The Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 11: A pause

8-23-15 As I've continued reading about Scarcity and reflected on what I've read, I've come to a fundamental recognition: Scarcity is simultaneously a motivator to action and also what keeps people in a place of discord within themselves as well as with others. Its an experience that is embedded in us physiologically and psychologically. I see it in the various interactions I and others have, in how businesses are run and how relationships are approached. It is a good recognition for me, because it demonstrates how much scarcity is so much more than just a person's choices. Certainly behavior is part of scarcity, but when the environment is set up to encourage scarcity, it makes it much harder to change those behaviors, much harder to find your center in your stillness as well. Nonetheless, I also see ways to approach scarcity that can work, if the person is willing to recognize the environmental aspects and plan for them. And I think part of that is actually found in stillness, in the ability to give yourself moments where you just are, instead of always doing. I have been an always doing kind of person...this last year of stillness work has taught me, more than ever, the value of just being, and how that can enhance your live significantly.

8-30-15 Part of stillness work involves learning how to be still not just with yourself but around other people. It can be hard to be still around people, because it requires you to put aside your attachments to what those people are doing or saying and just be still with what's happening. Yet it can also be a useful exercise for learning how to be present with someone and can show that person that you genuinely want to be present. Lately I've been stilling myself around other people and paying very close attention to those moments when thoughts do surface and I move away from stillness. It's helping me recognize what disturbs my stillness so that I can work with that more closely.

9-4-15 The other day I did a writing exercise from Ensouling Language and one of the questions the author asked is what do you hate. I put myself in that section and in reflecting on that answer I came to realize how much I do hate myself in some ways. It's ingrained from my childhood, when I was told I was a disappointment, told really that I wasn't good enough and never would be. Consequently there's always been part of me that's believed that I'm not worthy of anyone in my life and that I'm useless. Pretty sad and harsh and doing that exercise really helped me get in touch with that part of myself. I expressed it this morning to Kat, really just let her in and recognized in the process how much that part of me has hurt myself, has sabotaged me at different times of my life. I feel, after the fact, a bit drained, but also ready to do more work. Being still has helped me get much deeper into these issues that have dictated my life.

9-9-15 It came to me today, in meditation that stillness will only be until October and then I'll move into the next element. I thought initially it might be two years, because of movement being 2 years, but today it was made clear that stillness is one year and that I need to prep for the next element. I feel good about it. I've learned a lot from stillness, but at a certain point, with any element, its time to transition and it feels that way with stillness.

9-10-15 In my meditation I got further confirmation. I went deep and Zadok appeared and explained that knowing stillness was good, but knowing how to balance stillness with movement, to balance everything is just as important. It points the way to the next element.

9-14-15 In Dealing with People you can't Stand, I learned of a technique called the Pygmalion Power. It intrigues me and I'm going to apply it to myself and see how it helps with behavior modification. Basically they way it works is that you set up an expectation verbally. so for example if you want to encourage positive behavior you tell the person they are special or wonderful...or if you want to change, you might say, "That's not like you, you are X." Quite fascinating (and a bit manipulative), but I can see how it can be applied to create specific changes in behavior in one's self or in other people, especially if you use it to interrupt a person's behavior, causing them to reset.

9-17-15 I've just started to set up a patreon account. I've known about it for a little while, but I was on the fence about it. In thinking about it though I realized it's actually a good idea and seeing a few other people I know who have such accounts and seem to be making it work. I sometimes feel that when it comes magic, I'm ahead of the curve, working on projects and creating new techniques, but when it comes to business, I see other people who seem to do it effortlessly. I'm sure they'd say otherwise, but the perception is there. Still I figure I'm learning how to be better at business with experience and mistake I make.

9-22-15 You can't always control a situation, but you can plan your response to it. A planned response is always better than a reaction. It allows you to put the situation into a context that is favorable to you, and either puts the other person into neutral or puts them into a negative light. Be still, consider how you want to respond and then make the response that provides you a way to come out of the situation favorably.

9-23-15 I've been reading Exorcising the Tree of Evil by William Gray and he talks about lust and how its insatiable. You can't ever satisfy it. It reminded me a lot of emptiness. then later I did my meditation and Gray and Zadok showed up and talked about lust and how stillness could be used in regards to lust. It gave me a lot to consider and really helped me examine my relationship with emptiness, because I could see parallels to lust in what they discussed.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 10: Tension

7-27-15 Today I was meditating on tension I was feeling and it became very clear how the focus on tension really distracted me from being still or being present with my whole being. I could feel that tension take up everything, occupying my mind entirely and yet I knew it wasn't the whole of my existence. Sitting with that awareness helped me step back from the tension and realize that my identity didn't have to be defined by it and that I was allowing it to define my sense of awareness and being moreso than it actually might be.

7-30-15 I had a realization today about how I handle closeness with people. I only let people in so far before I start to push them away. It's a fear of abandonment. I'll abandon a person before they abandon me. Looking back on my history of relationships, familial, romantic, and otherwise, I see where I felt I was abandoned and consequently how this pattern developed out of that as a response to possible rejection. Nonetheless it hasn't helped my relationships with people in the past. I do feel I've changed it somewhat and I know that because I've let some people into my life enough for them to at least be some what close to me.

8-1-15 A long. hard conversation with Kat this morning really helped me appreciate on a deeper level how my issues have hurt the people in my life as well as appreciate how stillness is helping me go deep into those issues and see them from new perspectives. I can be an asshole sometimes to the people in my life and I really own that in a way I haven't before. Thankfully I am with someone who is willing to give me the benefit of the doubt and stick it out with me, even when I have made some hurtful choices. And I see how in making those choices I have sabotaged myself with her and with other people...but I also know I can take control or I can be defined by my issues. I'd rather take control and become a stronger, better person for it.

8-9-15 The qualities you want to embody are already within you. That's what Dzogchen offers in regards to working with a quality you want to cultivate. You aren't cultivating, so much as finding it, because its already within you. In my work with stillness, I've been realizing that in going deep within myself I can find my inner resources to draw on. They are already there. I don't have to look elsewhere. I think that in finding and working with the concepts and practices of Dzogchen, I've found a path of internal work that has allowed me to go further than I ever have in resolving my issues. And in stillness I'm finding clarity about who I am and who I want to be.

8-13-15 When I feel scarcity I feel tension and so I've been paying attention to that tension, acknowledging and then letting it merge into the wholeness of my being. This seems to be helpful because it causes me to recognize that the tension is just a moment, as opposed to all of me and that the moment will pass. It's not my identity. In Awakening the Luminous Mind, the author discusses how the tension is the pain mind and that pain mind is a distraction from being present...however to deal with the pain mind, you have to accept the pain, and care for it. You need to not judge it. I've always been judgmental of myself, but I'm finding that just being with the pain is helpful for coming to a different place with it, one where it doesn't occupy my thoughts, but instead is just part of me without encompassing me.

8-19-15 Sometimes I feel envious of some of my fellow authors. They understand the business of selling themselves and their products and services better than I do. I have written more books than most of them, but they've leveraged themselves as a business better than I have. Erik, my astrologer, told me that one of the reasons I'm here is to learn about business, and I am. It's a struggle sometimes. I see what other people do and it seems to come to them much easier. Some of it, I think, is that their writing is focused toward a wider audience that wants the traditional magical material. My writing is focused on edgier topics, with more of a niche audience. I see that with the response and lack of response that occurs around the topics I post about. When your writing is on the edge you get challenged more, either out of skeptical disbelief or envy on the part of other part for not thinking of it first. Still all I can do is keep learning the lesson I am learning about business and being a successful author. I've stumbled a lot on this journey, but I keep picking myself back up, determined to succeed.

8-20-15 One of the ways I'm learning how to work with tension is recognizing the importance of not acting on it right away. Yes I feel it and I hold space with it, but before I do anything else I just let myself feel and wait before I make a choice. I give myself time to fully get to the heart of it and then make an informed decision. To often, in my past, I've just reacted to tension and more often than not I haven't really liked the consequences. I let the tension define me, instead of defining it...now I'm defining it.

The Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 9: Scarcity

6-26-15 I've been continuing to read the book on scarcity and examine my own life in relationship to it. Something which struck me about it is how one aspect of scarcity is trying to do much at the same time. I've always been a workaholic, always working on multiple projects and I realize as I read this book that it has sometimes diminished the quality of my happiness because I've had too much going on and consequently haven't felt like I could focus. I've lately been divesting myself of some of what's kept me busy and the resultant feeling of time has been really nice. I've been able to focus more on the projects I rally want to work on instead of feeling like I'm giving my time away to someone else.

7-1-15 I had a realization recently because of the actions of another person. He was trying to get me to react to him by tagging me in a rant he was making and I realized that his rant was coming from a place of scarcity and it was a reaction to his various issues (and there are many). And I realized that he was trying to get a reaction from me, trying to put me into a place of scarcity because of his own scarcity. Scarcity begats scarcity...Reaction begats reaction, unless...you recognize it, recognize the blinders, the tunneling and step back and make a different choice, an objective choice. In this case, I realized this person wanted me to react, wanted drama because he's always needing attention from other people. So I stepped back and really looked at the situation and decided not to play in his sandbox of drama. I stilled myself and allowed the stillness to give me clarity so that whatever movement I make is one of proactive choice instead of reactive scarcity.

7-3-15 I've been feeling introverted the last couple of days. Part of it is the summer heat, which just makes not want to go anywhere and part of it is that Kat's away on a trip and so I'm not feeling social and just soaking up the alone time. Part of me wonders if I should try and go out, but sometimes what I enjoy the most is the chance to just be still and right now I have the opportunity to do that and let it pervade my being.

7-4-15 I feel lonely today. Undoubtedly part of it is the holiday and the fact that my sweetie is abroad right now, but it feels uncomfortable. So I'm sitting with it, holding space with that feeling and not acting on it reactively. Being still like this isn't comfortable, but it is revealing and I take the insights as valuable gifts I can draw on in my ongoing work.

7-8-15 Being minimalized by another person is an experience that is deadening. So often what I observe is that a person wants to be listened to, but doesn't want to listen and this is where communication breaks down. A moment of stillness can make a difference for the clarity it brings. Stop and ask yourself am I listening as ell as talking? And am I considering as well as asking to be considered?

7-14-15 In Awakening the Luminous Mind, Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche, uses the metaphor of the sky and clouds to describe how to hold space with your tensions. He urges the reader to become the sky, which isn't concerned if there are or aren't clouds, but simply is. In meditating on what he wrote, I came to a recognition that sometimes I've focused so much on 'letting go' of tensions and internal blockages that I haven't been fully present with them and consequently have become more attached because I haven't simply felt them. In fact to truly let go of something is to intimately feel it and be present with it, without becoming attached to it. You become the sky and you know there are clouds but they don't define you. Sometimes I really struggle with being present with my pain. It's easier to think about it or to fool myself into thinking I've let it go, but when have I been present with it?

7-17-15 In my stillness work, I've been focusing on just being and being aware of internal tensions without doing anything to them. I'm not trying to dissolve them or change them. I'm just holding space with them. It feels disquieting at first, but as I settle into the emptiness it just becomes part of the background. They are part of my space, but just part of it and any significance they have is given to them by me and my choice to make them more important. And this doesn't mean some dissolving work shouldn't occur, but I feel that in learning to just be still, it allows me a chance to not do so much as be, which doesn't come naturally to me, but can be helpful.

7-19-15 To feel recognized and vindicated is a wonderful feeling. I felt it today, reading the article on the Wild Hunt on pop culture magic, and seeing my work recognized and seeing a level of positive interaction about that work, which I've seen more and more of in the last couple years. To experience that recognition and know I've earned it...it feels really good...a moment I can enjoy and savor.

7-21-15 Relationships of any type bring with them constraints and limitations. I used to rail against such constraints and limitations, afraid in part of how I felt when I allowed someone to become close to me. And sometimes I still struggle with that aspect of a relationship. Whether its a friend or lover or what have you, being in any relationship does bring with it some type of limitation. It's not a bad thing either, but rather a recognition that choosing to be with someone requires a person to change in some ways. The acceptance of limits isn't inherently bad or good...its what you make of it. I'm learning to accept and work with that in a way I never did before...in part because the stillness work is helping me to really ground myself in what I have in my life, instead of just restlessly moving from one thing to another.

The Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 8: Reaction

5-22-15 I've started reading Scarcity by Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir. Just the introduction has me thinking about scarcity in a different way, especially as it shows up in my internal work. My relationship with emptiness is a perfect example of scarcity shaping that interaction, and when I see the needs exposed in that context it just helps examine the root causes in a way that makes even more sense than before. I was doing x because I was feeling scarcity in this way and I didn't recognize it as such but that feeling shaped my actions.

5-26-15 I've been doing some further processing around the scarcity mindset in my life. What I realize is that it has shown up in a number of different ways for me. It's shown up in in my relationship with love and related areas, but also in my relationship with food, and even buying things. I see how such fixation is really a symptom of scarcity, which is useful for identifying it as such...but I know there is more to it than just that.

5-28-15 I've been feeling restless the last few days and I think its related to the work around scarcity that I'm doing. No real surprise that when you take a look at something such as scarcity it stirs up feelings related to it. When I feel a sense of scarcity in my life, I feel like a hungry ghost, like I can never get enough of something. My skull feels tight and there is this deep sense of restlessness within me that leads to that place of emptiness. I've never really identified it in that way before, but doing so gives me something to work with as a way of identifying more fully when I'm feeling a lack of something.

6-1-15 I was reading an acquaintance's status update on Facebook and he was taking about how he'd spent the last year and a half saying goodbye to the places, people, etc, that he knows because he was making a cross country move. Reading his update made me appreciate what a conscious choice he had made and how much planning clearly went into it. I reflected on my own life and I'd have to say that most of my adult decisions have been reactive decisions because something else happened or because I didn't know what else to do. I got a Bachelor's in English and didn't know what else to do so I went and got a Master's and then still not knowing what else to do or what else I could, I pursued a Ph.D, only to leave that degree in part because it wasn't a good fit and because I didn't know what I really wanted to do and because the person I was dating at the time I left had decided to move to Seattle. The worst part of that was that I'd only really met her 6 months before she was going to move. She had made this conscious plan to move somewhere...but me...I just got involved with her after a breakup and just reactively went along with her plans without really considering what I wanted or if she even wanted me to come along (and just because I came along didn't necessarily mean she wanted me along). I didn't want to be alone and so I made a choice to move across the country because I didn't know what else to do. I reacted and let that reaction take me from friends and possibilities to a new place and to an unhealthy relationship, in no small part due to my reactivity. I lurched from decision to decision without any real plan and honestly I'm lucky I've landed on my feet each time. Fortunately I now live in a place I like, with someone I love and a number of communities I'm proud to be a part of...and I've actually figured out how to consciously plan my life and focus on achieving what I want, because I actually know what I want. It just took me a good portion of my adult life to actually figure it out. And I'm still making some choices from reaction, but reading that update made me realize how much reaction has governed my life and how much it no longer does.

