These days it seems like mental health is being acknowledged and discussed more than ever before. It’s good in a way because we are getting more open to sharing our vulnerabilities, and we are becoming more open to understanding other people’s struggles. Is this because we are becoming more caring and understanding, or could it also be because more people than ever before are experiencing symptoms of mental afflictions? We are living in a time where people are isolating themselves in fear, fear of disease, fear of the government, fear of unprovoked evil. The world, in general, seems to be getting a lot more restless, and we are seeing hate and violence all around us, so it is natural for many people to retreat from life, in a way, to shut themselves in their minds, in their own little world with the people they love. Although mental health is being acknowledged, it is seen as something evil, even as a mental illness, when in reality this is not exactly the case. When we get physically hurt, the pain we feel is our body telling us that something is wrong, and according to Carl Jung, neurotic conditions such as anxiety and depression are also messages we are trying to convey to ourselves, messages not just from what’s hidden deep in our own minds, in our subconscious, but from what Jung called the collective unconscious. Jung’s famous idea of archetypes was something he arrived at by analyzing a lot of his patients’ dreams, as well as the different stories found in the books of the world’s different religions and mythologies. The main idea is that we all share a collective consciousness which is hidden from our day-to-day consciousness, much like our own subconscious is. Like the subconscious, the collective unconscious can also trigger strong impulses within us, the difference being that our own subconscious is made up of subliminal images and ideas that have stuck with us because of our own life experiences, whereas the collective unconscious holds images and ideas that are with us because we are part of a collective whole. According to Jung these ideas, or archetypes, come from the evolution of consciousness that mankind has lived through for who knows how many years. These strong values which have always been present in humanity don’t just disappear because we change the way in which outward society functions, they are still there within our psyche, influencing our personalities. These archetypes, such as building a good social structure or becoming mentally independent from our parents, are ingrained into us, and they make us feel as if there’s certain things in life that we absolutely must accomplish. Jung’s theory was that if we try to fight against these ingrained ideas, which can be referred to as the tasks of life which we all feel compelled to complete, then we will run into mental problems because we are choosing to live in a way which is contrary to what we are hardwired to become. It is true that we have free will, yet that doesn’t mean that all of our impulses will lead to our well-being. In this way of seeing neurotic disorders, we can perceive them as signs that we are not living correctly, that we are fighting against our true nature and our true calling. Often times this is because we are afraid of facing up to the tasks of life, and we try to deceive ourselves into thinking that we don’t need to achieve anything. We might convince ourselves of this by telling ourselves that the issues does not lie within us, that the issue is external, and therefore, since it can’t be fixed, we are doing the right thing by not getting involved. One of my favorite writers, Charles Bukowski, said “I don’t have any politics. I’m an observer.” In a way, I really liked it when I read that quote, because I’ve always felt this way myself. Bukowski was also an alcoholic, and analyzing that quote, along with his life, makes me wonder if he maybe had some demons of his own which he was too afraid to face. I can tell this is the case in my own life, when I analyze it through Jung’s theory. For years I’ve been getting stoned, simply because weed can make ideas a lot more interesting, it can make the inner world of my mind appear fresh and limitless, with everything the mind can conceive of and create. It also makes music and philosophy more interesting, my two favorite things to consume. I told myself that the world is fucked up, and that I didn’t need to complicate my life with it. I have my wife and I enjoy music and philosophy, so there’s not much else in the world for me other than possible trouble. Maybe I’ve really been hiding away from the world because of fear, fear of losing the foundation which I already have, or fear of unexpected trouble that could come my way in a world that’s growing increasingly turbulent. Carl Jung explains how, at the beginning of a neurotic disorder, the neurotic person might not feel too inconvenienced by avoiding life situations which may trigger anxiety, and in fact will feel some comfort in it, yet over time, as his or her life becomes routine, the person notices that something is wrong, because life has become restricted and closed off from the world. Because of the archetype which drives us to create social bonds and connections, the neurotic can’t help but feel distressed because, deep inside, from the collective unconscious, stems this feeling that they are not fulfilling something important which is imperative to their happiness as human beings. Being super interested in philosophy, psychology and spirituality, I’ve always known about and been a fan of Carl Jung, yet his body of work is so extensive and his ideas are so deep that they must be analyzed time and time again, and I had never really went too deep into what I’m discussing in this post today. However, as I research more into it, I have to admit that I do see myself in the image he paints of the neurotic person. This isn’t a reason to panic though, because again, anxiety is just a sign that change is needed, and that means there is hope for change.
