It All Took A Courageous Human

It’s been gradually coming into my awareness that Human Penny has still had quite a few protective guards up and monitoring disciplines in place. I remind her over and over again that everything is okay, she did nothing wrong ever, and even when she’s scared, that she just needs to breathe and to trust herself that it will all be all right—“Just let the guards and self-monitors go, Hon.”

Sometimes I’d get exasperated with her moments of what my Human Mind considers her human weaknesses and flaws. I ask myself, “Is there an ending to this in the near future? It’s been a long, hard haul (and that’s putting it lightly).” It’s actually been a passage through hell and high water—all the while being handicapped further by a severe case of amnesia.

I keep telling myself, None of it really matters, there’s nothing you have to do or prove, no one who needs saving. You don’t need to figure out a purpose for simply being alive—whatever you choose to do, or be, doesn’t have to have any deeper meaning to it other than you’re exploring it for the fun of it—just because.

Years ago, back in the early days of hearing that voice of God within myself, I was having trouble with a lot of guilt and shame in myriad aspects of my life—some of it surrounding sex and sensuality, most of it basically having to do with a simple human pleasure of any kind.

The inner voice that told me I was going to have to learn to unconditionally love myself first before I was going to be able to do it with anyone else, is the same one that said, “Penny—in those moments when you’re feeling or thinking or doing something you’re ashamed of—Put Me There! Don’t hide yourself away from me in your shame. Put Me there with you."

Of all the things! Like I needed an AUDIENCE! But Human Me courageously took the leap and tried it out--and discovered that it lightened the load I was carrying. I discovered it was more fun when I allowed myself to enjoy myself without so much guilt plastered to every little bit of pleasure in life. From then on it was pretty much, “Okay, God, here I am in my bare-nakedness. I’m done playing Hide and Seek with you. Now what?”

Jesus reminded me, “Love your enemies.” I’ve come to define an enemy as being someone or something that I’m struggling with—trying to overcome. Thus my greatest enemy has been myself—my Human Mind/Ego. Out of fear and frustration and in blindness, I once thought I had to kill her off or force her into her proper place. I’ve discovered the only way to come to terms with her is to go back through all my moments with her and unconditionally love her by appreciating that Human Mind and Being who struggled so long and so hard to get Me here.

I have gums pushed so far back from overbrushing that my teeth are sensitive. I have a scar on my right cheek from overdoing it with a zit treatment back in high school. I had a severely disfigured shoulder and spine from hauling a bookbag filled with large textbooks around all throughout my schooling career. My Human Mind was doing everything she knew how to keep me healthy, perfect, alive and accepted--and she even used guilt and shame to keep me getting up in the mornings when I'd all but given up.

Back in those days, I didn't have the understandings and insights that I carry with me now. Back then I didn't even know how to simply breathe and I certainly didn't trust myself. I used to be so rigid, so pulled in, so scared, and so worthless feeling, so powerless in even my own life. I can still feel, in memory, what that was like.

And just yesterday, I was feeling ashamed of what I did to my teeth and gums and cheek--berating my Human Mind for "going overboard" in the judgments of myself. But in the beginning of all of this, my Human was all I knew I had available.

Throughout all these years of trying to stay connected to the God Within Me—to bring that part out and into the forefront of this human experience, I forgot for a bit that the only reason I AM present NOW is because a COURAGEOUS, FRIGHTENED, ALL-ALONE FEELING HUMAN relentlessly, lovingly kept knocking on doors, inviting God in and out to play with her.

I’ve heard that God/Our Divinity will never force itself on us—it waits compassionately for us to knock on the door or invite it in and then once we make that first move it reaches in and pulls us through.

This final chapter is in loving honor of Human Me—the one banging on the doors, the walls, the ceilings, the floors, the limits…I’m proud of you in all your ways along the way…YOU DID IT!!!

And don't worry anymore about the gums, the cheek or any of that other stuff--it's all okay--REALLY, there's not anything wrong with any part of me. Trust me, we'll see this is so.

It's time, Penny--LET'S DANCE!!!

My Awakening

I was driving home from the grocery store a couple of weeks ago when it struck me that Home/Heaven for me was here on Earth—that to return to where I originated from would seem empty and colorless. I gazed around me, remembering how amazing it is to be able to touch and to feel and to behold all that I love—that even the searing pain of losing a loved one was worth it all.

I recognized the truth for me of that old adage: It is better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all. While I know love is always present, regardless of the realm, it’s in this physical body that I get to witness and experience it in action. I have a sense of that being priceless.

That was a huge shift in perspective for me—especially having so recently lost someone so precious to me yet once again.

This time I’ve decided to walk through this whole loss to death thing in a new way. I’ve realized that the old platitudes and approaches aren’t enough for me. I don’t give a crap about the four steps of the grieving process, and I’m sick of believing it all as unchangeable just because of millennia of unquestioning acceptance that “that is the way it is.”

I’ve heard others say over and over again that they can’t wait to die in order to be reunited with their dead loved ones. But that’s not making sense to me. If I’m looking forward to getting this life over with, then am I truly enjoying and living the life--the gift of experience--that I have right now?

After losing enough people in my life to make it easy for me to let go and die myself, there’s something strange going on—I’m still here, and I’m not suicidal.

And I remember the story of Job in the Old Testament—the man lost everyone and everything dear to him to the point that this God-favored man got outright angry with God, with his circumstances. Platitudes and mental rationing (why and how this could happen to him, what he “needed to fix” about himself, how “he should be”, even sympathy) didn’t mean squat to him—none of the old ways and perspectives mattered to him. He got authentic and honest with himself—let his perception of the moral rightness and wrongness of everything go. And in the end, he lived--and what he’d initially lost was restored, but way better than what he had before he lost it all--because his experiences enriched all of what was once just airy, insubstantial concept. That story encourages me to awaken each morning with hope.

And then there’s Jesus. He died and yet he lived—and he also said that those who came after him would do “all these things and more.” So I’m standing here, hopping up and down, my arms waving wildly, yelling, “Pick me! Pick me!”

And then it occurs to me that really I’m the ONLY ONE who can pick me for the job. And so I have.

In Ecclesiastes, the poet came to the conclusion that there was a time for everything under the sun. In other words—my own words—every way IS a WAY TO BE. Each form of love in action provides us with insights and understandings inconceivable in any other way.

I believe these stories of life after a physical death stay in our world for thousands of years just maybe because there is a truth in them. And frankly, I’ve got nothing to lose in exploring their possibility of being a reality today—for me, they represent hope for my own enjoyment of this life, to create and to be my own unique Heaven on Earth.

I’m not willing to just get through another day without being able to connect with Molly. That death wound for the Little Human never truly heals with just the passage of time—the emptiness ache is still there, and sometimes it’s knife-sharp pain.

I still talk to my parents and to Arlen. My relationship with each of them has continued to evolve and expand just as much as it has with those around me who are alive.

In the past twenty plus years, I’ve had all kinds of dreams of interacting with those who have crossed the Veil. But during the dreams my heartache was horrendous because my mind would get in the way and remind me that they were “really dead and that I had to accept and get used to that.”

So instead of enjoying the moments I had with them, regardless of the dimension I was in, I was miserable at the prospect of knowing they would be gone soon. And I’d awaken to this world in a state of deep sadness. I hated those mornings after—despair hung around me like a cloud.

When I remember the look in Molly’s eyes that last day with her and the many things she communicated to me intuitively and physically, I KNOW that despair is NOT what she wanted for me. She wasn’t dying in order to hurt me beyond being able to breathe again—she was reaching out, touching me, showing me moment by moment how much she enjoyed her life with me and how much she loved me. And it seemed important to her that I recognize that she was choosing that path in order to help me go beyond—to help me transcend death.

Molly and Max came into my life when I first began to make choices to live my life my own way—and they have played supportive roles through this whole process I look at as being my awakening to remembering who I really am.

The roles I’ve acted out and felt stuck in for so long are just dramatic scripts that I’ve immersed myself in for awhile in order to understand the energies and concepts we think of as LIFE. But ultimately, they were all just roles; no one acting part was completely reflective of all that I am.

And my two precious furry friends continue to support me—Molly on one side of the Veil of Forgetting, and her brother Max with me on this side. I’ve seen her twice in dreams—and she’s very much alive and well. Max leaves wet food in the dish for her to clean up each morning like he always did when she was alive.

The only time he didn’t leave food for her was the last day she was alive. She could only lick up and swallow the gravy, so he’d come by afterwards and clean out the drier remains left in their bowl--this was completely opposite of their usual way of eating together. When she was gone, he then reverted back to leaving a bit in the bowl for her.

Max also seems to allow her to use his body as a way to touch me—he’s done “Molly acts.” One night he lay next to me on the couch with his paws draped over my legs like Molly used to. And he now sits on Kel’s lap in the evenings like his sister used to, but only after looking me in the eyes to make sure I know that he’s sharing himself with both of us.

In moments, my heart still hurts with her not being here teasing me, scratching on my calf for butter or traipsing towards me with that smile—whiskers on a lady never looked more darling. And I’m not always certain which aspect of myself is running this particular show. Sometimes I wonder about letting myself wail out my grief like the gypsies and just immersing myself in feeling it all until the emotions are spent. Would it somehow release me? I’ve moved a great deal of pain through and out of myself that way in the recent past.

And sometimes I wonder if maybe I should just stay calm and watchful and keep my drama queen in check. Always I’m reminding myself, Molly’s right here—she never really did die—this is all just illusion, after all. And if that’s so, then HOW DO I want to walk this journey between her seeming to leave and her being here?

