Showing posts with label grateful. Show all posts
Showing posts with label grateful. Show all posts

Thursday, August 20, 2020

Mind-Body Connection

Go to the refrigerator.

Pull out your produce drawer (called “the freshener,” although sometimes it’s “the rotter”). There among your produce, no matter what shape it’s in, you will find a wonderfully fresh, brilliant yellow lemon.

Take out the lemon and place it on the cutting board. Now cut the lemon in half.

Hold the half-lemon to your nose. Ah.

Stick out your tongue and lick it.

 What happened?

Did your saliva glands respond to the make-believe sour taste of the lemon?

That’s a mind-body connection.

We only talked about the lemon; we didn’t actually taste it. Remember Pavlov’s experiment with dogs? (Way back) He would ring a bell immediately before feeding them. After a few rings followed by feedings, the dogs would salivate simply upon hearing the bell ringing.

That’s a body-mind connection.

The fact that the body will respond to a suggestion is considered by some to be metaphysical. (Metaphysics simply means beyond physics. In other words, we don’t know the explanation yet—thus it is beyond the scope of physics.) Placebo’s work because the brain believes that the substance given them will help the body.  Metaphysical people try to use this fact consciously. That is to deliberately place a suggestion into the mind that something wonderful will come to them. The trouble is we’re smart enough to know we’re trying to fool ourselves.

The old gatekeeper of the brain says, “What?! You think you can be a rock star? Don’t be ridiculous. You a rock star? Ha. You aren’t talented enough, young enough, or good-looking enough.” (When did that stop some people? However, they probably had to get past their gatekeeper too.)

The gatekeeper tends to be a curmudgeon. You throw a suggestion toward the brain; the gatekeeper throws it out. 

Although some suggestions get in.

Why?

Other times it’s as though he has built a cement wall around your brain.

Sometimes we affirm that we can get that job, that raise, that house we want, that relationship we so desire, and it doesn’t happen. Why is that?

 “Ha.” It bounces off the wall. “You think you can do that? You want to be an artist? You don’t have the talent or ability. Artists starve. Get a real job.”

Remember the old cartoon of a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other? This is a perfect model. Not that I think there is an angel there or a devil; it merely states the point.  Conflicting thoughts are rallying for our attention. How in the world can we believe we can have what we want when the gatekeeper is screaming at us that we can’t?

We must find a way around the wall with its gatekeeper.

Meditate. Meditation calms the chaptering mind for a time, so some of the good thoughts can get in. Perhaps it puts the gatekeeper to sleep. 

Surround yourself with people who believe in you.

Bombard the gatekeeper with so many positive thoughts, he gets tired of resisting them and gives up the struggle.

Ask for more stuff.

Get happy. A tired, dejected, depressed mind will defeat you every time.

Write down all the reasons whatever you want won’t work and write “Bullshit,” beside each item.

Next, go through your list and turn all your negatives into positives.

This week I learned this: Over and over, I have heard that we ought to use the present tense when we affirm for something we want and write it as though it is already done.

I’m not offering pie in the sky. I know that some work is needed. If you want to be a pianist, practice.

However, affirm that you see yourself performing before a congregation, and you hear the applause, and you are grateful for the opportunity. You say, “Thank you.”

Somewhere I read this: before Luciano Pavarotti, the famed Italian operatic singer, had ever performed at the Hollywood Bowl, he rented it, or used it, I don’t know which, and stood on stage singing to an an audience of one—himself. He wanted to create a space where he could believe he could perform there, and, too, it allowed his body to become accustomed to that space.

 As a young man, Pavarotti’s father, knowing the limited possibilities of becoming a singer, reluctantly gave Pavarotti’s consent to study music. Dreamers are often met with resistance. That is one reason it is so hard for them to believe their dream is possible. Pavarotti beat the odds and became one of the world’s most acclaimed operatic singers, later to move into popular music. He and two others, “The Three Tenors” changed classical music forever.

I see the physical reason behind the idea of telling oneself that the thing you want is already here. Our bodies are used to hearing or saying “Thank you” after a deed is accomplished. We say “Thank you,” after someone gives us a compliment or offers food or good times.  We are grateful when something good happens to us. So, be grateful and say, “Thank you,” before it happens.

It will make a connection between the mind and the body.

 

I am now thinking of all the people who have told me they find value in what I have written. We’re having a cup of coffee together. We’re talking happy-talk. The cares of the world are far away. We’re noticing how the leaves of the Magnolia tree are fluttering like a wave of people at a sports event. The Pink Mandevilla alongside it is flourishing and spectacular.The ground cover is succulent, dotted with light sparking off the water droplets. The coffee is warm and slides down our throats, erasing all evidence of morning hoarseness. “What are you going to do today?” I ask.

“Anything I want,” you say.

                                           Pink Mandevilla. I'm keeping this baby watered.

 

 

 

Wednesday, May 13, 2020

This is Going to Be Weird


I'm guilty of it.

I know it, and yet, for some bizarre reason, I forget. 