Tag: alcohol
DAY 6: Cutting down on weed after more than a decade (1000 WORDS, 3rd attempt)
Day 6, I hope everyone who reads this is having an amazing day! Today is a sober day for me. I’ve been trying to cut down on weed for quite a while now, trying different methods, but haven’t had much success. I’m not blaming cannabis itself in any way, the issue is personal. I’ve been blazing since I was like twelve or thirteen, and even though at the beginning I smoked with my friends and just talked and laughed about random things, as time went on I started feeling less and less interested in hanging out and smoking with friends. I started mostly blazing alone, and eventually decided it was something I enjoyed enough to indulge in every day. Music was better, and since I always loved listening to music this was a big deal for me. I could blaze and listen to some beautiful music, some Bob Marley or Pink Floyd, and just look out at the sunrays shining through the leaves of the trees, and that in itself was just such a beautiful moment. I would walk around the streets and listen to music and just feel alive, as if there was this whole world out there, and I was just an observer, observing and taking it all in from the comfort of my own little world within. The people on the street didn’t know I was high. They didn’t know what music I was listening to, and they didn’t know that the combination of these two things was creating a whole landscape of ideas in my mind. Sometimes these moments would inspire me to write, whether ideas or possible lyrics for future songs, so I always kept a pen and notebook handy as well. I’ve always been super interested in spiritual or mystical experiences, and I believe these experiences were definitely mystical for me, they made me see life in a way I never had before and allowed me to just enjoy the moment. Unfortunately, as many stoners can probably relate, over time the magic faded, and it became just something to do to feel chill, eventually just to feel normal. I knew this wasn’t the right way to consume weed, but honestly I didn’t really mind, because I still enjoyed life a lot more while stoned, and I could still function pretty well, was still making music, still going to school and work and doing everything I was supposed to do. I feel like, in a way, this is where weed can get tricky. For example, an alcoholic or a heroin addict might feel the need to quit more intensely than a stoner, precisely because of the fact that the damage being caused in the alcoholic or the heroin addict’s life is obvious and hard to ignore, often they lose their families, their health, everything they have in life, to satisfy these vices, until maybe one day they feel absolutely compelled to quit. I haven’t ever gotten to that extreme, but at a certain point in my life, when I was feeling really negative and cynical, I was drinking heavily for long periods of time, and it quickly started to spiral out of control. So far I’ve gone this whole year without drinking even a beer, and I intend to finish the year in this way, and might even keep it up after the year is over. Alcohol just makes life a mess, no matter how fun it might be when you’re drunk. Weed, on the other hand, seems harmless, in the sense that we feel as if it doesn’t interfere with our ability to live life, maybe it even enhances life. It also doesn’t make us act in violent ways like alcohol does, and it doesn’t create a physical dependency either. What’s the problem with adding some extra spice to life then? Well, weed can definitely bring some things out which might not be expressed if one just goes through life sober forever, for example sometimes I’m more creative in the moment, it’s easier to focus on something which I really like, like making a beat and just jamming until it’s perfect, I know the effects of weed can be beneficial in many different settings. However, when I’m high I neglect other aspects of things, such as the marketing and promoting aspects of the music business. After all, no matter how much I may hate it, it’s still a business just like everything else in this world is. The boring stuff I never want to do just never gets done when I’m stoned. Why would I want to get stoned and try to reach out and market to people, to plan out marketing strategies and budgets, to look into this and that? I wanna get stoned and make music, or learn more about making even more kinds of music! Or draw or something. When I’m not doing anything creative I can also just get stoned and read some philosophic or spiritual books and my mind just travels to faraway places, my curiosity and imagination make it fun for me to just sit there and think. Without weed that just isn’t the same. What I’ve come to realize is something super basic – just like everything in life, balance is the key. As I mentioned, weed can be beneficial, it can help you bring creative ideas to life, to provide a different perspective on things, to stimulate the imagination, and it’s good for many other things. However, at least for me, it doesn’t make me wanna go out into the world and network, and make things happen. Instead, I tend to enjoy doing things alone when I’m stoned, or just hanging out with my wife at home. There’s nothing wrong with any of that, of course, but it all depends on what you want out of life. Personally, I’ve realized it’s time to step out of the comfortable bubble I’ve been living in for over a decade. I know that if I continue in the same way I’ve been living up until now, my dreams run the risk of never coming to fruition, and that’s too high a price to pay for just getting stoned. Don’t get me wrong though, my intention is not to quit completely, by any means. Weed has become a big part of my life, for better or for worse, and nowadays I mainly just eat edibles rather than smoking. Yeah they get me higher for longer, which I really enjoy, but the main reason I switched to edibles is because of my lung health. I know it’s not cancerous like cigarettes or whatever, but no smoke can be healthy for our lungs at the end of the day. I still smoke a joint occasionally, and I find that’s much more enjoyable than smoking every day, multiple times a day. Anyway, it’s tough for me to write about this, I feel like an addict coming clean to you all about my addiction, and I guess that’s really what this is. Anyway, I hope this can maybe help some of you who might be in the same situation. Analyze your goals, think deeply about what you want out of life, and balance your weed use so that it doesn’t interfere with what you really want to achieve!
Much love
~ rebel eye
1,000 WORDS (2nd attempt): DAY 61: Let Go of What You’re Attached To.
