Likely Last

But not necessarily.

Until further notice, I will be posting Mah Shit to a blog with a new name:

Nakie Time with Isaac the Mad Hermit

I suppose I'll have to make it look all sparkly and stuff at some point. For now it's just a standard template.
here's the link:
http://crazynakedhermit.blogspot.com/

Normal things made dirty

"Can I have some almond milk?"
"Of course. You can have as much of my nut milk as you want. Straight from the tap"

From Fullness Fullness Comes Out

I just had a tremendously long poop. It was fascinating, realizing how much poop can be inside of you.

Just a friendly reminder: most people, yourself included, are actually full of shit.

Spyder

Two days ago when I went to shower at my aunts, I found a spider there, chilling in the tub of the shower. One of those common garden spiders that's got a lighter brown pattern strip down it's middle that people always worry if it's a violin shape and thus a brown recluse (it's not.)

I used to be terrified of spiders. I would see them everywhere. Like that kid from the sixth sense. Like Peter Parker. I had a spidy sense too. Only it was more literal. I would come into a room and immediately start scanning corners, under tables, and a list of other places, checking for spiders. I found spiders where no one else thought there were any. I was like a bodyguard securing the area. If I found one, I would break into a cold sweat. I would edge away from wherever it was, as far as I could get without backing into another spider. I wouldn't be able to concentrate on anything else until it had either been killed or removed from the premises. And if it ran away before it was removed, I would be on even  higher alert, eyes constantly darting from danger zone to danger zone, ready for attack.

I couldn't kill them myself either. The feel of them squishing beneath a tissue or the sight of them curled up was frightening in itself. Mainly I made my mom do it. She tired to get them out safely, but sometimes, like when they were behind my bed, she knew she had to kill them, because if they dropped and got a way, I wouldn't be able to sleep in my bed without pulling the covers over me to the point where they nearly smothered me and staying awake for hours, violently twitching and spasming whenever I felt the tickle of a leg hair moving, afraid it was the spider come back for blood.

Though I wasn't always afraid of spiders. When I was really young, I would pick up spiders and scare my babysitters with them. Though I did have a healthy fear of the enormous wolf spiders that were semi regular appearances around he outside of the house, under the porch and in the garage. Those things are bigger than gerbils and to a little kid they look about as big as god. So when I got locked in the crawlspace with some dried up husks of the behemoth spiders to remind me who I was being forced to share the space with, hiding somewhere in the shadows, it made me uncomfortable.

I wasn't technically locked in the crawlspace. I could have gotten out at any point. But on the door of the crawlspace was a black, big butted web spider that I thought might be a black widow. So I called out for someone, parent or sibling, to help me. And called. And called.

Apparently we had good floor insulation, because I was screaming and crying for probably a good 45 minutes before anyone came to get me. That's a really long time when your little. Triply so when your frightened for your bodily fluids being devoured like cherry Slurpy by dog sized hell spiders.

I eventually got out, but not without scars of the psychic variety. However, I guess one time wasn't enough, because I did the same procedure at least two other times, before realizing it was a bad idea. (I think the last time, I actually was doing it to try and show myself there was nothing to be afraid of. Backfire.

This is all just to say, I was afraid of spiders for most of my childhood life, growing into physical maturity (I'm still growing into emotional maturity.)

The fact that I eventually mostly got over that fear is testament to the power of the meditation I did, and perhaps the other processes I engaged in for self growth. I don't know of any better encouragement or advertisement for picking up a good meditation. It won't make everything in your life perfect, but it will improve things, seemingly at random, that nothing else has been able to touch.


So, the story today: I stepped into the shower, noticing the spider. "Hey bud, I think your gonna want to get out of here. It's about to get a bit hairy for someone like you." no response. "OK, I warned you." Turn on the shower, trying to aim it away from the spider. Spider moves, seemingly at random, more into the shower. then tries to move away, but ends up moving into a big puddle and held their by surface tension. "I warned you." I feel sorry for the bedraggled spider and gently pick it up with a brush and deposit it on the shower mat to dry.

After the shower, I inspect it. the brush I used has hair in it which is tangled around the spider a bit. I know he's not gonna want me messing with him even if it is to free him from his hairy prison, so I leave him to dry and rest. When I come back later that day, he is on the other side of the bathroom, and I am happy he looks to be alright. Next time I check, he's gone.

Today I wake up, check my cell phone (in my awkward blind manipulations I had knocked it onto the ground so it fell on it's edge onto a bookshelf) for cracks, because I had a dream that I wasn't sure was a dream, where I checked my cell phone, twice and it's screen was cracked. (one of the most mundane dreams I've had. Mainly memorable because it's one of those dreams where you really want to do something but you are too tired to actually wake up and do it so your brain dreams you doing it and tells you it's real, so you'll shut up and go back to sleep.)