6-7-15 I've been considering my reactivity further. I don't think it's really that unusual for most people to live fairly reactive lives. Some never grow out of it and some people do, but it usually takes time. And sometimes you need those reactions.  My reactions have lead me to some interesting journeys and while I'm glad I'm more focused and conscious I don't know that I could've gotten to that without having the reactions I've had. They serve a purpose, actually as many purposes as I allow them to.

6-9-15 Today I meditated on a feeling of discomfort. I didn't think about it or try to categorize it or otherwise label it. I just felt it and was still with it. And by stilling myself with it, it became something I felt less and less. It just dissolved, acknowledged by me being still with it.

6-10-15 The hungry ghost is a being which can never get enough, has a distended belly and small mouth, basically an addict, when you think about it, but that addiction is motivated by scarcity of some sort at the root of what the ghost is trying satisfy. The ghost can never get enough because it isn't dealing with the scarcity or perceived scarcity. It's just focused on mindlessly trying to satisfy itself, with no clarity or conscious recognition of the source of its own misery.

6-11-15 Today I meditated on scarcity and reaction. I think the two go hand in hand. Reactions occur as a response to your environment, internal or external, and are partially derived from a feeling of scarcity, which in turn is fed by the reactions, because you are tunnel visioned into those reactions by your feeling of scarcity and not having enough. It blocks out everything else, and stops you from being in a place of conscious intention. I see this in my own life again and again. I've let my feelings of scarcity dictate my actions, really my reactions, and those same reactions have lead me back to scarcity in a cycle that repeats, each feeding each other and thus sustaining the cycle. Recognizing that cycle is hard. I feel depressed when I see how much my life has been a cycle of reaction and scarcity, but the fact that I can be aware of it, really aware of it, is and of itself some progress. I'm stepping back and seeing this cycle from a different place than I was able to before.

6-14-15 Today I walked along the Johnson Creek trail and meditated on a feeling of tension within me. I ended up exploring that tension as a form of vibration and worked to change the vibration frequency and as I did the tension dissolved. I saw how the tension was part of a cycle that was developed around the frequency the tension was part of and by changing the frequency, I released the tension.

6-16-15 I've been watching a new show called Damages, about a lawyer who is willing to do whatever it takes to win her cases. Makes for a fascinating pop culture entity to work with if it comes down to legal situations, but what I also find insightful about the show is the exploration of people's reactions. It's a show about reactions. Most of the people aren't consciously choosing so much as reacting to what is happening to them and those reactions work against them because the choice is already limited by the fact that its a reaction and someone has created specific limitations that affect what the person can or can't do.

6-19-15 The key to changing what you react to involves becoming still with your reaction. When it can no longer move you to act, it no longer has power over you. Then you can make choices from a place of awareness and that place allows you to knowingly make your choices and fully accept whatever consequences may come your way. It's harder and easier. Harder because you are knowingly making those choices and dealing with the consequences, but easier because you aren't letting life happen to you.

6-22-15 I feel like I'm developing a deeper relationship with stillness as a result of my work with it in context to reaction. Stillness provides a clarity of mind and being that purifies your awareness and allows you to recognize your reactions and how they are stopping you from seeing the bigger picture. In situations where I feel reactions arise, I use stillness to step back and see the blinders that the reactions are causing so that I can make conscious choices which are fully informed by all variables as opposed to what the reaction is focused on. And that in turn teaches me that what stillness can provide is an opportunity to be fully present with your environment, so that any movement that does occur happens on your schedule.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 7: Importance

4-21-15 In a conversation today with a business acquaintance, I had a realization. In some ways I have not been good at making the people in my life important. And what that really means is that I haven't always prioritized the people in my life in the right way. I've let my issues be more important and allowed them to take control of my life, instead of taking control of them. That realization is priceless, but what I do with it will be even more important. And this realization does give me a different outlook on a number of my choices and actions. It helps me see something I didn't see before, but now its time to do something with it.

4-22-15 In reflecting further on how I do or don't make the people in my life importance, I recognized that by stilling myself, and really being present, I'm opening myself to recognizing where I'm not showing up in the relationships of my life. Perfect example occurred last night, where Kat and I were trying to plan a trip and I was avoiding making decisions because I wanted her to decide. what she wanted was a mutual decision, something we agree upon together and that's something I'm not always good at. She was frustrated. This morning as I was driving to an event I realized how not making that decision really indicated to her that I didn't feel the trip was important. I had checked out instead of stepping up. So I began thinking about the trip and I came up with some ideas I shared with her later (better late than never). The result was that she sounded happier...I had made the trip and her important. And while I'm glad I recognized this, it made me realize I need to be more proactive. I need to make sure my priorities are in the right order, both in my life and with my relationships. Still I haven't ever thought about the relationships in my life in this way, so I guess this is a good start.

4-26-15 I've been reading and working through the Talking Tree by William Gray. In the sections on the Devil and Lovers Tarot cards as they relate to the paths on the Tree of Life, he makes some points that really stand out to me in relationship to my current struggles. I see that so much of my problem comes down to the unhealthy relationship I have with sex. The other night, in a conversation with a friend, the observation was made about how the abuse a person suffers with sex at someone else's hands can lead to a situation where one's own relationship with sex is abused. Gray makes some similar observations about how people misappropriate sexuality in an effort to create identity for themselves. Their focus is in the wrong direction, trying to establish their identity through the sexual relationships they have with people, instead of examining why they even need to to try and establish their identities in that way. That is part of my own work.

4-30-15 I'm reading Vocal Magick by Bill Duvendack. In it he discusses how thought forms can be created from behaviors and thoughts a person has that are repeatedly replicated and become an obsession for the person. I've come across this before, but I liked how he explained it and it helped me look at some of the work I'm doing from that angle of recognizing that certain behaviors, as thought forms, will fight to survive. I feel that some of what I've struggled with can be summed up in that way, and this helps me see where I need to do some of the work I'm in the process of doing. I'm going to do a ritual of release and see if that helps with this process.

5-4-15 I've been hitting deeper states of stillness through doing the Tsa Lung exercises in conjunction with Zhine, the sacred healing sounds and my Tumo practice. I feel like I'm fitting all these pieces together and hitting this deeper state, which is also providing me some ways to work energetically, emotionally, etc with the issues that have been coming up...and of course I think doing these exercises is also facilitating bringing up those issues, but I also think its worth it for the clarity its providing me.

5-7-15 When I feel certain patterns of behavior and thought come up, I've been still with them, observing them in a way I had never done before and contrasting them to new patterns of behavior and thought. I find this makes it easier to see what is and isn't working. Then it becomes a matter of making choices around what is important, what really matters, versus what is impulsive. I've also been doing some work around my relationship with writing and my sense of well-being. I told Kat, the other night, some of my frustrations around the writing and she grounded me by pointing out the other commitments I've made...I'm far busier than I ever was and I sometimes forget to appreciate that or consider perhaps the necessity of finding stillness for some of those commitments.

5-14-15 In some ways I think depression is the dark side of stillness...though that could just be an attribution on my part. But with depression, you don't really want to do much. You do what you have to do, but that's exhausting in and of itself. Anything more than that just seems like an uphill battle. You just want to curl in a ball and forget about anything else. I feel like that a lot right now with some of the different issues I'm working through.

5-15-15 To really work through any emotion you need to be with it, really with it...not just thinking about it, but actually feeling it. When you feel the emotion and are present with them fully it can be overwhelming but that gives way to release and from that release comes liberation.

5-19-15 The other day I took the above advice and actually applied it. Kat was telling me how she was feeling and I put myself into no-form and just soaked in the emotions behind the words so that I could empathize with where she was coming from and understand her perspective better. It was hard to do because I felt those emotions very keenly, to the point that I felt a weight on my stomach...yet doing it really helped me understand her. In the past I've often come up with rules of behavior, but not really understood her perspective and doing this I feel was a step in the right direction. Taking on no-form, becoming still allowed me to put aside my own dialogue and defensiveness to just be and become her perspective and experience.

5-21-15 As you continue to be still and work with what rises in you, what you discover is that it allows you to reach deeper states of altered consciousness and a higher level of awareness around possibilities. The less distraction there is, the more focused you get. I feel like the work I'm doing around what is coming up is helping me appreciate stillness in relationship to what moves in my life and at the same time question that movement and how it manifests in my life and if that is really what I want.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 6: Suffering

3-25-15 I'm feeling depressed or maybe derailed is more accurate. I had to take a bunch of images down from my sites..a lot of work which wasn't productive and it really just hit me hard. But it's also the last month and I'm just working through some tough issues. And so on and so forth. You get derailed and it can be hard to get back on track...especially if you wonder sometimes if there's a point to even being on track. Sometimes I wonder if there is because even with everything I do there is this sense of incompleteness. It's been there all my life, likely always will be and I think I kid myself as to whether I can ever really come to any peace with it. I live with it everyday and its what drives me but its also what haunts me. I'm feeling really haunted by it right now.

3-26-15 Having a confidant in one's life is a gift. Being able to tell someone what you feel, what you need, how your hurting...its precious. I've been working on doing that more with Kat. It doesn't come easily to me, because I've had a lifetime of learning not to tell people what I'm feeling and yet I think if I'd been better at communicating earlier in my life I might have been a better partner for people I used to be with. I can't change that, but I am working on changing it with who I'm with now.

On a somewhat related note I'm reading Awakening the Sacred Body and learning the Tsa Lung exercises. In one section, the author talks about gossip and the attachment people have to it. I had a reaction of sorts, because I do believe in informing people of predators and predator behavior, but I also recognize how it could be perceived as gossip. It's a fine balancing act, because you can get caught up in bitching about someone and that's gossip as opposed to informing someone about behavior that has been harmful to other people and could be harmful to more people if its not recognized for what it is. At the same time I know why I'm having that reaction...because its very easy to complain and let that complaint govern the experience of your life...taking up valuable energy and time that could be directed toward more productive pursuits.

3-31-15 In Awakening the Sacred Body, the author writes the following: "There is one tendency of mind that is important to notice, because it can undermine the positive effects of meditation, and that is our habit of moving from problem to problem. Without realizing it, we are addicted to our to do lists or so much more familiar with our problems that we tend to dwell on them, even when we recognize that doing so doesn't solve them." I was struck by that statement because I know it applies to me. I sometimes have treated my meditation as a to do list item, the work I'm doing as something to do and also as something I end up obsessing over. Part of what made last month hard is that I realized I needed to stop thinking so much and start experiencing more of what I was feeling. Reading that passage reinforced for me how essential it is and how you can only experience a certain level of meditation if you are stuck thinking about problems, and letting that thinking occupy your space.

4-6-15 Some tough work this last week, especially as I recognize patterns repeating themselves and producing the same results for me and in how I affect other people. My work with stillness has fittingly enough brought me back to emptiness, with all of its issues, and yet with an awareness of myself I previously lacked when I worked with it and I see so clearly how my relationship with it just leads to pain if I focus on trying to fill myself up, instead of just being with it and being open about it. I find when I am open about my misery, about what I'm feeling when I feel empty, it actually does serve to provide some relief and maybe I just need to accept that there is some part of me that is just deeply miserable and allowing myself to be that way without trying to change it, might be better for me. I've never done that, but its worth trying.

4-8-15 My suffering has defined a lot of who I am and a lot of the way I've related to other people. I've caused other people to suffer because of the pain I'm in and how I've handled that pain. In Awakening the Sacred Body, the author talks about how we hold on to the pain we feel because it is familiar to us. We become attached to it because we know it. To get past that involves learning how to open yourself to being in a place where that pain isn't there. I'm doing the TSA Lung exercises and as I do them and hold space with what I'm feeling I also consider that it could be possible to let go of the suffering I've felt and my attachment to it as a form of identity.

4-9-15 It fascinates me to encounter people who I recognize have similar traits as I do when it comes to how they measure social behavior and then respond. I talked with two such people today and could recognize how they calculated situations and also recognized the same tendency in me. I approach most situations with an a recognition that studying how people act can help me determine how I should respond, dependent on what I hope the situation will result in. I don't mind admitting that because the truth is I was a socially awkward person for a long time and it took me a while to figure out how to connect and relate to people. I did and do that partially by studying behavior and it makes easier to connect on a deeper level.

4-13-15 This weekend I helped put together a lot of furniture with Kat and the kids. It was a bonding experience and I felt a comfortable sense of work as I got into putting everything together. An experience of flow, which in a way can be a form of stillness because it becomes a moment that stretches beyond the usual experience of time. I've also been reflecting on how characters in books can reflect your own journey and be teachers in their own right. Nothing new in that reflection, but a renewed appreciation of lessons that can be learned if you are willing to see yourself in the character's journey.

4-15-15 Part of my suffering occurs with my creativity. I find it harder to write now than I used to. There will be occasions where the writing just flows and on those situations I write until I can't write anymore. Most of the time writing, for me happens in stops and starts and that's hard. It wasn't always that way and obviously despite my issues with my writing I still manage to put out a lot of writing, both in terms of books and blog entries, but I think I've worked harder for this writing in the last 5 years than I used to...then again, writing came a lot easier to me before I ended up in a long term situation that was fairly traumatic for me. And although its been a while since I've been in that situation, I think part of me is still just healing, and that includes the writer in me.

4-16-15 More and more I am seeing how my suffering internally leads to suffering for other people, when I act on that suffering, specifically when I try and find some way not to be present with it, but instead distract myself. Those distractions are really focused on my desires or my needs, as opposed to really being with someone. And when I see the result...a person hurt so deeply because of how I've handled my suffering, I realize that I have traumatized that person with my damage. It's a horrible feeling that deepens the very suffering I'm feeling because I now recognize how it's extended to someone else. I know I'm not the only one who's ever acted this way, but I also know I am the one person I can take responsibility for and that includes taking responsibility for my suffering and damage in a way that doesn't harm other people or myself. Doing that involves shifting from reaction to a place of proactive awareness, where I can recognize what motivates a given action and also acknowledge the potential effects that action could have on me and other people. Then its a matter of making a decision, the right decision, as opposed to continuing to react to my suffering.