Today’s my second day in a row without bud. In case you didn’t know, I’m a daily toker, I have been for many years now. In the past few years I’ve started experimenting with setting goals for myself, daily goals as well as long-term goals. One example is my goal with alcohol. Back in the days I used to drink way too much, and it was causing problems in my life, so I finally decided that something needed to be done. I didn’t want to stop, and every day it was so easy to just walk on over to the corner store and grab a six pack, especially in the infernal Honduras heat as we getting home from work, no longer in the comfort of the air conditioning. In the midst of a painful hangover, since they got worse and worse over the years, I’d always swear I’d never drink again. I had no need for it, I would say, I felt guilty or ashamed about possibly, very likely, having acted like an idiot the night before, and I didn’t want the situation to repeat itself. No more drinking, I’ll be a new man. These were my thoughts, but once the hangover went away, the cravings always came back. The problem is drinking to excess, but why not just have a beer or two? That refreshing cold taste, that initial euphoria and overall relaxed feeling, they were too nice to pass up, especially since everyone I know from work loves to drink. I don’t know many other people here, but wherever we find ourselves these days, usually most people love to drink anyway. It’s a socially acceptable destructive habit. I didn’t pay much attention to all my promises to stop drinking, but over time I did a lot of reflection, along with some powerful psychedelic trips which really showed me the desperate situation I was in, and so I built up the courage to get started on an abstinence goal. I started out with just five days, and I promised my wife Maria that I would stick to the five days no matter how I felt. She’s not a drinker at all, so she’s always been such great support and motivation for me on this particular goal, although she always supports me with all of the goals I set for myself. Sure enough, when I talked about forgetting the goal and having a beer she was there to remind me that I was the one who set the goal in the first place because I really thought I needed it, that I had been the one who asked her to support me with it even if I tried to back down, and that it would only be five days anyway, that I was strong enough to succeed. I did succeed, I didn’t drink for five days. Then I drank again, but this time I was ready, after a week or two of drinking, to do a ten day goal. I did it, and although I always did drink after the goal was over, I felt like each time I completed a goal, each time I stuck to the plan and practiced self-control instead of just giving in to temptation, I was getting a bit closer to freedom, I was leaving the need for alcohol behind. I no longer partied at this point, so I would just drink at home, waking up to a complete mess the next day. This went away, and the longer my no-drinking goal was, the longer I was able to spend uninterrupted peace of mind. My mind was much clearer, I didn’t have such negative thoughts floating around in my head, I felt less pains all throughout my body, less stomach problems, and I got to save up not only the money I used to spend on beers, but also the money I’d spend on all the dumb shit I’d buy after drinking beers. Fast forward to today, I’m three days away from reaching a hundred days, although the goal is two hundred. I previously completed a goal of a hundred days without drinking, it was my last goal. I drink when it ended, yes, but this time much more moderately than I used to. Now, halfway through my two hundred day goal, I honestly have days when I really feel like I could go on for the rest of my life without drinking, like I really don’t need to drink ever again, it just adds nothing to my life anymore. I really hope this mentality persists when I finish this goal, but I’ll probably do a bit of drinking before I start with the next goal. The good thing is that at least my attitude towards alcohol has drastically changed due to these experiments. As for the bud, which is what I started out by talking about, it’s a bit of a different story. Although smoking anything is harmful to the lungs in one way or another, weed is not really much of a problem, as far as cancer and things like that go. Either way though, I recently started using a vaporizer, but the real reason for me setting a goal of abstinence from cannabis for a while is due to my attitude towards it. Unlike alcohol, weed isn’t really a substance which I’m really looking to eventually remove from my life for good. On the contrary, I love bud and will probably use it until I grow old. The problem is not the weed, the problem is my attachment. It’s hard to admit at times, since we want to continue using or doing whatever we are attached to, but any kind of attachment is not healthy for us, and that truth cannot be escaped. Whether it’s weed, or money, or food, or whatever it is, if we are constantly in need of it and we don’t feel okay without it then we are attached. My goal with the bud is to cut down quite drastically for now, from blazing every day, to blazing only 15 days of each month, so basically half the month. This is the first month that I’m doing this experiment, and I blazed up until the tenth day of the month. I stopped on the eleventh and today, but when it gets to 12am I’ll blaze, and I can’t wait, only about fourteen minutes more until the new day. This weekend is directly leading up to my anniversary with Maria, our two year marriage anniversary, so we have to blaze this weekend for sure, and on Monday, which is the actual day. This will mean I’ll have gotten stoned for thirteen days of the month, leaving only two days for me to blaze, and about 15 days left of the month. I’m not looking forward to those five-day intervals without blazing, but the time has come to begin with this goal which I’ve been thinking of starting for quite a while. I already promised Maria anyway, and I can’t break that promise I made to her, so it helps to keep me accountable.
To be continued tomorrow, on Day 62.
~ Rebel Spirit
1,000 WORDS (2nd attempt): DAY 50: 50 Days Writing! Goals Review.