I see how Max allows himself to continue to enjoy his days on Earth and he works to make us laugh, too. I talk to Molly and tell her I’m watching for her—that I’m open to all of us being together again soon—and I’ve no idea how that looks. But I choose to explore the possibility that I don’t have to die in order to be reunited with her. I’ve got nothing to lose—I don’t care if I look foolish, and I don’t care about having a reputation.

And I hope it’s here—that Heaven is here on Earth wherever I am, for me…and wherever you are, for you…

Because when this is all said and done, it's truly been an honor...

My Last Waltz with Dad

This was a night of Hell on Earth for everyone involved, and I wanted so much to be able to make it all never to have happened in the first place. But that wasn't the way it was to be. Like Jesus with his beloved friend Lazarus, I had to experience coming on the scene shortly after the death of one, and then feel and see myself and others go through pain I wouldn't wish upon anyone...

All of it just to learn to let go of control and allow the story the freedom to arrange and transform itself to play out for the good for all of us...

This one is still transforming for me, nearly eight years later...

It was the last week in August, 2005. I was home in Minneapolis feeling a bit sad. I’d just remembered a phone conversation I’d had with Dad sometime in the months before he died. After Mom died, he and I usually talked with one another every Sunday.

On this particular Sunday, he told me he’d gone to a wedding dance in Ludlow and had danced with my sister, Laurie, and his granddaughter, Renae. He then said he was sure sad that I wasn’t there, too—that he’d missed the chance to dance with me. Our favorite was the waltz.

I remember feeling a bit choked up at the time, and in an attempt to head off a really painful moment for the two of us that I didn’t want to tarnish the little joy he’d recently had, I chimed in, “Oh, that’s okay, Dad. I’m so glad you got the chance to dance with Laurie and Renae.”

Two years later, here I was remembering that exchange, finally allowing myself to feel the pain of the loss of that last waltz with him.

A few days later I was on the highway alone, headed to Laurie and Terry’s place to spend a little time visiting them and other family, and taking in a football game that my nephews were playing.

On September 3rd, the two-year anniversary of my last night with my dad, I was heading back to Laurie and Terry’s after having spent part of a joy-filled day with my oldest brother and his family and part of it with my brother Steve. As I passed the turn-off where Arlen had been killed, two guys on motorcycles passed me, causing me to think of him and that night, and finding myself grateful that I’d arrive at Laurie’s before it was dark. Deer were in the ditches and I was especially vigilant about not driving after dark.

As I rounded the curve at the North Dakota/South Dakota border, I found myself talking to Dad sharing my joy of the day with him. I glanced at the clock and noted it was nearly eight o’clock. A few moments later I saw a wavery, dark-gray haze moving across the highway a mile or so in front me, on the north face of a hill known as Microwave Tower Hill.

As I drew closer, I noticed a man was standing in the middle of the highway waving his arms to flag me down. I pulled to the shoulder, taking in the glint of a motorcycle off to the side, and realized it was the guys who had passed me earlier. As I stopped the car and got out, he ran up to me and asked if I had a cell phone, which I didn’t.

I started following him and realized they’d hit a deer and that one of the men, his brother, was sprawled across the center of the highway, and motorcycle parts and deer parts were strewn across both lanes. I got about three feet away from the man lying on the highway, didn’t notice any movement from him and found the question, “Is he dead?” choked off somewhere between my heart and my vocal cords. I couldn’t bring myself to voice it.

And then we heard the roar of another vehicle, not visible yet, but approaching from over the top of the south side of the hill. We rushed into the middle of the lane, waving our arms trying to stop the truck. But the engine never slowed, and I remember grabbing the guy’s shoulder to signal him to jump off the road with me, keeping my back turned away and bracing for the sound of the impact as the truck ran over the downed biker. As his brother yelled and screamed his frustration beside me, another vehicle sped by, never stopping.

Shock took over—it would take me days to remember the second vehicle whipping by without stopping. I realized I needed to turn on my emergency flashers on the car, and as I started down the road in that direction, the passenger in the first truck met me. They’d pulled over at the first approach and he’d walked back to help—never realized that their truck had run over a human being. They thought it was a motorcycle part--parts were strewn all over the highway, as I explained earlier, and the man was clothed in black, pretty much invisible. I didn't even know he was there until I'd gotten out of my car. I knew the occupants of the truck, they were friends of the family—and my heart just dropped.

I ran across the highway to turn on the flashers, but even though I had noted gratefully how easy they were to find when we bought the car, I couldn’t see them. In the meantime, a truck pulling a horsetrailer came from the direction I had, and we managed to get them stopped in time. The husband and wife, with a daughter named Hope, helped turn on my lights and stayed near me, and one-by-one, traffic was stopped both directions and emergency vehicles began arriving.

I remember making the conscious choice at the time to walk through this whole accident with compassion for myself instead of the self-criticism of what I “should have done.” I didn’t know I was on the scene of an accident until I’d left the car, and then things just unfurled in a matter of seconds of time.

Once we had someone managing traffic from both directions, his brother went over and sat down next to the man on the highway—and told me the story of why they were out riding that late. He was blaming himself, but I finally knew by that time that it was important to express those thoughts and feelings in order to release them, no matter how painful, or seemingly misdirected. So I kept my mouth shut and my hand on his shoulder, and let him vent his pain.

Human angels came out of the prairie that dark and tragic night. One man came forward and suggested he help move the brother over to the side of the road. Another vehicle drove slowly through offering first aid and use of their phone. A school friend who was a member of the fire department took the time to give me a comforting hug as he went about his duties. And yet another friend came to keep an eye out for me until I’d talked to the sheriff, and then she and her husband delivered me and my car to Laurie and Terry’s that night.

Laurie and Terry’s house reminded me of a lighthouse that night as we drove up. I remember needing to shower right away to rinse the smells and the tastes of that scene off of me. Ever seemingly present at times I needed her the most, Laurie was there to go for a walk with me in order to move and clear some energies in yet another way.

My sister-in-law had given me a pair of cute red flip-flops that day, and after wearing them that night I couldn’t bring myself to go near them. I ended up throwing them in the dump, but what I really wanted to do was to burn them.

I was concerned for the friend who was driving the truck that ran over the biker, so I finally mustered up the courage to call him the next morning. It was then that I found out that his wife was driving—that’s why he’d looked especially heartsick at the scene. They didn't know they'd run over a person (albeit, I'm certain the man had already left his body by then) until the highway patrol came to their door later that night.

When I called, he was grateful, because his wife was understandably horrified by it and having a hell of a time. Plus, like me, I'm sure they were both in a state of shock yet, too.

That Sunday morning after, Terry drove down the highway to have a neighbor familiarize him with the layout of some land and access routes for fighting prairie fires, should the need arise. Terry told me afterwards that he’d driven that highway all those years, never noticing until that morning that there was a blind spot as one descended the hill that kept a driver from seeing all the way to the bottom.

By then, I also realized that both brothers and I had been clothed in black, and that against the fairly new-topped black highway, we would have been invisible in the hours of dusk.

Armed with these few facts, I made myself get in my car a few days later and drive into town to see the driver of the truck. Understandably, she admitted she wasn’t so sure she wanted to talk with me when she saw me walking up to her home. But once we got to talking and sharing our versions with each other, we both found it helped answer mercifully a lot of scary questions.

She was actually a hero. She was the one who’d made the emergency call and gotten help to the scene—using a dead cell phone. She said she almost didn't take it with them that night on their way to town for supper because it was uncharged, but she remembered hearing a story about battered women who were given old cell phones, because 911 calls could still be made on them.

While her husband walked back to where we were, she stayed with the vehicle and proceeded to flash her lights on and off (she couldn’t find her flashers either, but got creative). I’m pretty sure she was instrumental in getting the traffic stopped behind me.

Our conversation took a turn down memory lane and we got on the subject of my parents. She began telling me about attending a wedding dance shortly after the death of her first husband. She said she hadn’t wanted to go, but that the parents of the bride were good friends of hers so she endured the pain of watching couples dancing by in front of her.

A man came by—my Dad—and invited her to dance a waltz with him. She told him she didn’t know how, but he encouraged her that they could still give it a try. She told me, “I don’t know if I could ever do it again, but I think we actually did pretty good. I felt like Cinderella in the middle of the floor, surrounded by all these people…”

When I remember that awful, tragic night—this story, my last waltz with my dad, is at the forefront...

It gives me hope that no story, no matter how dark, is ever complete until it takes a turn for the good…and I hope the story of that night for my beloved friend and her husband, and for those two brothers, is one of those, as well...

My beloved friends, please keep your hearts and minds open to new possibilities--miracles. This didn't happen in order to punish any of us. For me, it was another step towards opening the doors beyond the old story illusion called Death. As well as a chance for me to actually practice the art of SELF-COMPASSION that was then naturally expressed as compassion for all the others.

With love and gratitude, Harry and Edward...

P.S. Less than two years later in May, on our way to my nephew's graduation, my husband and I were driving down the same highway in broad sunny daylight around 1:30 in the afternoon. We passed a caravan of motorcycles and a Jimmy pulling a trailer parked on the side of the road exactly where I'd parked that fateful night. It felt too coincidental for both of us, so we turned around about a mile past to backtrack and ask if they were somehow connected with the motorcyclists that night. Even with knowing they were there, we couldn't actually see them until we were actually upon the site on the other side of that little dip and rise in the highway. And the cyclists knew nothing of the accident. They had stopped to do repairs on one of the bikes.

I've decided that miracles and gifts are all around me--I just have to keep my heart and eyes open.............


Another P.S. In 2008, Kel and I experienced our own personal collision with a deer at night. We were unharmed, but our pick-up warranted a trip to the body shop. We were in the middle of nowhere, couldn't find the deer, but called in and reported the accident. A week later I picked up our truck from the shop and drove it straight home. That night, Kelly was called into work on an emergency. As he backed out of the garage he noticed the clock read 1:11 am, and that the odometer read 111,111.11 miles. In numerology, the number "one" means "new beginnings"...

