Can we be in love for a moment? I am lit with enthusiasm for life. Yes...I am excited , I have so much to achieve some or a lot will not get done, I am not sure what and it's not my business either way. Still I am happy in this moment, now here with you. I have moments of illumination when I remember that we never get it done, it's the journey not the destination. In fact I think the more sloppy and failure prone the luckier we are. Since lately I have been feeling a bit less glossy or glamorous a kind of anti Kimora Simmons. I can find the worth of being last or not so shiny.
My life is simple easy still at times I feel fragile or lost or foggy and unmotivated. I have been all of the above and still now I am buzzing with love and happy to be alive and tickled that the birds are singing, bees are buzzing and I can watch tennis and eat oatmeal and tell you all about it.
My life is complicated and yet is it really? No, my thinking of my life is complicated.
We do three things according to Byron Katie; We Stand , sit, or lie horizontal.
The rest is filled in "story"...gunk.
So in my wreck less wonder, or crazy hippy happy way, whatever we call it, I feel alive worthy and loved. No outward reason.
I wish the same for you today; Love, love and more love.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Friday, May 29, 2009
My brush with death
Driving to work late one morning from my lovely beach community at the end of summer. I was in my shiny black Mercedes sitting at a stop sign. I had rented a small shack on the water in a lovely seaside town called Birchbay. I was going into my second year there. I loved living in the border town. It was an hour away from my other house in Vancouver, Canada and from the set. I was filming the last season of a series called “Mysterious Ways”. Having the beach retreat allowed me to keep my days in the USA up (over 180 days) while I worked in Canada. Yes it was a tax thing but with a benefit. I got to live in a cool resort retirement community.
As I sat at the stop sign I noticed a big car coming down the road, medium speed.
I could have gone in front of it but something said wait. So I did. It passed me but as it did I made eye contact with the driver. He was an African American male, handsome and yet when our eyes met it was as if I was what? He looked at me like a hunter looks at prey. It sent a shiver down my spine.
As his car passed mine he snapped his neck to get a good look at me, he slowed his vehicle to a crawl. I waited a good moment or two before I pulled out after his car. I thought something was off, I felt weird. My community was pretty small and predominantly white (very tolerant and welcoming) still it was noticeable if someone of color was around. I noticed things like that being of color and I had not noticed him before. The driver was handsome with a medium size Afro (out of style). Having never seen the car or the driver before, he was acting weird, I was on alert. I could see that he was alone or so it seemed and he was was wearing a flak jacket. Being a border community that wasn’t unusual you would often see border agents wearing them. Normally there would be large white writing of some sort written across the chest, BORDER PATROL or DEA. It was not out of the norm to see a man wearing a flak vest. So immediately I think, he must be a new agent who has moved into the neighborhood.
I drive down the road. I can see that he had gotten out of his car. Okay I think "he’s creepy". I notice that he is lean, tall, he is wearing out of date polyester pants, his Afro and his clothes a throw back to the 70’s. He has on a collared shirt underneath the flak vest that is unusual and it's a blank vest no writing on it.
My intuition is on alert. alarms are now going off in my head.
No one from my area wear flak vests without writing, not even hunters. The local fish and game guys were obvious they wore camouflage,and they were out earlier. This guy was off, something wasn't right with him plus he had a lot of ordinance hanging off his body, too many bullets.
Standing outside his now parked car he watches my car coming and as if on cue I see that him begin to kick his tires as if he has a flat, only he doesn’t. He is pretending something is wrong. I can feel that he wants me to stop. Every part of my intuition is screaming "be careful" keep moving!
I pass him slowly…to double check his situation, just in case I am being paranoid.
I don’t see a problem except that he definitely wants me to slow or stop for him. He looks at me as I am passing and the feeling? Pure hate, evil, I felt chilled. So I put my foot to the gas and I speed away as fast as my car will go which being a Mercedes is fast. I look in the rear view mirror. He runs to get into his car. His car I notice is an American make maybe a Crown Victoria cop like, its a murky color it was retro like his style.
