Took me 280 shots to get this one last night from the deck last night.

Even this one ain't that great… But it's the only one that produced the goods…

Thank God for digital cameras, "burst mode", and moving items to the Trash.

Two or three lightning strikes every second (by then it was too dark and raining too hard for photos).

Sunny and cool today.

in sepia

Today's a cold and rainy day.

On the bright side, the rain is greening up the world outside my window in an Ireland sorta way. April showers and all that…

This afternoon I attended the funeral services for my godfather who passed at the age of 96. He was really more like the grandfather I never had; a wonderful man who showed me a lot of love as a little boy. I am very lucky to have had him and his lovely wife in my life.

A priest said a few words at the funeral parlor. He did a fine job, but listening to his words stirred up lots of old feelings for me.

I was raised a Catholic, but when I left for college I fell out of the habit of attending mass every Sunday.

The truth is, habit was the only reason I ever went to church.

I NEVER felt comfortable in the Catholic church.

Sometime around first grade (6 years old?) I had to make my first confession. For non-Catholics, this means I had to go into a dark little room and tell the priest who was hiding behind a screen how I had sinned against God.

I was terrified by the whole idea of confession. I did not like thinking of myself as a sinner, as someone bad. Up until that time, I thought I was just a little boy. And a pretty good one at that…

Filled with anxiety over the future of my soul, I couldn't sleep for the week before I was to repent. To further add to my stress, I had trouble thinking of what I had done to sin in the eyes of God in my six wild and careless years of life.

Um, sure, I had yelled at my sister and did not always do as my parents told me, but I wasn't sure if this was going to make the grade with the priest. The old guy scared the pants off me (not literally) and I wasn't taking any chances and getting into bigger trouble by not coming through with a bona fide sin.

So when I closed the door in the dark little booth, what did I do?

I lied, of course.

Stealing a scene from a movie, I told the priest I broke a neighbor's window with a baseball and ran away. As best I could tell, the priest bought it.

Grounded in fear, my relationship with the church was built on a rocky foundation. As the fear-based messages continued to roll in during my adolescence, ("If you keep listening to that devil music, you can expect eternal damnation"), any connections I felt disintegrated.

I was reminded of all of this today when the priest began to talk about how when our time comes, God will be waiting there like a shepard tending his flock and sorting through his sheep. God will lay his judgment down upon us and separate us into the GOOD and the BAD.

As I listened, I felt that same pit in my stomach that I felt as I waited to confess my sins for the first time.

This. Just. Feels. Wrong. To. Me.

 

 

On my way to basketball this AM I was listening to my trusty satellite radio, doing some rockin' out.

An old Def Leppard song came on — Action, Not Words.

I haven't heard the song in years, but  this was the music of my youth and in those days I spent all my money on albums, cassettes, walkmans, and speakers.

Somehow, all the lyrics were still embedded in my neural connections. The words poured out, I sang along, got pumped up to play some basketball, and reflected upon my teenage years.

While I couldn't quite remember who I was back then (I think I was happy, but was I?), I was certain that Def Leppard had indeed rocked. I wanted to share the sentiment with someone, to reminisce over the merits of the albums High N Dry and Pyromania. (For the record, they turned the corner for me with Hysteria.)

But it's just me and soon I'm at the gym, doing battle.

After the games, I stop at an internet cafe to do a little work and get some food.

I notice a couple in the booth across from where I type this entry.

Something about them strikes me, so I keep stealing glances, piecing together bits of information in my head (I do this, so beware of me in public places. I tell ya, I don't miss a trick). I notice his accent — pleasant. English? Certainly not from these parts…

There's something about them… are they artists of some kind?

On their way out, I hear him mention something about a manager for Def Leppard.

Wait a minute…

Is that…?

Of course, it is!

A Google search confirms everything…

The dude is one of the members of Def Leppard!

(I'll keep it private as to which one, but I'll say that I've never seen anyone else play his instrument the way he does. Got it now, rock fans?)

Believe me that when I tell you this was a rather unlikely meeting place. I'm still shaking my head at the thought of it. I do not live any where near L.A…. Logically, the odds had to be damn near zero… but I like to look deeper than logic can take me. (And if he hadn't said something about Def Leppard in front of me at the last minute, I never would have made the connection. It sorta felt like he was giving me a clue…?)

