Tag Archives: Life

Liking the Creature in the Mirror.

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Our lives, and our journey through our life finds us looking for where to turn, where to run and where we should be. This journey is oftentimes hard, but we go through it, our head in our hands, tears rolling down or a smile on our face, but it’s our decision which it is.

Going through the journey, we’re looking for something to grasp, something which attracts us and there are times which that something, which initially attracts, repels.

The act of being repelled by the journey sends us reeling and we have to get back up, stand on our feet and look in the mirror at the creature we’ve created.

The creature, though not who we wanted to be at the start of the journey, tells us who we are at that moment, and only at that moment.

The moment we get past that creature and on to another, we discover that we’re something better, not the creature in the mirror anymore, but the person we wanted to be all along.

The person we’ve become is a monster of different parts, taken from different aspects of who we are, who we’ve been and where we hope to be.

The person in the mirror is no longer one we don’t want to look at, it’s the one we take pride in, the one we tell our friends about and that person is the one we hoped to be at the beginning of our journey.

The journey is long, the road is filled with more bumps and divots than a 60-year-old freeway. We find ourselves going through new things each day, but at the end, when we look in the mirror at the creature staring back, is it the one you want to be, or the one you wish wasn’t there?

The creature is only where we are at that point, it changes, it moves and at the finality of the journey the creature becomes who we hoped to be.

The 5 Things I Believe Are More Important Since Starting Transcendental Meditation.

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It took a couple of days after TM to sink in that I wasn’t living the way I wanted. I was living cautious. I was living overly cautious.

I hadn’t done the things my wife and I wanted when we first got together. This was because of the fear of being judged by those around us.

If we’d done the things we wanted when we first had our kids, we’d be viewed as bad parents, or may still because we want to do more than walk through our lives, we want to live our lives.

The things we haven’t done which we wanted are many, but we’re going to start doing them.

The important things have been put off for too long because of the fear of being judged.

What was important before TM no longer is, but other things are.

The following is a list of 5 things I believe are more important now that I’m a TM Practitioner.

  1. Always be who you want to be. Being who you want is important to your sanity and to the way your kids view you.
  2. Only do the things which can improve yourself, wife or your kids. Doing things in your life which improve the lives of your family is extremely important to being fulfilled in life.
  3. Never trust someone to do the right thing, you must do the right thing. Though I explored this one already, the Right Thing is what makes you the stronger person.
  4. Be the person you looked up to as a kid. We all viewed someone as that indestructible person, be the way you viewed that person as a kid, never as an adult.
  5. Always go on adventure. This is the biggest one. Adventure keeps us wanting more out of life. It is the spark of inspiration, the never-ending life of who we are. Adventure is always there for you, but taking yourself or family on a trip somewhere is more important than anything you do in life. Take a new adventure every year.

Those around you who don’t think what you’re doing is important, no longer matter.

Go on an adventure, live life your way and don’t care what anyone says about you.

Finding Peace with the Angry Eight-Year-Old

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When I was eight years old my parents separated and eventually divorced.

I dealt with it like and 8-year-old would, I pushed the anger at my parents deep down inside.

I hid how angry I was–with random acts of rage and frustration–from everyone.

It wasn’t until I was older that I began to understand my anger, but I’d never truly had it under control, it would just be pushed down and ignored until it blew.

When it blew, watch out.

The first time my then girlfriend, and now wife, saw it for the first time, she didn’t no how to respond, it scared her, not because the anger was directed at her, but because she didn’t know how someone who seemed so calm could explode in that manner.

The anger at my parents for how they acted towards us after they separated didn’t help things. I was only eight and only knew my dad was kissing some other woman and my mom another man, nothing was ever explained to me.

When my son turned eight and my wife and I were still together, I felt like I’d conquered a childhood demon, a minor one, but still a demon.

Their divorce was a catalyst in my life. One of those moments where life changed, and I changed.

Before eight-years-old, I stood up to people who’d bullied my sisters and got good grades, afterward I was the one bullied and I no longer cared about my grades. Both of these had an effect on the relationship I had with my parents, something which I don’t think they understood then, though I believe my mom understands now.