Then, I sat up, and....
the spider falls off my head.
.
...
I take a moment to appreciate both the silliness of the situation, and the fact that I am totally calm and slightly amused, rather than across the room, shuddering uncontrollably  in a sweat, with nightmare fodder for the next week. I tell the spider that I'm going to take it outside, because I can't guarantee it's safety in here. I tell it to get on a piece of paper, and stay put till I get it outside.

This time, it listens.

Cloak of Darkness

I am weaving my darkness, refining it, purifying it in fire, twining it with ethereal hands. I am dipping it in a milky ocean, beating it against obsidian rocks, washing it. Weaving a cloak of darkness to drape around me, protective, grounded as the earth, sparkling with the stars of heaven. This is my coat of arms, and I wear it proudly. It is not done being created.

The darkness within is not fundamentally our enemy. No more than yin or yang is evil. The Darkness becomes demonic when it looses it's anchor. I think that as long as you are alive, you will contain desire, and the whole range of emotions. When they are brought into balance, all is right in the world, heaven reigns on earth. But when parts of us are rejected, ignored, feared and hated, then parts of us become hate, fear, ignorance, separation. Maya is the world. It's beautiful and playful. Without at least some of it, there is no creation, no world, no life, nothing to love. no one to play with.

Sometimes spiritual communities, like the one I'm in, form a habit of rejecting their shadows. Hoping that eventually they will go away. And it's sad to see what happens, because they end up living half the life they could. never really complete, whole. They are cut off from their dark mother, from there own heart, because they can't accept parts of themselves. I did that for a while. What I'm doing now, is deeply satisfying. When the darkness is dealt with in a healthy way, it grounds you. It's a freedom from fear that is unshakable, like the second innocence some people gain after a hard life, which cannot be moved because it has seen all that would take away our innocence or peace, and it has swallowed it all, dissolved it in love. Dwelling on negative thoughts is mostly pointless, leading to rumination and then depression. But there is a work that you can embark on, where the darkness is transmuted into greater light. This seems to me to be the process of bringing heaven down to earth. The first step on the path is sometimes ascending to heaven, seeing the view from the mountain top, becoming aware of one's immortality. And then the second step is going back down the mountain, going into the dark and scary parts of the world, of our heart, that have yet to receive this light, and bringing them, one by one, up to the mountain top. This cannot be done if you ignore your shadow, if you deny it's existence or seek to escape from the places in you where it still lives.

The brighter the light, the more intense the shadow can become. I'm just doing what I always do, trying to describe my own path and pitfalls and any wisdom I've gained from doing the wrong thing and getting hurt or stuck. What I am doing now is very mundane. It's sacred as well, but it's grounded, it's simple. Part of me may be divine, but there are so many areas that are still afraid, hurt, angry. I think my first teacher was quite brilliant when he said that after the initial realization of the Self as separate from activity, the rest of the journey is that of action from the level of the heart. He called it devotion: action and surrender. The action is necessary. it almost doesn't matter what action. Sometimes it's just getting up and going for a walk, right now it looks like trying to get a job, trying to get a life. The feeling level tells me whether it's right action or not. The right action is usually the one that feels a little dangerous at first. uncomfortable, scary. But in the end, it feels good and right.

I felt like writing was right action. perhaps it is. though this particular writing does not feel right. How to find it.... It's the thing that needs doing. and when I've been ignoring it, like I have today, it gets progressively more uncomfortable. It rips at my chest, grabs my heart and squeezes it like an angry woman grabbing a man by the nut sack. "you know what you need to do. Now do it."

Its a testament to fear that I still often don't do it. Or put it off till she gives a few yanks. This place of action from rightness in my heart...

first off, it's blind. I don't have a goddamn clue what's right. I just have some ideas. And I go down the list.

I used to kill myself worrying about what I hadn't done. it was like the cruel but righteous woman was twisting my...heart... right out of it's socket, the pain of regret was so intense. So I worked on that, and now I can at least usually put aside my past failures, even the immediate past, and remember that doing what needs doing only ever happens right the fuck now. And the more I practice doing that as soon as I realize I've gotten off track, the more I get in the habit of going off track less and less.

it's ultimately an awareness thing. If I am aware of my predicament, I do what needs doing. If I'm not, it's a coin toss that usually ends up tails.

by predicament, by the way, is this: I am a mortal, fragile body, or at least I'm inhabiting one, and I could die at any moment. And I am deeply dissatisfied with my life and actions and feelings about my life. But if I can just do my best, I can be at peace. God, it's so cliched. How do I say this in my own words?