Click on the following links to read posts related to this one:
Can Death Be Transcended?
In Loving Memory and Honor...Arlen
With Love, Dad...

Can Death Be Transcended?

This gift of a world of experience that God/Source gave me turned into a harsh, cruel world for me sometime in my early childhood. One of our dogs gave birth to a litter of puppies that was put in a gunnysack and drowned in the creek right after birth. It was done from an intention of doing the right and compassionate thing, because too many dogs in the context of that time and place equaled a pack that could wipe out a neighbor’s entire pasture of livestock.

But I didn’t understand that at the time—not that any rationalization mattered. All I knew were my own feelings of devastation, along with the mother’s, at the loss of all of that playful life. It’s the only time I recall of ever running away from home--which was to a place in the currant bushes a few trees into the shelter belt closest to the house--where I bawled out my distress and pain.

In looking back, it was one of those life-influencing moments where the door to the magic land closed. The new portal that was opened and that I’ve been exploring ever since is the one where the pre-dominant belief has been, “This is a cruel world and this is what you do to survive in it…and some of the things you have to do, you’re not going to like…but that’s life…that’s just the way it is…”

So, my question is, and has been all along: Can death be transcended? I really desire to know that it truly can. My own death doesn’t scare me, but losing my loved ones to death scares the hell out of me. I’m so tired of it. Eleven days ago I was done writing because death came calling at my doorstep once again and hit me where it could hurt the most. I literally lost it all for awhile. I couldn’t seem to get myself centered in the present moment and then I got a cold like I haven’t had in years and I just torpedoed into crazy land.

But, here I am, writing, getting centered, telling myself out loud over and over again, “I am that I am!!! I AM that I AM!!! Telling myself to trust that part of me that “knows” this experience is going somewhere that I truly don’t want to miss out on. So, at the risk of showing to the world how big a fool I can be, I’m writing everything down. I don’t know where this will lead. I only have the sense that it’s going to take a few postings and this first one will be a long one.

Part of this past week has been a process of becoming aware of all the voices that I’ve been listening to: mass consciousness, my own aspects, parents, teachers, preachers, any of the people around me at a given time, my “I am” voice, to name a few. This week one of those aspect voices came screaming to the forefront. She’s been pulling on my strings for a very long time, sometimes quietly, sometimes raging. And I’ve worked long and hard to try to quiet her, even avoid her, but she won’t shut up. I will call her Pure Desolation, a.k.a. All-Aloneness.

July 21, 1984: That’s the night Penny Lee Lewton died. Yes, my heart continued beating and my brain waves, waving—but while my biology kept on going, something intrinsically me died that night. I’m not sure what to call it even. I just lost HER.

That’s the night I returned home from a night out (the night from Hell) with my cousin and a friend of ours in Baker, MT. Pat had invited me to ride along with him—he was going over to have Brenda, our barber friend, cut his hair. Earlier, I had called Arlen to see if he’d go with me to the movie “Sixteen Candles” that was showing in town but he declined because he’d taken the weekend off from his job to help his family with harvest.

I felt a bit hurt and angry with him—this would later turn into the guilt trip (yes, from Hell) that lasted me decades—but decided I’d ride along with Pat for something to do. His staying home to help the family by working was a noble thing—I was being frivolous and irresponsible and demanding. It took me well over 25 years to realize that I’d actually offered Arlen a different path that night—but no, I had to view myself as a selfish little bastard instead, and punish myself accordingly.

We got to Baker, and Brenda cut Pat’s hair, after which we went to one of the bars for a drink. It seemed we just set foot in the bar when some inebriated guy took a shine to me. I tried convincing him that I was unavailable—even tried passing Pat off as my boyfriend—but the guy didn’t buy it and continued making advances.

We finally left Baker and on the drive home all I remember is thinking over and over to myself--I can’t wait to get home to Arlen. I can’t wait to get home to Arlen…
But when Pat pulled the car up in our driveway, Dad, Mom, Laurie and Dave stood outside the back door on the steps waiting for me.

I don’t remember the exact words, only that Dad told me Arlen had been hit by a car and killed while crossing the highway on his motorcycle on his way home from the field.

All I remember is screaming over and over into the night, “No-oooo! No-ooo…” For once, I didn’t give a shit what the neighbors or anyone thought.

And it’s the one night I experienced my solid, strong but gentle mom completely left hanging out there, not knowing how she was going to console or pick up the broken being that was her daughter.

Mom knew all too well the pain of losing loved ones to death. Her own rock-of-the-family mother had died when Mom was 19—only six weeks after she and Dad got married. Her youngest brother shot himself after being left paralyzed from an auto accident—he’d also been in his twenties. She’d also lost her only sister to cancer in the early 1970s.

After this night we had in common an experience neither of us ever wished on anyone—ever. But the damn thing called Death keeps happening.

Laurie slept in my bed alongside me those first few nights. I felt SO ALONE in my loss of Arlen. And when I think of it, we all uniquely experience the loss just as we do the life—no one’s is greater, just different and the only of its kind.

Mornings were Hell—one more day to get through, one day further away from touching Arlen. I just wanted to be held by him, but it wasn’t happening. I just wanted to be held, but I didn’t know how to ask for it. I was terrified of forgetting with the passage of time, the smallest detail of the moments we had shared.

I was aware that I was an aching reminder to Arlen’s family of the void left by Arlen’s death, though they were so good to me. I was painfully aware that I was a reminder to my own brother of the best friend he’d lost. Tim and Cheri and Arlen and I had done everything together. They had set us up and were with us on our first date. I couldn’t give Tim his best friend back. It almost felt as though he’d entrusted me with something priceless and I’d screwed up and lost it all, for all of us.

I felt like a walking bomb of pain that people tolerated—that I no longer really fit in anywhere. At least, not in the places I had when I was a part of the twosome called Arlen and Penny.

Christmas was Hell. Everyone around me kept on with their traditions, lives, families—but my celebrating had stopped. And I couldn’t find the words to express it—it just moldered away inside of me. I had no future, no partner, no children—I was in the world, but for all intents and purposes, I was dead at twenty.

I know I walked around with a scowl etched on my face. I was angry as hell with God, believing He was punishing me for not loving Arlen enough by taking him away from me. You know, “Nip that emerging tyrant in the bud.”

I remember likening the whole experience to feeling as though I’d been thrown face-down into a pile of gravel with a hand at the back of my head pressing and grinding my face in deeper.

I don’t remember confiding many of these things to the people around me—maybe some I did—but much of it I kept to myself, mainly because I had no words.

I SO DID NOT take Arlen’s death gracefully, in any way, shape or form. But I kept my most tortured parts of myself to myself.

After all, according to the belief of the time, sacrificing one’s own happiness for that of another was what it was all about. So I moved forward choosing to enslave myself in what was a distorted form of service to the never-ending supply of wounded ones outside of me, all in an attempt to keep Pure Desolation, who resided inside me, from feeling All-Alone. She just wanted to be held…

Maybe, just maybe, everything will be alright…I’m hoping that’s where I’m headed with all this…

For more about Arlen click to access the following post: In Loving Memory and Honor...Arlen

Just Breathe and Receive…

“You’re such a good girl!” My landlady would tell me this the few times I delivered some homemade caramel rolls to her and her sister who lived across the hall from us. They were elderly, and so very kind to Kel and me.

Kel used to mimic her, taunting me about being so nice all the time—yes, it made me get flashy eyes. I was trying so hard to do the right thing all the time, and then I’d get teased about it and I’d question my sincerity and motive for doing and saying the things I did.

I’ve spent most of my life trying to be a good fellow being, to leave the world having done some good in it. I tried so hard to do it as perfectly as I could, but never quite succeeded—ever. At least not according to my ego’s expectations.

I’ve been writing quite a bit on Facebook, as well as here—and in the last week I’ve found myself worrying about my use of cuss words in both places. My mom and dad didn’t raise me to use them at all—and I have to admit, the urge has been very strong to go back through all my comments and posts and either delete them entirely or edit out the naughty words.

I reread through them, cringing, but I haven’t allowed myself to delete any of it. Authenticity is important to me.

And sometimes I admittedly can’t resist using a little bit of shock and awe in my writings and speech. I know the occasional cuss word is probably not likely to gain me any more followers, but I sure have fun whipping one out every now and then.

My eighty-plus-year-old great aunt told me that a friend of hers (the widow of a medical doctor) said that cussing was a good way to lower blood pressure. So I observed my aunt relishing with joy, the flinging of expletives to her heart’s delight—and the delight was simply in doing something she’d never allowed herself to even try before. She wouldn’t quite go as far as the “F” word, but “shit” and “damn” were a “hell” of a lot of fun!

So every time I allow myself to go there, it frees something up in me, and I shift out of taking myself so seriously and, instead, start laughing at the things in life that sometimes have me feeling baffled, stymied, paralyzed, powerless. Funny what a naughty word can do.

As a little kid, some of my favorite moments were when my older brothers let me join them and their high school friends in their bedroom as they shared stories—many of them funny. It was so much fun, that as we all gathered around the kitchen table for a meal with everyone afterwards, I decided to try my own hand at making everyone laugh.

I lean over my plate trying to smother my giggle at the hilarity of it all and say, “Aw-Ugh! I think I’m going to throw up!” I burst out laughing and look around the table expecting to see the works holding their sides, only to be met with unbearable silence and discomfort.

Then Dad gives me a stern, disgusted, disappointed-in-you look and says quietly, “Pen, we don’t talk like that at the table.”

