Sunday, March 5, 2006

My Prejudice: Unveiled

Friday afternoon came in under the radar. I end the week taking Anouk to the river with our homeschool group. I had no money (which normally translates as no plans). Then a friend of mine invited me to go to a class at East West Books called, "How to Become an Irresistible Magnet for Love, Money & Miracles" with Jacqueline Aldana. While this is not something I normally would do (being stubbornly independent), I accepted. It was a nice offering and a good excuse to go hang out with my friend. And, under my breath, maybe I could learn something... The speaker, Jacqueline, was a very happy person. Her cup runneth over. And here, I speak the unspeakable: my prejudice. I cannot stand people who are always happy. I cannot stand the "fake it till you make it" attitude. Don't they know there's suffering in the world?! Don't they know that suffering is the other side of transformation?! Don't they know that it takes a lot of shit and decay to grow a beautiful garden?! Well, I let go of these thoughts so that I could actually hear what she was saying. And basically what it came down to was reprogramming your thoughts. If someone says, "I want you to notice the color BLUE," that's where your consciousness goes. Likewise, if you only notice the negative, the sad and the suffering, that's all you're going to be! And, if you're too stubborn to ask for help, you're not going to get it. I have the strong urge to insert a disclaimer here about how I love my melancholy and don't worry about me becoming all perky and new-agey, but I won't! (Hee-hee) At the end of the evening there was a raffle, and I won her journaling book called The Miracle Manifestation Manual II. And I'm going to commit myself to it! Why not? If not perkiness, it could at least give me an appreciation or understanding of happy people! And, who knows? Perhaps I will even transcend this mortal coil. You'll know I haven't through my continuing MySpace posts, but if you stop getting them, look for another star in the night sky. I'd be the one shaped like a flower growing out of a dung pile!

Saturday, March 4, 2006

Book Rating System

I make to-do lists.

And, although it is one of my favorite things to do, reading is not on my list.

What makes it on the list are mostly social obligations and conventions:

housecleaning and maintenance, call so-and-so, send thank you notes,

file taxes, laundry, shower --

things I might opt out of if my friends and family enabled my reading habit.

O.K. obsession.

An indicator of how good a book is -- is how long it takes to read --

and what goes undone.

Here's my rating system:

A 1 DAY READ

Spell-binding!

To-do list? Sleep?

A 2 DAYS READ

Juicy.

The to-do list is buried under piles of laundry and empty cans of green beans and stew eaten cold.

A 3 DAYS READ

Very interesting.

My friends and family have sent out search parties but only found a food-stained to-do list.

TAKES MORE THAN A WEEK

OR LESS THAN A DAY

Suspect.

I might as well do everything on the to-do list, damn-it.

I'm not sure why I'm reading this book.

In desperation I may start multiple books.

You know it's bad when your own thoughts carry you away on permanent vacation

and you reread the same sentence over and over.