Burn the box

Grab this lucid moment
don't let it pass away
it's so easy to be fake
so hard to awaken
shake off this preoccupation
with details, this fear
permeating everything
this isn't life
bogged down in details
petty and small
covered in fog
surrounding it all
until it's too late
and time has run out
and all I managed
was to keep breathing
not seeing
what everything
was really about
up to my eyes and ears
in grime and dust
unaware of the real
sleeping my life away
panicking within the confines
of the tiny box
I put myself in
stunting my growth to adjust
to the self-imposed limits
of life in a box
this is not okay
this is not fine
this will not do
I am more than this
burn the box
burn the box
destroy it all
all that's fake
all that's not real
maybe something will remain
maybe not
burn the box

Post nr 200

What's stopping you? What is holding you back? I sense a hesitance.
What's going on, M?
Being approved of, is that it? Do you need a man to approve of you? To approve what you are doing?
Do you need approval from yourself?
Do you really need approval or is that a trick to slow down?
Don't get sidetracked.
LOOK.
Am I on track?
Yes.
Worries about getting sidetracked are also a trick to slow things down.
Are you scared of where this is going, where you are heading?
No.
What are you scared of? There is always something.
I am scared of... losing my religion. What does R.E.M. have to do with all this??
Wait. Religion is the same as: belief system.
Are you afraid of losing your belief system?
You know, about being special, having a special purpose in this world, making a difference with that book of yours.
The book isn't yours. It's, you know what it is. It can't be born while you're still here being special and all.
Scared of losing your religion?
So the same thing pretty much everybody fears. Not so special after all, then.
Will you go on without your belief system? If it means losing that in order to go Further?
All those things you use to keep self-doubt at bay are part of your belief system. Countering the negative programming with positive programming is still programming.
It may have been necessary for a while, but it might be time to put childish things aside and move on, darling. You are able to.
This is not a death-trap, sweety. Only ego dies. That's all.
The crutch is keeping you from walking upright.
Very poetic, but no shit. You can do this. Look inside yourself; do you still need a pat on the shoulder? From who?
Truth isn't out there, it's inside you.
Do you still need or want a crutch? Or do you want to see clearly?
I'm scared I won't be able to do it.
The whole world can tell you you're a good for nothing. And you know what? They're right. You are good for Nothing. Nothing suits you just fine. It's Home.
Let it pull you in. No one has the authority to pull you down, they never had. Only you. So stop doing that. It's a waste of energy. Remember the emotional energy? Focus & intent. Use it there.
This is your path. Come on, man, enough with the pep-talk.
This is the help you wanted, and you got it. See? You always get what you need. Always.
You do not want the book to happen now. Your authentic desire is for the book to happen at the perfect time. You still doubt it, but that's irrelevant. Use your energy to get Further. Everything else will take care of itself.

book-stuff

I'm wearing many layers of fear, one over the other.
It's an ugly dress.
My sister keeps trying to get me to dress nicer, or, less bad. But it's not a priority. Housekeeping is not a priority, the garden isn't, friendships aren't. Relationships with men have been bumped off the list entirely.
So, why all these doubts about my focus?
Why do I think I have been more asleep lately?
I KNOW how it works, right? Ever widening circles, long episodes of working through stuff - plateaus where nothing seems to happen.
Still, it's better to doubt than to never doubt at all. But it's not such a black and white thing.

Aargh

The content of the Dreamstate book about focus and intent, and authentic desires, got me worried/confused again.
I know the Book, my book, is a very big thing to want. It's very big in my heart as well. It's also the first time I really want something and it doesn't immediately happen.
This keeps going through my head, which I use in an attempt to unworry myself: "Your writing can only be as good as you are."
Thinking that that may be the reason why the book isn't springing to life. I can only write it when 'I' am gone. The best and only way to let the book be as good as it possibly can be.
Also, practicing patience, which I did not have - at all. It's good for that too.
Okay, it's huge. It's absolutely huge and it's the book I would have wanted to have at the beginning of all this, at the start of my journey, which maybe was 23 years ago, or hasn't even really started yet with the First Step as Jed describes.
I just don't know.
The beginning was a whirlwind of energy, insights, ecstasy, elation, peak experiences, miracles et cetera.
That was decades ago. Now it's mostly reading, writing, processing, watching tv, repeat.
Have I been more asleep?
Is that even a real heartfelt question?
Is it normal that my book is taking so long?
Is it normal that I am taking so long?
Am I being too negative?
I'm over the rape. I'm over most painful experiences.
I have become a tiny bit better at washing dishes, as in no more hidden jungles of fungus in forgotten pots and pans.
Less grudges, more mildness or whatever you call it.
Does that mean more asleep though?
Does that mean less emotional energy to work with on the focus & intent business?
I'm confused.
Other than that, I liked the diversity of the book - Alice, Morpheus, Roadrunner, makes it easier to read again.
I'm probably making too big a deal of this. I can't even put into words what 'this' is exactly.

There is something, I feel something, a pinprick of grief or old pain or whatever, it's not important what it is, but I'm going to follow it, see where it goes. It's what came up, maybe it can tell me something.
Maybe this is all a waste of words.