Speeding away I leave him in the dust. I make sure to turn on to different streets so I am hard to follow.
Two weeks later watching the news I see that car again. There were reports of a sniper on the East Coast killing people I didn’t pay too close attention I was working. Then the story broke wide when after murdering ten people all over the country the killers were apprehended caught by the authorities while sleeping at a truck stop. Then I saw a photo of the ‘Shooter” or one “the DC snipers” that’s the name they acquired. It was the same man in the flak jacket, the same guy from Birchbay. Apparently he and his accomplice spent the morning in a field (in Birchbay) target shooting nearby where I was living at the time. A morning spent shooting at stumps and apparently looking for victims. His target of choice, woman of color. Just like me. Just like the wife he was getting back at by killing innocent people.
Behind my street stood a very open large tract of land in fact the surrounding area was nothing but large tracts of land a perfect place to target shoot. He was living in a shelter in Seattle an hour and a half south of Birchbay. A disgruntled mentally deranged ex-military man who was living in a shelter, who spent his time training an underage child, a kid he had “adopted”in the art of combat, murder. That day they were looking for prey. His accomplice would lie prone in a special cubby they built inside the car that extended to the trunk. The kids name was Malvoy, a teenage boy from the Caribbean. The kid, stupid and impressed was being trained by Mohammad in his Mohammad's personal war on society. The kid with his eye in the scope of the high powered rifle lying in wait for anyone, for me. They had rigged the car so the gun aimed out of a small undetectable hole in the trunk. When I passed them slowly the car was parked with the trunk facing the road. Had I been a proper neighbor and stopped to check on the handsome man with “The problem” I would have been lined up exactly so the kid could get a clean shot at close range. Helping him would have been my last moment on Earth. Sends chills down my spine.
I would have never seen it coming. That’s how they got their victims…needing help. Once they had your attention they killed. Cowards, deranged men.
By that morning they had already shot killed and robbed three people. One victim a woman in Louisiana I bet she thought he was handsome too, like I did.
Apparently he was on a rampage to get revenge because his wife was successful in escaping from him and she was awarded full custody of their children. He was looking to kill her ultimately but he wanted to punish the world. So he made his way east looking for her, them. We trained this man. Our tax dollars paid for his military skills.
It is so horrible to think that I made eye contact with this killer. Something scary was in his eyes and I saw it, I felt it. I am alive because I followed my inner guidance to be on alert, to distrust him. I urge everyone to trust the senses, to trust your quiet self, that inner knowing. There are deeply confused individuals out there.
I read an article about the accomplice, Malvoy. It said that of the two he was not sentenced to death. He was sentenced to life with no parole. He lives in a cell where he is alone for 23 hours of the day. Apparently he cries most of the time. He caries for himself and apparently for the victims. I know this may sound terrible but he came across in the article as a simpleton, mentally challenged. I hope so. Mentally challenged he may not have had the ability to know things. To know that Mohammad was a crack pot, a psychotic killer. I feel sad for him , the same as I do for their victims. So it seems extra tragic that this idiot who killed along with this guy is rotting away in a cell. I believe he has gotten what he deserves he is a murderer. Still if he is mentally challenged it’s sad.
The boy sentenced as an adult crying all day in a cell for the rest of his life. Everything he did he did for love, harm for love, for the approval of his mentor.
We lack efficient means of diagnosing and treating people with mental health issues in the world and in this country particularly. Both of these men need and needed help before they went on the rampage. Killing innocent people is a heinous act and one that should be punished. Still I am sorry for everyone and I hope for their sake that these men are getting help. Don’t get me wrong they deserve their punishment. But I can’help think that our system our society failed everyone. Them and the people who were killed and their survivors. We all suffer.
We have a lot of mentally ill people walking around undiagnosed and unsupported. What’s really at issue here is that we need to address mental health and the science and in some cases the spiritual science that it is.
