Touch the Source

In general things like exercise and meditation all seem like things one can do to cope with stress.  I remember some time back when I attended Depression support groups, the one thing everyone was in agreement about was that exercise helps with your mental and emotional health.  It all makes sense.  However, recently I’ve found that it can actually interfere with my emotional and mental well being.

Over the past few weeks, I had seriously ramped up my physical activity by running more regularly.  It got to the point I was running about 3 miles a day, and each day I challenged and pushed myself just to push a little harder.  When I felt fatigued, it was a satisfying feeling that I was reinvigorating my physical fitness level, making me healthier.  And I was more motivated and had more energy.  I could stay up past midnight and wake up at 5 AM and start running.  And each time I ran, I seemed noticeably faster, stronger and less fatigued.

But then I noticed that mid-day I would start to drag a bit, with this craving to start running again. I started to be less hungry and ate healthier and ate less.  Yet, my body weight stayed the same.  For a period of time I actually got this rush of a sensation that I was back in my 20′s and wanted my body to return to that same physically fit form.  I actually started to intentionally cut back on eating, even when I craved for some food.  And when I felt kind of stuck emotionally, just chomping on the bit to munch on some potato chips, I felt this edginess, this need to go out and run again and exhaust my new found energy.  But despite the fact I was controlling my eating and exercising a lot, my body weight remained the same.  My clothes were getting a bit looser, but my weight stayed the same.

My only conclusion was that I was starting to gain a bit of muscle mass while I was losing some fat mass so my weight remained the same, despite the fact I was getting leaner.  This probably meant that my testosterone levels were starting to go back up.

I’m a bit convinced that in my case where I went from very little to no exercise to a lot of exercise, was that my emotions were now on a bit of a steroidal high. I definitely felt this urge to start exercising more and start going to a gym and lifting weights to get back to this image of myself in my 20′s when I had a very satisfying muscular upper body with cut abdomens.  I recall that rush of muscular ego that was constantly thinking hard of ways to make myself look better or at least preserve how good I looked.  So it was as much of a compulsion as it was a high.

When athletes take steroids, it’s reported that their emotions can get edgy and irritable from a steroid rage.  And I now believe that my exercise translated into miny “roid” rages that amounted to me just being edgy and irritable, with a strong desire to push myself physically to feed my self-esteem and exhaust the edginess.

Exercise, especially with the intent of looking physically better, is just ego-driven.  And while it sort of nourishes your self esteem, it’s not sustainable.  No matter what you do or achieve physically it is not the same as just feeling total worth, no matter what.  This is unconditional self-esteem, unconditional self-love.  When your self-esteem and self-love is conditional then it’s ego.

When I try to sit or lie still and connect my heart to the Source, that is what it’s about to feel that self esteem and self love.  And if I’ve exercised strenuously earilier in the day, the “roid” edginess interferes with that connection.  To keep connected I just needed to let go and let the connection happen. Once I start feeling the “roid” edginess and ego the connection was real hard to make as I’d so much rather go out an run or achieve something.  In someways it was like the mini “roid” edginess was just an exercise addiction much like being a workaholic.

And in fact this past week I think I was definitely becoming a work-a-holic driven to accomplish things at work so that I could sit back, rest and smile at myself for accomplishing something and feeling valued for accomplishing this.  And once in that addictive cycle of needing to do more, it’s hard to connect, because connection is more about slowing down, and in fact being still so that you can just allow it to happen.

So this past week I had gotten so busy that my exercise completely stopped.  Then when the weekend finally hit I first initially found myself working a bit on the weekend, but then I thought about doing some running to clear things up.  But instead I elected to NOT run, despite being physically inactive.  I decided to just take time to slow down, eat more if I have to and be OK about it.  I decided to preserve the time and energy I would have invested into exercise into doing a bit of nothing and to get settled into meditating.  I even actually slowed down below the level of meditation by just staying still going limp and just being.