4-17-15 One of my problems is I'm impulsive. I see something I want and I go after it without weighing all the factors. This does't always occur and happens less frequently now than it used to, but its still an issue. What I need to do is step back and really examine what the possible results will be. Not easy in the heat of the moment, but I've done it before and I can do it again.

4-20-15 This weekend I finally finished writing chapter of the pop culture magic book...a chapter I started at the end of February. It doesn't escape me my attention that when I get distracted by internal conflict, my writing suffers. Beyond that though, in working with stillness, I've come to see how much it calls up all the issues in my life and forces me to face them. In being present with myself, I am also present with everything going on that I've either buried away or tried to get away from...and I know I can't get away or bury it away. At some point it catches up and gets me...What I do about that though is up to me.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 5: Stagnation

2-27-15 I'm feeling pretty fried from all the travel I've done, plus the jet lag I'm feeling. I'm leaving on yet another trip in a few days and then after that, I'm done for a while. In all of that I've tried to maintain my connection to stillness and sometimes I have and sometimes I haven't. I don't stress myself too much about it, because it just is part of this time of year and also an opportunity to find stillness within movement. The two lead into each other and create each other.

3-2-15 I had a breakthrough realization about my meditation and actually about some issues in my life. I'm analyzing them too much...not engaging them on an experiential level. I know what you're thinking is...isn't that what you are writing about and doing a lot of and yes I am, but I can attest to the fact that some times you have to learn some thing multiple times, in multiple ways in order to get it. You realize it on one level and then go deeper and realize it all over again in a different way.

3-4-15 There are occasions where I feel a sense of destiny, a recognition that something significant will happen. I felt that way today, going into a business meeting and I'm feeling about my trip to the Between the Worlds Conference. The key, when you feel that way, is to still yourself, let the event unfold and know what you want from it, so that when the opportunity occurs you can take the right action to produce the desired result.

3-8-15 It's been quite a weekend at the Between the Worlds conference. I had several experiences that in their respective ways have brought about some deep realizations for me. I had a chance to meet with Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki for about 2o minutes, to discuss her books and the possibility of her publishing her books through Immanion Press. We chatted for a bit about western esotericism and people such as W. G. Gray as well as discussing publishing and I'm hopeful she'll publish books with us...but I also had an experience with her that I've never really had before...or if I have it hasn't stood out in quite the way it did this time. She did a spiritual transmission with me. I felt this wave of energy pass from her to me. The hair on my arms and legs and head stood on end and I could feel this heat pass through my body. It lasted for a quite a while after and I knew it was from her. I also know its one of those things, where it will manifest itself as needed, when its time for it to manifest.

And I felt like it already has manifested a bit, because I came away with another realization this weekend, more on the shadow side of things. Basically I came to recognize on how selfish I can be and how that selfishness has hurt people in my life in the past and in the present. I have a tendency to get really fixated on something I want, to the exclusion of thinking anything or anyone else...and sometimes that can be good, like when working on a creative project, and sometimes it can be bad such as when I place my own desires over anything else in my life. I'm really sitting with that and recognizing how its a pattern that's shown up multiple times in my life. I know I can change it...I also know I need to own it.

3-11-15 The last few days have been rough. I've really had to come face to face with my own selfishness and what motivates that selfishness. My conclusion, at least as it applies to relationships, is that its a defense mechanism in order to not let people get to close. The selfish part of me doesn't want the experience of love, so much as it wants whatever sensations it can have access to in order to distract it from itself. It's always been an issue for me that has played out in my relationships as well. It's a cold, calculating aspect of myself, my survivor really, but it's not helping me when it comes to my important relationships. It's focus is on taking care of itself to the exclusion of taking care of the people in my life and it really sucks.

3-13-15 Feeling something, instead of thinking about it, is hard. It calls for a level of vulnerability that doesn't come easily to me. And so much of what I feel is wrapped around this core part of myself that is trying to escape what its feeling. I know this is a recurring theme for me, but its a theme that nonetheless is profound for me because of how much it motivates my choices. Am I doing something to escape what I'm feeling inside or am I doing it because I genuinely want it? I don't know because the two are so entangled.

3-14-15 A friend of mine sent me a link to an article on what self-loving people do for themselves. As I read through it, I realized what behaviors I was doing and what behaviors I wasn't doing. I'm learning to listen to my emotions. This seems like a long journey for me, but compared to where I was years ago, I'm actually getting better at feeling emotions. I'm pretty good at taking responsibility, but I'll admit I still sometimes slip into blame mode, more often than not with myself and I do feel there is a difference between taking responsibility and blaming yourself. I definitely feed my passions and creativity and I enjoy spending time alone. I'm getting better at weighing long term choices over instant gratification, but I have a ways to go as well. For me, instant gratification has often been a way to just tune out, instead of really being present. Setting boundaries is a skill I've had to work hard at and being aware of the boundaries of others is another skill I've had to work at. Both are skills I'm still working with, and it goes right back to the instant gratification over weighing long term goals. As for admitting mistakes...in some ways that's the easiest skill, though it does venture into self-blaming. Still reading that article does indicate I'm getting better at self-love, slowly, but surely.

3-15-15 Feeling without labeling is a part of stillness work. I found myself trying to label today, to judge really, and I just called myself on it and went back to feeling. I feel that the Spiritual Transmission that Dolores gave me has helped me with some of this work. It's blown up some blockages and allowed me to do some integration work within myself.

3-18-15 The last few days I've had a cold, which has made doing any work much harder than it normally would be. There is just enough fuzziness there that it becomes an exercise to do anything. Feels a lot like stagnation and I realize that's the shadow side of stillness...where everything grinds to a halt. This month has felt a lot like that for me.

3-19-15 To experience an element, you necessarily need to encounter the shadow aspects of it. If you can't do that, then the work involved isn't for you. In some ways I think the shadow work is the most essential part of finding balance with an element. It calls on you to be vulnerable and open to changing yourself, especially aspects that you may not have examined. Ignorance is stripped away and what is left reveals who you are becoming as you do this work.

3-23-15 This month has been the hardest one with the stillness work. I feel I've come face to face with the shadow side of stillness and it is not easy to deal with. Nonetheless I also feel I've gained a lot from working with it...deeper insight into myself and my issues that allows me to see a history in my relationships that I hadn't previously acknowledged. It's hard and necessary work, but its work that keeps me going because ultimately I feel better for doing it. I feel stagnant, but actually i'm really not...I'm just encountering that feeling of stagnant as it shows up in my life.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 4: Strategy

1-23-2015 Sometimes when you play games, its useful not to play to win, but instead play to observe. When you play to observe you do so to better understand how someone else plays. You also play to observes so that you can observe your own responses. What this teaches you is how to be aware of your own responses and ask what's moving me in this situation. You can apply this same idea to any situation in life. If you find yourself in a place of reaction, still yourself and observe your reactions. Observe what other people are doing. Relax and let go of your attachment to the situation. You'll discover strategy in your stillness, by allowing yourself to observe and freeing yourself from the expectations involved in the situation.

1-31-15 As I've been working with stillness this week, I've been stepping back and observing my responses to various situations and seeing how I can be still in those situations instead. I'm finding it instructive to be still in those moments and compare how I might respond otherwise. Would the response really be the right one to make? It's not a second guess kind of thing, so much as its an appreciation for how being still can provide me some perspective about my choices and help me make more informed responses.

2-4-15 I've been feeling anxious the last couple days. I know why. I'm getting ready to do a lot of traveling starting next week...basically three trips in one month's time, and being around a lot of people. I know once it happens I'll be fine. I'm sitting with that anxiety and really watching how it shows up in my behavior and actions. For example, I didn't go to a networking meeting today and the reason is because I don't want to be around other people. I want to just be at home and I know that's a response to the travel, knowing I won't be at home. It surprises me how strong this feeling is and how much it motivates me to not do things in my regular routine, even though those things are important. I really need to be still with this feeling and work with it so that I can acknowledge it, but not let it stop me from doing what I need to do for my businesses.

2-6-15 Stillness, when embraced, leads to openness of presence. Openness of presence leads to awareness of possibility, and to the discovery that it was really there all along. You just didn't realize it because you were caught up in the cacophony of your life and forgot how to let yourself relax, let go, and discover everything within you that had been drowned out by whatever grabbed your attention. Bring yourself back to center. Still yourself, and be present with whatever comes up. Sit with whatever you feel, think, etc., with no judgement. It just is and you just are, but if you can accept it, it changes and so do you. What will you change into? No one knows the answer until the answer happens to you.

2-11-15 Sometimes the hardest part of working with stillness is what comes up when you are trying to be still. Your inner demons can rear their heads and come out in force. Of course, you can switch to a different meditation to work through those demons, such as using water breathing to dissolve the demons, but it can also be instructive to just be still with your inner demons and attentive to what you are getting from them. there is always an underlying message waiting to be found and learning to be still with yourself, when you actually don't want to be still can be a useful experience as well. I've been sitting with some of my demons this week and while its hard going, it's also rewarding in terms of the insights I'm getting from being as still as I can be with them.

2-13-15 In Awakening the Sacred Body, the author explains that when you are still and open to presence you can feel emotions come up such as anger. The reason this occurs is because we aren't distancing ourselves from the emotions, but instead are opening to them through the stillness. The key at that point is to just experience the emotion, without trying to analyze it or think about it or contextualize it. Then you just breathe it out, and release it. I struggle with this some because I'm so used to holding on to anger and I see how even analyzing it and thinking about it is still holding onto it.

A related challenge, which I've written about before is that sometimes I find myself trying to force the stillness...I did that today and I just stopped because I knew I couldn't force it. Then later my inner contact told me that I couldn't force a connection...I had to open to it. So I just accepted that and let myself acknowledge that my forcing it is really born out of desire and is not allowing me to authentically connect. I'm conceptualizing but not opening up to the stillness.

2-16-15 The last few days have been interesting experiences. Pantheacon is always a crucible of sorts. This year, moreso than any other year, I felt accepted and managed to connect with lots of wonderful people, some new acquaintances and some dear friends I always enjoy seeing. Each day I did my stillness work and instead of focusing on anything I just allowed myself to be still when the moments were perfect. This morning in teaching the elemental balancing ritual, I also felt myself connect with the next element I may work with. It gives me a lot to consider, but as always I know this work will be rewarding.

2-17-15 Last night Kat and I had a hard conversation about some communication problems I bring to our relationship. I've always had a tendency to go off and make my own plans without consulting my significant other. This has occurred because I've typically identified my S. O. as an authority figure in my life and therefore someone to work around instead of work with. I know where that originates from, but I also see how it has hurt my relationships in the past and present. I need to bring my partner in with me when I make plans, instead of making plans and then informing her after the fact. I know she'll back me up and help me and I need to trust that instead of creating a power dynamic that really isn't there.

2-18-15 As I can reading the Nature of Personal Reality by Jane Roberts, I am struck simultaneously by how there is at times a fair amount of law of attraction language, which I typically don't agree with and a lot of content focused on working with the consciousness or working through emotions, which shows me how this work has inspired my magical practice despite how long its been since I read it. A lot of what's written does apply to my stillness work as well, especially as it relates to opening to being.

2-19-15 I was reading more of The Nature of Personal Reality by Jane Roberts and there was something very insightful offered about aging that really made me pay attention. Seth, the spirit Roberts channeled, noted that people who are desperate to stay young, do so in order to negate their beliefs feelings about aging, and consequently reject part of themselves. This really resonated with me. I've noticed, this year, more so than the past my own aging and it has made me feel uneasy. I don't like that I have a slower metabolism, that some of my joints ache and need some warming up and that my forehead has less hair than it used to. I see these signs of aging and part of me wants to resist it. Reading what Seth shared helped me recognize this and I'm just sitting with it. I am aging and it is part of the process of living life.

2-22-15 the wrap up of a convention is always an interesting process. The people leave and the convention reaches a place of stillness, but its only temporary. It will all start up again at some point. Not everyone will be there for the next iteration. New people will come, others will go...but the spirit of it lasts.

On a different note, I've been thinking about my own lessons to learn and realizing that sometimes I put myself through a lot because I don't always learn what I need to learn right away. Hard lessons...but once I learn them, my life gets better.

The Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 3: Disinterest

12-23-14 I feel numb right now. I don't think numbness is the same as stillness, because underneath that numbness is a lot of thoughts and emotions stirring. The numbness is just a mask, a protective layer, while I figure out how to process what I'm thinking and feeling. To hear about similar experiences from the only other person in the circumstances I was in is both saddening and validating. I'm not alone in feeling this way. I'm not alone in having the experiences I had...and yet its not really a surprise. I knew I wasn't alone. But hearing it is still something different. I'll figure out what to make of all of it later.

12-24-14 Today as I was doing my stillness meditation, a thought came into my head about an ongoing situation in my life and I was able to follow that thought to several possibilities I hadn't considered before. So I let those possibilities present themselves to me and will see about implementing one., but I mention this here in relationship to stillness because one of the ways I've used stillness is to step away from everything going on in my life so that I can actually observe the possibilities available, instead of letting myself be so into a situation that I can't see the possibilities. I think working with stillness in this way will be something I continue to do to work with as a form of problem solving. I see how putting myself into stillness can be quite useful for opening the possibilities up and although I'd already been aware of that to some degree, today's working further illustrated it.

12-28-14 You can't make stillness happen. When you try to make stillness happen, it's not stillness that occurs. Stillness is something you let happen to you. You make yourself receptive to stillness. The difference is distinct in the sense that imposed stillness is not true stillness, so much as an attempt to be still, whereas genuine stillness is a state of being, an experience of consciousness that occurs to you, changing you because you are open to experiencing change.

1-7-2015 Lately I've been working with the Dehara system of magic, which is based off the Wraeththu series. In my daily meditations I've had vivid experiences of being a Hara in that universe. I feel like I'm tapping into an alternate version of myself. I feel like the stillness work has helped me to be more receptive to such experiences because I'm stilling myself and opening up to what comes my way (within reason).

1-8-2015 Today was the opposite of yesterday. I floundered at being still. It was like trying to grasp a piece of wood in a stormy ocean, with waves about to swallow you whole. So at some point I just gave up trying to be still and let myself go wherever I wanted to go. After that I became still and it was effortless because nothing was being constrained anymore. I was just letting it be.

Tonight I had a reaction. I happened to see an event coming up this weekend and I reacted to it. Part of me began thinking I should try and run my own event and after I entertained this thought for a bit, I stilled myself and asked what really motivated me and I realized it was jealousy and a sense of feeling threatened by the people running the event.  So I was creating this scenario of competition and setting myself up to lose because the motivation wasn't for anything useful and I just stopped. I don't want to go down that route. It's a route I've traveled far too often in my life and any benefit has always been short. My genuine success has come from being true to myself and my vision of what I want to accomplish. Staying on course with that is more important than letting jealousy get the better of me.