It’s imperative we give it attention, because it is an issue, as a society we need to give more time and money. We need a stronger network of helpers, doctors, nurses. We need more well funded clinics for people to go to and heal or not heal but still remain safe for themselves and society as a whole.
Had these men been diagnosed had many men and woman been diagnosed properly and lovingly cared for we might not be sitting here reeling in sorrow. I don’t wish anyone a brush with a serial killer. These “killers” are just like you and me only different. “They “demand our attention in the most destructive ways possible.
No more Virginia Techs, Columbines, Amish school house massacres…let’s create a society that cares for the lost, the broken and confused, let’s.
As I sat at the stop sign I noticed a big car coming down the road, medium speed.
I could have gone in front of it but something said wait. So I did. It passed me but as it did I made eye contact with the driver. He was an African American male, handsome and yet when our eyes met it was as if I was what? He looked at me like a hunter looks at prey. It sent a shiver down my spine.
As his car passed mine he snapped his neck to get a good look at me, he slowed his vehicle to a crawl. I waited a good moment or two before I pulled out after his car. I thought something was off, I felt weird. My community was pretty small and predominantly white (very tolerant and welcoming) still it was noticeable if someone of color was around. I noticed things like that being of color and I had not noticed him before. The driver was handsome with a medium size Afro (out of style). Having never seen the car or the driver before, he was acting weird, I was on alert. I could see that he was alone or so it seemed and he was was wearing a flak jacket. Being a border community that wasn’t unusual you would often see border agents wearing them. Normally there would be large white writing of some sort written across the chest, BORDER PATROL or DEA. It was not out of the norm to see a man wearing a flak vest. So immediately I think, he must be a new agent who has moved into the neighborhood.
I drive down the road. I can see that he had gotten out of his car. Okay I think "he’s creepy". I notice that he is lean, tall, he is wearing out of date polyester pants, his Afro and his clothes a throw back to the 70’s. He has on a collared shirt underneath the flak vest that is unusual and it's a blank vest no writing on it.
My intuition is on alert. alarms are now going off in my head.
No one from my area wear flak vests without writing, not even hunters. The local fish and game guys were obvious they wore camouflage,and they were out earlier. This guy was off, something wasn't right with him plus he had a lot of ordinance hanging off his body, too many bullets.
Standing outside his now parked car he watches my car coming and as if on cue I see that him begin to kick his tires as if he has a flat, only he doesn’t. He is pretending something is wrong. I can feel that he wants me to stop. Every part of my intuition is screaming "be careful" keep moving!
I pass him slowly…to double check his situation, just in case I am being paranoid.
I don’t see a problem except that he definitely wants me to slow or stop for him. He looks at me as I am passing and the feeling? Pure hate, evil, I felt chilled. So I put my foot to the gas and I speed away as fast as my car will go which being a Mercedes is fast. I look in the rear view mirror. He runs to get into his car. His car I notice is an American make maybe a Crown Victoria cop like, its a murky color it was retro like his style.
Speeding away I leave him in the dust. I make sure to turn on to different streets so I am hard to follow.
Two weeks later watching the news I see that car again. There were reports of a sniper on the East Coast killing people I didn’t pay too close attention I was working. Then the story broke wide when after murdering ten people all over the country the killers were apprehended caught by the authorities while sleeping at a truck stop. Then I saw a photo of the ‘Shooter” or one “the DC snipers” that’s the name they acquired. It was the same man in the flak jacket, the same guy from Birchbay. Apparently he and his accomplice spent the morning in a field (in Birchbay) target shooting nearby where I was living at the time. A morning spent shooting at stumps and apparently looking for victims. His target of choice, woman of color. Just like me. Just like the wife he was getting back at by killing innocent people.