And so as a result I found the time and urge to write.  I found the urge to be and feel the child. I became more at ease, less tension, more restful and more satisfied with myself. I’ve come to accept and be proud of my lack of accomplishment, because I have invested and fulfilled myself in just being or doing what feels natural and at the same time fostering what will feel natural.

It’s all rather interesting that just a bit more than light to moderate exercise could actually be too much exercise.  In the end it is all about finding that right balance. In the end it’s all about constantly taking time to step back and see if you are able to just be and be OK with just being.

So for about almost a year I’ve been reading this book Balancing Heaven and Earth by Robert A. Johnson.  The main reason I was introduced to this book was because my mention of my experiences with the Source.  Someone mentioned that it sounded a bit like the Golden World that Robert A. Johnson experienced maybe 3 times in his life.  The first time he experienced it was when he was in his teens on a table in a hospital dying from massive internal bleeding from a severely crushed leg, and then some later times generally triggered by a certain aspect of the sunshine under particular circumstances.  In the end Robert states that there is no known way of reaching the Source.  That it is bestowed upon the recipient purely upon grace.

But aside from these encounters with a taste of Heaven, Robert takes what I’ve found the most profound spiritual book I’ve ever read to date.  It’s so much about being a human, being fallible and because of being human and fallible being so simply perceptive.

I think the big thing that Robert reveals is the impact and person Carl Jung.  I’ve heard of Carl Jung in the context of the great Sigmund Frued. When you hear these names you think of troubled and disturbed minds undergoing psychoanalysis of psychiatric intellectuals speaking with German accents.  For a good time Carl Jung was an active intellectual partner of Sigmund Freud and both agreed on the basic concepts of ego and subconcious.  But then at some point Carl took a sharp detour into a world one might consider insanity.  And in the end seemed much more of modern day Shaman rather than a psychologist.  Carl became fascinated with the power of dreams not merely revealing your own issues but in a way predicting the outcome of mankind or almost in ways the coming of a messiah.

Carl Jung discovered evidence of a human collective conscious where a thought in the mind of one person gets transferred to the minds of all mankind without any communication.  This collective conscious is like the great common spiritual ocean, and ultimately our subconscious.  Carl Jung emphasized the importance of this subconscious connection, this spiritual connection otherwise one experiences psychological issues in the conscious world.  In the end the conscious world we live in everyday is not very significant and real.  In fact the big things that occupy our every day conscious life are actually rather meaningless and its the subtle feelings felt in the inner world of our beings that are huge in meaning.  Carl Jung introduces the concept of archetypes as a way of  helping interpret the language of our inner beings.  And many years later a spiritual book writer named Carolyn Myss comes out with a book Sacred Contracts that ultimately flushes out the concept of archetypes.

Robert A Johnson it seems may have been one of Carl Jung’s most esteemed students.  And in the end Carl Jung instructed Robert to stay away from the lime light and not go to any of his Jungian schools because in a way Carl felt Robert was too advanced for his school.  Even Carl Jung himself distanced himself from his own schools, almost to say I’ve matured beyond my legacy, “now don’t listen to my great teachings, listen to your inner voice”

So the 2nd half of Carl Jung’s life, the part that still has yet to be absorbed by psychologist is contained in a recently published book called “the Red Book”.  And this Red Book has a glow of mistique about it.  The Washington Post said: “With a rich crimson dust jacket, thick cream-colored paper and calligraphied pages, this huge tome [the Red Book] is the size of a lectern Bible and looks like the kind of spell book a wizard might consult.”  For years kept a secret in a safe deposit box and then published carefully in a large hard cover book that you might expect to find on one of the shelves of the forbidden section of the library in Hogwartz. Someone is currently selling one copy of this RedBook for $3,500 on Amazon.

So in the end, the truest follower of the late Carl Jung, Robert A Johnson I believe conveys much of the wisdom of this Red Book, but possibly even truer then the book itself.  Dr. Wayne Dyer pretty much founded his fame on words of wisdoms from Carl Jung.  Dr. Dyer is famous and materially wealthy.  Robert A. Johnson is Dr. Dyer’s senior and is much more the real deal, yet is pretty much unknown.  Carl Jung predicted that Robert was destined for a solitary path, and Robert has pretty done this and in the closing parts of what is probably Robert’s last book, is his statement that his ultimate state of being and teaching will be in his silence.

