A Conscious Awakening on how to make decisions

A dawn of Confusion and Conscious Awakening

 

 

How can you trust your own mind, intuitive guidance and conscious beliefs when it is filled with contradictory internal and circular arguments, thoughts and feelings? How do you deal with the dawning of this confusion and conscious awakening that is tearing you apart? One must learn to trust the head and the heart but it’s easier said than done.

 

One day, whether early morning after a night’s sleep or just before going to bed, you may have such an experience suspecting or feeling confused, paralyzed and overwhelmed with a moral dilemma to do what is right and stop this inner turmoil inside the head and heart. It is one of the most painful experiences known to mankind but it is often a major decision that has to be made at one time or another.

 

The anxiety of being faced with a crossroad in life where a next decision must be made in order to move forward from this stopped, stuck place, is often tremendously stressful. No easy debate to follow as it is so paralyzing in way we feel. Dealing with such negative stressful forces can make the situation insurmountable in every aspect of life and sometimes hopeless.

 

Making a decision under such conditions means dealing with two forces very different in nature as you learn to listen to your heart in one situation and use your head in the same circumstance. How do you know which is right? The fact is, making decisions under such conditions can be very impossible without a little help. Two major questions come up to deal with:

 

·         Which do I trust in this situation with which I am faced: the head or the heart?

 

·         How do I know what to listen to? How can I trust my own inner guidance when I am confused and stuck in contradictory circular inner arguments, thoughts, and feelings?

 

Let’s examine these two forces: the head and the heart, each in turn as they both speak different languages we all understand. However, when they exist at the same time, or they are circular in values, then it becomes more important to pay attention how you “think” in such a situation. This is the first clue in such situations – keeping it rational and logical if at all possible.

 

The Heart of the Matter are arguments which contain feelings related to your soul and can be stronger than the head in the emotional feelings of desire and passion. It may appear timid but it does not feel fear – rather it thrives on love, either self-narcissistic ways or the love or powerful appeal for something or someone else.

 

The heart takes us to risky and unknown paths in life. It creates confusion strong enough to avoid making a decision. This inner conflict between the wishes of the heart versus the voice of the head makes it hard to decide which is the right path to take.

 

The Head of the Matter are arguments that the heart does not feel. The head is emotionless and comparative with a thorough thought process that includes fear. It is your mind corrupted by human flaws such as greed, lust, and wealth as enticements or incentives to make decisions.

 

The head enlists the thinking process to do the comparative process and decides what is best on motive, expectations and desires. In other words, unlike the heart, it tries to convince us what is the safest, best or most desirable decision to make based on fear of making the wrong decision.

 

Under most circumstance, the heart and the head will fight boldly and argue the situation persuasively and seductively in favor of a compromise or fulfillment of some sort. The outcome depends on what you long for the most in life. The head may dictate a status quo in your life while your heart may seek a change. Patience is a virtue when faced with such difficult situations.

 

On the other hand, since the head is always looking out for potential risks in keeping you safe, it might act as our bodyguard and convince you to change your mind contrary to your heart’s desires. Since our heart does not monitor fear, our head keeps our wits about us! It is our heads that trigger the “fight or flight” syndrome inside our body and changes our hormones to deal with the fear or survival needs. If it were not for the head or intelligence we possess, our ability to sustain and survive life would be seriously impaired.

 

Recognizing this argument between heart and head we can see the heart seats itself as our pleasure mechanism or triggers of passion, pulling the heartstrings in many different directions. Without our heart, we would not experience love, explore the freedoms and beauty of life and in all practical terms, be a dead heartless species. One can quickly see how that impacts our decision making capabilities as well as our moral values.  

 

We have to come to some balanced sense of clarity and courage of choice of actions or directions. The best course to take is the do the stepping with true conscious awareness of the dynamics and inner dialogue that goes on between the head and the heart from an authentic self – this translates into making a decision by yourself, and not follow the advice of others involved or witnessing this inner struggle.

 

This is your story – your challenge and your decision. Making or taking the right action or decision depends on your values and staying true to your own nature, mind, heart and conscious awareness.

 

Young man, Look at my Life

Young man, look at my life

 

Young man, look at my life, and measure where I have been

68 and counting, every part of the world I have seen

I was a lot like you were, I started off being young

But now, after living so longer stretch of time,

I find I have some sobering teardrops in my eye

 

Young man, look at my life, you have to believe there is much more

I live alone in my little corner of the world, with a window so small I cannot see

The love I have lost, the beauty of our Earth and the people who used to call me friend

The things I liked got lost along the way, it’s like a hike into eternity

Like an old two headed coin, that gets tossed in the air, my life is showing wear and tear

 

Young man, look at my life, I sit here by the window and stare

I was a lot like you, I laughed the whole day through and one look into my eyes

You know that everything I tell you is true

There were no wrinkles on my face, my eyes could see clearly for miles

And as I look into your younger eyes, you know I tell you no lies

 

So aging fast, the end is near, and life is what I made it to be

Life means so much when you are young, spirited and free

I still feel the touch; I can still sense the wind as it blows around my head

I have lived life fast and hard, I have visited the past and even now, I see the dead

But in reality, I know I was never the first, and now I know I won’t be the last

Another great Hoax - Donald Trump - a marketing scheme

Donald Trump – a Marketing scheme that worked Momentarily

 

The end of days is coming for Donald Trump – his success of delivering varies messages to the population has successfully seeded the American society with what is really on the minds of many voters. His presence was a purely politically and socially marketing scheme to draw out the weaknesses of the American voters and put their issues out there on the front pages.