I don't fit into a box, any kind of box, and shouldn't try to.
I am good enough.
I am good enough and all this happened exactly as it was always going to happen.
Right, time for some offline digging.

P.S. Lots of tiny baby miracles today, because I looked (thanks for the reminder, Jed).
One of them was an email from my favorite book-ordering site, telling me 'the story' of my orders from the beginning.
Apparently the first book I ever ordered from them was the Dutch translation of "Spiritual Enlightenment - The Damnedest Thing" in 2005.
Tears.

I don't know what's happening, whether I'll get help or the confusion will dissolve on its own, I just know this is a vague and foggy time and I can't see clearly and I want to. I want to.

Dreamstate and the cursed child

Picked up my Harry Potter at the bookstore.
Will probably read it in the gaps between reading and digesting "Dreamstate - A Conspiracy Theory."

All those questions. And when I look to try and find the answer, they're not there anymore. But they'll return later on. Probably, maybe not. They're not important, I guess.
One does come up again though. Maybe I shouldn't compare my 'road' to the map in the book, but I can't help wondering (again) why there's such a discrepancy. It's most likely my false way of looking, too much fog blocking a clear view of the road ahead. But still.
All that frantic-ness, euphoria, epiphanies, high level energy people get when they're in free-fall towards that black hole.. That's what it was like for me in the beginning, over twenty years ago. I've become less frantic, less euphoric.
Have I fallen asleep more deeply? It doesn't seem like it. But it wouldn't if that were the case, now would it?
My progress seems more like the ripple effect of a stone thrown into a pond. Ever widening circles.
Am I fooling myself?
I am still asking questions. I still look at myself.
The difference now is that I can't get my frustration level up high enough to force change. Because of some .. some what? Hold on.
Because of this: everything happens the way it's supposed to happen. If frustration happens, it happens and that's okay.
This is not always how I feel it, but underneath, it is.
Underneath what happens, underneath my 'feelings' about what happens, I'm okay with what happens. Uhm.. yeah. Something like that. That's why I don't get the map in the book.
There is less struggle, more releasing of the tiller. How does that combine with the frantic stuff?
If there's anyone I'd trust to be 'right' about this stuff, it's Jed.
But in the end, all I can do is trust my instincts, intuition, et cetera.
So.

Am I doing what's needed to clean and ultimately discard the lens?
No answer.
Okay.
Will 'I' make 'me' disappear if 'I' continue along the road 'I' am on?
Yes.
Okidoki then.
Oh right! I get it. 'I' am not doing anything, so the phrasing of the sentence was incorrect. Existence/the universe/whatever is doing it through me, through the lens of 'me'.
[expletives] [mild blasphemy]
God I need some tea.

Family

Came back from sis & co yesterday. It was hard to leave them, again. Bro in law told me in the car on the way back that my sister had cried too. She didn't want me to go.
It felt so... family.
Sat up watching "Scream" episodes with my sister and ten-year-old nephew until 2 a.m. Then he was sent to bed and my niece came down from her cave to sit with us a while. It was nice. (School starts again in a week.) I even miss the cats.
The sadness and sense of loss stayed with me today. So much so that I considered what it would be like to move there. My sister would love that, she's always telling me how wonderful it would be.
I considered it partly because my intuition hasn't made any big decisions for me lately. It's been years.
Can't remember the last big decision. The last big change. It's all been slow, small steps. But I can't decide something just because the voice is absent - you know, force it out of hibernation by making some bad choices.
The way I am now, it wouldn't be healthy for me to move there. I'd still lose myself.
But the family feeling is nice.
To belong somewhere, to be welcome, to be hugged. To sit up and watch silly series together, make rude jokes, inhale food like there's no tomorrow, share weird experiences, anecdotes. We had a blast making up ads for Marktplaats (Dutch Craigslist) - I didn't even know it was a thing.
I wanted to do an elaborate photo-shoot with a fork; different angles, dreamy lighting, sexy poses, using twenty-something photos to capture the inner fork-ness of the fork for potential buyers.
We came up with some pretty awful puns and 'creative' descriptions for items we could sell, declaring everything decrepit, rotten or dead "vintage".
It was fun. Lame jokes are nice when you're alone, but hilarious when you're with people who share your terrible sense of humor.

Anyway, my head hasn't cleared yet and my heart hasn't either.
They're all so brilliant.
If if if.

Wind

Fear, fear, fear.
Forgetting this isn't forever.
What a cliché.
To go through the same cycle again and again and every single time forgetting that this too shall pass. So weird.
Still exhausted: burning eyes, unsure, unable to go for walks due to (take your pick) foot/ankle/leg/hip/back problems.
Overwhelmed by contacts with family.

Let go, let go, let go is the message I'm receiving.

Immune system has been having a hard time ever since my last visit to my mother. Throat especially.
Sleeping doesn't lessen the tiredness.

[Cat has draped itself over my legs in a ridiculous way.]

Extra nervousness over potential new neighbor.
I have forever lost my innocence in that area.

Backlash, M. This is backlash.
You know how it works, ride it out.