Carolyn Myss mentioned that the heavens work in opposites.  That what seems big is probably small.  What seems small is probably big.  The Bible has words like “the first shall be the last and the last shall be the first” And with Robert it seems the quietest is the truest and the most popular and loudest doesn’t mean very much.

And so lately I’m absorbing and integrating the emotions in me stirred up in my subconscious and conscious with my recent job loss and recovery, my spiritual journey thru the labryinth, my entire life, my purpose, the completion of reading Balancing Heaven and Earth, taking a course in self healing a local intuitive energy school, work in Active Imagination, work in Lucid Dreaming, newer meditations and greater awareness of the pains that had at it’s worst driven to commit suicide.

I think I am at a stage of my life that I am maturing to understand and feel how much pain I really am at. I’ve had people describe at points in my life that I must be in great pain and have never felt it.  But then there would at times points where I’d explode in anger, or shutdown in apathy, or try to mortally hurt myself.  I’d usually handle it by thinking this behavior is wrong and suppress things and act proper and in the process conclude that I’m not in pain and not feel the pain.  But in the end only learn not to feel.

So in this process of unlearning not be unfeeling.  To unlearn how to be “a man”.  To unlearn how to “be strong”. I’ve found myself unraveling into a blubbering mess like a baby from simply watching several different scenes in movies I’ve seen before on cable TV.  I remember when I was in this state before, I watched 10 seconds of a person recounting how he heard news of the Pearl Harbor bombing in World War II and I suddenly started crying uncontrollably at the realization of the great suffering and senseless killing that we are doing to each other. I listened and sang to John Lennon’s “Imagine” and was sobbing and my insides were aching so badly.  And then most recently I was watching Toy Story 3 with others and I was kettle ready to burst in tears.  And all I was thinking to myself is “Oh my God please please keep it together. Please look away from the screen.  This is going to be so embarrassing, a grown man crying from a cartoon.  Suppress the emotion.  Suppress the emotion.”

So if you’ve been reading up on http://www.tiredmiddleagedman.com I’ve been processing the rite of being layed off. For some of you readers being layed off is no big deal, so I guess I’m new at this.  But in any regards if you’re new at anything and it’s something that has happened for the first time in over 20 years, it’s kind of a big thing emotionally.  I mean for me, a 44 year old person, we’re talking about something I’ve lived with for nearly 50% of my entire life.  So I only digress like this to stress that this is emotionally quite big for me.  And within all big emotional hardships comes great opportunity to spiritual growth.  Well it’s being nice to call it an opportunity, it’s more just something that happens and you will inevitably grow whether you like it or not; it may be nice, but more likely very uncomfortable or downright terrible, but trust me you will grow.

So today I took a time out to just be more in the present.  I started to think more and more about Ekert Tolle’s title “The Power of Now” and it’s calling to be in the present.  This past Wednesday I had an opportunity to walk with a group of others in the Labryinth on the Delaware Art Museum grounds.  The process absolutely made a huge impact on me.  It uncovered the inner child in me and his desire to keep time still so that things don’t change, treasured places remain, and loved one’s don’t grow up or depart from your life.

What the Labryinth experience started to reveal to me is that we all are spreading our life energy across time.  The more we crave, wish, worry, regret, strive, move, and achieve all we are doing is spreading our trail across time.  And in the end all we really want is to be one and whole, yet we see other people, things and events around us moving and changing and we want to chase them back in time and forward in time and it stretches us further and further apart so that as time moves on we get spread thinner and thinner.  For most, maybe all of us, it isn’t until physical death do we get to gather up our entire trail across time.  Time is compressed back into a single point and the trail that was once us is gathered back together as one, we are one again, the beginning and the end, the alpha and omega together as one again.  This is your life flashing before your eyes.  This is the review of your life experience that you will go thru before you can die.

