How to Navigate Bad Times

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune...

To be or not to be, that is the question;
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing, end them. To die, to sleep;
...To sleep, perchance to dream. Ay, there's the rub,

Rub indeed - ain't it the truth!

This post is prompted by the too many incidents of suicide these days.  This is heart-breaking as most of these are due to depression which is an imminently treatable disease.  But it is also a killer.  If we knew that we were at risk, for cancer or heart disease, we would do everything we could to prevent it.  It's just that the prevention for depression involves the mind which is responsible for judgment, which is what gets us to profession care.  Hopefully realizing this, if you are depressed or feel depression, at "see more" part of this post is more information about quick (albeit little) quizes to see if you need to go to a professional for your depression.

This is one of the most significant soliloquies of English literature.  How did Shakespeare know so much and able to say so much with so few words....

Whether it is more noble to suffer the trauma of sticks and stones of the world, or rather to just end it all and go to a place away from here...possibly even to dream.  What a luring temptation when you are in the middle of war.

And this is a temptation.  To say it isn't, is folly.  To say that we all haven't had this thought is folly as well.  Hopefully we snap out of it. 

But if you don't, and it persists:  seek professional help immediately.  This is a clear sign of depression that will need a professional to set the broken part into a cast so that he will heal normally.  After all if you had a broken leg, you wouldn't continue to walk around on it hoping things would "get better" would you?  If you would, then ignore getting professional help.  Check the bottom of this blog for more about this.  This is important - don't let it go.

But if you do not have this as a persistent thought - it's just a passing thought, here are some ideas and techniques to get  you out of your funk.

First of all, let's hit the nail on the head and not mess around with words - suicide (this is what we're talking about here), is the most selfish act a person can make.  That is why there is no forgiveness for it.  That is why it is a great sin.  Why?  Because the mess that you do not want to contend with, will be left for your loved ones to contend with. 

This folly of believing that the world would be better off without you in it, is selfish nonsense.   Don't mean to sound like Dr. Laura, but there it is.

The next is the legacy - for generations - that this leaves in your family.  The legacy suicide leaves in family and loved ones is enormous.  For generations to come, children, grand-children, nieces, nephews, cousins all believe that because you couldn't make it, therefore how can they expect or hope to make it.  It sets a precedent that is not only difficult to overcome, but near impossible (particularly without professional help).

If you believe you are the first person in the world or in your family to have to undergo difficult times, get real.  We have it easy compared to those who went before us.  From our faith  how would you liked to have lived in the 2nd Century - you'd be on the menu at the Coliseum!), to our daily lives - the conveniences and everyday amenities of freedom, protection, conveniences and availability of information that are an integral part of our lives. 

Granted our life and times have specific demands that are new and greater in other areas, but every generation has had these same challenges, and that's what they are....challenges placed in front of you to cause you to spiritually unfold and know yourself better. 

OK - so you say you don't want to know yourself better.  Well, that's all fine and dandy, but your life would not only be boring, but it would also be a life of quiet desperation.  This may sound good, but it's not the life that God means for us to live on this Earth.  He means for us to live a full life, one of discovering who we really are and that we, with His help, can be far more than we ever thought we could be.

OK - so hopefully that helps put things in perspective. 

Here are some easy steps to take to get you out of this:

1. Thought Stoppage - stop it.  I know it's hard, but just say to yourself - stop it - like Nike would say...just say, "Stop it!"
2. Meditation - This is a mind saver - it gives your mind down time to recover from the mayhem all around.
3. Prayer - this is like meditation - I consider it another form of meditation or meditation a form of prayer, whatever you prefer.  The big difference here is that you can slow yourself down long enough and deep enough that you can have those wonderful conversations with God.  Wow!  Talk about a relief!
4. Affirmations - Say these over and over and over and over (OK enuf already!)  But these do work.  And make up some that work for you:  words, phrases, thoughts that mean something to you.
5. Forgiveness - how did that get in here.  Well, a lot of times the strict gauge we have of ourselves, is self-defeating.  Forgive yourself, and forgive others around you who have persecuted you, wronged you, sinned against you and have generally made your life miserable even from the time you were born.  This doesn't mean that you forget it, and it certainly doesn't mean that you lay down and get in front of their cement roller. What it means is that you give these people to God and from now on it's God's problem to deal with the, no yours.  You give the whole revenge, retribution and judgement to God.  He can write a far better script than you can even hope to write.
6. Professional Help - after all this, if you are still having difficult time (and it does not mean that you are any less of a person, it probably means that you are taking on a heavy load), please, please seek professional help.  There are lots of resources at the bottom of this post (see the con't section).

All of these and more are in the Basics section of this blog along with some really cool Downloads that should spark your imagination to think of some other things that will be wonderful for you to use as resources.

These are really wonderful jump-starters to help get you out of that low depression.

As I mentioned earlier, if you are still having problems with depression please seek professional help, with some resources below.

One more little science thing....

A lot of people (Stephen Hawking among them) think you are either a scientist or religious....I don't think they are mutually exclusive.  I guess I have an open mind.