1-10-2015 Today I relaxed into the stillness work. I started Zhine, found what I'd focus on and relaxed into it and there I was...still. When I hit such states, I find that the stillness gradually deepens and eventually you no longer focus on anything. You become part of the background. Nothing and everything all there, all at once...just being.

In my Dehara work I was taken on a journey by Dahuun to Malkuth, where Aruhani is and explored Aruhani in the context of Earth and Malkuth, combining planetary and Quabalistic associations. It was a fascinating journey that helped me appreciate certain aspects of Dehara better as well as reimprinting some principles of magic through the work.

1-14-15 I'm very careful about the people I have in my life. Today I defriended someone because I noticed a lot of negativity on his page and didn't really want to read about it further. His response was over the top, but seemingly typical. It just confirmed why I don't want that drama in my life. Part of the cultivation of stillness, for myself, is cultivating the right relationships and letting the rest go. I see no need to tolerate someone just because of how they might react...that's a toxic relationship right there.

On the Dehara front, I've progressed up to Netzach with the pathworking, visiting and remediating the experience of the Sephiroth with the Dehara I've associated with them. I've found this useful for further imprinting the Sephiroth and Dehara on my consciousness and subconsciousness. I may try this with other systems of magic to see how it changes my understanding of those systems.

1-17-2015 Today in my stillness work, Zadok told me how important it is to be aware of my stillness and ask myself why I want to be moved toward a possibility. Am I moving myself there based on reaction or am I moving to that possibility for other reasons? Do I even want to move from stillness? Good questions prompted by the entertaining of a possibility while in stillness meditation and recognizing that my desire to realize that possibility was primarily because of a reaction and that such a realization wasn't necessarily the best use of my resources or time. Actually, what I recognize from this meditation today is just how easy it is to get caught up in possibility, for I do it a lot and even if I do nothing else that still can be a distraction or a benefit (or both) depending upon how I direct it.

On the Dehara front I've worked my way up to Geburah, associating Pellaz and Calanthe with Tiphareth and Geburah respectively. I'm not sure if anyone else would make those associations, but they make sense to me. I guess the real test will come when other people give this work a try on their end. It occurs to me as well that when you are working on creating or developing a pop culture magic system, you play a role in the perception and work of other people that come after. You've set the stage for them and that brings with it some type of responsibility.

1-19-15 Stillness can be chaotic. Stillness isn't about perfect harmony...it's about being present with whatever is in your life in that moment. So if there is some chaos, that's ok. The key isn't to try and change it into stillness. The key is to be with it and be still, allowing yourself to feel the chaos without necessarily becoming the chaos.

One of the books I've been reading, The Nature of Personal Reality by Seth shares some intriguing ideas about the communication in the body and in the thoughts of a person. A lot of it echoes some of my own writings and I see once again how this book has influenced my spiritual development. There are some work that won't really make an impact and others that will, but you own't realize it until years later when you look over the material again. And some just hit you over the head. I guess that's a lot like people as well. In any case, in reading over the material I'm struck by how relevant some of it is, especially to the inner alchemical work I'm doing.

1-21-15 In the last week or so I've had two different people try to draw me into their drama, in one form or another. It hasn't worked very well for them, mainly because they're a lot more invested in being right than I am in them being wrong. At a certain point in a debate, when the conversation goes around and around with no change in either stance, its wise to simply say, "Let's agree to disagree" and leave it at that. Unfortunately many people get so invested in proving their point of view, proving they are right and the other person is wrong that they try to have the last word or do their best to disprove the other person. I could care less. I know going into such situations that I likely won't prove my point of view to the other person's satisfaction because they are looking for a specific result (that they are right) and so its not worth my time to try and argue otherwise. So I take the stance of disinterest because I'm not interested in being their punching bag or agreeing with them. I know that my stance is based on my experiences and while I'm happy to entertain the possibility that they could be right, I don't necessarily feel I need to agree or validate them. I also feel that there are many ways to explain something and my explanation can be just as valid as anyone else's. That said I don't expect anyone else will agree and that's ok. They can disagree...just don't expect me to go out of my way to waste time arguing about it. I have better, more productive usage of my time in mind then arguing over who is right and who is wrong.

I see my stance of disinterest as a form of stillness, informed as it is by my desire to not engage in pointless arguments. When a conversation has a point and there is give and take, then its a worthy investment of time, but when its all about proving someone wrong or one's self right, then it becomes an exercise in futility and allowing yourself to be moved by that kind of argument takes away from your quality of life.

The Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 2: Centering

11-29-2014 One of the things that Stillness does for you is help you be aware of what isn't still with you. In my case, working with stillness has made me more aware of how I repress my emotions as well as what that leads to. My response has been to express my feelings more than I have. Instead of repressing my frustration, I'm expressing it. I never been good at doing this, because I learned early on that expressing my emotions wasn't welcomed, but I don't want to live by that standard if I can help it.

Doing the stillness work each day has been fascinating, in part, because some of the other ongoing work I'm doing has slowed down. I don't have a problem with this because it feels right, part of really getting in deep with stillness. To know an element is to let it express itself through you, and that means allowing some changes to really get the element.

12-1-14 Today when I was doing my stillness work, I felt like what I really needed to do was be still with everything going on in my mind. My thoughts weren't still and instead of trying to still them I just let them go where they went and allowed myself to notice them without doing anything. Feeling so scattered can be frustrating, but it can also be liberating to just be with it instead of trying to do something about it. I've found through my meditation experiences that learning to let go and be with the experience is what really makes meditation effective. Anything else actually keeps you away from stillness...so in those moments when the thoughts go everywhere, let go and let your thoughts go everywhere. Observe them without doing anything and you will become the observer instead of the thinker.

12-4-14 The other day I told Kat that doing this stillness work isn't about a result, but about the process and so when I don't have any experiences while meditating, I don't take it as anything other than being still and in the process. I think it's important to note this because sometimes the focus is so much on achieving specific outcomes that the journey/process is forgotten about, but doing the work really involves a need to be present with what is happening even when nothing seems to be happening. Oftentimes what is happening is very subtle and yet it builds up until its ready to reveal itself...you just have to be diligent and do the work.

12-8-14 Today I had an experience with stillness, where I connected with how movement interacts with stillness. It felt like Stillness pulls movement toward it, like a black hole creating a gravity well that pulls everything into it. It was a strong pull that stilled the movement, but nonetheless also seemed to feed it, for what became still nonetheless also seemed to eventually move again, becoming displaced by what else was pulled to it.

12-9-14 Further work with stillness and movement, understanding that neither is stronger then the other, but rather that they serve complementary purposes, with movement going into stillness, but eventually becoming movement again, with stillness being the pause and timing to make sure things are done right. They fit together instead of being opposing forces.

12-11-14 Today I couldn't find stillness. Zadok told me that sometimes we have to work for it...it won't just come to us. Just because I am still doesn't mean I'm tied into stillness. It felt that way today.

12-12-14 Today Zadok explained that stillness was the centering of a person's being so that s/he could connect with possibilities both around and within. My experience of this was a connection with alternate versions of myself and simultaneously connecting with the possibility those other selves were part of. He explained that a person could experience variants of his/her life using stillness as a way to commune with the alternate self...so that you consequently live that life while still connected to the version you are. I've had experiences like that before, but what this meditation did was help me tune into those experiences much more consciously.

12-14-14 Lately I've been recognizing how part of me has been conditioned toward conflict. My relationship with Kat is very stable and yet some part of me finds that disquieting and waits for conflict to occur to feel safe. I told her about this realization this morning and she said that it makes sense in its own way. We've both lived in environments where there was lots of conflict and even if that conflict was unhealthy it was also familiar. I feel that consciously recognizing this is helpful to me because then I can work on it and be aware of it so that I don't sabotage my relationship with Kat. Telling her about it is one way to resolve it, but I've also just been allowing myself to acknowledge the vulnerability I fee in having a much more stable relationship than I'm used to.

I've also been meditating on food and how food has been a drive in my life. I realize that food has been such a drive not just because of survival, but also because it was one of the few ways I received approval in my childhood years. I always ate the food on my plate and that made my step-mom happy, so she'd comment on it. In retrospect I realize what made her happy was not having to deal with a fussy kid, but at the time, that was a rare form of approval that I received. Recognizing that is helping me to understand my relationship with food in a different way that I think will help me develop a healthier relationship with it.

12-19-14 The last couple of days has involved going deeper into stillness work, with a sense of being prepared for work in specific directions that were hinted at earlier by Zadok. The work would be with Xah and Teriel...so we'll see what happens.

12-21-14 Today in stillness meditation I felt myself a the center of the web of space and time. I was still. I didn't move until I felt the vibration of movement on the web. I was still, being with space and time, but not doing anything until there was a need to do something. I felt still, calm, connected to the universe, knowing any changes I made would be made from the right place to make them.

12-22-14 Falling in love and loving someone are two different experiences. Falling in love is really selfish in some ways, built as it is on the fantasies that you have about the person, the relationship you might have, the life you might live. It's very easy to get caught up in those fantasies, to let them create an idealized version of the person. Loving someone on the other hand is actually being present with the person. It's not a fantasy...it is the everyday reality of that person and your interactions with that person. Falling in love is glamorized, but loving someone not so much. Still I think loving someone is when you discover what you have with the person. It's no longer fantasy. It's reality based on the experience you are in, instead of projections about experiences you think you want to have.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Stillness Month 1: Zadok

10-22-14 Today I did the necessary meditations to start my work with the element of Stillness. First I did the 5 warrior syllable vocalizations I've learned from Tibetan Sound Healing. Fittingly enough I learned the last chant today. What was really interesting was recognizing that this is a stillness practice that nonetheless leads to movement, to manifestation, with the last syllable focusing the desired intention of the practitioner and manifesting it outward. I've discussed this in further depth in a blog post, on this topic.

I also did the Tumo exercise of raising energy, in this case stillness. Stillness is different. There is no movement, no anything. It just is, so you raise that energy and it doesn't move so much as it just manifests and there you are, in this space of stillness, just being.

And then I did the connection and mediation of stillness with the spiritual guide I'll be working with: Zadok also known as Ronald Heaver. Interestingly enough when I did the connection I could not remember the mundane name of Ronald Heaver (though I was able to visualize his face) but I was easily able to remember his magical name Zadok and when we connected he explained that had been purposeful because he didn't want me to connect with the form of Ronald Heaver, but rather wanted me to connect with the deeper spiritual current of Zadok. He pointed out it was the same with me. Taylor Ellwood is the current form, but the magical current is Teriel and Xah, much deeper and different and I actually felt those currents within me stir and realized that part of this work will involve more consciously connecting with both Xah and Teriel.

In any case, I connected with Zadok and I felt him work with my energy and switch me over to stillness. I felt myself reach this place of stillness, of being that I've already experienced, but this time it was much deeper. He told me this year's work would build on the movement work by going much deeper and that it would have an effect on all the other work I'm manifesting.

10-24-14 I met with my astrologer today to do an updated reading. A lot of what he told me confirms other information I've gotten about what patterns to look for in my life and work on, but its good to have additional confirmation. One thing which really stands out from the reading is his suggestion to work more closely with the feminine within me. While I've always felt in touch with that part of me, I'll admit I don't think I have the healthiest relationship with that part of myself, so I'm going to sit with his advice and think of how I can work with that part of myself in a more conscious way.

10-28-14 I'm in New Orleans for a couple days while Kat goes to a conference here. I've been to New Orleans once before but it was ten years ago and I didn't wander around much. This time I actually have wandered around quite a bit. Both Kat and I noticed the raw, primal energy of this city, as well as the spirits that are here. I also noticed the smell. The energy of the land is strong and it wants to move you. I guess its fitting that my first month into stillness and I deal with movement, but in this case I don't want to move with it, so I've been holding on to my stillness, just abiding and being without changing anything.

10-30-14 Today's meditation with Zadok was interesting. He brought up Xah and Teriel once again and discussed how they were spiritual aspects that could be drawn upon not only for knowledge, but also a form of genius or daimonic inspiration. He also explained that being still isn't about emptying the mind, but with abiding with what ever is there, being present with whatever comes up instead of trying to get rid of it.

11-1-14 In today's work with stillness, I was struck again by how there is no silence. Whether its the mental chatter of the person or the environmental sounds around you, there is always something happening, which doesn't necessarily stop stillness, so much as when you are still you become aware of everything around you.

11-3-14 Sometimes stillness is found in doing something. Instead of trying so hard to be still, do something and allow the doing of it to bring you to stillness.

11-12-14 Sometimes when you write a lot of content, it can feel frustrating when you feel like you don't have something to share. I felt this way last week. And then I felt the stillness within me and I realized I didn't need to write. I didn't to try and make something come out. That perhaps the best thing I could do was be still and allow that stillness to settle the part of me that felt restless. So I did that and didn't write and I felt at peace about it.

11-16-14 The other night I had a dream about an ex. I was trying to bury the hatchet with her and everything I did was turned around and used against me by her. I realized the dream was a warning not to pursue any such attempts with that person, but what struck me the most about it was all this activity I was trying to do, and how what I really needed to do was be still instead of trying so hard to change something that wasn't going to change.

11-19-14 I have a tendency to take all the fault of a situation and put it on me. I learned to do this early on, with my dad and step-mother. I either hid what I did from them or I took on all the fault. Of course it didn't help that they would make it abundantly clear that I was at fault. Being told you are a disappointment has an odd effect of really fucking with your sense of self worth. In relationships I had with romantic partners this same pattern would replicate, through no fault of those partners. However this pattern makes it hard to work through an issue. I take a situation onto myself and pull it into me and stew in how its all my "fault." It's not healthy and while I've made some strides to make changes, it's quite frustrating at times because it is a resilient behavior informed by my fear of being abandoned. Fortunately Kat is quite willing to call me out on this behavior and do it in a loving manner that nonetheless reinforces the necessary boundaries. And that helps...because with something like this I can do the work, but I also need help at times with it. I couldn't have asked for that help in previous relationships because I didn't know how to be comfortable with my vulnerability, but fortunately with her I can do it.

11-22-14 It seems appropriate that I end this month with continuing my work with the Quabala. I've started reading and working through The Talking Tree by William Gray, which is a companion book to The Ladder of Lights. This book explores the paths between the Sephiroth. The first path is the Hierophant and when I did my meditation on it, Bill Gray showed up. I asked him why and he said, because that's what you expected, which I guess makes sense. He walked me through that path, explaining it in terms of how the Angelic orders of Kether and Chockmah connected together, each providing something to the other, which helped manifest the path.