So once again I recognize the need to consider not spreading my trail.  Start raveling in my past, worry not of the future and absolutely savor the present based upon the past special moments I so so so miss.  I want to bring in my entire spirit now spread over 44 years of time back together into the present.  I want to be.

And so I found much of today, me, my mind drifting into beautiful vistas in my memory of beautiful places I’ve been to.  In fact many places of the past are so much more beautiful and precious because they simply do not exist anymore due to the fact they have been destroyed or torn down.  For example I can remember so much more vividly the time I walked on the roof of one of the World Trade Center towers.  It’s more spectacular now than it was back then.  And this is a big key.  In just the same manner you can recall a memory more spectacular and precious than it was when you first experienced it, you can apply that principle right now in the present.  Know this, that this moment where ever you are is so special and precious and many many years from now you will wish you were here.  Know this feeling and starting wishing you were here right now.  And this wishing so badly you were here while actually being here is at least part of what it means to be Now in The Power of Now.  I would probably add start bringing in the past as well and bring back all of your spirit into the present.  Miss yourself no more.

In this state I had noticed one thing, that the having a bright Sun somewhere helps — a lot. And it started to dawn upon me today that I can actually hear the Sun?!  What do I mean?

I mean I remember a year ago I traveled to the Bahamas and it was so so Sunny and I was in my hotel room and when the window was open, even with my eyes closed I could smell, hear and feel tropical paradise. But what was so clear was this sort of background sound, which I think was the sound of the Sun. My best logical explanation for what this sound is, is it’s probably a bit of the heat that the Sun generates on a truly powerfully sunny day.  The heat causes heat waves which can be heard as maybe a soft low frequency continuous thud or distortion that just resonates and permeates all over.  It triggers breezes to come in and if there are trees, birds they are prompted into motion.  If you’re by an ocean the rawnesss of that energy is enhanced with the transition of water waves rippling from a humungous ocean into the land of the shore.  But even if there was no breeze, no ocean, no trees, and nor birds, I swear I can still hear something that is the Sun.  Imagine a scene in your mind at night and now imagine it with a rip roaring Sun.  I don’t know about you but in that imagined scene don’t your hear something different?

And so today as I basked in the present I savored the sound of the Sun. I savored the sound of the Sun now and the Sun in the past in all of those places.  Like a huge symphony across time and space I touch every point of my trail of my spirit across time and space under the loving stare of that familiar Sun, that one thing that quite honestly seems to have stayed the same for as long as I can remember.

So here I am preparing to join the many who are unemployed.  To some extent I guess I feel like a big baby not being to take this so well.  But honestly it feels like I’m dying and everywhere I try I’m only met with huge disappointment.  Yes there are brief moments where I do contemplate suicide a bit.  This coming week I have a job interview to drive to.  The person is really excited to find me, but I’m highly skeptical if this one’s going to come thru.  I’ll be driving over the Delaware Memorial Bridge.  I know that on March 16th, 2010 one person parked his car on the Commodore Barry Bridge and was talked out of jumping.  I remember driving past his parked car on the bridge that day.  The next day someone jumped off the Walt Whitman Bridge and died.  So I briefly picture myself parking, but I guess I just wouldn’t have quite the gumption to climb out and jump, or would I?  I mean if you park your car in the middle of the bridge, I wonder how long before police cars swarm on you?  I’d say at least 5 minutes but no more than 15 minutes.  I let the thought go.

A couple of important people in my life mentioned I should take some Vitamin D, worried I was sinking into a depression.  Well lately I’ve been taking a ton of Vitamin D.  I’m taking about 100 capsules a day.  I did wonder a bit if doing this was dangerous but it doesn’t seem to have any ill effect.  But just the same I’m not sure if it’s helping. I also took some pain killers to dampen the pain, but it probably only made me slightly numb.  I only have a couple pills left.  OK I admit it feels a bit reckless, but I’m really really hurting inside more than I can ever remember.