First, there's no way we can know everything - only when we are looking into the eyes of God will we know everything, and that ain't happenin' on this planet!

Second, if we're not going to know everything, then there's always going to be something smaller or bigger for us to know - that which is created by God.

Third, we will always need God no matter what.  It is our very nature, no matter how smart we get, we will always need Him - we are born needing Him.  It is through him that we are able to survive and accomplish and even excel greater than we thought through all the wonders, or what others might say is the scary-dark of the unknown.

Fourth, We were not put on this Earth with our God-given intelligence, curiosity with the dictate not to use that intelligence - or to use it some places but not in others.  We are all meant to be curious, to experiment, to discover the wonder that God has created all around us.  Why wouldn't we want to know about all the wonders...they get us closer to God.

This is why I love checking out all these science sites, particularly the ones on Relativity vs. Quantum Theories.  I love checking out Michio Kaku, Brian Green, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Stephen Hawking, Einsten, and Max Planck.  Just to name a few!  But these are mostly the easiest and therefore more knowlegeable people I know.  These guys know their stuff so well, they can simplify it for the rest of us.

One of them was this site, which explains why there is a discrepancy between the rate mass travels and the rate light travels...which gets a little into the brain esplodin' territory!

But before we go too far...here's a wonderful piece by Michio Kaku - hold on - it's going to be a bumpy ride.

So what's the point of all this - why does it matter?...who cares about other universes, who cares if is uni-verse or multi-verse or schmuniverse - what's that got to do with how my life is now?

Well, one of the things that scientist are beginning to toy with is how the future affects the past.  What?  Isn't that the other way around?  Well, yes in Newton's world it was the other way around.  But in this new world of multi-verses - possible parallel universes, time warps, unfolding and folding space and other concepts that are in the BED (brain-exploding department).

These are some of the same concepts that philosophers have been talking about for years.   Concepts like believing your goals are already met, affirming from a future point of view as though your goals have already been met.  Isn't this the future affecting the present, which is the future's past?  Isn't this God having a plan for all of us and we are just now realizing that we can almost prove it with theoretical physics?

These are questions that can cause some to think they are heretical, but the truth is, that it isn't that at all.  As Michio Kaku says - we are in a Copernican time right now....a time when we are about to break through into a whole new way of thinking of our world and uni/multi-verses.  How exciting is that? 

Voids, Vacums, Vacuities - oh my!

I know I've talked a lot about the "new" Physics - particle/wave duality, quantum, relativity, and this is a switch off that (thank heavens!)

This is part of the physical world we know.  We know this is true because we've seen it over and over. How have we seen it?

I live in the Southern Plains, and in the spring we see it lots of fronts, dry lines, updrafts, towering cumulus and tornadoes.  When a lo pressure moves through - before and after, there are a lot of winds.  Why?  Because there is a "low" pressure, and the air is moving from the "high" pressure (where this is lots of air) to the "low" pressure (where there is less air).

That sounds like a given, but it is a very firm Law of Physics.  This law states that nature will always seek to fill a vacuum or void. It will always flow from the much to the less.  Heat will always move from more heat to a cooler spot.

How does this pertain to us?  Well, if you have a vacuum, it will be filled. 

One of the fun things to do is go through your apartment or home and clean out old, unwanted or items that need to be discarded.  Clean out that old garage, closet, attict, basement and get all the unused or discarded items.  Do this throughout your home, office, car wherever.  Get your environment in order.  This brings a lot of extra space into your home, but it also clears out the old cobwebs for new order.  This is one of those things - trust me!  It works.

Lent

Good morning and welcome to Lent.  That sounds so depressing, but actually it's not.  This is a wonderful time of introspection and examining ourselves and making sure that you are where you want to be as well as a chance to hone up some of those skills and techniques that will get you through your tough times.

Lent is that time that comes right before spring.  It's February 25th this year (2009).   Starting in the "dog days of winter," here we are bored to tears of cold weather and another cold front is coming through with dreams of warm lazy days totally lost in the snow and cloudy weather. All we want is a little warm weather and in comes another March ice storm!  In my part of the country, our worst winter weather is usually in March, usually after we've received a taste of some warm weather.

Lent is a lot of things to different religions.  My Catholic side of the family believes that giving something up for lent is a symbol of their faith.  A favorite when I was growing up was chocolate or something fattening.

On the religious calendar, lent is that time that Jesus went into the wilderness and was tempted by the devil.  He resisted and then started his ministry.  So the temptations in the wilderness were a time of preparation of his ministry.  That's the meaning that has grown through time to mean more of a time of discipline than anything else. 

At my religious school, where the establishment realized they were leading a variety of denominations, they encouraged the student body to not only think of lent as a time of "giving up" something but to also think of a time of doing something extra. I particularly liked this idea.  This is a time of discipline which can mean that you could decide to do something extra - like pick up my room and leave it neat every day; or add another hour of study to my schedule every day; or drink more water.

The point is that it is a time of discipline - whether that's giving up or doing something extra is up to you.