It's the attitude that runs the show.

Daughter Dear reminded me that our thoughts are a built-in mechanism to tell us if we are on the right track.

Well, well, that's telling. 

If our thoughts run the show, we're in trouble.

We are used to reacting to what we see, hear, or feel. We bounce off reality, or what we think is reality. We jump to conclusions and rail against the injustice of it all.

Take this Covid19 scare, for example. We were driven by fear of getting sick, and of losing our lives. (Well, that's natural.) But, wouldn't it help a bit to focus on what we want instead of what is?

 I remember a teacher telling us to see the banquet table as full.

"But master, the table is empty."

"See it as full."

I can hear you…"Jo, for heaven's sake, don't be a kook. If there is a killer virus out there, it is prudent to protect yourself and those around you."

Yes, indeed, but to run scared and let the propaganda machine drive us into hidey holes without questioning is irresponsible.

Some say the virus isn't as deadly as we have been led to believe.

Can we test that?

Some say that people don't die of anything but Covid19. If a person goes into a hospital with a heart attack and dies—chances are it's labeled as "Killed by Covid19," for they tested positive. I've read that most people, if tested, have the antibodies for a coronavirus. Perhaps they've had a similar virus in the past. So, a large percent of the population would test positive.

Babies are born every day, and I'm sorry, but people die every day. We don't usually follow the numbers. 

But now, death numbers are thrown in our faces daily.

Why?

And where did this social distancing come from anyway?

Yes, wash your hands, keep your hands away from your face. Be aware of distance if someone is sick, disinfect. 

Grocery stores are carefully disinfecting, why can't business stay open? 

And there is unemployment.

The government wouldn't want to bite the hand that feeds it. If people aren't working, they aren't paying taxes.

Don't you smell something rotten in Denmark?

Yesterday I noticed how the media wants to keep the word "Killer" in front of our faces. (Oh, heck, it sells.) Now we have "Killer" hornets, and "Killer" white cap mushrooms.

Don't eat any mushrooms growing up in your yard, and get out the bug spray.

I read one blogger this morning who was depressed out of her gourd.

I refuse to go there.


I am grateful for medical science. I remember well the Polio rampage and how thankful we were for the Jonas Salk vaccine. TB used to be a death sentence. They would send TB patients to sanitariums, and they would get better for a while, then relapse and eventually die of the disease. Talk about living in fear. Cough up blood. Whoops.

What I'm not grateful for are FEAR-driven tactics that appear to be good for a few at the expense of the many. 

Have you ever had a feeling that something was amiss, but you're afraid you might be wrong? It concerns me for what if we wait too long to wake up? 

I have been grateful for vaccinations—my kids didn't get the measles or mumps or whooping cough as I did, they did get the Chickenpox before there was a vaccine. And I had a terrible scare with German measles, as my husband got it while I was three-months pregnant. I didn't remember ever having it. I was shot in both arms and legs with Gamma globin (a substance in the blood collected from many people, figuring someone had the antibodies for the three-day measles). All turned out perfect, but it was a worry. Before our time, many babies and children died of Diphtheria, and not anymore. 

However, and I hate to say it, but I'm beginning to wonder if Pharmacia companies have an agenda. What do they want to inject into us? Please don't let it be mercury or zinc or some of those chemical preservatives, or anything that would make us sicker or more susceptible to other invasions? (For which we need another vaccine.) Can we have all vaccines tested by a third party the way they test Cannabis? 

Have you seen The Awakening? *I didn't know an Awakening was happening until a dear reader sent me the video. (See below.) Around the world, especially in cities, people are peacefully assembling to protest the lockdown. One lady said, "Well, is this our choice, "Get the virus or starve to death?" 

People around the world are mad as hell and not going to take it anymore. Track the money. "What doesn't seem right?

We can't question—we're afraid to.

So, to go back to my original comment on HOW WE ARE FOCUSING ON THE WRONG THINGS:

Instead of reacting to what is, what is we focus on how we want it to be?

I'm having trouble explaining this, although I know many metaphysical teachers ascribe to this line of thinking. If thought creates—then you begin with a thought. "In the beginning was the word." 

You might say, "Jo, thinking doesn't make it so."

Yes, but the attitude pulls in more of the same. Have a thought, hold it for a minute or so, and it will attract another thought. It's like iron filings pulled to a magnet. What can we do to fix it? Another thought joins it. Well, we can do this…and this, maybe this, until a solution is found. 

Woo-woo? 

Could be, but what if it works?

I'm not a person who's standing on their rooftop amid a flood praying to God to save me while ignoring a boat that comes to the rescue.
I'm going to take it.


Something fun: I wish I had a picture, but I'll have to describe it. A creative family eating out: Two adults and two children had set up a table, complete with a table cloth and settings, and four chairs in the back of a pickup and were having a dinner out. Real civilized opposed to balancing dinner on their laps. They were parked in the middle of an empty mall parking lot that had take-out restaurants along its periphery. Eugene, Oregon.