Yesterday I took a seminar teaching skills on grounding my energy so as to help drain the hurt within me.  I learned that I have a tendency to try and suck in energies outside of me to make up for the deficit and hurt that’s in me.  Instead of taking in outside energies to compensate for my pain, I was being taught to visualize connecting my first chakra (base of spine) to the center of the Earth and not attempt to draw-in the energy of the Earth, but merely make the connection.  That sensation of not drawing in the energy of the Earth was agonizing as my insides ached to be healed and nurtured.  I was then instructed to visualize a bright energy above my had, and then allow one sun shine energy above my head drop into my body filling my empty bagged body and around me.  I started to visualize my pains draining into the Earth.  Then I was told to allow a 2nd sun energy fill out my aura, to which I sort of revised a bit  it as hugging me with love.  So after my session I had a fairly good day enjoying the remaining couple of hours of sun light. I was told these sun shines where my personal energy, which is interesting because I would have thought of them being divine energies that were not of me.  If you’ve read some of my description of the Source, this intrigues me.  Because I’ve at times seen the Source as being the center energy source of that which makes Me and now I’m being told that these sources of bright light above my head are also that which makes Me.  And so I’m drawn to ponder about my concepts of hypersheres.

In my concept of hyperspheres if you travel to the center of any point and you implode sort of like a black hole, you will inevitably emerge on some outer edge of the universe.  In other words the outside of a sphere is really kind of like a “moebius strip” connection to the very center of a sphere.  If you implode symmetrically you will be the entire outer sphere showering back towards the center.  If you send all your love and energy towards what you perceive as your center, it’s net effect is to love the universe from the outside in.  If you send love symmetrically outwards from your body to all of the universe the net effect is to love the universe from the inside out and when you “love rays” reach the outer edges of the universe those same “love rays” will emerge from the center of your heart.  If you are slightly less than symmetric in your implosion or explosion then your intention only reaches particular people, places or regions within your body.  So the concept of Me being above my head as sunshine but also Me being from a center within Me made me think a bit of my concept of hyperspheres.

After I was grounded, I can’t say I noticed distinctively that I was “GROUNDED”, but I did notice my taste sensations had shot up.  At the seminar I tasted some of the best tasting chocolates I have ever tasted in my life.  It was like a scene from the movie: “Defending your Life” where someone goes to Judgement City in sort of a partial Heaven world where the food was guaranteed to be the best tasting food you’ve ever tasted and you could eat as much as you want for free and never ever gain weight.  The person orders some eggs at a diner in Judgement city and asks if they are good.  The waitress replies there the best you’ve ever had served just the way you like them.  He orders the eggs and gets them immediately with no wait just the way he likes them. And when he eats them he practically goes into orgasm of taste and exclaims “these are the best damned eggs I’ve ever had”   And so these chocolates were so good that I couldn’t help myself but to grab more and eat more.  These chocolates were Hershey’s!?  I felt just slightly giddy and had some Trader Joe’s brand tea with some plain white sugar and after about the 10th sip I realized WOW this is the best tea I’ve ever tasted. Wow this is good tea! The best I could surmise was that the grounding excercises I had been doing was a powerful way to getting towards being in the Now and present and so being so much more present my appreciation of Now was greater.

But I’m back to today and I’m in pain.  The grounding exercises help only but a little now.  I think it’s because tomorrow is Monday.  I think it’s because I am trying to look and apply for more jobs, but frankly I’m so plain damned tired of looking for jobs.  I really want to give up, accept unemployment and just go down for the count.  ”No Mas.  No Mas…!”  ”Uncle,  Uncle .. !”

