We've learned about different types of soulless humans inhabiting this sphere with us: how to suss them out, bust them on their egregious bullshit (which usually sends with them running away), while keeping our heads above water. It isn't easy. I've known people so wrecked by life that they become easily programmable drones with nothing to lose (besides a soul that's gone), and those are the most dangerous types of people we have on this planet. What do you say to someone who's been brain-washed since birth to accept death as a part of their human sacrifice to some fictional netherworld? It's hell, boy.
And that's what this culture of death and fear is about: getting you to accept the premise that life is pain, and the only way out of it is through your death. But, how can that be? His Holiness the Dali Lama recently posted on Twitter that human problems require human solutions, and it couldn't be any truer. You don't want to know the life conditions divinity exists under, and be glad for it. Celestial levels exist for a reason. Faith requires trust, and nothing erodes trust faster than fear and pain.
I've seen rotting souls up close, and its even uglier than some bloody cartoon made for t.v. You couldn't put on television the horrors that warriors deal with excellently every day. Those taped-up rooms full of broken bodies are not sights for the uninitiated. It's take a lot of focus, discipline, and training to overcome the worst humanity has, to see through to better days. In our religious world, we repeat the sayings, prayers, proverbs, and gospels that carry us to the promised land of light and hope, but how to reach the ignorant and insane? Repetition helps, as does a solid foundation in education.
The analogy I've always used in my work with the disordered people I'm closest to, my own family, is that they need much more help than I do. I am their "Anne Sullivan", so if I don't get through to them who will? Doctors? Pharmaceutical companies? Therapists? Television? It hasn't worked so far, has it? So what if some nut plays head games with me? I can break through any mindset borne of sickness, because I'm healthy. No matter the stimuli or conditions, I will endure to survive.
I was talking to a lovely older African-American woman here at the library the other day who is struggling from job loss, economic instability, and the destabilization of her family unit that comes with sudden changes in her life. Right, been there: "If Mama goes down, we all go down!" And she knew exactly what I meant when I said it. She's been through it before. But, why me? She wanted to know. "Because G-d always chooses the strongest to challenge, not the sickest and weakest among us." We laughed about it, as she nodded her head in agreement, because the cornerstone of our faith is the juncture where the warrior meets their own inequities to adapt and change to.
She struggles with old technological advances like computers (typical for her generation) and as we talked, she realized that we were the same person, because I told her honestly than no one has ever helped me with my work. I'm largely self-taught, because there are no classes, or books, or television programs, to become "Master Illuminator". I've also been alone and challenged as the people around me fell apart, and it's always me that pulled me through.
In this modern world of psychotherapy that fails so many ailing people, I consulted an expert on her turf and conditions, under my family's threats of financial hurt (as is typical for them) when 1) I lost my job in the economic crash, like so many other people around the world 2) my friend committed suicide practically on Facebook 3) I got punched in the head repeatedly during MMA training and 4) I finally lost my beloved and very aged grandmother—as my psychotic aunt guarded her hyper-vigilantly so I couldn't see her during her last days, caught in the grip of paranoia that marks schizophrenia—as the last good link to my maternal line, because if my world goes under, so does theirs.
The woman I consulted under my then-doctor's recommendation already knew I was extraordinary, but she still wondered about my state of being. I couldn't help but smile when I brought her back in a full circle to my troubled family as the source of my lifelong woes (the place I always come back to, because it's true), which led her to ask me (and for this question, she leaned in, with her eyes shining brightly): how? I told her the truth: I am the source of my strength. Huh...but who supports you? Ah, yes, the language of any typical psychology student in these troubled times that we think are so unique to today. It always comes up short in the face of superior technology, doesn't it? I couldn't help but laugh to myself during this last session with a human healer who wants to be on the forefront of this new world with us; my very own Counselor Troi on the USS Enterprise (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deanna_Troi). "I do", I told her.
Normally so poised, she shuffled in her chair, adjusting her notepad on her lap, switching her pen to the other hand. She waited a moment to see if I would go further, so I did what I always do with people who are light years behind; I repeated it. "I am the one who supports me." And that's "my truth", a recurring motto of these times lifted from pop culture, as a justification for an insanity that cannot be explained away. I am the one who supports me. It's me. I am the strength I need. I am the one I seek. I have been all along. And so I became the one she sought after, too. I hope it was worth it, Dolores!
It couldn't have been easy for our breach into your usual patient confidentiality clause, but I'm sure you'll forgive me. Same with you, Dr. Elizabeth, and my fellow confessors. It's disturbing to be known like that, isn't it? There's no secrecy in our world. But, now you know and you can never not know it. Now you know the truth about transparency, and living a life beyond reproach. See you on-board my ship. Hope you make it! Until then, fight. Fight back with all your might. That's what I do. Life is worth it, all of it: the good, the bad, the ugly, and the indifferent. That's my mantra. Life is beautiful. So...what's next?
"Everyday I Write The Book"
Don't tell me you don't know what love is
When you're old enough to know better
When you find strange hands in your sweater
When your dreamboat turns out to be a footnote
I'm a man with a mission in two or three editions
And I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book
Chapter One we didn't really get along
Chapter Two I think I fell in love with you
You said you'd stand by me in the middle of Chapter Three
But you were up to your old tricks in Chapters Four, Five and Six
The way you walk
The way you talk, and try to kiss me, and laugh
In four or five paragraphs
All your compliments and your cutting remarks
Are captured here in my quotation marks
Don't tell me you don't know the difference
Between a lover and a fighter
With my pen and my electric typewriter
Even in a perfect world where everyone was equal
I'd still own the film rights and be working on the sequel
When you're old enough to know better
When you find strange hands in your sweater
When your dreamboat turns out to be a footnote
I'm a man with a mission in two or three editions
And I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book
Chapter One we didn't really get along
Chapter Two I think I fell in love with you
You said you'd stand by me in the middle of Chapter Three
But you were up to your old tricks in Chapters Four, Five and Six
The way you walk
The way you talk, and try to kiss me, and laugh
In four or five paragraphs
All your compliments and your cutting remarks
Are captured here in my quotation marks
Don't tell me you don't know the difference
Between a lover and a fighter
With my pen and my electric typewriter
Even in a perfect world where everyone was equal
I'd still own the film rights and be working on the sequel