In terms of the ongoing stillness work, I spent some time today being still with everything in my head, recognizing how many impressions of the world around me end up in my head and why its so important to declutter and be so particular with what you choose to feed yourself. I know this, but its worth stating again for myself as well as any other person who cares to read this.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Movement Month 24: Transition

9-24-14 This is the last month of the movement working and its a bit odd to realize that because I've spent almost 2 years working with this particular element. I feel like I've only dug in a little ways to movement in all this work I've done, but I've not doubt that there will be more realizations and deeper worker to come and I feel that I have reached a place of balance with this work. I also feel that the Plutonian current I've been dealing with, the night of the dark soul, is receding. When you do this kind of work you become attuned to the currents of energy or spirit you're working with and what I feel is I'm in this place of transition, movement slowing into stillness.

I also started work with Chockmah today. What was interesting about that meditation was recognizing that Chockmah is the beginning of limitation, the initial formation of possibility becoming reality, contained in a very conceptual form that then impregnates Binah, which provides further limitations. Nonetheless I recognized how a biological imperative is placed on the tree, male leading into female which then begats the next layer of the tree and I wondered what it would like if the direction of manifestation went counter clockwise instead of clockwise. This inspired me to think about the quiploth and at some point I must do some research to see if there anything to that, but it also strikes me as a limitation of the tree, bound to a physicality that may or may not be accurate. Of course I also need to recognize the lens of what I'm reading and how that shapes this perception as well.

9-26-14 I'm coming to the conclusion that for the most part weekend intensives don't work, though it probably also doesn't help that my intensive is happening during Mabon, which automatically seems to draw people away, but even without that I've come to recognize a trend that indicates that its probably better to just do webinars and teleclasses with occasional appearances at festivals and bookstores. It's frustrating to figure all this out the hard way, but sometimes its how you learn. My problem here admittedly is that  don't really pay attention to holidays in general and so that hurt me with this particular weekend initiative.

On a different note I've been losing some weight and that makes me happy to actually see it happening, but it also makes me think about what I'll do to make it actually work down the line when I'm not dieting any further. In Ladder of Lights Gray discusses the Auphanim, which are the angelic order of Chockmah. According to him they are the mills of God, creating and sustaining cyclical patterns until a person doesn't need the pattern any more. I've been contemplating that all day, seeing it show up in multiple ways in my life, and thinking of how those patterns are broken down by the work a person does that necessarily involves learning how to end a pattern instead of stay in it.

10-02-14 I finished up working with Chockmah today. When I worked with Ratziel, he showed me his book, but told me there was nothing in there I didn't already know, if I was willing to do the work. And I agree with that, because I find that Chockmah makes a lot of sense to me. Chockmah is patterns within patterns forming into more patterns that convey concept into reality. I do find it very interesting that as I continue this climb up the ladder, I'm also coming to a close with the movement work and getting ready for stillness. Kether is, I think, an embodiment of stillness in its own right, with motion moving toward stillness, and eventually into motion again.

10-6-14 In working with the angelic order of Kether, the impressions I've experienced has been as Kether as the first impulse...yes is everything and nothing, but its also the motivation to do something, to become something distinct from everything else. And when you consider that Kether is ultimately a label to that effect, which describes a Sephiroth, it makes a lot of sense. Kether is that beginning movement of becoming, that initial urge to do something.

The last week has been pretty challenged and at one point Kat asked me what the lesson was and I realized it was that I'm feeling blocked. So I took the weekend off and didn't do anything related to work. Sometimes I think people are so focused on trying to move, trying to find a way to get past an obstacle, they forget the value of just stopping and doing something else or nothing at all. Certainly I'm one of those people.

10-7-14 I connected with Metatron today, who pointed out something significant to me. He explained that even Kether has its own limitation and that the tree itself is a form of limitation that presents a specific way of working with reality that fits the needs of the people utilizing it but also limits those people to that system and the limitations within it. And it's a good point to make...any given system has its own limitations which need to be recognized because at some point a person can and often does evolve past it.

10-8-14 I'm feeling restless and depressed lately. I think it's the fallout from the recent trip, so I'm doing my best to sit with the emotions and get clear on what I'm feeling and why. Perhaps part of it also is that I'm going to be 38 soon. I realize that and I look at my life and it just seems like so much of it has been a mess, which I've managed to get somewhat cleaned up. I know there's plenty of accomplishments there as well, but I think you only really start to come into your own when you've lived life a bit. My twenties were me learning something of what being an adult is about, and my thirties has really been about establishing an identity of who and what I am and do. I'm realizing that and it just hits me I'll be older than my parents when I was born and what I have to show for it...depends on how you look at it I guess, but I actually think I have a lot to show for it...if I'm willing to recognize it.

10-9-14 I finished up with the Ladder of Lights today. There was something in it that Gray wrote: "We neglect Nothing at our greatest cost, for it is the universal element, the ultimate thought, and the unique source of all energy." That's my experience with nothing. Nothing and yet everything all wrapped up on the razor edge of Zero. I hadn't read the Ladder of Lights in a long, long time, but its been good to re-read it and to experience it in a different manner which is more focused through the practice I created around it.

10-15-14 I had an interesting dream last night. I dreamed I was interacting with the experience a person has with eating a Subway sandwich. It was pretty surreal, but it essentially opened my mind to some possibilities with pop culture magic that I'll explore in more depth in the book. The dream came about as a result of feeling a bit of anxiety over the fact that another person is presenting on the topic of pop culture magic. On the one hand, I'm glad someone else is doing presentations and on the other hand, there is a bit of possessiveness on my part and also the fear that what I plan to write will be obsolete, but the dream confirmed something for me and proved quite helpful in put that fear to rest. I realized that my own perspectives are unique enough and that other people presenting shows that pop culture magic is finally reaching that place of acceptance I'd always hoped for with it.

I also had an interesting experience with the Tibetan sound work I'm doing. I decided to do the chanting with the purpose of attuning the spirit cord to the chanting. I felt the astral version of the cord vibrate with the sound, attuning itself to the purpose of the sound and amplifying the effect. Further experimentation is warranted.

10-16-14 I'm feeling frustrated with myself. It feels likely lately I'm making all the wrong decisions or at least acting before I fully think things through. The intentions are good, but the results are less so. Ugh. I think I need to slow the fuck down, which is why it'll be good for me to take on stillness. Sometimes you get so caught up in the movement of life you don't do the necessary due diligence...there's no excuse for that.

10-21-14 Today is the last day of the movement work. I did my invocation of Eros and thanked him for all his help. I know I'll work with him again, especially because there is so much more to tap into with this particular element. I feel even, with 2 years in, I could spend much more time, but I'm also ready for Stillness and I know I will learn things about movement from Stillness. Actually when I think about Stillness, I recognize that I've been integrating stillness practices into my life for the better part of this last year. It's an interesting demonstration of how the elemental balancing work ends up blending together. Tomorrow I will do the ritual to set up stillness as the element to work with for this next year, in full.

Last night, I spoke with Kat about the elemental balancing ritual. I asked her if it was ever a burden for her, me doing this work, and she told me it wasn't...that she accepted it and understood its significance in my life and that she felt it had reverberations in her life as well, but that she welcomed them as part of being involved with me. It meant a lot to me, to hear that support for my spiritual work and the acceptance of just how important this balancing work is to what I'm doing overall. Having a partner who fully gets and supports this work and what it means not just to my personal development, but also the overall work I'm doing with magic is truly a blessing.

Happy birthday to me!

Elemental Balancing Ritual Movement Month 22: Balancing Act

7-24-14 The second day at Pathways, we took Bill Duvendack to lunch. Bill is a stand up guy, intelligent, and he shared some interesting insights on the international community. We also talked more about one of the books he's sending to Immanion, which I'm looking forward to editing myself. Afterwards I did some Tarot readings and then the manifesting wealth class, which was well received. We had a larger crowd that night then the previous one. Afterwards we went to dinner with River Higginbotham, who'd been kind enough to host us while in St. Louis. We had some good conversations around leadership and magic. He has some similar interests in space/time magic work, and also the Seth material.

On the 23rd, we arrived in Indianapolis. Actually we checked out the cahokia mounds. I'd never heard of them before. We walked among and wood henge. What I felt was a residual trace of the original people. After that we drove to Indianapolis and I arrived at Spiritual Gardens. At that shop there was one person there for the workshop and I put aside all expectations or anything else and gave a really good version of the Alchemy of Breath, which I'll use in the future. It also occurred to me that I should write a book on that topic specifically. I've written about breath work in Inner Alchemy, but this would be an expansion on what I wrote there. The person attending the class bouth three books and this is only significant for one reason, which I'll share shortly.

Kat and I took the bookstore owner and her son to dinner. It turns out that the patron of the owner and the store is Papa Legba, a loa of the crossroads. Kat and I do a lot of crossroads work, and I felt Legba's presence show up at dinner. The receipt for the meal, plus tip came out to the exact amount I was paid for the books, which I found interesting. The shop owner also told me that Legba likes people to be humble and I realized that the workshop at the bookstore and the dinner was part of encounter with Legba, a test of sorts. Kat and I ended up chatting for quite a while with the owner about the Indianapolis community and at some point Legba came through and the conversation shifted to changes in the owner's life. I feel we passed the test, but it made me appreciate how the movement we experience in life sometimes happens for very specific reasons that remind us of specific lesson we need to take into account. Certainly the entire experience here reminded me of the importance of being humble in the face of success, accepting it, but not letting it go to my head either.

7-26-14 I've been working with the Elohim, which are the angelic order for Netzach. They've shown up as multi-faceted beings with mirror like finishes that mediate specific forces and serve as middle men to connect those forces to people. They are also mirrors of the heart and soul of the person. Sometimes they've shown up with lots of eyes, offering a glimpse into something else.

I've also been at the 2nd international left hand path conference. There's been some good presentations on luciferianism, secret societies, magic etc. I've also been able to meet a couple of people I've long wanted to meet such as Laurelei Black and Michael Ford. I'm grateful for the opportunity to speak and be at this event, and to meet the various people here.

7-29-14 Home at last. The 2nd international left hand path conference was excellent, with lots of good presenters. The trip home was uneventful, but the time away made me realize how much I value my time at home, how much I value PDX. It's great to move and to see further movement resulting as a result, but it's also good to savor hat you have and appreciate the space you are in. I feel the transition to Stillness starting.

7-31-14 Today I was working with Netzach and specifically the Archangel for Netzach, who is known as Auriel or Hanael. A while back in an R.J. Stewart workshop, I had an encounter with a being named Hanael, so when I did my meditation today it was the same being and it was fascinating because in the workshop the focus wasn't on connecting with archangelic powers. According to Gray this archangel directs energy from the athletic to artistic fields...he focuses people into a specific direction. We discussed that quite a bit today, in relationship to some of the changes occurring in my life. It helps me understand some of those choices as well as the benefits. I'll be curious to see what further work with him will bring about.

8-4-2014 It's horrible to tell someone that s/he is a disappointment. I heard that phrase far too often in my childhood. It shut me down. It told me I wasn't good enough. To hear it uttered about someone else always triggers a reaction within me.

8-5-2014 I'm reading The Fruitful Darkness by Joan Halifax. It's an autobiography of sorts about her work with Buddhism and shamanic practices. She makes an interesting statement, where she says there can only be a harvest when a person yields. It makes me think about the movement work and my recognition that sometimes to move, you need to allow yourself to be moved. Today I felt moved to stop by and visit Kat during her break. I told her how much I love her, how much she has moved me, how much she has helped me connect with parts of myself I had frozen and locked away. I don't always find it easy to express such things, but I felt a need to tell her how much she means to me, how much she moves me. So I let myself by moved by how she moves me and spoke my feelings to her, told her how much she means to me and how much she has helped me grow as a person.

8-9-14 I've been feeling the transition to stillness even more lately. It's a subtle transition, but nonetheless I feel that movement is morphing into stillness in my deep work and I'm ready for it. At the same time I feel that Eros will continue to be part of this work, which makes sense as I continue to develop a relationship with him. I haven't written about him much because the relationship has always been subtle, yet nonetheless I have felt him at work in the various experiences I've had and am having.

I've also wrapped up my work with Netzach today. Hanael actually assigned an angel of the Elohim order to me to help me with some specific internal work I'm doing. That angel is holding up a mirror for me...that is its function and yet that function is helping me to see what I need to do to take the internal work deeper.

Something I've been thinking about is leadership and how a good leader recognizes that s/he has feet of clay, or in other words recognizes the flaws s/he has. I definitely have some flaws and have made some choices over the years that were harmful to myself and to other people in my life. I have and continue to work on those flaws with the recognition that this work is a continuous journey. I also know I haven't always been a good leader. I've made some questionable choices that I look back on now and regret making. However what I can do with those choices is learn from them and make sure that I make better choices in my life and work.

8-15-14 I've been working with Tiphareth. I connected with the Malakim, which are the angels of balance. They seemed more abstract than the previous angelic orders, and told me that they were because their focus was on balancing the other Sephiroth and making sure that the right energies balanced each other. Meditating on this helped me appreciate anew the balance between movement and stillness, but also balance in and of itself as a principle of the world. I think I will explore balance as an element after Stillness, if balance calls to me.

8-17-14 The last few days have been pretty tough. I had a situation occur where I was essentially told I wasn't trusted. I got the situation resolved, or at least as resolved as it can be, but to have someone you respect tell you that they don't trust you or that they trust you in theory, but not in practice really hurts. At the same time I suppose what it also indicates is what the real nature of the relationship is. It saddens me, because I realize that whatever the relationship is or may be, this situation has changed it on both ends.

8-20-14 My continued work with Tiphareth has been interesting because of how much more abstract its been and how quickly its gone through. It really is a Sephiroth of balance, with the focus really being on mediating and directing the various energies of the other Sephiroth. It has made me think, as I've worked with it, about how important balance really is and how even though I've integrated into elemental balancing ritual, I haven't really worked with Balance in and of itself.