But I have another job interview tomorrow.  And I have only 2 weeks left to land an official offer or I’m unemployed.  And this job interview I have is a bit of a “Hail Mary” attempt because I feel i’ts partly just a way of the person interviewing me just sympathizing with my plight and just being willing to go thru the motions of a job interview and seeing something will happen.  I wonder if I should even bother preparing for this interview.  But frankly I think it doesn’t matter anymore.  What my personal experience has showed me is that you can have the best damned interview you have ever had in your life, poor out your guts in preparation, practically do a song and dance show, be the most qualified person they’ve ever seen, have them show great enthusiasm in hearing about you and have them turn you down feeling like they probably never intended to hire you from the very beginning and find out they rejected all the interviewees and have done so for a long time!  I’ve spent a lot of time and energy applying for jobs that actually don’t exist. So in the end I can get drawn out rejections from hiring managers that realize the job I’ve applied for had long been filled by someone else!  They indirectly blame someone else for not correcting the information, so it’s sort of “oh well, and we’re really quite sorry, hoped it hasn’t inconvenienced you too much, and wish you the best.”

The opening for child to separate from ego occurs upon failure

When you praise in light of a child’s success, achievment, or accomplishment you support the ego part of self esteem.

When you can praise in failure you support self esteem without ego. Pure self esteem is feeling worth just because you exist and most especially when you struggle, flub up, screw up major time. You are seen so beautiful in the process of failure. Your inner beauty shines so brightly in failure, in the genuine fighting, the humility,the threshold of secumbing to the realization of total hopelessness and failure. When this is seen and you are seen and cheered and praised then their is pure self esteem without ego. Because you are loved just because you exist, and even more loved because you failed! You are loved mostly because you are a nobody.

The Law of Attraction does not explain the sucker punch. This is when your energy is riding high from an experience that exceeded your expectations. You are almost euphoric and you get a wakeup call sucker punch that brings you back down.

Last week I was riding on a high when someone called me up about a job as a Program Manager, basically a job where I’d be managing other managers.  I definitely thought this was a bit too much of a stretch for me, so I was surprised to get a phone call from someone interested in me.  They described all the stresses and high expectations from this position and somehow I spoke up and sold myself well enough that the person thought that although this was a stretch for me, my enthusiasm and sales pitch indicate I could pull it off.

A few days later I attended a LOA (Law of Attraction) seminar with lots of emphasis on maintaining positive imagery along with neutral emotions around the outcome.  The overall point was to maintain a net positive “vibration” so as to attract positive outcomes.  Well I was riding on an all time high: very positive and not fearing outcomes, because I fully expected positive outcomes.

So today I had the official interview fully expecting good outcomes.  I was taken off guard when I was met with less than enthusiastic emotions.  In fact I got back lots of skepticism.  And so I was asked to sell myself again, and as I spoke about my proudest moments, I got back silence.  They were not impressed.  In fact all my proudest moments and best accomplishments seemed to turn into negative points because they all seemed to typecast me as a computer programmer and not a manager.  And so the more they asked me to sell myself, I started to fumble and trip up more.  I felt sort of humiliated.  But one saving grace is that they had to cut my interview short due to another work emergency, and so they rescheduled me for a 2nd interview to try again.

So according to LOA

At this time I also tried to call someone else about another job that I did spectacular well in the interviewing process.  I was so sure I would have an offer by today, but every time I called for the status I got only the voice mail and no return phone calls.  It’s like they were intentionally avoiding me.

According to LOA principles I was vibrating positivity big time, and then I had an outcome I was not prepared at all.  I was sucker punched.  It’s the lack of encompassing the truth and purpose of negative energy where the LOA fails.  In fact the LOA focus on positive energy I believe probably will only yield satisfactory effectiveness in your life about 50% of the time.  LOA also completely does not address self Love, which by the way involves an acceptance of negativity as well as positivity.

I had to heal myself.  So I found a quiet sanctuary and I dug down deep to feel my saddest emotions of frustration and fear.  I wanted to see if I could pull out that crying child from within and what came forward was this image of me hugging myself as I was lying down on the floor with my anguished face buried in a pillow.  And I was saying to myself “you are so beautiful in your vulnerability! I saw how you were struggling, desparate and trying so hard to be honest, to honor your fears, to hold it together somewhat. So loveable and endearing you are. I have never seen someone try so hard.  I love you so much Wilson”