My mortality reminds me of what is important. My shame, when I see it clearly, is just my own heart kicking me in the balls until I do what I deeply want to do. I need that discomfort of seeing my life heading for the jagged rocks to get me past the inertia and fear and insanity that keeps me from starting these projects. And by starting, I mean sitting down, right now, and beginning to write, or play, or clean. Whatever needs doing. Every day, it's a start. Sometimes I don't start until late in the day. This is why it's easier in some ways to have a job where someone else is the boss. You're accountable to others. You need to get up, or you'll get fired. And so you get started, and it's good. I'm going to get a job soon, and I'm going to learn about jobs. I need to know how to live my life, and to do that, I need to do stuff, and find out what feels good and what feels wrong.

p.s. sometimes what feels good also feels really uncomfortable. It's scary to write a book and try and get it published. send it to editors and publishers and get subjected to scrutiny and rejection.



[notes from the future: this was perhaps necessary, working with my darkness, but suprissingly it seems to have come to an end.  Not that it's all done but it's done enough that it's time to move on to something else.  Which is still figuring out work and living in the world.  but the part where I talk about my guilt and shame motivating me to do stuff was ineffective and I don't recommend it for successful and continued creating.  I've found a system that is much more effective.  I might say infinitely more effective, since the system of guilt got approximately nothing more done than without it, and this system gets something more done that if I didn't have it.  I should write a post about it.  To sum it up though, it's much more effective to focus on what you do want to create rather than what you want to avoid (shame, for example), as long as you are also keenly aware of where you are now. Anyways, I'm maybe explain it in a new post.]

I have no idea where this came from

She had slender legs, like a swan.

But not a swan's legs, no, her legs were like the swan's neck, soft white, supple, rounding and swelling as the neck met the body and the legs met the butt.   She had green eye shadow, deftly applied, and her lids drooped indolently.  She was thin.   Ballet dancers are often unhealthily thin.  Ballet teachers are often unhealthily cold bitches.  The two go together.  You can expect a cold bitch ballet teacher to say to one of her girls, "you're getting kind of fat there.  I think soon you'll barely fit into your leotard."  And you can expect the impressionable ballet girls to take the comment like an arrow to there heart, embedded for years, festering and radiating out in all aspects of their life.  Ballet is an art for people who hate themselves.

But people who hate themselves are an easy target for other people who want things from them.

Brusequa was one such man-boy. He wanted pussy. Not literally.  Certainly he wanted to insert his prick into some female reproductive anatomy, but beyond that, he wanted the manly conquest of doing so, the status, the power, the smug sense of self worth that came from having stories about women submitting to him, letting him, begging him to give it to them.   Brusequa was, is, not a sympathetic character then, but to someone who had not been introduced to him via this open and truthful portrayal, he would be seen as clean, pleasant, and agreeable.  He had good manners.   He had a handsome body marred only by a too long neck that was an asset to the ballet and a too big nose that was a punishment by his author.  Something to keep him from looking to good, being to self-confident.

Don't think this made him appear humble, no, it made him present himself as even more prideful.  But it was just a tad bit of an act.  Not totally believed, for who could love that gargantuan nose.

Needless to say, he got the ladies he sook with his entry into the world of ballet. Men are always in short supply, so he could be a prima donna much of the time.  And being around all those women, so insecure about their pudgy, bloated waists that were almost as wide around as there wrists.  Oh la la.

"Francqua, Francqua, you must be joking. Oh girl, you are a silly creature."

"Oh, Brusqua, don't taunt me so.  I'm serious.  I'm practicing my part."

"It can't be.   Look at that frolicking.   You look perfectly ridiculous."

"Oh don't say such a thing.  Here, let me show you."

And the delicate creature proceeded to dance for smug Brusequa.

[writers note: what the shit is this? I'm so fucking tired. I just wanted to write something today. but ...must...sleep. faaaiilling.

sleep]

The ultimate secret of all fad diets

I'm going to save you a lot of time trying out different crazy diets and give you the drop of truth behind the mountain of bull shit.  OK, here goes:

Don't eat lots of any one thing.
Eat lots of different things.
Avoid processed foods.
Eat lots of plants.
If you need to add extra flavor to make it not taste repulsive then don't eat it.

OK?  That's it.  You want a good diet, there it is.  If you really want to get finicky some things that may have a hard to measure additional benefit:

Avoid weird chemicals (that's partially covered in not eating processed foods, but also means you avoid things with chemicals sprayed on or injected into them.)
Eat stuff as fresh as you can get it.

And to sum it all up in one simple concept: eat like a crazy forest hermit.

Elaboration:  eat like nature intended us to eat.  That's quite variable if you look at different 'primitive' peoples.  Extremely variable, depending on the environment.  But if you can understand and apply this principle in a non-insane way, you don't need any of the others.

There.  Now for god's sake stop giving people money to tell you fractions of this over the course of weeks and months and years and spend that time and money eating good food.