Behind my street stood a very open large tract of land in fact the surrounding area was nothing but large tracts of land a perfect place to target shoot. He was living in a shelter in Seattle an hour and a half south of Birchbay. A disgruntled mentally deranged ex-military man who was living in a shelter, who spent his time training an underage child, a kid he had “adopted”in the art of combat, murder. That day they were looking for prey. His accomplice would lie prone in a special cubby they built inside the car that extended to the trunk. The kids name was Malvoy, a teenage boy from the Caribbean. The kid, stupid and impressed was being trained by Mohammad in his Mohammad's personal war on society. The kid with his eye in the scope of the high powered rifle lying in wait for anyone, for me. They had rigged the car so the gun aimed out of a small undetectable hole in the trunk. When I passed them slowly the car was parked with the trunk facing the road. Had I been a proper neighbor and stopped to check on the handsome man with “The problem” I would have been lined up exactly so the kid could get a clean shot at close range. Helping him would have been my last moment on Earth. Sends chills down my spine.
I would have never seen it coming. That’s how they got their victims…needing help. Once they had your attention they killed. Cowards, deranged men.
By that morning they had already shot killed and robbed three people. One victim a woman in Louisiana I bet she thought he was handsome too, like I did.
Apparently he was on a rampage to get revenge because his wife was successful in escaping from him and she was awarded full custody of their children. He was looking to kill her ultimately but he wanted to punish the world. So he made his way east looking for her, them. We trained this man. Our tax dollars paid for his military skills.
It is so horrible to think that I made eye contact with this killer. Something scary was in his eyes and I saw it, I felt it. I am alive because I followed my inner guidance to be on alert, to distrust him. I urge everyone to trust the senses, to trust your quiet self, that inner knowing. There are deeply confused individuals out there.
I read an article about the accomplice, Malvoy. It said that of the two he was not sentenced to death. He was sentenced to life with no parole. He lives in a cell where he is alone for 23 hours of the day. Apparently he cries most of the time. He caries for himself and apparently for the victims. I know this may sound terrible but he came across in the article as a simpleton, mentally challenged. I hope so. Mentally challenged he may not have had the ability to know things. To know that Mohammad was a crack pot, a psychotic killer. I feel sad for him , the same as I do for their victims. So it seems extra tragic that this idiot who killed along with this guy is rotting away in a cell. I believe he has gotten what he deserves he is a murderer. Still if he is mentally challenged it’s sad.
The boy sentenced as an adult crying all day in a cell for the rest of his life. Everything he did he did for love, harm for love, for the approval of his mentor.
We lack efficient means of diagnosing and treating people with mental health issues in the world and in this country particularly. Both of these men need and needed help before they went on the rampage. Killing innocent people is a heinous act and one that should be punished. Still I am sorry for everyone and I hope for their sake that these men are getting help. Don’t get me wrong they deserve their punishment. But I can’help think that our system our society failed everyone. Them and the people who were killed and their survivors. We all suffer.
We have a lot of mentally ill people walking around undiagnosed and unsupported. What’s really at issue here is that we need to address mental health and the science and in some cases the spiritual science that it is.
It’s imperative we give it attention, because it is an issue, as a society we need to give more time and money. We need a stronger network of helpers, doctors, nurses. We need more well funded clinics for people to go to and heal or not heal but still remain safe for themselves and society as a whole.
Had these men been diagnosed had many men and woman been diagnosed properly and lovingly cared for we might not be sitting here reeling in sorrow. I don’t wish anyone a brush with a serial killer. These “killers” are just like you and me only different. “They “demand our attention in the most destructive ways possible.
No more Virginia Techs, Columbines, Amish school house massacres…let’s create a society that cares for the lost, the broken and confused, let’s.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
The split
Trauma creates a unique response called "Splitting" where we separate our consciousness our awareness from the part of us we deem abused or guilty depending on the event. It is a rather distressing survival mechanism because we do this "splitting" off into segments unconsciously and it costs us because it's something that doesn't correct on it's own. No, we have to be aware we do this and we have to wrestle our selves back into wholeness. Not easy and impossible without assistance and if you feel like maybe you do this you should get help. One of the first clues is loss of time. We wake up in some cases years later going what have I just been doing? Often we go unassisted and we live entire lifetimes with little or no recollection of events past and it's tragic because awareness comes at the very end, stress filled.
