gray is listed in the family tree as a fully Native American which explains a whole bunch. Her son, my great-grandfather was a pastor among other things. Spiritual matters are in my blood it seems.

In the next couple days, I'll be editing a blog that will be an edited compilation of emails I've sent that show how Lucinda is influencing my writing, interacting with me and affecting her presence in my life.

Of note:
Tomorrow is Thanksgiving here in the US. I have not been in touch with my father's side of my family. He died thirteen years ago. I saw them all at his funeral and then a subset three years later at my paternal grandmother's funeral over a decade ago.

There was one instance when I ran into an uncle who teaches math in my same school district several years ago, but that has been the extent of the contact.

Last Saturday I was doing a workshop on my book, the non-fiction parent primer on California Schools at a district-sponsored event with over 40 presenters and some twenty colleges represented. My room was in the farthest building, the farthest corner at the end. That, by the way, is exactly where I had kept the family reunion booklet that included the only reference in my home to "Aunt Cindy" aka Luzca--in the furthest most corner of my bottom bookshelf on the side of the split drawer that is furthest away from where I sit and type.

There were no attendees at 8:00am when the first session was to begin. The halls were empty. So empty, so lifeless, that after setting up I took the time to see who the competition might be, who else was presenting. I notice a name that sounds vaguely familiar. The first name is a bit unique. It sounded like a cousin. A quick check of the last name and sure enough it is a cousin from my father's side.

Wow! It was only the week earlier, six days prior, that I had uncovered Lucinda Gray. When I did, when I saw all the parallels between the story line that I had laid out for my fictitious Luzca and GranGrae, I vowed to get in touch with my paternal relatives. That was on the Monday before the Saturday workshop. Of course, I put it off, did nothing, and wouldn't have any time soon left to my own initiative.

I glance back down at the program. I'm in disbelief that while I sit at this workshop that I had previously determined was gonna be my last workshop connected with my first book, a connection to Lucinda is there too.

Unbelievable. Forty presenters, a huge spread of rooms that span three two-story buildings. My cousin is in the next room.

That Luzca!

She's serious. The first words out of this cousin's mouth. "You have to come over for Thanksgiving." With two feasts to attend already, my initial response was not affirmative. It took a few minutes to appreciate that this was not optional. I had failed to follow through and email or call as I had promised Luzca I would. No worries. She already had the whole thing planned anyway.

I'll wait till after tomorrow's reunion to post the edited emails. More coming.

...and why did I finally begin to blog tonight? I'm finally knuckling down and attempting to get on paper some of this novel I seem to be channeling more than writing. And as I do, the tone begins to stand out. It is Lucinda's own voice describing our lineage, the tradition of connection to spirit, the crossing of dimensions, the melding of worlds.

Too fascinating.