I've also been feeling a bit depressed. Ironically I've been a bit more creative or maybe I've just focused on that creativity as a channel for what I'm feeling. Regardless it is good to get things done and I like that I've made some progress on a couple of projects that had been proceeding at a very slow speed of progress. I suppose what it really comes right down to is figuring out how to take anything and find a way to use it if you can, including depression.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Movement Month 21: Responsibility

 6-20-14 When I was working with my spirit cord today, I felt it pulse and sync with my heart beat. It was quite an interesting experience and not something I'd previously felt in my work with the spirit cord. I also continued my work around regret. I dove in really deep today with that blockage that's by my navel, and I felt it continue to loosen up and as it did I experienced some memories and feelings about a couple of people and choices I'd made around those people. It was hard to feel those emotions, to be in those memories, but I let myself relax into them and as I did, I allowed myself to acknowledge and feel those emotions instead of avoiding them. I felt some sadness and a sense of responsibility that I had previously denied or tried to foist on someone else. Instead I chose to accept the responsibility. There's still work to do around it, but I felt taking that step was significant enough in its own right. 6-23-14 Regret is a form of fantasy, in some sense, and I find that as I delve into this work that some regrets turn into a sense of fantasy, a what if scenario. I realize such a scenario is a blockage, in and of itself, but it also an expression of the regret that can be worked through. So part of my dissolving work has involved working with the regret through the fantasy and using the fantasy to recognize certain realities that the regret doesn't factor in. One of the realizations I came away with is an awareness that I felt like I had to fit myself around another person and their issues and life as opposed to actively working on creating a true partnership. I felt this way multiple times with multiple people and that helped me look at the regret in a different light, because it showed me that the regret presented a filtered perspective. By doing the dissolving work it strips away the filter.

7-1-14 I've been continuing to meditate on regret and today I hit a realization about some of my choices earlier in my life that helped me understand that the reason I made those choices was because I was looking for something and fooling myself into thinking I could get it in the way I was pursuing it. Hindsight being 20-20 I eventually realized that my choices weren't providing me what I was looking for, but in meditating on those choices with the regret work, I was able to understand them in a different way that helped me find a sense of resolution about them I hadn't felt before. Working with regret in the way I've been working it has helped me see how the lack of closure creates regret but also how trying to meet a need can do the same. And when you do meet that need, you may still need to work with past issues in order to resolve those periods of time and occurrences in order to be fully present with the solution.

7-4-14 I'm feeling a bit frustrated lately. I'm having to change my event in Chicago into something else due to the lack of signups for the intensive. And it looks like my September event is encountering difficulties due to circumstances that originate with the place I'd be presenting at. What this continues to illustrate to me is that it may be more useful to invest in video and webinars for classes. While the initial cost might be high, the overall overhead would likely be low. After this month is over, I'm going to start doing some research into what other authors are doing...and this illustrates the importance of being adaptable, of being able to change movement as needed in order to go where you want to be.

7-8-14 I've been doing some work with Raphael, who is the Archangel of Hod. He's appeared to me as a doctor in a clinic, healing various people. He told me I needed to be open about my wounds if I wanted to find healing for them. Later on I talked with Kat and I admitted I was feeling depressed. A lot ended up coming out that helped me realize how much pressure I put on myself, but what really stood out to me was how hard it was for me to feel present with a part of myself that I identify myself as young boy. I think for men in general its hard to identify with the boy aspect of themselves. Part of this is because I think one of the immature images of men is men who never grow up, who essentially are still boys. However, I think that you can be a mature man and still connect with the boy within, but doing that easily...especially if that part of you has been so wounded...that's hard for me and sharing it with someone else is even harder.

7-12-14 I've been watching Neon Genesis Evangelion with Kat. It's been over 5 years since I last watched it. I've seen the series over 8 times. It's one of my favorite series and its also a cathartic series for me, because of the triggers and issues that come up in regards to my own relationship with my parents. However watching it this time around has been different. I've still felt some triggers and issues, but its different now, more muted. The internal work I've done has changed a lot of my reactions...its still a show that touches me, but it doesn't grab me in quite the same way. And I'm happy about that because as much as I like the show, it's good to know I've changed, that while it still touches me, it doesn't hit in quite the same way it did before.

7-15-14 I've come to a place with the regret work where I feel I've plumbed the depths as it were and gotten what I need from it. I'm glad I dedicated the time to it, but now I'll return to some other projects. I've also started work with Netzach, doing the initial phase of connection work, which I'll build on when the time is appropriate. It occurs to me that Netzach and Hod are mirrors to each other representing both the same and opposite principles, a union of opposites to create a composite realization, which would be Yesod, which when refined further becomes Malkuth. Of course the other Sephiroth also have something to add to that, but I'll get to those later.

7-20-14 I've started working with Netzach. Today I encountered the Elohim, which showed up as multi-faceted mirrors which mediated spiritual forces. They explained how they acted as connections between specific types of spiritual forces and the magician. Also Eros pointed something out today in my meditations, specifically noting how I've certain places in my life, certain relationships where the movement is stopped or blocked by how I let those relationships effect. Something to meditate on further. I'm in Chicago right now and visited the Life Force Arts center, as well as the Occult Bookstore. I liked the energy of the Occult bookstore and look forward to coming back some time and presenting again.

7-21-14 Left Chicago today. It's been years since I was there and what struck me the most about the city is the manic, frenetic energy. It's a good place to visit, but I don't know if I could live around that many people all the time. Feeling the movement of the city, both in terms of traffic and people was interesting. It has its own rhythm, made up of all the people, the traffic, events and everything else. And I could see how a person could tap into the energy to fuel their workings, though I think it would be dangerous. You'd have to be careful with how you were connecting and what you were connecting with.

And we arrived in St. Louis. The shop Pathways is wonderful, one of the best stocked occult bookshops I've seen, with hard to find works. The community is friendly and welcoming. I also felt the spirit of the original proprietor connect with me and welcome me to the shop. The workshop I offered was well received and I could tell it helped people come to some good realizations for themselves. More than anything I want my workshops to provide that kind of experience to the people who take them.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Movement Month 20: Regret

5-26-14: As I navigate the Pluto cycle of my chart and the dark night of the soul it brings with it, I find that what matters most is how I approach the challenge I'm facing and that what movement teaches me isn't just how to move around a situation or through it, but how to move with it, and through that movement find resolution. This last weekend I made a mistake. I had the best of intentions, but how I approached the situation created some discomfort for other people. What it made me aware of is how I can sometimes get so fixated in what's in front of me that I lose the big picture perspective. I move with that realization and I make it part of the movement of my life so that I can learn from the mistake and apply it proactively to my life and interactions as well.

5-28-14 The latest Dresden Files book, Skin Game, just came out and I'm eagerly reading it now. It's one of my favorite fantasy series, in part because  love the whole occult detective angle the author explores. If I ever get back to writing fiction I'd want to write an occult detective series myself, though I don't know if I could do quite so good as Butcher does. I'm also reading a book on magic that I'm not sure I'll review. I find myself fundamentally disagreeing with pretty much everything the author shares and I feel that there's a lot of distorted information being shared. On the other hand I also consider that ultimately the person is sharing their perspective and I don't have to agree with it. It's just rare for me to disagree so much with what someone shares.

5-30-14 I finished the book I disagreed and decided not to read any of the other books by the author. I'm not going to name the person, but I definitely will not read any further as it would be a waste of my time. I think this is the first time I've come across material where its clear to me the material is distorted and that whatever the person is connected to is something I shouldn't have anything else to do with. I've read books by people I personally don't like and still found value in the books they wrote, but this is something else altogether. It's rare for me to feel this way about something I've encountered, but there it is.

5-31-14 Yesterday I had a fairly deep, intense meditation where I was present with the stress in my body and I saw that a lot of it was brought about by regret and I could feel those regrets pressing on my mind, creating tension, holding me back. I promised myself I wouldn't have regrets and yet I have them. It's hard to really sit with that and yet also liberating. I've decided that I need to focus more on my dissolving work and spend some time digging into those regrets. I don't expect it to be easy, but I think it will be rewarding once I've been able to let go of them.

6-1-14 In a conversation with Kat, we discussed my feelings of regret. I realize that what I regret is that 9 years ago I made a lot of decisions based on reaction and on someone else's schedule. I made those choices, so I'm responsible for them, but I regret I made them because I didn't honor myself at all in doing so. I made decisions that changed the direction of my life and I did it for the wrong reasons. That's no one else's fault or responsibility. It's my responsibility, but what I take from that is just how important it is to never let someone else's schedule dictate my choices and also how important it is to make decisions by design instead of reaction. I've made the majority of my decisions in this life by reaction. I know that by looking at the history of my life. I suspect most people live in the same way, but over the last few years I've learned to apply design awareness to my choices. I've started asking myself what really informs that decision. And so Id like to think that I'm learning how to make decisions from a place of awareness that examines the consequences of the decision and allows me to map out what I could or should do before I make that decision. As for the regret...I'm allowing myself to fully acknowledge it, be present with it and recognize it for what it is. I haven't done that before now...I don't think I was ready to. Now I am and that will help a lot as I meditate on it.

I took a trip down memory lane today reading old issues of Razor Smile and Konton Magazines. I remember writing articles for both magazines in the mid 2000's. It's sad to me that the magazines have been replaced for the most part by blogs. I like blogging, but writing for those magazines and getting the magazines in the mail was an experience. I feel some nostalgia for those times. It was a period of time where lots of people were writing and sharing ideas, then after 2006 it all feel to the wayside.

6-5-14 Today when I meditated on regret, I ended up meditating about my earliest romantic experiences with women. I allowed myself to feel the regret, but also really paid attention to it and realized that all of my regret is about the relationships in my life with women. I don't have regrets about anything else other then the ph.d program. Everything is around those relationships and so I just sat with that and meditated on it, recognizing underneath the regret were feelings of emptiness, of trying to get filled, of trying to be accepted, of looking for something in the wrong place. How much have I defined my life by my relationships? A lot. More than I'm comfortable with. So much of my sense of self has come from trying to connect with women in my life, in part I think, because of how I've tried to resolve in my mind and heart, my earliest experiences with my step mom. I feel that much of my focus on connecting with women has really been about trying to heal a wound no one else can heal, to find acceptance only I can.

6-7-14 I find it relevant that the yesallwomen conversation is occurring now as I do my work around regret. It helps me to situate that work within the cultural aspects of the movement, highlighting to me how much my own feelings are conditioned in part by how men have treated women. I know I've sometimes been guilty of behavior that's been disrespectful to women and reading the accounts in yesallwomen calls that into account and provides me a chance to recognize that behavior and put it into context with the regret work I've been doing. Today Kat and I discussed that work. She asked me if I felt regret about being with her or about the choices we've made as a couple in respect to our relationship. A reasonable question to ask. I told her I don't felt regret about being with her or our choices, but instead feel that what I'm working through with the regrets I'm working with is another layer of conditioning, reactions, and feelings about women in my life and my life choices that have lead to me live a reactive life, for the majority of my life. I don't want to live such a life, and yet I find the only way to change it necessarily involves working with those reactions and emotions I haven't fully acknowledged or accepted in myself.

6-10-14 I've been watching West Wing on Netflix. In one episode a character discusses his addiction issues. He acknowledges that although he hasn't had a drink or taken pills in 6 years, he's still an addict and admits he doesn't thinking of taking one drink, he thinks of taking ten drinks. It was an interesting statement about the nature of addiction and it made me think about how addiction takes away the enjoyment of something: the enjoyment of a drink, the enjoyment of sex, the enjoyment of anything else. Addiction is something else, trying to forget something, to fill something up, to numb the pain. It eats as you because no matter what you do, its temporary at best. And even if you do nothing, its still there. The only way you can deal with it is to do the work and face whatever it is you are using the addiction to mask.

6-15-14 In Born for Love the author discusses chameleons. Chameleons in this case refers to people who are trying to belong and as such change themselves to fit whoever they are around. When I read that, it reminded me a lot of myself. I've been a chameleon at times. Around the time I was reading that chapter, I was meditating on regret and I had a really deep, long meditation and in that meditation I was told, "Stop trying to be everything for everyone." Then I was shown a bunch of different moments in my life when I had tried to be what other people had wanted. From my step mom to my mom, to friendships and romantic relationships, I've always tried to fit myself into what the other person wanted, often making myself miserable as a result. I've learning, in my marriage with Kat, how not to do that so much, how to assert myself more, but I see how this ties into regret, specifically because in trying to fit myself into what I thought other people wanted, I gave away my sense of authenticity, my awareness of what I wanted, submerging it in the interests of trying to be something else.

6-16-14 In how The Mighty Fall, the author makes a point that I think is significant to dealing with regret. He notes we aren't imprisoned by our circumstances, or our setbacks, or our history, or our mistakes. Instead we are freed by our choices, and what brings us freedom is the ability to learn from our mistakes, to make a choice where we come back from our setbacks. Never give up on yourself, never give up on the ability to prevail, the belief in yourself, and never give up on your core values. I feel this is relevant to regret, because I think that regret can sabotage your belief in yourself. When I meditated today on regret, I felt that same place in body where the tension is, and I went deep once again and I dissolved some of it, coming away with a realization of how regret is still an attempt to fill something up. Reading what I did today helped me recognize the strength that my core values have brought me over the years, especially in how I have not given up on achieving what it is important to me. Whatever regrets have come up, I have not allowed them to drag me down.

6-19-14 I'm visiting the ocean right now. Seems appropriate to do so when doing dissolving work. Today's meditation continued focusing on regret. I feel that the area in my torso where the emotion of regret is found is becoming less tense as I do this work. It doesn't feel as blocked and I feel as well that I'm able to let go of what I've been holding onto for so long. It seems to me that part of dealing with regret boils down to taking responsibility for what you regret. And what I mean by that is that feeling regret doesn't necessarily involve taking responsibility. Taking responsibility means you acknowledge why you feel the regret and why you are letting it move you. In my case, regret has moved me a lot in life and I recognize that in a way I previously hadn't. This dissolving work is just the first step in my work with regret, the first step toward taking responsibility for it so it doesn't move my life in the way it has in the past.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Month 19: Ebb and Flow

4-24-14 I decided to pick up the biography on Steve Jobs at the library. I was there to meet a business connection (who no showed) and while I was waiting I started reading it. Initial thoughts on reading it: It's sad how many people have felt abandoned in life, yet in his case he clearly had adoptive parents who game him the world. Nonetheless I see certain patterns in the character of his personality that are similar to what I discovered in Born to Love. It's a fascinating read. I admit that I occasionally do get fascinated with a particular person and learn about that person...usually someone who's really intelligent, who's gone their own way, and who's had some struggles. Not all that different from my life and I like seeing what other people, in their respective circumstances, did to get wherever they are/were. Usually the lessons I've learned boil down to a combination of going their own way, persevering in believing in their vision of the world (as opposed to buying into someone's else vision), and not being afraid to admit mistakes or change course as needed. Good lessons to remind myself of.