Trauma, abuse anything we deem cataclysmic will set us apart will "split" us.
So if you suspect this is you get help. It is common and easily addressed.
Plus that feeling of "did I do something or say something wrong"? goes away.
We catch up with ourselves we no longer fear our actions.
Everyone deserves to be reunited, everyone deserves to feel safe.
Trauma, abuse anything we deem cataclysmic will set us apart will "split" us.
So if you suspect this is you get help. It is common and easily addressed.
Plus that feeling of "did I do something or say something wrong"? goes away.
We catch up with ourselves we no longer fear our actions.
Everyone deserves to be reunited, everyone deserves to feel safe.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
God of Carnage
Last night I was lucky I got to see the new play "God of Carnage" with James Gandolfini, Marcia Gay Harden, Hope Davis, and Jeff Daniels it was amazing, very funny and quite unsettling since it is a play centered around two couples brought together to discuss an "event" between their two boys with everyone at first on best behavior. It is often verbally violent mixed with high comedy. I was impressed by the play, great writing and confident staging. I was impressed by the audiences willingness to laugh at tough stuff and to not laugh at the right moments too. It exposes the truth of us and our needs and hopes which are often times cloaked in artifice. The need to be perfect and the needs which are not perfect but messy are on display. If you get to NYC and if you can try to see this 1.5 hours long therapy session/play called "God of Carnage".
I was seated next to an actor from the Sopranos who was tickled pink by the show and who laughed loudly...its hard (at first) but you do forget that the big guy on stage was once a hardened criminal on television that we fell in love with.
The play made me love humanity. We are flawed, so flawed but in our flaws we are perfection.
Genius.
I was seated next to an actor from the Sopranos who was tickled pink by the show and who laughed loudly...its hard (at first) but you do forget that the big guy on stage was once a hardened criminal on television that we fell in love with.
The play made me love humanity. We are flawed, so flawed but in our flaws we are perfection.
Genius.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Slender
There are a few affirmations that I enjoy I want to share them. I know it can be frustrating to do them, affirmations and it seems incredibly silly sometimes but I think they work. It feels as if they move brain matter or uplift our vibration. Vibrations beong everything...here are a few;
Divine intelligence gives me all the ideas I can use.
Everything I touch is a success.
There is plenty for everyone, including me.
There are plenty of customers for my services.
I establish a new awareness of success.
I move into the winning circle.
I am a magnet for Divine Prosperity.
I am blessed beyond my fondest dreams.
Riches are drawn to me.
Golden opportunities are everywhere for me.
Affirmations by;
Louise Hay from her book "you can heal your life"
I love these they have been my companions.
It seems so simplistic to do these affirmations but I think if we are deeply honest they are complex and difficult to truly believe and use.
It is takes small inner adjustments to reach our goals.
Tiny little movements upward in vibration.
...take it one affirmation at a time try to do them all day.
Then tell me how it felt/feels...I want to know.
We are loved, we are deeply adored.
Divine intelligence gives me all the ideas I can use.
Everything I touch is a success.
There is plenty for everyone, including me.
There are plenty of customers for my services.
I establish a new awareness of success.
I move into the winning circle.
I am a magnet for Divine Prosperity.
I am blessed beyond my fondest dreams.
Riches are drawn to me.
Golden opportunities are everywhere for me.
Affirmations by;
Louise Hay from her book "you can heal your life"
I love these they have been my companions.
It seems so simplistic to do these affirmations but I think if we are deeply honest they are complex and difficult to truly believe and use.
It is takes small inner adjustments to reach our goals.
Tiny little movements upward in vibration.