Half a hundred days of writing and posting a thousand words. I’ve failed at some other goals during this time, and I’ve restarted them right back for another attempt, but I’m especially happy that I’ve been able to stay on track with this particular goal. I was just letting my wife know about it. It’s great to have people all over the world have access to what you write, and to actually have people read it, even if it’s just a few people sometimes. It’s one of the truly wonderful about the internet age which we live in. It’s a great privilege which requires great responsibility on a writer’s part, so I try to keep my mind as clear as possible when I write these things, free of all negativity and frustration. I don’t drink anymore, which is great, since it would have been such a hindrance to staying on track with my daily writing goal, both because I’d obviously going out more, and because I’d feel totally destroyed the day after getting wasted. It didn’t feel so bad when I was younger, and I know for sure I drank a lot more back then, so I knew my body was now beginning to tell me that it was time to take it easy. I’m super glad about this goal as well, I haven’t drank a drop of alcohol in almost a hundred days now, so I gotta a hundred and a few more to go on my current challenge of two hundred days. Sometimes I feel I might just lay off the booze for good, even after I finish my two hundred day goal. I don’t crave it anymore and I feel totally fine without it, and it feels like I got my shit together, like I got things a bit more under control. Life isn’t always about being in control of everything, but completely losing control of oneself can be dangerous, and it’s certainly something that alcohol intoxication can lead to, and does lead to a lot of the time. Life feels good without it, but then I think that, if I can manage to keep it under control and moderation, then a beer or two here and there won’t do much harm, and will make me enjoy any nice day or night out. The problem is that I can’t ever stop at two, so I think I just might try to lay off the booze completely for as long as possible. Either way, I’ve been doing some experiments with psychedelics, in the past mostly shrooms, but now I have a connect for some good acid, and since I don’t party anymore, I’ve been just tripping alone at home (since Maria usually falls asleep), and concentrating on peace, meditating, reflecting having deeply profound experiences of psychological and spiritual growth. New thoughts come to me, and things which I know deep inside, which I’ve even forgotten from so much neglect, from being ignored for so long, from not wanting to deal with them, start to make themselves known to me, their significance becomes inescapable and I know without a doubt that, what matters most in life, is to love others, to love and care for one’s family and friends, to make connections, to always keep a good vibe following you wherever you go, a contagious feeling that will inspire others to live in the same way. I’ve been tripping on two or three tabs at a time, a few months at a time, two or three maybe, and reflecting on my progress with my goals as well. So what do I need alcohol for, that dulling sensation of the mind, that lustful appetite and aggressive behavior? Sometimes I feel frustrated with my goals, but I cannot abandon my sadhana. I have also been working on keeping lust off my mind, inspired by various books, mostly by Hindu Swamis, on the power of Brahmacharya. The concept of Brahmacharya provides, in my opinion, a better explanation of what I had read before in Mantak Chia’s book, regarding the same concept but from the Taoist perspective. Abstaining from all lustful thoughts and looks, ideas, only making love with my wife every few days, meditating and reading daily, the Bible and the Sutras, abstaining from alcohol, writing every day to keep my creative side alive. I wish I was making music, but for some reason, I find I don’t have much inspiration for that at this moment in life, but it comes and it goes I believe. Some other things I feel I need to do are to start focusing more on my health. I was already exercising every day as a goal, but I stopped about a month and a half back since I got sick with a random and mysterious fever. It would hit me every single day, for about a week and a half or two weeks. I had to gather my strength after those two weeks, so I’ve been eating better, thinking that not eating enough might have something to do with me being weak and therefore susceptible to such fevers. I still haven’t started exercising, but I need to, and I will do so any day now, I’ll start again with my weights and pushups, yoga and jogging around the baseball field which is a block away. Exercise makes you feel energetic, alive, and it keeps us healthy. We all need to exercise a healthy habit of daily exercise! There’s no denying its benefits. And the hardest goal of all, I made a promise to Maria that I would start this month, that I would only smoke weed fifteen days of the month. I didn’t promise this to her because of any pressure on her part, but instead because I knew I’d have to honor my promise to her no matter what, so this would be the perfect way for me to keep feeling accountable for completing this new goal. I’m not taking on this weed goal because I think it’s harmful, but because I feel I’m too attached to staying faded. Nothing should become an attachment in our lives, and if we see that something has, then we need to deal with it, then we can partake in it again in a healthy way. Wish me luck so I can smoke only half the month this month of July (usually I blaze every day)!
To be continued tomorrow, on Day 51.
~ Rebel Spirit
1,000 WORDS (2nd attempt): DAY 44: Mentality Matures as we Grow and Learn.