The end of days is coming – Trump’s support base will collapse within the next few weeks. He no longer serves a purpose other than a decoy for the reality around us. Every word he spoke was done without any intent to carry out any promises as he knew, he would never be elected. There are virtually no conditions today that would support him indefinitely until the main election.

His last hooray for the veterans, elderly and white folks who see him as a patriarch of the white race is soon to be declared over. In all reality, nobody who supports Trump supports small government and many glaze over social security, Medicare and other elderly support programs. They couldn’t care less.

Trump’s lifestyle is his personal means of living and cannot sustain a political life. Trump is about authority and wealthy, not virtue or integrity – he has no morals and he will bankrupt any business he gets his hands on. Truthfully, his campaign has made his wealth richer, one could expect that to happen when he raises the kind of financial backing to be the proxy candidate for the real candidate soon to be announced.

Trump is about control – yet he cannot control himself. He is no more a conservative as anyone currently in the United States Congress. He has New York values and carries a large stock on Wall Street style of friendships. He neither cares about the environment, war, peace or any other capitalist topic except economics. He wants to be richer than he already is.

He mobilized voters to divide and conquer the population. His mere presence has stigmatized the election to where these loud and visible whitest of many American voters won’t even participate if he is not on the ballot or even as a third party candidate.

In this manner, they have been defeated with their will to vote this coming election and as before, a lower voter turnout stacked with voters rising from the dead, illegal immigrants, expired visa holding foreigners and many more ineligible “citizens’ who under most conditions could not vote.

Today, the electoral system has been manipulated and broken down, and the real motives are out in the open. The rich will remain rich and the middle class will join the poor.

The Donald Trump rally call was actually a call for political suicide and the erosion of the white patriarchy he represented so well. There is no conservative movement. There is a small libertarian movement but too small to make a difference in the election. We have all seen the flamboyancy of a hustler. He has done his job well and his efforts will be compensated by the winners.

 

Is Shame a positive motivator?

Correctional Officers – Is Shame a Positive Motivator?

Reading about human nature and behaviors, one has to reflect a moment and see if the tool of “Shame” is one of the means you use to motivate your inmate population. Analytically speaking, to shame a person can be detrimental to his or her regaining whatever deficiency or imperfection they may have suffered during a setback, whether it was in the performance a personality disorder, an act of criminality or even an addiction. It may also create conflict or friction which may perpetuate an undesirable act.

To define shame – a condition of humiliating, disgrace or disrepute a person or behavior - is putting someone on “front street” to teach them the error of their ways. This could be pure subjective and counterproductive of the goal intended, which is usually to redirect them towards the positive goals of better human behaviors or relations. Undisputedly, perhaps in some circumstances, shaming a person can be helpful since it is a genuine emotion that we all carry with us and can stop us from further self-inflicted harm or continued behaviors.

Therefore, the use of embarrassment is to police others is used to reduce damage or defuse targeted action and encourage them not to repeat them. However, for those who use this tool too much, it has been found to be unhealthy if used as a weapon to crush spirits when used too often.  It may cause anger and depressions. By means of technique create a state of humiliation, is a delicate tool that should be used sparingly as a deterrent to avoid repeat mistakes or behaviors.

Personally, I discourage the use of shame. It has been my experience; in the spirit it may be used can be detrimental if abused or misused in specific situations. Keep in mind that whenever you use shame as a means to address a situation, it could backfire due to the anger and emotions involved in such a discussion. It could put you or others at risk of a verbal or physical attack in a very spontaneous manner.

Attempting to shame someone to “come clean” of a drug addiction could create the exact opposite effect; it could send the person into a deeper pit of addiction or anger. For many, it creates a “no way out” to come clean. Keep in mind the audience present when you lash out shame.

Prisons or jails are already volatile places to work and adding any negative fuel to the fire is strongly discouraged by anyone who has experience in sound supervisory principles. Remember, shaming someone in front of others can created an emotion of revenge or retaliation that could come back to harm you or those you work with. Prisoners are not well known to exhibit self-control or positive impulse mechanisms. Hence the key is to avoid chronic shame – guilt can motivate but on the other hand, it does promote self-loathing and a sense of decreased value. It becomes a vicious tool to create further self-destruction and increase the cycle of self-abuse.