4-26-14 The more I read the biography about Jobs, the more fascinating I find him to be. He was clearly a driven person, but also a bit of a tyrant. He had a vision for the world and he wouldn't let anyone stop him, but he didn't know how to work well with most people. That seems to be true for most of the innovators of the world. Reading the biography does make me reflect on some of my personality traits. I'm not easy to work with either. I can be temperamental and I have very particular ideas about what I want to do and how to do it. That said, I wouldn't change any of it. To do something different calls for a different person who is willing to push the limits for the sake of the vision s/he has. Settling for less lessens a person who knows there can be better than what's already out there.

4-29-14 I finished reading the biography of Steve Jobs today. A fascinating book about someone who changed this world. A bit of irony here: I have never used Apple computers or products. There was always something about them I didn't like and reading the biography allowed me to figure out that it's that the computers feel very controlled. Jobs was a control freak and it showed in the computers and other products he developed. I suppose the relevance of this book as it relates to my spiritual work is that it makes me appreciate two things: How a person can move the world around him/her with a particular understanding of his/her focus and calling. And also the importance of continually being aware of how the shadow aspects of yourself can show up, as well as what do about them.

5-2-14 It's a tough day today. I've made some choices and those choices have had effects I didn't expect. It's not the end of the world, but it changes you...when you see yourself in a different way because of the consequences of your choices. The way you think of yourself also changes. What you thought you were, you no longer are and what you've become isn't what you wanted to be. I've referred, a few times, to the fact this is the dark night of the soul cycle in my astrological chart and this definitely fits that experience. The shadow side of that Plutonic energy showing up and presenting itself as a specter that effects your life. Yet somehow I'll continue on, because this doesn't really change that much for me...it just makes it more apparent and life continues on. I'm still here...can still do what I want to do, and knowing that I'll allow myself to feel this moment and everything it brings up and then use it to fuel my fire and continue on my journey.

5-3-14 You either move forward when you deal with a crisis event or you give up. So I'm moving forward with an eye toward how to solve the problem I'm dealing with. I've done some research and the silver lining in all of this is that it provides me an opportunity to work on some experiments. An experiment works better based on need than on curiosity, though both are useful enough.

5-8-14 The last few days I've re-examined my schedule and changed it around to make sure I'm exercising and meditating each day. I meditate almost every day, but occasionally I let my business schedule get in the way. Exercise has been more sporadic the last few months and I'm not happy about that. So I looked at my schedule and what I realized is that I just need to go in to each week with the understanding that no matter how much I have to do, self-care has to come first. So if I don't get to everything I was hoping to do, it's more important I exercise and meditate. I'm going to hold myself to that, and have done so for the last few days, which has helped immensely.

5-10-14 As part of my work with movement, I've decided to change my daily work a bit. I'm focusing more on the Taoist breathing techniques, but also doing daily cord work and have just added some work with the Sacred Heart technique. Each of these different techniques incorporates movement to one degree or another, even it if it is just awareness of the rhythm of a type of movement...and yet each of them also leads into stillness, and the profound awareness of stillness that I find lies hidden within movement. As I do each exercise I'm mindful of the movement, but also the stillness at the heart of the movement, and how both feed into each other, creating this awareness of the universe if we are willing to just be aware.

5-11-14 So much of how I felt in my life has involved a feeling of profound emptiness, painful emptiness, which I have tried to fill up a variety of ways, none of which ever worked. Eventually I learned to sit with my emptiness, to be present with it, to accept it as a part of my life instead of treating it as an enemy. I came to recognize nothing could ever fill it up, no person, no deity or god, nothing...and that there was no need to fill it up...instead I could simply be with it and come to a place of peace with it by accepting it as a natural part of being me. It's a part of my journey in this life.

Mother's day today. Mother's day is mixed for me. I have a mixed relationship with my mom. I have no relationship with my ex-step-mom and no wish for one. My experiences with mothers has been less then ideal really. Actually that's true of my experience with my parents period. In some ways we have a good relationships, but sometimes what I remember is how neglected and unloved and unwanted and unaccepted I felt.

5-15-14 In one of the meditations I've been doing, I've been interacting with what might be considered my Angel or higher self. I always encounter this being in a library, around a book stand which contains the book of my life. This being is filling out details of that book. We've been discussing this life and the possible variations of it and something he said today struck me profoundly. "No matter what you change about this life, what variation of it you explore, there will always be some part of you that is unsatisfied because until you learn how to accept what you have, there will always be a sense that something is missing" I've encountered variations of this before, but I'm a slow learner sometimes and I know there is truth to this, just as I also know that so much of what I've struggled with in my life has really involved that sense of emptiness and thinking that something else could feel it up. It's taking me a while to realize a simple truth: There is no variation, no ideal version, no change that will be perfect. That no matter what life you live there will be struggles and challenges and something missing and the question is do you focus on what's missing or do you focus on what you have. Now it can be useful to focus on what's missing as it can drive you to do some great things, but it can also drive you to do terrible things. Focusing on what you have, learning to accept it and be at peace with yourself is a hard struggle at times. What I heard today is a simple truth but getting that simple truth has taken and is taking a lot of work on my part.

5-16-14 Earlier this week Kat and I caught a cat that had come wandering around. It was surprisingly friendly and we planned on getting it fixed, until a friend pointed out it was pregnant. Then we started looking into no kill shelters, but it felt like a time bomb on our hands because it was pretty clear that the Cat was close to birthing. Today I finally found one and I took the cat in...While I was driving the cat started giving birth. Quite an experience and fortunately the shelter was still willing to take the cat and kittens in, but what a day. And while its seemingly not relevant to my magical journey, I found it awe inspiring to take part in this journey of life that as occurring.

5-20-14 A lot of the magical work I'm doing lately is transitional work from movement to stillness. Although it's only May and I won't switch until October, I'm nonetheless finding this theme of transition in play, which I think actually makes sense. It's really an exploration of the relationship movement and stillness have with each other. what's intriguing is how stillness generates movement, for I find when I do stillness work that it nonetheless creates movement and following that movement may not be very stilling, but it does lead to some interesting discoveries. And with movement itself, I'm also recognizing how it comes to an end at some time and then you transition to something else. Part of this work has been around the lunar and sublunar realm as well and coming to understand how the movement of life into death into life.

Something else I've been thinking about is the worst decision I've made in my life. Why have I been thinking about it? Because I recognize how much that decision changed me life, in ways I couldn't even begin to know until after it was made and how even though its been some time since I made that decision it's a decision that played a role in other decisions I made since. It makes me glad I'm less impulsive now, more focused on making decisions by design than out of reaction. It also makes me realize how careful I need to be when I make big decisions in my life, because of how things can play out. I know my life would be very different if I'd made a different decision 9 years ago. And you might wonder why I'm thinking about that decision? The truth is that I'm thinking about it so much because I'm finally processing it and the effect its had on me. It's taken me a long time, in part because so much has happened and because I'd been doing a lot of other internal work, but at some point you catch up and start to see things closer to where you are now. I look at that decision and I see how it's played a role in other decisions I've made in the last nine years and its kind of staggering. I don't want to dwell on this decision forever, but I need to make peace with the fact that I made it and also make peace with the consequences of it. And with all that said I need to learn from it, which I've done in some ways and in other ways I'm still learning.

5-21-14 Ebb and flow is the rhythm of movement. When you recognize ebb and flow in your life, in your business, etc., you learn not to take it so personally or worry about it. You become self-assured because you recognize it for what it is. You look at what you need to change, what actions to take, but you don't freak about it either because you know that the ebb and flow you're dealing with is something you can handle. You've handled it all your life. I'm recognizing the ebb and flow in my life, in the rhythms of movement, events, activities, and everything else along those lines and this makes it easier to plan for and to work with. I recognize my ebb and flow and accept it as part of the nature of my life, and as a result I'm working what I've got at any given time and making it matter where it counts most.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Movement Month 18: Design

3-22-14 I found a segment of Psychic TV the Black album on youtube. It's been way too long since I watched the video so it was a nice surprise to even see part of it. I used to have it on tape and then it got lost. Watching it always puts me into a creative flow mindset and that's what it got me into tonight. What as really interesting however was having several dialogues with people about concepts related to experimental magic and seeing those people embrace it, really embrace and accept the value of going outside of convention. I feel like with pop culture magic especially, but also space/time magic, these currents are coming more into their own as more people recognize the validity of them and want to apply them to their lives in meaningful ways. To see that happening, especially when it seemed like I was a lone voice for a long time is really gratifying. I'm not alone anymore. There are other people out there actively working with and interested in the same concepts and practices. 3-23-14 Something I've been doing with movement is calculating movement, or if you will planning it be design. I look at a possible movement I want to do and I explore the timeline of that movement, calculating what could happen, where the movement could go, and what factors would need to change. This has helped me recognize whether or not a given movement is wise or if I should let it go. It's also helped me understand whether a desired result is really worth the effort involved in moving toward it. I've been an impulsive person and still can be on occasion, but I'm learning to step back and consider the path before I actually set foot on it.

3-26-14 I've continued reading Born for Love. In the latest chapter I read the topic was on lies and consequences, which ultimately became a discussion about altruism in society. What it brought up for me was my own experiences as a child. I learned early on how to lie and how to lie in such a way that it would be very hard to tell if I was lying. I had to learn this skill early on because I found that when I told the truth I was punished. There was no motivation to be honest when no matter what I did I would be punished and penalized. Lying, on the other hand, at least delayed the consequences. It took a long time to undo this particular behavior and change it. And even now I find that it can be hard tell the truth, because there is always a feeling of fear, especially if I perceive someone as an authority in my life. Authority has always been the enemy, because authority has always been more interested in crushing me than actually helping me.

The key, as an adult, has been to realize I am the ultimate authority of my life and anyone else in my life may have a lace of importance, but I determine that importance. It's helped me work through the fear and become more honest as a result. On the other hand, learning those skills and surviving as I did in my early years taught me a shades of gray approach to life that I still draw on. I don't feel its bad to have that mentality and it has certainly helped me significantly, but with the people closest to me I want to continue to work toward being able to feel safe enough to be fully present with them. Another interesting point: "Altruism can survive in a population only if those who don't do their part aren't able to get away with it for long." So true. In networking, altruism works if everyone looks out for each other and actively works to help other people. The question I start with everyday is "Who can I help today?" That question defines my existence, defines my life and keeps me focused on helping other people. I know altruism has more benefits than a more selfish perspective does.

3-30-14 A lot has happened over the last few days and I'm only writing it here. Kenny Klein, a Pagan author and musician, was arrested and charged with 25 counts of Child Pornography on his computer, which he confessed was his. He also confessed that he had downloaded and shared the pornography. I didn't find out about this until someone asked me what Immanion Press's position on the matter was. I responded and later that day Storm and I decided to pull the one book he'd published with us from the line-up. We didn't feel we could continue to support someone who'd admitted guilt to such things. Some people have supported our decision while others have told us we're irresponsible or claimed we're doing it for PC reasons. It doesn't matter though. I know why I wanted the book pulled. Because it doesn't reflect the values of Immanion Press to support the work of an author who has done such deeds, but also because on a personal front, I know what it's like to be a victim of sexual abuse and I don't want to support someone who has caused harm to other people and contributes to causing additional harm to people. this whole incident has stirred some feelings up, but for the most part of I've focused on the community and the need all of us have to make sense of this and make meaningful change moving forward.

On a somewhat related front, I recently finished reading a chapter in Born to Love about sociopaths. What I found interesting was how the early years of life can contribute to sociopathic tendencies. In other words if you don't get the requisite love and attention you need you can end up with such tendencies. A sociopath treats other people like objects and can have addictive behavior to experiences that make them feel something. I don't feel that I'm a sociopath, but I could see how the neglect I experienced in my early childhood lead to me being distant with other people. Through the internal work I did and work I've done with Kat, I've become much closer to the people in my life, learning how to let them in and learning how to connect with them emotionally in ways I couldn't do before. It's taken a lot of work, but as I continue to undo the learned behaviors from my past and become closer I find myself forming more meaningful relationships with people as a result. The Klein situation does get me to think some of my past interactions at conventions and festivals. When I was in my 20's I didn't respect people's boundaries as well as I should have. Eventually it was pointed out to me, and I did a lot of work on my awareness of other peoples' boundaries, and on my own behavior and boundaries. I've really had to face myself and it hasn't always been easy, but I'm glad I have because I want to be a person who is good for myself and the people in my life.

4-3-14 It's interesting to observe how people respond to being challenged, myself included. I had a recent interaction with an another occult author on this blog and while it ended well, the initial response was heated. I resolved to be professional and I think I handled it well. I'm not invested in being right and I know I can learn and I'm willing, indeed driven, to learn. What drives me is curiosity. I want to learn and so I don't care if someone makes a point that involves me revising a position I've taken. If I'm so invested in that position that I'm not open to learning then I'm doing myself a disservice as a magician and spiritual seeker. Whereas if I'm open to learning what I can discover will surely help me improve myself as a person and improve what I love to do.

4-6-14 I think of movement in relationship to design as purposeful movement that is done to achieve specific results. This month has shown me that in a number of ways I hadn't expected, such as with the publishing work, but also with a lot of the activity I'm doing right now to set up events and classes for the summer and fall. A lot of movement is happening and a lot is happening in the background to make that movement possible. It's not spontaneous in the way some movement is, but rather is directed and focused movement that requires that everything is set up just so in order to effectively each the design. 4-8-14 I just finished watching the movie Jobs, while working on layout. I always find biographical films interesting, especially when its about someone who has a vision for changing the world and forces that vision through regardless of what other people try to do. Such people are different because they look at the world differently and see something that can be changed in a fundamental way. When I look at my own work, both the writing and the publishing of other peoples' writing, I can tell you that my motivation is to change the world, to change the communities I am a part of, to challenge the status quo. I think you have to have that motivation if you really want to bring change to a discipline you are involved in. You have to be willing to take a risk and do something differently because the potential result makes the change worth it. 4-10-14 Last night I attended a talk at ODN on leadership and how your leadership style is reflected by the people around you. It was an interesting that got me to thinking about how the conflicts I have with a person are reflective of the values each of us holds and how those values conflict with each other. It gives me some thought on how I can assess my interactions with people, in respect to values.

4-14-14 Back from an intense weekend workshop I did with R. J. Stewart about William Gray and Ronald Heaver. There's so much to say, but I'll start simple. An internal issue that came up as a result of the work was a recognition of how the need for approval has seeded itself in my life. I've addressed that issue on certain fronts, but spiritually, I haven't. It came up for me when I realized that William Gray the person probably wouldn't really approve of how I practice magic. Seems silly to worry about what a dead person would think of how I practice magic, but I'd built up this image of him in my head, and this weekend that got stripped away (which was good) and forced me to face this issue of approval.