So, my moment as a comedian was extremely short-lived. But that little girl with the questionable taste in humor still pops embarrassingly forth every now and again. I love her and she still makes me grin in the moment, but sometimes, afterwards, I just want to shrink and sink into the ground and pretend she didn’t say what she just said.

I’ve had many a way-less-than-stellar moment—more than I care to remember, much less record for the world to see here. I have a deep-seated fear that it’ll cause people to reject me, not want to be with me.

A few nights ago I had the best dream:

Basically, LOVE was here to be with me. Love was symbolized as a beloved man in my life who I found myself barking with laughter with because I was so over-joyed to finally be together.

But, in the dream, I had just awakened from a night’s sleep and I found myself wanting to get cleaned up before we spent the rest of the day together. So I leave to “take care of business” only to find that there are other people along the way who have issues that I decide I need to help out first—some are dealing with releasing old hurts, others are dealing with their perception of lack of abundance.

My beloved had given me a gift—a pair of earrings—but I didn’t take the time to put them on. I was saving them until I was dressed up enough for them.

Ultimately, I never get my own releasing or cleaning up done and return to find that my loved one is going away for a bit. But just as my heart sinks at the prospect of him not staying with me, he reaches across the table to grasp my wrist to let me know that he’s not leaving me again--that his intention is to stay with me, to be with me for the rest of time.

I keep remembering that conversation I had with God years ago when I’d pleaded for help with the whole judging my neighbor thing. That voice within had said, “Penny—love yourself unconditionally FIRST. And the rest will then be easy.”

As the dream showed, I’ve been spending all this time FIRST loving everyone and everything outside of me, trying to make myself worthy of unconditional love.

I wasn’t allowing myself to receive the gift of it—symbolized by my not putting the earrings on the moment I unwrapped them.

It seems like an oxy-moron kind of thing: by its very definition, I don’t have to do, or prove, or be, anything in order to be loved UN-CONDITIONALLY.

All that is necessary is that I ALLOW MYSELF TO RECEIVE it!

So, these last few days I’ve been reminded to “JUST BREATHE and RECEIVE…Yes! Yes!”

And breathing it and a-receiving it I have been, that goofy little girl with the weird humor absolutely relishing it…


P.S. The man in my dream was my soulmate--me, my DIVINE MASCULINE--the partner to my DIVINE FEMININE. I used to feel him kissing me on the lips, sometimes while I was awake, and often in my dreams. For years, in my dreams, he was on the sidelines, just out of my reach. I could never seem to connect with him. It was so frustrating, because I was working so hard to get him to notice me, but no matter what I did, it was never enough, and I'd wake up disappointed. People mistakenly believe their soulmate is another person outside of you, but it's not. 

Your soulmate is you! It is you...

Or you could think of the dream being the story of the all-alone-feeling Little Human finally REALIZING and INVITING HOME its DIVINITY/Soul/Spirit. 

The important thing is, I had to CONSCIOUSLY CHOOSE to invite my divinity into my life as a human in order for it to come home to me in my present consciousness. As long as I kept it out there somewhere outside of me, while trying to perfect my little human story, I never really truly ALLOWED myself to RECEIVE all the love, grace and ease it had to offer. 

In short--we're all perfect already in all our human imperfection. There's nothing we need to fix. It's just a matter of consciously breathing until we tingle with the knowingness presence of our DIVINITY--and ALLOWING ourselves to RECEIVE the love of oneself...

How Do I Quit That Judging Habit?

One of the most exasperating challenges in this walk of mine has been how to quit judging—period. Just when I think I’ve got it licked, I find evidence of my own self-righteousness bleeping at me all over the place—the postings on my blog are littered with it. And that brings on feelings of self-shame which then seduces me into further recycling dramas, which are frankly getting extremely boring.

My little human ego mind will cover and deny and slink around the fact that I’m judging, thus getting judged (victimhood).

I’ve posted about studying my belief systems—and one thing I’ve found is that my emotions will cause things to manifest very quickly, especially when they’re connected to judgments I have. I’ve found that when I’m emotionally bracing myself for some shoe to fall because of believing I’m either wrong or right, I’m conjuring up a shoe to fall.

Jesus was not accusing or blaming me for being human when he stated, “Judge not, lest you be judged.”

He was reminding me of how I was unconsciously bringing forth (manifesting) the challenges I was experiencing in my life simply because I was deciding this was wrong or that was right.

By labeling it a “right choice” or a “wrong choice” I actually charged it into being an experience based in judgment. They are simply choices—period.

I remember my dad once telling me I was being selfish—and that “that was no way to be.” So that phrase, that’s no way to be, has been circling around in my consciousness ever since, and I’ve been looking at it from as many different perspectives as I can.

Every way that humans have been and are throughout millennia, are all ways of being. Selfish IS a way to be. And so is selfless and self-loving and self-condemning. These are all ways to be, compliments of the MOST LOVING ONE who gave us life and free choice.

Some choices may be painful, miserable ones—and I may hate them, but they don’t have to be labeled as “wrong choices.” They were just a choice that led to an experience that didn’t feel very good so I probably won’t choose that one again.

Likewise (and this is the tricky one for me because of pride or shame), some of my choices may be truly joy-filled and fun and exciting, but I’ve discovered that labeling them as a “right choice” has placed judgment in my creation, and that is going to bring about judgmental-charged consequences.

Anyway, that’s my latest and greatest.

I’m liking the idea of feeling and breathing and living just plain and simple GRATITUDE for this amazing gift of being able to experience first-hand my own choices…A special thanks to all who walked with me through my self-righteous way of being…

Moments I Fall in Love All Over Again

I know it seems like I’ve been writing about “my angst” an awful lot lately, but truthfully, I’m realizing more with each passing day how beautifully the Universe and God/My Divine Source has supported me in every moment of my being. I’ve been, and am, abundantly gifted with whatever I desire in every single moment—without any efforting on my part—unless, of course, I’m wanting to experience that.

I picture it as all sorts of wavy energies coming together to burst into beingness all these amazing, and sometimes perplexing, things in my life. The energies take the forms of everything touchable--from a tiny grain of sand sparkling on my shoe to our beloved Max and Molly cats to this house that I call home. It flows outward to become the community that I play with. And that expands even further out to become the planet on which I live.

A whole world is created magically just for me to experience—and I’m the source and center of this amazing bubble of reality that is mine. I’m feeling more at Home here than I ever have before. The Kingdom of Heaven truly feels right at hand—right here on Earth where I am.

One thing I’ve recognized more and more fully as I go along is how truly we love one another unconditionally. All of us—every single human that was and is, has loved, and loves, unconditionally. Even when we were acting out love dramas loaded with conditions—the real thing was there right in the middle of it all.

Here are some of the moments when I fall in love with my world and those in it, all over again and again and again:

I woke up this morning with Kelly’s arm around me snuggling me close. I headed to the bathroom to turn the faucet on for Molly to get a drink, and Kel went downstairs to put together our morning cappuccinos. As I joined him in the kitchen, Max and Molly were sitting right behind him on the floor, waiting patiently for the food he had assembled to put in dishes for them after he finished frothing the creamer and milk for our coffee.

I was putting dishes away that I’d left in the sink to dry overnight when I heard him cuss. He’d accidentally dumped his freshly frothed milk all over the counter. My instinct was to intervene and grab the dishcloth and start wiping it up before it got to the edge and spilled over onto the floor. But something had me hesitate and watch instead—and I’m SO glad I did!

Kel stepped across the kitchen to grab a pancake spatula and a big serving spoon out of the utensil drawer. He used these to scrape up and save his precious froth off the counter and return it to our coffee cups. It looked and sounded like he was back working at his old fast-food job at Max’s Drive-in, wielding his utensils at the grill.

I burst out laughing. If I’d allowed my old tendencies to interfere and started cleaning up after him, I’d have missed out on one of the most prized and entertaining moments of my life.

As it was, I watched a new day come to life as a sparkling frost-covered morning outside while I sipped my delicious, frothy cappuccino (counter scraped) in my warm home. I had a contented Molly stretched out on the table beside me, along with Max gazing out the patio door from his place on the rug next to my feet. And I listened to Kel sipping his coffee and singing along with some song he was working on in the room below us. All was truly well in my world.

About a month ago, Kel came to find me the moment he got home from work to show me what he’d been perfecting with his co-workers all day. He bent his knees in something of a lunge, and rocked back and forth on his feet as he pumped his arms in rhythm and sang, “Bow-chicka-wow-wow.” We’d just watched the movie, Dear Frankie (one of my all-time favorites), where a little nine-year-old boy was doing a similar dance in the hallway outside his friend’s apartment as he waited for the door to be answered. God--my husband was adorable!

A few days later I was passing through the rec room where Kel was practicing guitar when he said to me, in reference to himself, “I suck. I should just give up and quit.”

My usual, exasperatingly useless response was to chew him out for being so cruel to himself. But this time I decided to hold my tongue and leave the room. I returned to the room a minute or so later and asked him what he wanted from me when he said things like that about himself in my presence, specifically for my ears.

He replied, “Tell me I suck and that I should give it up.”

So I obliged him and said, “You suck. You should give it up.”

And I walked out of the room grinning to myself as one of the great loves of my life continued playing his guitar.

“The World is My Oyster,” said the Pearl…

A Painful Lump, An Answering Dream, Love of Angry Me

The last week or so, I’ve had a lump in my lower left-side back near the waistline that’s been painful again. The pain comes and goes, and I have probably had the lump all my life—just lately in the last decade I’ve pinpointed it to a more specific area. Normal activities like snow shoveling or vacuuming, sometimes even walking, don’t feel so good when it hits—so I lay low for a bit and listen to what the pain has to tell me.

Pain, for me, is a way of my body supporting me in helping me to realize:
1. That I’m running away from myself.
2.That I need to stop and listen so I can become aware of my feelings and thoughts at that time.
3. I need to lovingly care for myself.