Throughout my lifetime I’ve held many very different ideas at many different times. At a certain point I was determined to make it big as a rapper, to tour the world as a superstar and make incredibly popular music. I had a belief that nobody could stop me if I really set my mind to it. I still believe this, yet in my younger days, way, way back in the day, there simply was no doubt in my mind about whether I was going to make it or not. I was going to make it, without a doubt, because I had to. I grew up in a very ethical household, my parents really taught me most of the positive values and habits that make me who I am today. I strayed from their teachings from years, and I still do in some ways, but nowhere nearly as much as I did before. In my adolescent mind, their entire worldview was simply wrong. I didn’t give it much though though, I just didn’t follow it. I followed my own rules, which often meant breaking many rules, both imposed by my parents and by the law. I had no idea about people who try to live a life of righteousness to the best of their ability, I gave no thought to the deeper side of life, to all suffering that surrounds us, to how we must all do our best to uplift each other and to ease each other’s suffering. I did acknowledge all the suffering and evil in the world, but I only used my music to lash out at society, to blame the government or whoever is really running things, or to promote myself and my own ideas about not trusting anyone, about keeping your circle small and keeping it real and not fucking around with me. I was busy causing suffering myself, by stealing, whether sweaters at the mall or candy at the dollar store, or by fighting in the street or at school, or arguing at home, or disobeying and disregarding my parents and the way they felt about things. I was so inconsiderate, and I see that it was due to my mindset which had become completely corrupt. I was attempting to recreate a mental image that I had of myself, or rather who I thought I was, and I was acting out in unnecessary ways, always wanting to be the craziest one, the one who does the craziest shit or gets the most fucked up. I tried so many different drugs back in those days. I can’t say I’m done with all of them, but at least I don’t do them indiscriminately anymore, in big quantities and doses, mixing different kinds of substances. I’ve always done my research on these things, and by learning and experience I’ve come to learn what the differences are between many different kinds of psychoactive effects, which substances can be positive and not harm one’s body or mind, and which are simply poison, including crack/cocaine as well as most pharmaceuticals. I can’t say I regret my past, as I have learned a lot, and I’ve had a lot of good times. Pain and suffering, even ignorance, are all part of one’s life, at some times more than others. We usually mature as we age, as we learn, as we live and grow. This has been true for me. Perhaps I still got a long way to go in the process, but at least I’ve come this far. I no longer make music without attempting to provide a solution to the problems I address, I know longer party or try to hook up with random girls, since I’m not married and also don’t drink, probably for about a hundred days now. I can save more money, I don’t have to act a fool on a regular basis, and I don’t have to have my sadhana constantly interrupted by periods of guilt, shame, disgust, plus a terrible hangover and all it includes. I feel that I’ve done quite enough drinking in my life, and at this point I only smoke chronic, plus indulge in a productive psychedelic trip once in a while, in the comfortable set and setting of my own home, with my wife accompanying me, or sometimes as she sleeps. One must respect these substances and understand that partaking in drugs, even psychedelics, is no game. Psychedelics are more unpredictable than other kinds of drugs, and the trip they take a person on highly depends on one’s mindset, and set and their setting, as well as one’s expectations and underlying beliefs about the nature of the psychedelic experience. One must be fully aware in order to become totally immersed in a mystical psychedelic experience and reap the benefits of it afterward, if determination is applied to the trip’s revelations. I guess I can say I’ve changed a lot, for the better, over the years, partly by naturally maturing, and by reconsidering some of my parent’s advice, partly understanding that we all are on a search for God, for transcendence, and some of these realizations have become deeply ingrained in my consciousness because of my psychedelic trips throughout the years. I now read more, I research, I try not to talk about much nonsense, or indulge in petty or destructive conversation. I try to be constructive with all I do, and sometimes I fail at it, as old habits prevent me from behaving in the best way I know. Self-mastery is a slow process, and it is no easy task, but it is worth it. When I realized, a few years back, the extent to which I had gone in causing my parents grief, and setting a bad example for my brothers, I felt deeply ashamed of myself for it. For a few years I was consumed by the idea of paying them back for all that had done for me, to make up for what I had not done for them, such as being a good son. In some ways I was though, and in some I wasn’t. I’m glad to say I don’t feel so guilty now, as I’ve grown and I’ve learned, my relationship with my parents has only continued to get better. I can’t wait to see them again when Maria and I fly back to Canada.
To be continued tomorrow, on Day 45.
~ Rebel Spirit
1,000 WORDS (2nd attempt): DAY 23: Habits, Self-Control, Spirituality, Attachment.