...take it one affirmation at a time try to do them all day.
Then tell me how it felt/feels...I want to know.
We are loved, we are deeply adored.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Exchange
Growing up I could list in long colorful details everything I felt was done to me by my Dad. As if he was supposed to be this tower of perfection the redefinition of Fatherhood. I was so upset that I had this guy as my Dad and yet I adored him like mad. Still do, I miss him when I don’t see him and I am in agony when I do see him or hear about him and it’s something he has done some crime committed that just irks me just throws me off my game. If he wasn’t so important to me I wouldn’t hang on his every action as if it mattered. Someone once said to me when I had given my father a wide berth (years) of space. They said you will miss him when he goes (dies) more then you will know and it will haunt you so get over what ever you have between him and love him. I forgot to call him on his birthday and it has really caused him and me pain. In truth it was his pain of having to remind me that it was his birthday that I felt. It is one thing to hate a person for their very being but not mean it (I never did mean it) it is another thing to really see that in deed I do affect him and it is to the quick so to speak.
AGH… fathers why is it that it is this lightening rod of “stuff” of history and it is so meaningful?
I am deeply grateful Tommy Chong is my father . His behavior growing up and as recent as yesterday has shaped me. It has helped me see my own deep wounds and faults which are many. And he has taught me tolerance., I love this guy and his imperfections. He is THE BEST father for me and I love him.
Happy Birthday daddy you are a sweet spot in my heart, my delight… my beloved.
AGH… fathers why is it that it is this lightening rod of “stuff” of history and it is so meaningful?
I am deeply grateful Tommy Chong is my father . His behavior growing up and as recent as yesterday has shaped me. It has helped me see my own deep wounds and faults which are many. And he has taught me tolerance., I love this guy and his imperfections. He is THE BEST father for me and I love him.
Happy Birthday daddy you are a sweet spot in my heart, my delight… my beloved.
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Spew
The other day while playing tennis we took a break and for some reason we started telling war stories about our most embarrassing drunk moments. It was a lot of barfing and other distasteful bodily fluid loss in public or sort of public places. What was the most endearing thing for me was how generous everyone was and how unembarrassed we all were. It is natural to make mistakes, it is normal to over do it. I was and am so proud I know women who are so relaxed and comfortable about being imperfect. There was something else, it made me love each of them in deeper way. Okay , I am not encouraging people to over do it. I just think we need some times to be let off the hook. We get so driven to perfection that it prevents inner forgiveness of ourselves. I know for me I don’t trust someone who has never lost control. I am suspect of the person who keeps it all together 100% of the time. Where is the courage to “die” metaphorically, because whether it is with a substance like booze or hallucinogenics, illness or a temporary loss of sanity we all need to hike in the dark mountains of unknowing in order to find order, If you ask me. You are saying, why? Or disagreeing? Seriously if you keep everything together how will you know to trust life or God or what have you? Because when it all hits the fan and stuff happens, fans get hit…we need to know we can fly, or land or make it and or still be respectable.
Try it…tell someone or two, just make sure it is people you like in an appropriate place something you may have thought too embarrassing to share and share it. It’s amazing but it will not kill you and shock of ages, they too will probably come clean about something just as embarrassing and guess what? We get to discover everyone has moments. I am not saying blurt a spew story to your boss over the copy machine , not good.
No, I mean in a circle of chatter when everyone isn’t itching to be some where else and it’s just organic to share.
Being human is liberating and being imperfect Divine.
Try it…tell someone or two, just make sure it is people you like in an appropriate place something you may have thought too embarrassing to share and share it. It’s amazing but it will not kill you and shock of ages, they too will probably come clean about something just as embarrassing and guess what? We get to discover everyone has moments. I am not saying blurt a spew story to your boss over the copy machine , not good.
No, I mean in a circle of chatter when everyone isn’t itching to be some where else and it’s just organic to share.
Being human is liberating and being imperfect Divine.
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