As I readied for sleep last night, I rubbed the painful spot and chose to ask my dreams to show me the underlying core energy struggle/wound that was resulting in the pain I felt.

The answering dream was a night terror:

In the dream, I was in a recently vacated room with two other guys who felt like friends of mine. I reached down to pick up a pile of blown-up photos left on a table. The photos were of murder victims and of people’s hands that had fingers severed off through torture. The murderer’s appearance in the room felt imminent, so I grabbed the pictures knowing he was coming for them, and I left with one of the guys. As I crawled across the driver’s seat of my friend’s vehicle to get into the passenger seat, I noticed that my side of the vehicle seemed frozen over with a thick layer of ice in the interior (like in a frosted deep freezer). Occasionally water from the ice would drip on me.

The dream shifted and I found myself in a café with mobster-like men. One of them grabbed me and slammed my head repeatedly on the table with a metal napkin dispenser. I seemed to be in and out of my body—one moment it was me being beat-up, the next I was watching him do it to my sister. I was trying so hard to scream but something kept interfering with my ability to make a sound. I was terrified for the two of us.

Somehow I slipped free of the two men at the table. One of them was grappling to hold onto my sister with the intent to kill her, and in a blaze of pure rage I plunged a spoon into his neck to stop him.

Thankfully, I woke up then--though, I awoke terrified, drenched in sweat and with a sore throat. And even after getting up to use the bathroom and taking some breaths to center myself, I was still shaken up enough from it to make it difficult to return to sleep right away.

In yesterday’s posting to my blog, I’d written about recently becoming aware of how I emotionally protected people from experiencing the consequence of my anger with them when they judged or tried to control me, or someone I love.

My temper scares the crap out of me—and I’m really quite harmless. But my feelings of anger frighten me so much so, that I look back often at what I write, whether on this site or in personal emails, to see how harsh I’ve been in response to my feeling of being attacked in some manner.

I have to say, my writing shows how I mentally try to handle the anger I actually feel because I’m terrified of losing control like in that nightmare and actually murdering someone. The anger I actually feel is more like a raging blast of energy that’s pretty much yelling, “Back off NOW!!!”

Back in 1998, a dog mauled our one-year-old Molly cat right outside the door in front of me. I watched him drop his mouth over her entire front end and pick her up and shake her. My mother instinct kicked in and I slammed open that door screaming and beating on that dog until he dropped Molly and ran off. He was a big dog, too, either a mastiff or a boxer. Rationally, I know not to interfere in dog and cat fights—but, my well-being wasn’t even a thought for me in that moment. All I knew was, “Make him stop!”

If I’d had anything handier than my two bare hands, I’m afraid I would have killed that dog. And I love dogs, too.

In a nutshell—as I’ve written many times over here—anger is one of those HUMAN emotions that has been a real challenge for me. I’ve tried to keep such tight control of my expression of it that it’s actually physically painful for me. My body has just been alerting me to what I’ve been doing with it—reminding me that I’m better off expressing it the moment anger hits, rather than stuffing it until it’s got nowhere to go except to explode in order to release the energy. I choose to HONOR MYSELF and whoever is playing my button-pusher by releasing it before it gets to that point.

There are certain things in this world that are taking place that do anger me. I don't like gossip and back-biting—and I’ve quietly suppressed myself while in the presence of someone engaging in that. I hurt from being in the presence of such malevolence. I get angry at people forcing their beliefs on someone else—whether it’s forcing them on me, on their own child, or on some distant person in a third world country. I dislike wars and finger-pointing. These are to name a few.

Guess I’m really just tired of all the unnecessary fighting, period. I see us—humanity--as capable of having so much more enjoyable lives together. I envision a world where we’re celebrating our diversity and uniqueness along with all those things we have in common with every living thing on this beloved Earth. I guess I’d rather we looked for ways to connect with each other rather than setting our sights on getting the others to conform to our expectations.

Maybe making that vision a reality first involves allowing myself to get upset and angry with the old ways…

And I don’t believe I have to kill anyone off either…just be aware of how I feel and honor that in my expression of all that I am…

I Already Found All My Answers

Yesterday I got an email from a concerned Christian who told me, “I will pray for you, Penny. God loves you and He sent His only Son to die for you. I hope you will immerse yourself in His Word so you can find what you’re looking for. God Bless…”

I love the Harry Potter series, and she’d forwarded to me the day before, a message of someone’s interpretation on the “wickedness” of it--to which I requested her to not send me anymore such filth.

To yesterday’s message, I simply replied back, “I’ve already found ALL of my answers.”

I realized something in the last several days that I hadn’t been aware of before. Because I am so sensitive to the emotions all around me—an attribute of all humans that I have just a bit more of than most, called empathy—I have had a tendency all this time to emotionally protect everyone around me from pain of any kind.

And often, I’ve done it by unconsciously sacrificing my authentic self—I’ll literally take the hits emotionally for someone else’s choices. And often, I’ve been protecting them from my own expression of anger towards them simply because they’ve chosen to judge me or someone else. And that’s not honoring myself, nor does it allow the choice-maker to fully immerse in their created experience.

For instance, a phone solicitor calls me on my private line or a government employee solicits me for information and I think to myself, “Well they’re desperate. They need the money to live on. I’ll make it easy for them and not make waves.” And then they yammer and waste my time and suck my energy. And I’ve allowed it all because I felt sorry them.

Never mind that I consciously chose not to take on jobs such as theirs back when I was feeling desperately insecure in the financial area. I couldn’t personally stomach forcing someone to buy something or using intimidation tactics to coerce another just in order for me to get a paycheck. Yet, here I thought I had to take it easy on those who evidently didn’t contemplate those things.

Same with those pushy self-proclaimed Christians (not all Christians—just the ones who have tried to force their beliefs on me). I’ve been again taking the hits of my own anger for them because I recognized the misery and suffering that that individual was in, and I didn’t want to pile more pain on them.

People are driven to find comfort in God when they are feeling at their worst about themselves—I did that myself. But, if they are going to continue poking me, well, I’m done allowing it. They can reap what they’re choosing to sow with my blessing—even if it means they’re probably going to get poked back.

By admonishing me to “immerse myself in God’s Word,” my concerned Christian was telling me to study the Bible. But had she really cared to connect with me, she would have known that I read her precious scriptures years ago—pretty much the whole book.

And I followed what was stated in there for me—the gist of which simply said, “Don’t study the literal word. The Word—the Expression of God--lies within you, is you—study that, study you, Penny.”

As far as I’m concerned the Real Word of God is alive in each of us and in every single thing in the Universe.

The Song of Solomon, for me, very eloquently tells the story of every human that ever was and is. Like the bridegroom, each of our human halves goes searching for our other half, the bride/God/Our True Love thinking she’s “out there” separate from us. And after wandering all over the place, outside of us, for awhile, we realize in the end that the bride/God has been with us the entire time—an actual essential part of ourselves, within us, from the very beginning all through to the end. We just couldn’t seem to perceive her—like we forgot she was there until one day we flipped some switch in ourselves that revealed her to us in all her glory.

I love reading good, inspiring, up-lifting books—and the Bible is filled with many inspiring stories. But to analyze any book, for me, is to diminish my enjoyment of it. I sometimes read a favorite novel several times, and discover layers of insight that I missed previously—and I’ll celebrate those when I realize them.

I loved reading the books assigned us for English classes—but I hated being required to answer questions someone made up surrounding the story. I call it being led intellectually (a literal word study) instead of just exposing someone to a story and letting that individual decide if they find anything of value in it. I love when people share with me the parts they liked about a story—and I like to share those myself. But I find no joy in using it as a standard of judgment or measurement to use on myself or on another.

I have no answers for anyone else—and I’m not going to pretend I do, and force my ideas upon another. I know WE ARE ALL CONNECTED, and I’ll do no harm to anyone, myself included, because I know that to intentionally hurt another is to intentionally hurt myself.

I will also no longer take the painful hits for another’s choice to strike out at me or try to control me…if I’m angry with you for judging me, so be it…FEEL THAT! Ha!

My Idea of A Dark Night of the Soul

When I was confronted with questioning a belief system that I’d so firmly accepted as my truth for a good portion of my life it caused a highly traumatic commotion in me for a period of time--emotionally, mentally, physically and spiritually. I’ve deemed to call such an event A Dark Night of the Soul.

It felt as though the whole foundation beneath me had been terrifyingly removed and that any step in a new direction could be a wrong one. I was paralyzed for a time until I just reminded myself to breathe—just breathe. Deep breaths down into my belly, down into my toes. And I literally held myself, cried as I often needed to, yelled if I needed to—all in my safe and sacred space while I searched my own soul.

And somehow in that, I managed to move enough old stuff out in order to crack open a new door to explore. In looking back, something deep inside me intrinsically believed that life on earth—my life, all life—was a tremendously unconditionally loving gift from God/Source of All That Is. And I’m certain it was that belief that pulled me through my darkest nights.

Through the years I’ve had well-meaning Christians trying to warn me off reading certain materials, believing certain things or doing certain things a particular way. They were afraid that I was destined to an eternal hell unless I followed their rules.

How many of those particular people, I wonder, have asked themselves the question of WHY my supposed “hell destination” bothers them?

Could it be, on some level, that that particular person is disagreeing with the condemning, judgmental god they’ve believed in and worshipped all those years?

Could it be that it would be hell for that “faithful Christian” to watch me roasting, toasting and burning eternally? I guess I’d like to think that was so.

Talk about a Dark Night of the Soul…

“So—What do you do?”

“So—what do you do?” That’s probably been the single most difficult and challenging question for me to answer. When someone asks my husband about me he segues over to how great a cook I am—but I’m really not that great, and I’m not being modest.