23 days into writing a thousand words. Writer’s block feeling is creeping up. Damn, I knew this day would come. Scratch that ‘damn’, I can’t complain. No, really, I can’t complain. I’m about a week into my new goal of catching myself whenever I complain, ideally before the words leave my mouth. A mental complaint isn’t as bad as an uttered one, at least it shows some self-control building up within if I can stop the complaint before I spew it out. This writing goal has definitely been helping in that aspect as well, of self-control, since on some days I don’t even feel like writing. I’d always thought about inspiration in the way that it is something which suddenly strikes, and which one has to be prepared at any moment to give artistic expression to. I’ve been realizing it isn’t much like that at all, though. It’s been great to come to know the truth, that one can summon inspiration, that one can produce a mental state which is optimal for creativity, for inspiration to strike and for magic to be manifested. When I don’t feel like writing I just push myself to write, in the moment, I realize the moment is all I have to put up with. One moment of boredom, of confusion, of indecision. But after that moment, as long as I was able to get one word down, every successive moment throws more words at me that I can connect with the previous ones I wrote. Often all that is needed is that we begin, and ultimately that’s the biggest gain from all these goals I’ve been setting: greater self-control, a determination to beat resistance and to never shy away from my goals, big or small. One of the most difficult goals for me to work with so far has been the chronic. This is a goal I’ve been thinking of setting for myself for quite a while now but neglecting. Since weed isn’t really all that harmful to one’s body or mind, I haven’t ever gotten serious enough about balancing that aspect of my life. The problem is that, after years of blazing, the high is no longer the same, especially when one is smoking various times a day, before meals, before sleeping, wake’n’bake every morning. The experience loses its value and begins to feel commonplace, dull, another motion in the everyday routine. If we let this happen, the outcome is that we become way too comfortable with being stoned to even think about extending our energies outward, into the world, and we become trapped in our own world, in our comfort zone. We might have great ideas yet we never bring them to life. I think this is a consequence of abusing an otherwise benevolent plant which ought to be respected and treated with restraint,, used with balance just as any other substance should. I’ll probably take my last big bong toke of the day right at 11:59 p.m., since I can’t blaze past midnight. I’m only supposed to blaze three days a week, since a few weeks back. If I’m honest, I’ve failed most weeks, yet I do feel I’m smoking a lot less now, each week getting closer to the actual three days, and I don’t feel as attached to the kush any more, to the need to have it. This is great progress, since I was used to having bud around at all times, during all activities. Although the weed wasn’t really harming my life in such a drastic way, I was confronted with the realization that if I’m serious about following the spiritual path in life, the path of discernment, of doing what is right, of living free, of feeling and being in touch with the real Self, then I cannot afford to be attached to any external substance, or anything else external for that matter. So now, whenever it’s time not to blaze, although temptation arises, I tend to sit and meditate and focus my attention fully to the present moment, realizing that God dwells within me, as in all of us, and that there is no need for me to crave for anything other than this everlasting love. This practice has become a great way to build spiritual stamina and to strengthen self-control. Also, I get to save a bit more money, which is great since I’m at a point in life now where I’ve really been thinking about simplifying my life, reducing pointless spending, and being free from most products, from money, and from the need to work. Not to an extreme, just trying to minimize and simplify. So, it’s good to work on my weed consumption from that point of view. I’m not saying that weed is addictive in itself however, and I do understand that it has many positives that go along with it. My point with this goal is not to quit blazing for good, since I think weed can be used in a very positive and even spiritual manner. Other substances I’ve cut out of my life for good, since it has become quite obvious to me that they serve no purpose in my life other than creating chaos where none needs to exist. I suspect this might be true of other people’s lives and experiences with such substances, yet they continue to ignorantly indulge. Sadly one can only lead by example, since people don’t like being told what to do. Personally though, I’m glad I’m completely off alcohol and cigarettes, two habits which I cherished and partook in heavily for almost a decade. They both started with small goals of a few days of abstinence, and now I feel zero to no craving for either one. Often I get frustrated with having to do these goals, with failing, with starting again, with failing and starting over yet once more, but this is how self-control and willpower are built, and we have to remind ourselves that true progress takes time, that success isn’t reached overnight. Failure is a part of success. My success in overcoming alcohol and cigarettes has also, apart from building up my self-control and willpower, contributed to the improvement of my overall health and mood and to a much clearer mental state, and it has allowed me to stop wasting money on things I used to compulsively buy when drunk, on junk food, and on things I have to replace when drunk me breaks them. Instead of hearing all the gossip that gets said at parties I stay home and read, or enjoy any other activities with my wife. I always love staying home and feasting on one of her delicious meals. Maria is a naturally gifted cook, and her meals always turn out delicious. I always remember to thank God for giving me such an amazing wife. As far as food goes, I’ve had to set some goals as well, such as not eating at all after midnight, and making sure to eat breakfast each morning. These have been easier to take on than the goals regarding substances, but in the end everything helps strengthen my self-control, as well as weaken my attachment to external conditions.
To be continued tomorrow, on Day 24.
~ Rebel Spirit
1,000 WORDS (2nd attempt): DAY 18: Hatred and Hip-Hop, Lessons Learned from Party Days.