For our purposes here, you can use this "time of discipline" to do lots of things that will enhance your effectiveness like:

1. Be more aware of problems, doubts sneaking into your daily life that can erode or destroy your belief and work to rid yourself of them
2. Be disciplined and scheduled about your affirmations, meditations on a daily basis.
3. Hone up your wish list, but examining the most important dreams you have.  Ask yourself why you want this or why you want to be like this or why you want to be here or there.  This is not to question whether they are true, this is to get more clear in your mind why they are so true, and therefore help you be more clear about your affirming and meditating processes.
4. Add, refine, edit your vision board
5. Do some journaling starting with your affirmations and just let yourself wander with it and allow yourself to explore all your affirmations.  Try something like this:
       I am a patient person.  I enjoy being patient because it brings me great peace.  Being patient allows me to have the peace I really enjoy.  When I’m patient I’m easy and fun and so at one with God.  Patience is a way for God to speak to me and for me a chance to listen to all that he has to say to me.  He can tell me to go here, or do this or wait or not do that.  I love being patient.  It has taken me a long time to learn it, and I relish that I have finally become patient enough to enjoy the process.  There are certain things I do to really practice my patience, and when I do them more often, patience is much easier for me.
6. Are there some areas that need a little tweaking?...wish list, vision board....
7. Review a lot of the basic theories here and go through and see if any of your applications can use some updating. 

You can use lent to give you a greater discipline that will make you a better person than you thought you could be. 

This is the real purpose of lent, plus there's always a wonderful gift at the end:  not only will you have spent this time disciplining yourself and getting better at all the techniques, there's....

Easter!

R & R

There's a great line in Postcards From The Edge:

"You have a realization and your life changes a month or so later."

Wow - when I finally realized that, it took a lot of pressure off me.  I thought I was supposed to "get" stuff immediately after I realized it.  I mean all these movies, and stories talk about someone crying and wailing and finally realizing that this or that happened to them and that's why they act this or that way, and poof!!!!  Instantly they are cured:  they loose all that fat weight, grow beautiful overnight, and their bank account is instantly filled....isn't life supposed to be the same?

It's not?!!!

Affirmations

I'm not sure we've talked about this, but Affirmations are vital. 

Here are the "vitals" for making the most of your dreams:

• Ask, Believe, Receive (this includes all the refining on your ask - as in how to ask, etc.; believing and all that involves, and receiving - being in that state of mind.)
• Vision Board - really second step in asking
• Meditation
• Affirmation

These are vital to your work in keeping your mind above the fray.  Even though I've listed Affirmations last, that doesn't mean it is the last. These act as confirmations of your dreams and wishes. 

Meditation techniques and types

I wrote on an earlier blog about meditation in general, but here are some more detailed techniques that will get your creative juices flowing to get you started on a good method of meditating regularly.

• Meditating on words, phrases, quotes, scripture
• Meditating on a single thought or visual place from your mind
• Meditating through physical breathing techniques or other physical techniques.
• Meditating with the aid of an audio or video 

Here's further description of these

Timespace

What do the "mean reds", vision boards, mood shifters, meditation all have to do with Time & Space.

For an artist I have an amazing scientific mind....I just love physics (particularly the modern physics - quantum, relativity and all that stuff), and all the things connected with it, 13 dimensions, string theories, parallel universes, time & space warps, wave/particle duality - they are all fascinating....it's like ol' Newton had a nightmare and then wrote up a whole new set of Laws of Physics or more like Newton was tossed on his head and everything is upside down.

Review

Don't you hate reviews....I know, but I've got to go through these again.  They are really important.

Affirmations - Don't forget these.  These are your discipline everyday for 10 to 15 minutes a day.  This helps keep your focus.

Meditation -  Most major prosperous people will tell you that they meditate on a regular basis.  It is a time for them to clear their mind and to be creative and open to new prosperous ideas.

Ask, Receive, Believe - right out of all the gospels....this is found in all the gospels, as well as "believe" which is found numerous times in all the gospels

Thankfulness - be grateful for the surroundings around you.  Bless the manna close at hand and fearlessly use it, it multiplies.

Here's some more of my affirmation goodies that I've listed before
Morning Mantras
Blessings
Quotes
Verses & Prayers

Gee - there's a lot to remember here.  But believe it or not you will fall into a formula that will work for you.  These are just an array of ideas that will help you choose which ones work best for you.  This is your process and you have to make yourself have those positive thoughts that will demonstrate themselves as good feelings...that's how you know your positive thoughts are on target.

Attraction of Likes

I can't believe I've gone this far and haven't talked about this. 

This is another one of those proven laws that is a given.  IOW, it's not theoretical or been expounded upon as theory, it's actually been proven.

The most striking example I can think of is the formation of the solar system and solar systems in general.  Solar systems for out of gases and debris in space.  Pretty soon the debris begins to collect and stick together then as it does the debris begins to swirl around the center of the mass, and that debris begins to collect in the spirals out from that mass....in our solar system, the Sun was the mass that everything swirled around.  After that smaller masses begin to form from the debris in the swirls of masses that the Sun attracted forming the planets and asteroids, moons and "little planets". 

These were not formed from "dark matter" and particles and light and other things - particles attracted particles only.  Like attracts like.