I study belief systems—pretty much starting, and ending, with my own. And, as one can imagine, that area of passion has taken me on many different tangents.

How did I get into this?

I guess I woke up too many mornings feeling like that victim I detested so much, thinking to myself, “Damn! I woke up again—here goes one more day to get through.”

And then I’d literally feel myself physically and emotionally bracing to plow through whatever painful something or other that I felt certain was headed my way. Even moments of pure pleasure and happiness were overshadowed by the next thing bound to trip me up and take me somewhere painful I didn’t want to go.

Truthfully, I have lived a blessed life—I was born a member of a wonderful family and I had parents who were the savory salt of the earth. Yes, I lost some people and friends very dear to me fairly early on in life as well as in more recent years, the passing of my mom and dad. But, frankly, my stories are no more tragic or beautiful than another human’s—just uniquely my own.

I know, and appreciate, my story like no other person can—and I’ve discovered that that is a responsibility I take both seriously and humorously. God blessed me with this gift of being alive in a human body that gets to experience TOUCH in all its many forms. So I decided that I wasn’t enjoying life enough and I began to work on adjusting my own attitude about it.

I have Dad to thank for making me so aware of the power of a belief system. I observed him in those final weeks choosing physical discomfort over relief, simply because he believed that petroleum-based lotions were poisonous to him. The oxygen tubes in his nose were drying out his nasal passages and a lotion was recommended to address it, but he was unwilling to even try it. For him, I could see clearly, that that petroleum-based lotion was going to be toxic if we tried to force it on him—he was so adamant about not going there.

There were many instances that summer with Dad and others that mirrored this power of belief for me—most of the beliefs were based in fear. And the thing that made me so aware of it was because many of the beliefs were the same as my own, or had been at some point in my life. This got me looking more closely at my own stuff and questioning whether it was true, or if I’d somehow made it true simply by accepting that it was so.

It got me looking at the concepts of research and facts—and I began to question whether an actual scientific blind study could be completely unbiased—or if the researcher wasn’t somehow unconsciously skewing the study to match his belief systems.

Some part deep down inside of me keeps feeling like this reality I’m living is actually a very grand illusion/playground—and that God gave me the ability to be the front and center creator of my own life, with His/Her unconditional blessing. I’ve just been UNCONSCIOUSLY creating this whole time, based on the acceptance as truth, by me, of suggestions about the way life is by others around me.

The Plus Side of Being Able to “Bawl My Eyes Out”

A couple days ago my brother, Steve--who is one of the most precious beings on earth that I get to be related to biologically--shared with me a bit of what he was reading that morning. A man was told that he was thinking too much and needed to just cry instead. He was told that he didn’t have to figure out if they were tears of joy or sorrow or anger or anything—just to let himself cry for the release of it all.

Then my brother and I got into a discussion about what it means to cry. And that there is a big difference between having tears in one’s eyes versus letting them overflow all over the place.

Now, as anyone who’s read any of my previous posts can attest to, I am the poster child for being able to get the whole crying jag done properly.

I’ve done it so well throughout my life that I’ve felt more embarrassed and ashamed of it than proud. I literally bawled through my entire graduation speech and at least one other public speaking stint in my recollection. All my mom and sister and I ever had to do was to see the other one crying and, well, we were ankle-deep in tears and snot, and laughing at ourselves in the process.

Steve shared with me how it was to be a man—and how foreign and absolutely terrifying it was to even contemplate letting the tears loose from the eyes. I could feel the vulnerability and frustration in his words, of what it was like to grow up with the idea that “boys and men don’t cry” or “feel emotions.” That was one gift left to the realm of the female, at least, for the most part.

Not that “not crying” hasn’t crossed over into the female side of things either because I tried it, too, at one point in my journey. I talked myself out of crying through the Titanic—the numbness didn’t feel too good, and the movie haunted me for years afterward until I watched it a second time and allowed myself to dribble and sob all over the place with the allowance of feeling.

Steve said that even when he was someplace all alone, it still felt to him as if all the eyes of the universe were witnessing him at his utmost weakest—that he still didn’t feel safe enough to just let it loose. He can actually turn the tears off at will—like a water faucet—and my chest tightens with that stopping of the natural flow of things.

Our conversation got me to thinking back over the moments I’ve had with the men and boys in my life—I’ve seen tears in the eyes, but I don’t ever think I’ve heard one of them actually cry and sob while I was present. I get all choked up and suffocated-feeling just imagining myself in their shoes.

No wonder guys get all emotional and worked up over what I often think of as “silly” professional ball games. It’s an emotional release for them—a form of crying in a way accepted among most men.

I’ve gradually come to realize these past several years what a gift it has been to be able to be sensitive to feelings—even to find myself salt-watering everyone and everything around me at the seemingly most inopportune times. It truly is a release and a movement of stagnated energies within me. Life soon afterwards feels clearer and much easier, in that I breathe more freely.

I’m not a pretty thing when I’m in the midst of it, sometimes bellering at myself in the mirror. My eyes and nose are red and swollen, the Kleenex box (toilet paper roll, if I’m out) soon gets depleted, and the grimaces on my face would translate beautifully onto the screen for a horror flick—but I get ‘er done. I usually opt to cry things out in that safe, sacred space of my bathroom or my bedroom or out in the pasture if it’s handy.

And if the universe is tuned in to watch, well, they must see some value in it for themselves or they wouldn’t bother watching. Maybe it’s simply for pure entertainment purposes—but, hey, I can live with that. I think that just may be what I’m here for…

Anger--that tricky-feeling emotion...

When I started this blog I made a deal with myself: I wasn’t going to let my ego try to paint myself pretty. Whatever I posted had to be as authentic in my thoughts and feelings as I could possibly be in that moment.

So, my last few posts seemed to me to be a bit more vehement on the angry side than I truly feel comfortable with expressing, yet when I re-read them they seem quite mild and actually resolved by the time I’m through writing. They are nowhere near as scary as some of the things going through my mind and heart prior to writing it down.

I actually found myself appreciative (shortly after the writing and posting) of the people in the Census Bureau playing my “bad guys” roles so I could finally come out of hiding and express to the world who I am and what I’m really all about—just being myself.

One of the most troubling emotions for me to feel has been ANGER--I don't like how I am, how I look, the feeling like a victim that invariably seems to accompany it, or the pain of it. And I spent so much of my life trying to "handle it." I eventually discovered that the key to moving it out of my being for good was to simply allow myself to FEEL it.

But the hardest ones to allow myself to feel it with were those I loved the deepest--and often they had already left the planet.

Case in point: When my dad left my mom at the hospital, she told him out loud that she loved him. He didn't say it back in that moment and he beat on himself for it afterward because he didn't get another chance--it was the first thing he told me when I walked in the door into his arms that afternoon.

My mom very much played the gentle, yet strong, supporting woman behind the man--I so wanted to be just like her. She saw the things within my dad that he struggled with--she and I talked a lot--and one of Dad's greatest challenges was to see himself as worthy. He couldn't give enough of himself, sacrifice enough of himself, to ever be good enough. And because of that, he often took the "angel that he married" for granted, and a few times he was verbally cruel to her when I was present.

You know, those arguments that take place between married people when people just lash out like cornered wild animals fighting for survival. I, being married myself, of course, have done that exact same thing. Words just explode out of you and there is no taking them back so you just add a bit more shame to the old back-pack.

That was the hardest thing for me to feel--an adored, beloved one hurting another adored, beloved one. That one always got placed on the back burner—just didn’t know what to do with it.

I didn't observe my mom--maybe I just didn't see it out a sense of shock--telling Dad in those moments how painful the things he said were to her. She just seemed to take it, and then move on.

Then, when she died, I felt and watched my Dad try to go forward without her. He really tried, even tried dating another woman--but she wasn't able to fill that void left by his beloved Leona. I tried to pick him up, support him, be strong for him--but I knew even then that I was never going to be able to fill that void either. I had a father who was in so much pain and heart-suffering--and it was impossible for me to fix, and I knew it. So I watched it, took on a good portion of his pain, guilt, suffering through empathy, and made it my own.

I made it my own so much to the point that one night I had such pain in the joints of my arms and hands that it finally made me admit to myself, with GREAT DISMAY, that I was ANGRY with MY BELOVED ANGELIC MOM. I was angry with her for leaving me in the impossible position of trying to pick up the pieces of Humpty-Dumpty--because she didn't stand up to him in all those moments to simply say, "Dean--you're hurting me. Stop it!" Yes, I was feeling really victimy and icky and horrendous.

And so, that night I let myself feel the anger towards my mom, think the thoughts that fueled that anger towards her--and bawled my eyes out until the pain in my arms disappeared.

And afterwards I noticed an ease of breathing in me, a release, and that knowingness that the feeling of anger was okay--it, too, was simply a part of the human experience, and not something to be judged as always being a "wrong" feeling.

Sometimes, I discovered, it is appropriate. And just because I felt it in a moment, it didn't mean I had to feel it the rest of my life. I did it, not planning to hang onto it, but to release myself from it. I felt it in order to move it out--and move it out of me, I did. I no longer felt angry with her—but instead realized that because of her in her perfection of being in that moment, I learned something about myself.

I also walked out of that experience knowing that honoring my parents and loved ones didn't mean making all of their choices my own. Honoring them, to me, means thanking them for all their choices and then taking what I learned from their lives of choice and deciding which I wanted to try out for my own life.

I took my parents' journey together and chose to communicate my feelings, thoughts and my intentions with Kelly out loud, clearly. I chose to let him know when something he said or did brought about pain for me--knowing all along (and telling him and myself out loud) that he was just the closest human mirror to how I was internally hurting myself.