These sorts of meetings have been happening quite a bit in the past few weeks (but this one takes the prize so far). I will think of someone and then bump into them in an unlikley way. It's fun and a bit freaky too…

I've doing some working clearing any barriers to my intuition with my Very Cool Life Network group… I think this is likely it — that I'm just in tune with what's to unfold.

Here's to remembering more of the future!

And rocking out…

d

• The morning light on my cat, Jezebel, is brighter
• The robins have been around for at least two weeks now
• Canada geese flying overhead woke me the other morning
• I had to swerve my car to avoid hitting a wooly bear (catepillar) crossing the road yesterday. Hadn't seen one of those since fall.
• The shoot of a lilly is poking through the snow and mud
• Cardinals and red-winged blackbirds have been hitting the feeder, too
• The hill sides are more brown than white
• I am on my last cord of firewood
• I can drive my car with little fear of getting caught in a storm. But you never know this time of year.
• When the sun is out and you walk through the woods, you can hear the world coming back to life
• Major League baseball players are already brawling
• The New York State High School Basketball Championships are in town. Time to go watch a few games…

 

I am sitting in a cafe, using the place's WiFi to upload some files.

It's okay, I bought a sandwich…

Anyhow, if you live in the United States, I am sure you heard the news about the governor of my fair state.
If you live elsewhere on the globe, I'll fill you in…

Our governor (or former governor, I should say, as he resigned today) was found to be a client of an upscale prostitution ring. Sex and power are not such strange bedfellows, of course. (You can visit www.nytimes.com for the latest if you so desire).

But again, for those of you unfamiliar with Eliot Spitzer, he built his reputation as a crusader for ethics. He was known as a real hard-ass and made lots of powerful enemies on Wall Street and elsewhere. So the revelation of his incongruous behavior stunned most people. You can count me in that group, much more so than Bill Clinton's shenanigans.

Of the conversations I've had or listened to, the same question comes up…

How could he not know he was going to get caught? How could he have been so stupid?

Well, I have a thought about that…

The man is a bright guy. On one level, he knew the huge risk he was taking. But on another level — a more unconscious level, he was driven/attracted to this sort of self-destructive behavior. And clearly, what exists within him on an unconscious level is a powerful, powerful force. Enough to override any semblance of common sense. This is the same force at work in any addictive behavior.

For example…

You have an intention in your conscious mind: I am healthy and take care of my body. And yet when you look at your behavior objectively, there are lots of habits that contradict/override this intention (i.e., eating lots of sugar, large portions, dessert, etc.).

In this example, the impulse to eat a dessert is a largely unconscious behavior. Of course, you know what you are doing if asked about it — but in the moment the force, the urge, the impulse is the most powerful connection for action. Before you know it, the dessert is eaten and you sit there wondering why you made yourself so uncomfortable by choosing something you didn't really even want or enjoy.

The reason?

A powerful conflicting intention. A field of energy that's been conditioned into you that exists at the subconscious level. And the thing about subconscious fields of energy/blocks is that they manifest themselves in insidious ways. Ways that do not serve you. Ways that have you scratching your head, wondering, how could I be so f*cking stupid?

Just like the former governor of New York State is now.

It's not until you bring your unconscious, conflicting intentions to the level of conscious awareness that you can deal with them. And yes, this goes beyond just talking about them (i.e. traditional talk therapy). This means eliminating that old pattern of energy that has been unconsciously guiding you. This is the future of coaching/therapy/personal development, by the way. Energy medicine. Quite simply, it's what works best.

For the record, my hunch is that Mr. Spitzer had many conflicting intentions about his position as governor. I suspect his whole life was based on meeting the expectation of someone else, most likely a parent. This is just the manifestation of this long seeded, unconscious intention. I hope he addresses it in the proper way, or, like a dandelion not taken at the root, it will just return in some form.

And I feel for the guy. God knows I've done some stupid stuff that I am not proud of — stuff that hurt people. But in my work addressing my own conflicting intentions for the past 5 or 6 years, I've gotten better…

Like I said, this stuff works…

Okay, files are loaded. Time to go home.