[Sand on her ear, claw in my leg.]

I like the wind, the motion it causes in trees and grass. The sound.

[I feel a little heartbeat on my right shin.]

The same question: how do I let go?
If you're pushing yourself to let go, you are not letting go.
I'll listen to the wind instead.
If something comes up, I'll do that.
If not, I won't do anything.

Just return to your intuition, M.
Do whatever it tells you to do.
If it's quiet, stay still.
Listen to the wind.

Be tired.
Feel fear.
Stroke the Cat.
Repeat.

Scatterings

"It can be terrifying
to be slowly dying."

A dream, Jed McKenna telling me (in symbols) to 'bridge the gap'.

There's a hole inside of me
where my issues used to be.

No clear, defined thought.
Grasping.

How valuable my time in this town has been.
The place to work through everything that needed to be worked through.
All this time fantasizing about leaving, moving.
Look at the work that has been done here!
Invaluable.

Reminder to let This. Let It.
Dissolve.
It will provide.
Action or no action.

It's okay. Whatever happens.
Fear is okay, of course it is!
Do or don't, it doesn't matter.
Everything is appropriate.

Thoughts, music, tea, birch tree, fear, thoughts.

Another dream. My need to be loved.

Lozenge crunching between my teeth, piano music.

The repetitiveness of grasping for self.

Magpie strutting its stuff in the garden. They seem especially bold this year.

Now tea, with honey.
Camomile.

Trying to do, where doing isn't needed. Trying to not-do, where trying isn't needed. It's all fine, honey.
Do what you do, think what thought appears. It's all absolutely fine.
You cannot do something wrong. You cannot think wrong.
Let It take care of things. Let It take care of 'you'.

Traces of guilt.
Self-importance.

Birch tree leaves lifting up in the wind, like tiny kites.

Headache from trying to stay with what is, as if anything else were possible!
Little me, trying to be in control.

So many butterflies darting into the living room this summer!

Cereal, in the sun.
Shopping list.
Grasping.
Writing.

Two Fridays

Friday July 29

Been working through a lot of old stuff lately, even remnants of past-life issues!
For example: I cried for a day after remembering two people very important to me in a previous life somewhere in the middle east. One of them apparently was my son and - needless to say - he died horribly.
I'm sporadically remembering names and dates.
This is possible now.
If it had happened before I would have been overly concerned with trying to find out more. Using vague memories of previous lives to get out of this one.
Getting sidetracked is easy if you want it.
I need to stay focused.
It's a subconscious processing of old stuff, let's keep it at that.

Meanwhile, while I am writing this, my mother is badgering me with emails about two pages I told her to cut - they add nothing to the story and repeat things and information from previous pages (as we repeat stuff in our lives I guess).


Friday August 5

Been dead tired these past three days.
First I worked intensively on five pages of comic book script, with sketches, numbered speech balloons (if that's not the right word, you can feel what it means), story background, some fun ideas and some brilliant ideas.
Tuesday I worked my ass off to finish it and send it to my mother, who was jubilantly impressed and overexcited and immediately began constructing new pages out of it and in her enthusiasm forgot to save them.
She is now, again, at page two, but I'm too tired to look at the results.

Wednesday I had a 'progress-talk' at the Social Security building.
Drained afterwards, as usual after talking to someone for an hour - especially someone with seeming power over my circumstances.
However, she considered it mostly positive what I told her and I agreed. She could see through outer appearances, which was nice and reminded me to do that more often as well.
I get stuck sometimes (for a short while) percieving myself as I think others do.

Yesterday my father visited the town I live in. Yes he did. And I didn't immediately drop everything to comply. No I didn't.
We spent an hour and a half together (more than we have in the past five or six years). We walked to the center, had lunch, talked, and walked back to the train station.
Any longer and I would have disappeared, as I was already fading after forty-sixty minutes, but all in all it went well. As in I didn't pretend to be someone I'm not (funny, successful, worthy).
I was who I was at that moment, so there was no need to beat myself up afterwards. It went the way it went and I was who I was and that's that.
In the afternoon I called my sister because I felt she needed it, which was also okay. I wasn't the wise, spiritual, helpful big sister because I was tired myself, but I was who I was at the moment and that's how things go.
I'll be going there soon; it will be nice to spend some time away from this moist armpit of a town. My punching bag is growing mold in the shed and my throat needs some dry air.

[Just now I was sitting in the yard, between rain showers, and a butterfly sat on the back of the chair, next to my head. It fought to hold on with its tiny insect legs on the smooth plastic surface, and when it nearly fell off it flew away after bumping into my cheek.
Despite all the rain I'm getting lots of butterfly action this summer.]

No amount of sleep can undo this kind of fatigue.
Still, this week I started noticing a, yes, what to call that? Some sort of centered-ness? No. A kind of security within myself? A ground floor. A steady place, a ... I really don't know what to call it.
I do know it got me through the week, through which would otherwise have been sheer panic. There were nerves, fear and tensions but through it all there was this thing in the middle of it.
It has something to do with resolve. Focus.
Everything is allowed within the context of my assignment.
Everything to get me Further.