I knew I was solely responsible for all the joyful and the painful moments of my life--but also that in accepting that responsibility, I had to do it with full self-compassion. Self-blame and self-condemnation weren't going to change a thing--I'd already given those many years of practice, and they never worked for me.

For those of you who have chosen to read my posts—thanks for allowing me the chance to express that awful anger emotion out loud. It’s more of a gift than you can possibly know…

Much love,
Pen

I am that I am!!!

I am that I am, Penny, of sovereign domain!

What does that statement of My Soul--my entire Body of Consciousness--mean? It simply means that I am accepting full responsibility for my entire life, and beingness, and that no other has any dominion over me. I am a child of our Creator/Source of All That Is/God, Whom has bestowed me with Divine Free Will. I accept that Gift with Honor.

Many of us humans have been playing the game, most of us without consciously knowing it, of giving our sovereignty away on a platter to others who touch our lives—family, friends, neighbors, community, religious and educational institutions, government corporations, businesses. The list goes on and on.

We've all been deeply ingrained with Self Doubt. And our human minds have developed a type of pattern from this cycle of giving our GIFT of FREE CHOICE away, where we’re seduced into feelingly believing that we have to tangle with the web of illusion that’s been in place, for age upon age upon age. Frankly, I’m done being sucked on by some make-believe hairy-scary spider that really can’t touch me at all.

I’m tired of, and done with, playing the game of “who I am not trying to figure out who I am.” No more!

I know who I am—I know what’s in my heart and my intentions—and I know that I come from GOODNESS ITSELF, thus how can I be anything but GOODNESS?

The last twelve months, I had the opportunity to interact with the Census Bureau of the Corporate U.S. government—through one of its slave employees acting like a government agent. One of the ladies showed up ringing my doorbell on a bitterly cold winter day over a year ago. Being the kind person that I am, I invited her in and I answered her survey of very intrusive questions—many of which were about my husband, which I had no business answering. They asked me his salary, how many hours of overtime he worked the previous week, how much money we spent on groceries the previous week, how much we spent eating out that week, how many people lived in our house—I think by now you get the gist.

I didn’t mean to, but I was pulling figures out of the air and she was punching my answers into her long questionnaire. We finished up with this little episode, only for her to tell me as she’s leaving that she will be contacting me over the phone for the next three or four months to interview me some more about the previous weeks.

Okay—I allowed the bullshit to continue through the invasive proceedings into my husband’s and my own life for the following four months. I knew it was all crap and I was amazed at the stupidity of this survey, but I chose not to make waves and I kept telling myself that these women were just trying to keep food on their tables doing this dumb-ass job.

After the four months was up, I was told that they were going to contact me again beginning this past December, and then do four more months of surveys into my husband’s and my life.

December came around and I’d received a letter from the U.S. Census Bureau telling me of the survey starting again and that my participation was “voluntary.” I did not know this before or I would have turned the first person away who appeared on my doorstep. I chose to cooperate rather than make a stink—out of compassion.

So, when Field Representative, Aemilia, called me again to start the surveys over I told her that I realized this was a voluntary act that I chose to no longer be part of it.

And she told me, “You have to call your congressman in order to be taken off the list. Otherwise they’ll keep sending your name to us and we’ll have to keep contacting you.” In the meantime, she interviewed me to fill out her survey for that month—and I kindly allowed her to do so. All of this was after I had told her that the survey absolutely meant nothing to me and that I saw no issue-solving value in it whatsoever. BUT SHE DIDN’T LISTEN!

As we concluded that phone conversation, I told her—and I meant it from my heart—that I would have enjoyed meeting her under other circumstances, that maybe we could simply have a cup of coffee together as friends. I didn’t let my bitch loose on her at any time in any of our interactions.

But evidently, I should have. She contacted me again—and this time, Kelly answered the phone and told her I wasn’t interested in participating anymore. Then she asked him if he would—and he told her he was not interested either.

Evidently the “no” over the phone wasn’t enough. Doesn’t “no” mean anything? After the turndown over the phone on Saturday, I got an overnighted letter via FedEx from Cathy L. Lacy, Regional Director of the Regional Office of the U.S. Census Bureau in Denver, CO, informing me that their field representative will be “calling on me again in the near future.”

No “congressman” ever contacted me to ASK me to “volunteer” for this survey, so why should I have to figure out who he is and then track him down in order to have him take me off a list? A list volunteering me for taking part in something I was never consulted about, by him in the first place. I am a sovereign being—the Corporate U.S. Census Bureau should not even be messing with me using peon employees—they should be sending GOOD WILL AMBASSADORS, if anyone at all, to visit me.

In all their stupid long lists of mindless questions, not one asked the important things about me, and they should never have been asking me questions about my husband’s life--a sovereign being I had no place in speaking for, even if I was "married" to him.

These are the important, world-difference-making things people should know about me. I’m a benevolent sister, neighbor, friend and I’m sometimes that compassionate stranger you might meet while walking, or while out and about on errands. I’m not going to tell you what you should believe, nor am I going to grill you about what you do or don’t do.

I’ll honor your free choice to play out your life however you wish and I won’t pretend to have your answers. I’ll tell you to trust in yourself every time and I’ll remind you to remember the gift that you are--to be kind to, and appreciative and unconditionally loving of, yourself first, so then you can be that way with your neighbor, too.

As to the rest of you who would force yourselves and your ideas upon me—the first time or two, I’ll give you the chance to go on your own way quietly, but if you come back and try to negotiate with me, consider yourself served notice. The bitch will be set loose and you’re not going to gain one thing except an education in honoring sovereignty. And so I am!

In Loving Memory and Honor...Arlen

“Penny—you did it! I’m so proud of you!” He said this as he was walking up the steps towards me, smiling. And then he leaned over the rail and kissed me.

Few dreams have ever felt so good. And prior to this one, twenty years in the making, in all my other dreams/nightmares he was always angry with me for not waiting for him, for going forward in my life with Kelly.

It wasn’t really Arlen who was angry with me though—the dreams were a mirror of the struggle I was having within myself—and Arlen wasn’t allowed by me to come in, in any other way, until I resolved my feelings of guilt and shame and worthlessness surrounding him.

That dream of him being proud of me was the first chink out of a gigantoid iceberg. It was the marking of a point in my life where I had made the conscious choice to no longer beat up on myself. I had looked in the mirror one day, looked into my own eyes leaking over with tears, and realized how cruel and harsh I had been with myself—more so than I would be to anyone outside of me. I sincerely apologized, right then and there, to myself. And I began to actually practice loving myself unconditionally and with compassion. The girl who stared back at me in the mirror had tried and tried and tried SO HARD to do, and be, all the “right things”—only to be harped at and to go unappreciated by me. I was finally done with not being good enough.

Arlen was my first love. We were neighbors—grew up on farms and ranches—and he and my brother, Tim, were best friends from childhood. Tim and his wife, Cheri, pretty much orchestrated the two of us getting together, and from the moment of our first date we were a foursome who did everything together.

When I slip back into our year together, I remember it as being so fun and full of laughter. Arlen and I both loved animals and nature and looking at the stars--true romantics at heart. He picked me a bouquet of wild yellow sweet peas when he, Tim and I went to check out the damage after a tornado had passed through a deserted neighboring farmstead. When I quit school and returned home, he stopped the pick-up in the middle of the road on the way into our family farm where Tim and Cheri lived, to kiss me, saying, “I’ve been wanting to do that ever since you got home.”

He and Tim whole-heartedly threw themselves into acting like fools just to entertain their women. One of my favorite memories of those two is watching them run, in their cut-offs, down to the beach of Haley Dam, girlishly squealing as they held their towels in front of them and then daintily dipping their toes in the water.

The four of us were parked in the pick-up on the Big Hill, and I remember Tim making some wise crack to which Arlen replied as he kissed me, “Shut up, Lewton, I’m trying to seduce your sister.”

He hunted all over his parents’ home to find a child-size helmet that would fit me when he took me with him on a motorcycle ride in the pastures to check cows. As we stopped to open a gate, he told me, with the most charming grin, that I looked like a little kid in that helmet.

The memories go on and on, warming my heart with every one. I used to be terrified of forgetting anything from our time together, and I actually did forget for an awful-feeling frantic moment. But then my heart started filling in the gaps: and the memories, I’ve discovered, have gotten sweeter with age and experience.

That year was filled with a lot of firsts for me. My grandmother had passed away when college started, and Arlen, my first boyfriend, and I had just started dating that summer. I was in my second year at NDSU for landscape design when I hit school burnout. I was sick with something like walking pneumonia most of what was to be my last fall quarter, and the school thing was just something I was doing because everyone else my age seemed to be doing it. In looking back, it wasn’t my desire—I was feeling really empty and lost there. I was in a void.

The idea of an education in a life-long career of doing one thing was feeling really limiting and suffocating for me. I couldn’t put it into words then because of feeling so much shame at “being a quitter” in the first place, plus I was mentally exhausted from trying to perform to the level of excellence I was expecting of myself. Even then, I was wrestling with the “not good enough” theme.

At nineteen years of age, I was an expert at rote regurgitation of all kinds of subject matter—my teachers and instructors loved it—but I was losing my sense of unique identity, my own “I am-ness.” My sense of imagination and creativity had just torpedoed down a black hole. I was a conglomeration of everyone else’s ideas and belief systems, molding myself this way and that, immersing myself to the point I no longer even felt real. And so choice-making,for me, became overloaded with overwhelming and paralyzing fears of making the wrong choice.

So, I quit, returned home and went to work at one of the local drugstores part-time. I was a painter-for-hire with my mom and sister on our days off. And pretty much every weekend was spent with Arlen and Tim and Cheri, and my newborn niece, Crystal.