It’s been 30 years since then, and I’m going through another catalyst, this time a different better one.

After pushing my anger down, I’ve begun to deal with the eight-year-old I was, and we’ve been talking about how things can move forward with who we are, and not be the angry little boy.

This began with TM.

My break earlier this year was 30 years in the making and though I cried more than I screamed on that day, I’ve come to understand myself better with TM. I’ve learned that my parents didn’t know what the hell they were doing and that though they were young and didn’t seem to care about me at eight, they do now.

With TM I’ve learned that the angry eight-year-old is part of who I am, and that journey has come to an end in the calmness I feel with TM.

I know that I can’t get back the 30 years I lost to anger, but I can live in peace with the person I am now, and I have Transcendental Meditation to thank for that.

I’m a better person than I was five months ago when I wanted to kill myself, and I know that my life is finally hit another road, which I’m following faithfully, keeping my head on the things I want to accomplish in my life and that, in the end Peace is better than being an angry eight-year-old.

Doing the Right Thing

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Each of us want to do something which changes the world around us, but the problem we have is finding the opportunity or the means to do it.

We want to do this for on simple reason, because it’s right.

What’s right hasn’t always been my best play. I’d usually sit on the sidelines, watching everything play out. But, and this is a big one, I never thought I had anything to contribute to the world.

Sure I have two kids, but they’re carrying on as people who will eventually, like the rest of us, not be here.

I wanted to give back in a way which would others, not for glory, but because it’s what is right.

The right thing often escapes us.

We find it lying in the corner, its body thrashed and battered, but we want to be right, we want to do good for the sake of helping others.

That’s why creativity is important in the world.

There are tons of doctors, lawyers, but the creatives are shunned until they can produce something worthwhile.

Writers room are full rejection slips. Some of us hold onto them as a badge of honor.

We look at them as we finish our current project and hope, “Maybe this is the one.”

Then we send it off, hoping.

Doing right is something which will sustain us, keep us safe and hopefully help our writing.

I write to help others, which seems to be working lately if you’ve found this blog from TM.org.

Helping others is what we should do, because it’s the right thing

Finding your Belief

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“You have to believe. Otherwise, it will never happen.”  – Neil Gaiman, Stardust

The things we see, feel and hear are how we interpret our life.

These things change from the time we’re children until we grow into adulthood, but what we never understand are the thing before us define who we are.

The definitions we use to describe our lives…happy, sad, frustrated or depressed are who we define ourselves as.

Those definitions are the who we believe ourselves to be. These categories tell us, what to believe, feel and how we should act toward ourselves and others, but there’s more to it than that.

These definitions of our beliefs, they’re only for that moment in time. That moment we choose to be happy, sad or whatever.

The way we view our world is something which can be changed.

We follow what we’re told to follow, believe what we’re told to believe, especially as children.

We want to become what our parents tell us we should be, but we’re often let down by that, mostly because parents set such lofty goals for their children, and those goals are unattainable, whether by financial means or by intellect, but if we get past what our parents say, what then?

Our beliefs as adults are no longer reigned in by our parents, or at least they shouldn’t be.

We’re never taught to think for ourselves, to do what we want or to believe in what is closest to our heart. This is the travesty of society.

Finding the belief in yourself which has always been there is not as difficult as it sounds. We’re told finding ourselves will be a challenge, that it takes something significant to make that discovery.

That’s wrong!

Nothing significant happens to make us change who we are, or what we believe, it’s merely trial and error. The road we take is our own, and it’s the only road which leads us to where we should be in life, because of this we don’t want to work as hard for it, mostly because the work is hard.

If your belief in yourself is greater than the belief of those around you, then maybe you should change friends or jobs.

The belief you have in yourself should always be greater than that of those around you, if you have no belief in yourself, you’re only walking through life, taking the road everyone else takes, but you should take the road you want, and to hell with what everyone else thinks.

You have to believe in yourself, otherwise no one else will!