For as long as I can remember, I have always been more or less aware of the unnatural state of the life we live, of the wicked way the world works, of the way the whole system runs. I was afflicted by the hatred and violence I would see on the news that my dad would watch every day, by the corruption and poverty, the incessant and unnecessary pain and suffering of so many, by the hypocrisy of the world. I would hear horrible stories of gruesome deaths taking place in my home country, gang members dismembering business owners for not being able to pay a monthly sum. I couldn’t imagine people living in such conditions of fear in the country I had been born in. Except it wasn’t only in Central America that this was going on. I often watched videos of another powerful, international gang, the police, attack people on video as well, tackling and killing unarmed civilians, and I was absorbing all this hatred and internalizing it subconsciously. I would show these videos to my mother, who always advised me not to let hatred affect me, that nothing good comes from witnessing injustice. I just kept making offensive remarks about the police officers, about how they should be severely punished, and that there should be no police at all, since all the officers are just as corrupt as any of us regular people without a badge. I was filled with a stupid, self-righteous hatred at all the injustice, I was becoming an extremist, not acknowledging that there are good and bad people in every profession. I knew that hip-hop was the perfect venue to express my hatred, hip-hop having been long associated with protesting and fighting the system, and also the police and the government, for a cause. Meanwhile as my hatred grew, I also absorbed lyrics which casually discussed guns and drugs on a daily basis, thinking I could just vibe along to the rhythm and the rhymes scheme, not internalizing what was being said. I was naïve and didn’t know at that age that our soul is always listening, paying attention behind the scenes. I hadn’t yet learned about the unconscious mind and how it registers everything and applies it in our daily life. Not surprisingly to my current self, I normalized these behaviors and overall lifestyle in my mind, and I started doing the same things that I listened to, since they naturally arose anyway when I entered high school. I’m not saying that I did anything I did directly influenced by music, but once certain ideas about life are normalized in a young person’s mind, it’s more likely that they will succumb to such behavior, especially when it presents itself as a great temptation. My group of friends consisted of a gang of crazy kids who were involved in fights, drugs and problems with police. Many came from broken homes and have parents who are in and out of jail, or came from families with serious financial problems, or substance abuse problems. I was raised in a different way than them, at least at home. My parents always taught me morals, which endure to this day, and those morals have kept me from going over the limit many times if I’m honest with myself and with you all. Maybe my friends’ decisions to live these kinds of lives were not influenced so much by music or the media, but by the people in their own lives who they saw as role models, as well as their peers, and who resembled those characters in their favorite songs. In my case, my parents could never have imagined that I would do some of the things I did, especially at such a young age, so they trusted I wasn’t doing anything wrong. They had done everything they could to prevent my brothers and I from being in the company of anyone they believed was living life wrong, who would influence us down the wrong path. Kids in Honduras don’t start getting fucked up with their friends at 13 or 14, leaving home, getting in street fights and getting arrested, unless they are already entering into the gang life, one which they will never escape from. My parents were used to a very conservative culture where children grow with their parents and family is always close together. This prevents any unprecedented danger since the family moves as a pack, and values are mutually agreed upon and enforced. My eyes were open to a whole new life, to what I thought was unlimited freedom. I spent the summer after the eighth grade getting extremely intoxicated on various substances and partying in many different places, with many different people, while my parents thought I was at the mall all day, or swimming, or at the beach. Not to say I wasn’t doing those things, or that I wasn’t at those places a lot of the times, but definitely not under the conditions they imagined, that’s for sure. Life was just too exciting to pass up, a daily adventure; drugs, booze, girls, friends. This brought along everything that usually comes with excessive drinking and too much partying with too many people; fights, lost items, broken items, police problems, and all kinds of other problems. Except to me they weren’t problems, because I simply didn’t care. I lived my life as a young adolescent based solely on pleasure, chasing thrills on the daily. My parents were the ones who suffered in the background, and this I couldn’t see, as I was clearly blinded by the thick veil of ignorance I had decided to cover my eyes with. What was my parents’ suffering at home, in such a distant place, when I was here now, in the moment, drugged up, tripping, feeling like I was part of a crew, part of the fun we were having, part of an unstoppable force, the unfiltered energy of youth? I realized that my music was shifting, it was no longer so much about solutions, the lyrics I was writing had ceased to be about finding a solution to the world’s problems. My rebel energy was being incorrectly applied, it was becoming confused and intertwined with this reckless and restless energy which surrounded me. I thought that we were going against the system, and my music was defiant, as if this was the life that truly free individuals were meant to live. I was so, so blind. I couldn’t see that my friends and I were simply victims of the system, rebellious kids full of anger and rage and the desire to let it out, full of dissatisfaction, drowning in alcohol and drugs, avoiding any real self-reflection. I felt like I was on top of the world, and it was only much later when I realized I had been living in a very low state for much too long.
To be continued tomorrow, on Day 19.
~ Rebel Spirit
DAY 8: 1,000 WORDS: ON ALCOHOLISM, ON HABITS, ON TRAVEL, ON LOVE.