Arlen never once treated me like, or intimated that, I was only a fling for him. I was treated with honor and affection all the while we dated. So, now when I look back at one of our last times together, I’m astonished at how much an I’m not good enough self-perception managed to twist and distort what was really a very unconditional love-based act.

He had pulled over on the township road, after leaving Tim and Cheri’s, to talk. As he held me, he asked, “Do you think we should break up so you can go back and finish school?”

Believing he was sick and tired of dating pathetic me, I found myself bawling my eyes out at the thought of parting from him—and that only made it worse in my eyes, because I detested women using tears to manipulate men. And there I was seemingly doing that very thing—even though that wasn’t my intention.

It took me nearly twenty-five years to look at that moment from some other perspective than “I’m a loser nobody would want to be with.” Twenty-five years to even consider the possibility that that was maybe guy-speak for, “I’m feeling serious about us, but I don’t want to get in your way of happiness. And I’m asking you how you feel about us.” He sure kissed me afterward like he meant business. Grin.

But no—I couldn’t even let myself fully enjoy that at the time, because, in my mind, I believed he was resorting to kissing me in order to calm down a hysterical wreck and to smooth over an awkward moment of trying to break up with me nicely.

I was SO NOT PROUD of MYSELF back then, and for all those years afterward…and that made for a very long and difficult journey.

This is the start of my story with Arlen…there is so much more to come…but this is enough for now…

For more on the story of Arlen, click the titles here to read the posts:
Can Death Be Transcended?
Good-bye Conspiracy Theories

The Gift That “Autism” Is

A couple of years ago, I once again became aware of a sweet, silvery, comforting, ringing sound in my ears. I heard it all the time as a kid, and I associate it with nights of stargazing—I think of it as the singing of the stars. I could hear it out on the prairies, even when the frogs’ chirping down by the creek was so loud they sounded like a tractor running in the field.

All of our human dramas, lights (especially fluorescent bulbs), electronics and appliances put out a great deal of harsh noise—and it drowned out this sweet sound, until I started listening for it again. Now I can call it up and still hear it over the hum of my computer. To hear it properly at first, I had to shut things off, including my head chatter. And in order to stop the mind-racing chatter I had to learn to consciously breathe deeper all the time, and yes, to once again be kind with myself.

I had to practice over and over again the art of giving myself a SAFE and SACRED SPACE in which to be.

If I was anxious and scared, then I gave myself the safe space in which to allow the “unthinkable” thoughts to be thought, and the “awful” feelings to be felt—all in a place where I had set the intention to think and to feel, without causing harm to myself or another.

That little practice, along with reminding myself to “breathe into my belly,” stopped my frantically racing mind, and brought me to a state of peace.

Remember SAFE, SACRED SPACE—this is one of the messages that those people labeled with the term “autism” have brought to us.

Imagine for a little while that you, a being from the fairly civilized society of today (2010), suddenly got sucked through a time warp and found yourself in Britain during the Dark Ages. I recently finished reading Ken Follett's international bestselling novel, The Pillars of the Earth. I found myself skimming through some parts because they were actually painful for me to read.

Consider the assault of smells, sounds, sights, tastes, textures—and emotional feelings—that you might experience. Bathing wasn’t  a common practice, so body odors would be horrendous. People urinated and defecated right in the streets. Punishments were often public displays--gory and tortuous. Starving people ate anything at hand. Superstitions ran rampant. Class systems and prejudices abounded. Survival and safety were iffy states of being.

It would be an extremely painful bombardment of the senses to a person of our era. I have a feeling that is how our world today must feel to a highly sensitive being, the ones our society has labeled "autistic."

And last night, I realized what I do when I feel bombarded by what feels like chaotic energies all around me—I withdraw from the source of discomfort as much as I can, I seek the comfort of repetition, and I immerse myself in patterns familiar to me.

Some people rock themselves—it’s rhythmic--and rhythm is a function of the right hemisphere of the brain. The right hemisphere is connected to our divine Source, our intuition. It's our connection to All that Is.

Some find comfort in the familiar repetitions of their work. Some people find comfort in the patterns and beauty of numbers, some in the patterns of music, some in the patterns of artwork of all kinds.

Simply put, we seek a safe and sacred space in which to be. Too much change, all at once, away from the familiar can overwhelm sometimes, so the tools of BREATHING, and of the SAFE and SACRED SPACE, helps one navigate all that glorious change.

Safe and Sacred Space practices will help encourage those with autism to gradually let go of their comforting repetitions, which are like security blankets. I once knew a little boy, who found more solace in numbers, than he did in human touch. Human touch was too overwhelming for him--and now I better understand why that was so.

Autism is NOT a developmental disorder! These people just have a heightened sensitivity to the consciousness environment around them. For example, for a more multi-sensitive person, colors may have tastes, textures, and aromas, and maybe even some personality traits, too.

Our speaking language is harsh—there is very little lilt and rhythm to it anymore. And it’s become so over-used, in the sense that we are speaking from our human left brains, instead of from our hearts, that it’s been rendered meaningless and shallow--drab and loud.

How much heart is invested in all those cell phone conversations, I wonder? Why do we feel the need to fill our surroundings up with noise? Yes, I like to visit with people over the phone, but there also moments when I can't get that piece of equipment hung up or shut off soon enough, depending on the quality of what is said.

It’s been said that pictures paint a thousand words—they do for me. And so does music. I remember stories from my childhood because of pictures that captured my heart. I was born in 1964--so I grew up during the Vietnam War—and I remember listening to an announcer call off the draft numbers over the TV, holding my breath in fear that one of them would mean one of my brothers was being sent to battle. So I vividly remember songs from that era, like One Tin Soldier, Billy—Don’t be a Hero, Tapestry. They told the stories of those days, and they painted a picture of the relationships, on a heart level, that I could feel into.

I was so emotionally empathetic with my parents, that I “knew” when they were upset.

Kids are so tuned in to their parents that they feel their parent’s pain as if it is their very own. They KNOW intuitively when Dad, or Mom, isn’t feeling safe. And until you learn the difference of what belongs to whom—you REACT as though it’s your own issues and burdens.

That’s why the parents of autistic children (ALL children, actually) will do more good by their children if they learn the practice of Conscious Breathing and creating their own Safe, Sacred Space.

Example and personal practices are always the best standards.

You don’t need to find any miracle cures for your child, nor do you need to fight battles. Just learn to listen first, with your heart (which doesn't require a single word), in order to communicate with them. Help them “find their words,” or their own form of self-expression, by using tools (art and music) that are soothing and that appeal to their heart and imaginations. Sing them a story, read to them from books full of glorious pictures, and filled with lilting rhythms and rhymes.

Share with them the things, the moments, that have deepest meaning for you. Re-member your own childhood, with genuine authenticity--experiences with color and feelings--how you perceived things then, and how you see the same things now.

Be willing to share all your life stories of what it has been like to be an "imperfect human," and how you felt in the experiences. Talk about the moments when you "thought" you'd failed or done something wrong. Have compassion for yourself--and LOVINGLY LAUGH at all aspects of yourself. To love, means to unconditionally accept, and to release--to set yourself free--from judgment. His standard of being the FIRST to laugh at himself is probably one of the greatest gifts my Dad gave me.

All judgment of yourself, by others outside of you, actually originates with you. They're just being in loving service to you by playing the roles you've scripted for them, in order to have them mirror back to you something you're trying to understand--actually, to simply accept and release--about yourself. Thank everyone for playing all the parts for you--that GRATITUDE changes your reality and sets you all free.

And don’t throw any kids, whether diagnosed autistic or not, in rooms full of other kids. Those chaotic energies feel like an attack to a person already highly sensitive to the energies, of all forms, of everyone and everything around him. Get the safe space and breathing concept down first at home—they are tools that will help him get centered so that no matter what is going on around him, he knows he’s okay. He can then participate in life, instead of reacting to it.

I know this, because I have used these very tools, myself, over and over again these last several years. It took me a very long time to find my speaking words--I could write, but I struggled a long time with talking clearly when in groups of all sizes, or even sometimes in casual conversations with strangers. Public speaking moments were nightmares. This lasted well into my adulthood—sometimes the emotions that I was reading from those around me interrupted my train of thought. Words and full sentences would just dissipate before I could spit them out. It got extremely frustrating, to say the least. I experienced this even more drastically as I tried to fit in with the world around me, by taking on the burdens I was taught I should care about. The less worthy, and the more guilty, I felt, the less my confidence in myself. I began to lose trust in my ability to express myself. This is why I'm not a lover of the whole "born in sin" belief system--I see us all as gifts, and I'm sticking to that.

Sometimes the energies of crowded malls was so overwhelming that headaches and weird physical symptoms would exhaust me, and literally stop me in my tracks, until I reminded myself to breathe.

I've had my share of quirks as an imperfect human, but, thankfully, I never got a label, nor was I ever diagnosed as having any kind of disorder. No kid needs any kind of label. Mom and Dad and my brothers and sisters had me engaged in music and art of all kinds, and they shared with me lots of stories—some of them funny, some of them sad, many of them full of heart. And I had a feeling of unconditional acceptance, especially from my mom, who was with me the most. She never told me I should change, or be more like someone else. As a result, I usually had no problems clearly expressing myself with her. I treasured our relationship--it was a true friendship.

This autistic state of being is not here as a result of anyone’s wrong practices. We should be honored that they are here—they’re reminding us that we have come along far enough in our own evolution and consciousness that we’re ready to communicate on a higher, more heart-felt level than humanity has communicated in a very long time. Let them show us what we're capable of.

Embrace them, embrace yourself—and consider the possibility that maybe we don’t need fixing…

Viewing life from a different perspective for a moment or two isn’t going to hurt a thing…