A recent by Jessica Tracy and Daniel Randles of the University of British Columbia conducted research using universal body language to measure shame as a recovery tool. Their findings, published in Clinical Psychological Science, showed a definite connection between shame and relapse. Those most ashamed were more likely to relapse, and have relapses that were more severe.

These results demonstrate that shame does not appear to promote sobriety but in fact promotes addiction. Shaming someone in such a vulnerable state is not helpful, but dangerous. Experiencing shame during recovery can have detrimental effects on multiple fronts and cause the following conditions:

·         Shame can cause an individual to avoid forming the supportive relationships needed for successful self-recovery and self-esteem.

·         Shame prevents enjoyment of success. Those in recovery need to be capable of celebrating their successes and a mental “beat down” can instill negative emotions.

·         Shame may cause an addict or offender to feel they don’t deserve a better life. Their shame will prevent them from making efforts towards bettering themselves while incarcerated.

·         Shame has been shown to increase the risk of other conditions that worsen addiction, such as depression, anger, and other volatile or intense negative behaviors.

·         Shame adds further discomfort to the difficult “life behind bars” process. A person experiencing shame in their life working to reform their own habits, will likely relapse.

·         Shame is self-destructive. Even if the addict gets self-restrained in manner, they may continue other self-destructive behaviors due to their shame that could be relative to their ability to return to prison and jeopardize reoffending opportunities.

Reference:

http://www.recovery.org/is-shame-a-good-motivator-in-recovery/

Less to worry about when you don't know the answer?

Ignorance is Bliss

 

Most of us can say with some level of honesty that ignorance is “foolish and presumptuous” when there are so many sources out there to seek the truth. The reason I say ignorance is bliss can be based on the fact the (s)he who thinks (s)he is wise thinks s(he) knows it all when in fact, (s)he doesn’t know it at all.

Therefore, those who choose to live in ignorance may be living a contradiction as they claim to know something but failed the test to make it meet the truth or facts Hence, failing to try to meet the test to find the truth is their justification for being ignorant rather than saying, “I don’t know.”

In order to avoid a level of ignorance, one must make an effort to inquire so to find the answer or perhaps question or cross examine the statement. One cannot answer or refute the response if a proper inquiry is not made to justify the answer, hence it is a failure on oneself part to do so.

Although this sounds petty, it has large consequences on one’s own integrity to know the facts or tell the truth. Sometimes, it’s best to say that “I know that I do not know” as that may in fact be the truth rather than make up an untruthful answer.

“Know thy self” begins with being truthful with thy self and one’s own mind. One could also say that choosing not to know the truth is one way not to worry about it.

The Sanctity of Human Love

The Redeeming Effect of Human Love

 

Martin Luther King Day, 2016

 

Human Love is not apart from love that is Sacred and Divine

It is not possible to have human love without the love of God

There are no limitations on our relationships with admirations of God

Even when stressed, tested or pulled apart from the insanities of life

 

We all seek a union that is blessed and covered by faith, vision and hope

Finding a deepening romance that blossoms around giving and receiving

Creating a redeeming way to bring this love together for an ultimate union

Knowing that love is the answer when combined with words of God

 

So open up your eyes, heart and mind, by partaking and believing in oneself

These things are all made possible by faith and vision to share your life with others

With those who share a divine relationship with humanity and celestial mediation

Together or as many, seek the yearning to satisfy self-fulfillment and blessings

 

A perfect union between self, God and others is experienced with passions of love

This way, there is no self-centered way, no self-idolatry; just visions of reality

For God is the source of inner sanctum and spirited passion which surrounds us

As His presence brings deliverance, union and sanctification of human love

 

Restless Heart - Calming Seas

Restless Heart – Calming Seas

 

I lived my life in the fast lane more than once

The reasons for such wildness was never a question of sanity or anger

But rather it was a moment of calmness that the rough seas brought to my heart

Because when nothing goes right, a restless heart seeks to find a calming sea

 

I had been told by many that it would be the cause for my demise

Living like a masochist, they said it would eventually take my life

Why couldn’t I be like the rest of men, who walked the calming seas

Instead of finding a way to ride the highest waves brought on by these dreams

 

A rebel heart inside me took me to the highest summits of my life

It gave me visions of hope, desire and passion that I wanted to be a part of me

I belonged to the wildness in this world, I passed on the calming seas

It seemed that walking on the wild side of life was the life that satisfied me

 

Living with this kind of acceptancy, it took me on the rebel side of me

It made me feel that it was part of my destiny, leaving me never satisfied

I took the high road more often than the dark road but it barely kept me alive

You might say that making bad choices is what kept me the will to survive

 

The depth of my heart, the strength of my soul was what kept me going strong

Even though at times, my heart knew what I was doing was wrong

As I aged I shed my skin and outgrew that part of me that caused me pain

So every now and then, I take an opportunity to shed a tear by walking in the rain