Eighth day of my project of writing and posting 1000 words. It hasn’t been that long and I can’t even believe I’ve gotten this far. All that time of working on my self-control seems to be slowly but surely paying off. Aside from this writing/blogging goal, I’m also 31 days into my meditation goal at the moment, which consists of dedicating 20 to 30 minutes a day to silent meditation, without even the noise of the fan blowing in the hot Honduras weather, in peace in our fully darkened room. I’m also currently 76 days into my no drinking goal! This last one is a goal I’m especially proud of. It’s not the first goal I set for myself to limit my drinking, but it is the longest one so far though, since I used to drink quite a lot at certain periods of my life growing up, and I came to a point when I just needed to cut back without a doubt. Since 13 or 14 basically, life was mostly about partying and trying to get as fucked up as possible, to be frank about it. This mentality kept me going for the better part of the following decade, until I realized it was totally stupid. Now at 24, I find that that mentality is gone, I’ve moved past it, yet the habits remain, since habits are strong forces, and once developed it’s extremely difficult to fully let them go. This is especially true of very pleasurable habits, vices, addictions which can develop before you know it, like alcoholism. I don’t think that my goal is to stop drinking altogether, forever, yet I don’t want alcohol to be something that’s constantly in my life any longer. 76 days in, I can honestly say that life is way, way clearer, my mind is way clearer, my mood is way better with less ups and downs, now that I don’t get drunk every weekend and feel a horrible hangover the next morning. Not to mention I get to keep more of the money I work for. I’ll go more into detail in later posts into my full motivations and expectations for this goal, and also into further detail of earlier no-drinking goals I’ve set for myself, and of my complicated history with alcohol. Although drinking can have its place in life during certain occasions, if you feel like you are having problems in your life due to it then it’s always best to completely stop for a set period of time, in order to analyze your life situation from a sober standpoint, and at that point you can make a truly wise decision if you just sit back and contemplate for a moment. So, drinking had a lot to do with the reasons why I decided to travel back to Honduras for what I call my first trip back (on my own, that is), as it led, or contributed to, most of the problems I got involved in in Vancouver. As a teenager, I was drunk a lot, and although I never committed any extreme crimes, my parents couldn’t handle what was going on, as I was getting in endless problems and fights while wasted. My father had brought my brothers and I to a new and better nation so that we could succeed, so that we could prosper, and there was no way he would just stand by and watch me fuck it all up now. He was living in stress every day, the atmosphere was tense at home and it was all my fault. I didn’t hate my family or my home, yet I needed to get out as quick as I could in order to diffuse the tension within me and within my family. As I didn’t have enough money to rent a place in Vancouver, which is in the top ten most expensive cities on the planet, I traveled to Honduras where the few thousand bucks I’d saved up would be worth gold. My objective? Continue my party lifestyle in the perpetually sunny summer of Honduras. Who would have known I would return to Canada in order to save money to return to Honduras yet again, but that the money I’d be saving this second time around would be for my wedding? Again, life works in mysterious ways. That first trip to Honduras was the ticket to a profound transformation which began taking place within me. So, I returned to Canada and got to working as the administrator of an immigration consulting office. I improved my people skills, my time management skills, and my fluency of my native Spanish, as well as my Portuguese. During my time in Canada I got to attend a Kabbalah class mostly every weekend, where I was introduced to a lot of basic mystical concepts, and also got to practice some meditation there. I was feeling great at this point in life, really serene, like I had a clear objective to work towards, like things were truly meant to be. I saved up the money that Maria and I needed in order to marry. Maria saved some of it up back in Honduras, of course, and since her visitor’s visa to Canada, where we originally planned to marry, was denied, I traveled back to Honduras after a year and a half of working. The job had been great, although often stressful and extremely busy, but it was time to go. The time had finally come to be reunited with my love. We were indeed reunited in June of 2017, in San Pedro Sula, and we married a month later on the 15th of July in this same city. We were now together for life, and we were both excited about it, since we’ve both always known each other to be loyal lovers, who are ready to work through problems and make opportunities out of them. Maria brought out the best in me, and it turns out I already had it in me. I had learned much of love simply from my mother’s example. Both my wife and my mother have such big hearts, and I don’t only say this because they are the 2 most special ladies in my own life. I mention this to stress the fact that, when one meets a person who reminds one of the good one has learned or experienced in another special person at some point before, this meeting ignites that flame of goodness that resides within, which has been transmitted at some previous point in time, and which is currently dormant within the individual’s soul potential. Our love was bliss, and after our marriage we had our honeymoon at La Ensenada Beach Resort, here in Honduras. No need to travel anywhere for beautiful beaches and weather (at least for relaxing at the beach). Everything had gone as planned and even a thousand times better. At our wedding, I rapped a song to Maria that I had written to her. The final recorded version is on my 2017 mixtape “Musical Alchemy” (which you can download freely on this website). It was a success, and my family and extended family was there as well as Maria’s. We had some wonderful times during the ceremony, and at night we blazed a nice doobie on the hotel rooftop, watching the smoke fade up to the stars while enjoying each other’s amazing company once more, yet now as a newly married couple, just before heading down to our room. That was July 2017, and since then a long and arduous process of gathering a bunch of paperwork followed, until we were finally able to submit our spousal sponsorship application to the Canadian government, very recently in fact, last month, just finishing up 2018. The application takes about a year to be processed, and there is no reason why it should be denied, so God willing we will be together in Canada soon, and we can have some great times with my family and friends up there once again. For now it’s just another blessed day here in Honduras, writing to you all, to the world, working on my goals and taking it one day at a time. One love y’all!
~ Rebel Spirit ~
rebel eye 