Today, I meditated on the issue of approval and what I came away with is that it stems back to childhood, to wanting approval from my family and later on wanting approval from people I learned magic from. I even see this desire for approval coming out in some of my current interactions. So what does this tell me? That I need to work on that need and addressing it. Realistically I don't need approval from anyone, but I recognize this emotional need for what it is and how it shows up in my life. As for the weekend itself...I did experience a mini crisis of faith based off the perspective I had about Gray, but I came through it more connected to the spiritual lineages that my magical practice is part of. Kat helped me work through some of what I was feeling, but what helped the most was several encounters with Gray while doing the magical work this weekend. The first time, he just said, "Ok so now you know what a bastard I was. Are you really going to let that stop you? Get over it and decide: Do you want continue working with what I have to offer and deepen that work or do you want to go on you way?" Straight and to the point. I chose to go deeper, getting over what I felt about the person and focusing on the spiritual connection I know is there and choosing to deepen it.

When I told R. J. this, he told me that I should contact Jacobus Swart, who I am acquainted with, so I'll be doing that soon. Saturday night I did dream work and in that dream work I encountered William Gray again and we talked further about magic, the importance of internal work and why it needs to continue being integrated in magical practice, the importance of experimentation in magic and also about my calling in this world as it relates to magical work. He told me to get in touch with Jacobus and also urged me to continue working with R. J., while also continuing to develop my own practices. Afterwards I encountered a short, darkhaired woman, with a martial nature who talked with me about magical partnership and how each partner grounds the other and provides the basis for going into deeper magical work through consistent practice together (I suspect she was Bill's partner Roberta). Then on a field of Green, I encountered Ronald Heaver who briefly discussed stillness as a form of magical practice and told me to re-read the book about him when I switched over to stillness and call on him as an inner contact for that work. I felt that the connections with all three changed some internal magical structures for me.

There was a lot more that happened this weekend, but I'd say of what happened, that each practice served to deepen the connection to the respective lineages that William Gray and Ronald Heaver are part of and allowed me to integrate those lineages into my continued work.

4-15-14 Further meditation on approval today was quite instructive in allowing me to release the need for approval. As I dissolved the blockage around approval, I felt myself come to a place where I met with a younger version of myself and helped that younger version understand that he didn't need anyone's approval to do anything or to be praised for what he's done. The magical work we do is what matters...the fulfillment of my calling and purpose is what drives me. Everything else is temporary.

4-16-14 In my dream work and later meditation I was visited by Bill Gray and Bobbi his wife. They both spoke at some length on magical partnership and how important it is to have a firm foundation with your partner in order to effectively develop magical systems and/or traditions. I also felt a continued energetic exchange and a continued push toward some of the work I'm now looking at. It's interesting to me, that I'd decided to re-read The Ladder of Lights right before the workshop and now it seems more appropriate than ever to pick it up and work with it.

I'm also reading The Old Sod, which is a biography about Bill Gray. In reading about his early life, I see a lot of parallels with mine. Like me he grew with an interest in magic, pretty much from the get go and like me he grew up in an environment where he was mostly neglected. Seeing such parallels in his life doesn't surprise me...I think you can unfortunately find such parallels in the lives of many people. But what it does make me feel some sense of sadness and recognition that for so many people there really is no such thing as a family automatically. We find our own way and if we are lucky we find our way to people who become chosen family.

4-17-14 When I first got into occultism I had this naive idea that people in the magical community would somehow be more enlightened, open minded, and open to learning than other people. I eventually learned that occultists and pagans were like everybody else. Some people are open minded, some people are close minded, etc.. What really matters is that you find the people that are right for your life...It's something I've recognized about the company I keep now. The more internal work I do, the more I pay attention to my calling, the more I align myself with people who hold similar values. Ironically, I suppose, this serves to filter certain perspectives out, but then I figure that if I really want to seek those perspectives out I can do so without necessarily inviting people in, by finding the right cultural artifacts that represent those perspectives.

4-21-14 Last night I had a dream where I was given all these gifts, but I couldn't handle all of them, so most of them were taken back and I was told you are only given what you can handle. My meditations have also run around a similar theme of recognizing what  have and working with it. I don't think there's any particular reason for this message other than to recognize what I've got and to know that I can handle what I have in my life right now...which is actually a good message to receive. As I've thought about this month and the theme of design, I've thought about how the experiences I've had this month, in one form or another, have all shown how design manifests...it's not always my design, but there is a design in place and the movement that occurs runs in that design. I can work with that...I am working with that and it is something which makes me appreciative of movement and the context movement happens in.

4-22-14 Another dream last night, where I was directed to read The Sacred Cross by Anastacia Nutt and integrate it into my spiritual practice. When I was at the workshop a week and a half ago I felt very drawn to this book, so I picked it up. I usually don't feel so drawn to a book, but this one called to me...and unusually I'm reading it sooner than later, as most books I get go to the bottom of my to read pile. Kat told me that the day she met, she actually took the class on this material from Anastacia. We both found that to be an interesting synchronicity. I suppose it's just another layer of the design of movement showing up in my life.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Month 17: Presence

2-20-14 I flew out today to Convocation. Last night and this morning I was a bit emotional. I miss Kat. I've gotten used to having her with me at events like this and this is one of those rare times where that's not the case. I'll see her in a few days, but it does make me appreciate just how much she has come to mean to me. As for Convocation...I flew in and discovered that the hotel didn't have shuttle service, so I needed to get a cab, so I wasn't thrilled with that. However I was able to get here just in time for my workshop on Space/Time Magic and I did a decent presentation of it. I feel it could've been better, but I also had just gotten in, was hungry, and I made it work despite all that. The convention itself is low key. The people are friendly, and it's not nearly as overwhelming as Pantheacon can be. And Glasolya-Labolas is looking out for me, which I really appreciate. It's good to have a spirit ally to back you up.

2-22-14 Convocation has been a fun experience. I definitely plan to come back next year and present again. I've had lovely conversations with Shauna Aura Knight about Pagan Leadership and Ritual Sonics. It's always nice to find people you can geek out with about topics of mutual interest. And speaking of that I've also had the pleasure of meeting Corvus Nocturem and discussing publishing with him. He owns a small press as well and we both found a lot to talk about and may even team up to do so presentations on publishing together. I've felt Glasolya-Labolas's presence throughout this convention, and at different times have gotten intuitions to go somewhere or talk with someone. Each time it's proven helpful and I've felt that I'm coming away from this convention with some new friends and allies. There is movement here and I'm excited to be part of it. At the same time I miss Kat. I look forward to seeing her when I fly home and catch up in person. While I appreciate her in general, being away from her has helped me appreciate her more.

2-23-14 I'm getting ready to leave convocation. This convention has themes based around the tarot. The one for this year was Judgement, and it seemed really apt to me because of the fact that I'd be running into several people here where things went South with those people. Nothing happened here...we ignored each other than having brief exchanges, but I also felt that this convention helped me face myself as well. I participated in a ritual that Shauna put together. I actually ended up invoking the Earth element and being one of the people holding a mirror and telling people to go deep and face their shadows. And I faced some of mine as well. I've always been my harshest critic, but something I've learned over the years is how to stop judging myself and how to start working with myself and at this convention I felt that come into play, both in my interactions with other people and my interactions with myself. I want to make good choices in my life and part of doing that is choosing not to judge myself, but instead work with what's at hand and make a choice based off that in a way that doesn't judge me, but instead validates me and the life I choose to live. More of a proactive approach really, instead of reacting, which I think is really what judgement is about.

2-26-14 The choice not to move, not to take action, can be just as potent a form of movement as anything itself. I also feel it can be a declaration of choosing to be present with yourself. It's something I've been contemplating since I've gotten back from Convocation. I've also been thinking about the concept of the meta-processor, someone who processes multiple streams of information simultaneously. I'm a meta-processor, which is usually good, but I do feel a bit overwhelmed of late because my life is a bit too busy for my liking. It'll be slowing down soon, and this makes me appreciate that the speed of movement is not in and of itself always a good thing.

3-3-14 This last weekend I attended the Spirit Cord workshop. I shared most of my experiences in this post, but some of I decided to post here because of its relevance to my work. I feel that the cord work is very relevant to my current work with my very young self as a baby and pre-baby. I'm doing some intense internal work around those early memories and also I feel going through a cycle that prepares me for my 38th birthday when I move into Stillness and into the exact natal position my astrological chart was in when I was born. In the workshop R. J. mentioned that the cord goes through the center of the spindle of a person's natal chart. He also mentioned that the cord has correlations to the umbilical cord, which makes sense given the life and death aspects of the spirit cord. This is something I hope to explore in more depth down the line, as I work with my spirit cord further.

3-8-14 I've fallen off the wagon with exercise. I haven't been consistent about it at all. I know I need to do something about it, but I think I've been feeling so overwhelmed by all the various projects on my plate, I've just put it off. That's not good for me to do because it's taking an essential part of my life and putting on the shelf. So I acknowledge this and I know I need to get back on the wagon regardless of how much else I need to do.

3-12-14 In the last few days I've gotten back on the wagon and found to my pleasant surprise that my body has still stayed in the shape it was in overall despite some infrequent exercising. However, choosing to exercise regularly already makes me feel better. It's amazing how even getting back into a routine can make a difference about how you feel about yourself. It highlights to me just how important this activity is to my overall well being. No matter how busy I get I need to make sure I stay present with myself and with the movement that is best for me.

3-13-14 I'm heading off to Paganicon tomorrow. I'll be working with Glasolya-Labolas again and Kat will be with me, which I'm happy about. I feel like this month is passing in a blur of movement, as if everything is speeding up. I'm not sure if it's because of how much traveling I'm doing, or if it's just because of the work I'm doing with the element of movement. Either way movement is happening, in so many positive, wonderful ways.

3-17-14 I'm back from Paganicon. This entire month feels like its just flown by in a blur. It make me wonder if I've really been as present with it as I hoped. I did work with Glasolya-Labolas again and at this event I unexpectedly found a bunch of familiar faces, as well as the right encounters that needed to happen. Glasolya-Labolas is quite the diplomat and quite the coordinator of schedules. I look forward to working with him further and am quite impressed with his skills.

I feel like my understanding of movement is changing even further. There is always a rhythm to movement even if we don't always perceive it. I feel that rhythm at work and it shows up in both obvious and subtle ways. The obvious ways is all the traveling and the fact that both businesses seem to be taking off, but the less obvious ways show up in my interactions with specific people or how I experience a given day. Everything is moving and I am part of that movement, moved even as I move it.

3-18-14 Donald Michael Kraig is dead. I only met him a couple times and we never exchanged more than a hello. I read both of his books and found them to be helpful in my own practice. A lot of people were clearly touched by his death and made a response to it on their Facebook pages. Seeing that made me think that at some point all of us die. I know I will die some day. Hopefully it'll be a long time from now, but regardless of when it happens, I'll die and most people won't care, a few people may be happy at my demise, and some will feel sad and acknowledge that I had some type of effect on their life. I'll move from this life onto another life or the void, or whatever and life will go on without me.  Nothing is forever, but everything continues on. I hope Donald Michael Kraig is resting in peace and moving on to whatever next adventure finds it way to his path.

3-20-14 I dislike passive aggressiveness in people, myself included. I know I'm guilty of it on occasion, and I think most, if not all, people are. It's a way to mask how you feel about someone, to smile, but if you look closely at that smile, it's really a snarl. It's a way to pretend friendliness when what you really want to do is stab a knife in the person's back. However in the last few years, I've worked hard to get passive aggressive people out of my life and to make sure I'm not being that way, because why would I really want someone close to my life who pretends friendliness but wants to hurt me? I realize that doing this also extends to online mediums such as Facebook. I don't need people trying to impede my movement in life. I figure I do that enough for myself on occasion, so I'm really being present and asking myself why I'd really want to be connected with people I know wish me harm, no matter how much they act otherwise. Connection of any form lets such people in and says I condone your hostility toward me. Obviously I can't assume that I know the intentions of every person that comes into my life or makes a friend request on an online medium, but when I do know someone who has a history of being hostile toward me I also should know better then to allow that person any connection with me, because as soon as that person sees an opportunity, out comes the knife. I consider the lesson learned today, when it comes to online mediums. I need to honor my choice not to put up with behavior from people that I know is counter productive for me. I want the right connections, right people in my life and I won't find that with someone who wants to tear me down because of their own insecurities and issues.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Movement Month 16: Momentum

1-21-14 Last night Kat and I meditated and in my meditation I was asked: "How can you be present with another person, when you don't know how to be present with yourself?" Good question and as I meditated on it, I realize how much just being with myself can be a painful experience. This morning's meditation just seemed to confirm that there is this core part of me that feels such pain and hurt, and emptiness and longing and that just sitting with it, really being present with it is something I've spent my entire life avoiding. I think I can point to any number of whys, which is useful for resolution purposes, but even more than that just sitting with myself, really sitting with myself is something and being present is something I need to learn. I told Kat how I realized that for me, my life has always been about then ext person, project etc., and how that focus has always provided me a way to avoid just being present with myself, just feeling whatever it is I'm feeling.

In a related note, Erik, my astrologer had told me that my birthday, this year, would occur in the exact space that happened when I was initially born. I find this interesting and relevant, even to the work I'm doing now, because I feel that in exploring my earliest experiences in this life I'm actually allowing myself to figuratively explore the beginnings of this life and the experiences I've had. It was around this time of year that I was conceived and so I find it helpful to be exploring these issues now even as this year eventually comes to my birth date and allows me perhaps to experience a re-birth in the same space as will have occurred 38 years ago. I'm going to doing something special this year for that particular birthday, but I will just allow that to come to me as the time continues. For now I just need to focus on this work.

I'm continuing to read Born for Love and they talk quite a bit about the neurochemistry of bonding. I'm familiar with the neurochemistry, but as I read it, I consider my relationship with the particular neurotransmitters and map that relationship to my behaviors and I see patterns in ways I hadn't, which confirms the realizations I'm having right now about the drive and motivation behind many of my choices.

1-26-14 I've always been tightly wound as a person, in some ways. Kat observed that I don't do spontaneity so much as I do scheduled spontaneity and I think that's accurate. I can be spontaneous, but it's all scheduled in my mind. I've always been a person who lives in my head, and allowing myself to really feel, to really be present with what I'm feeling is something that still comes hard to me because of how wound tight I've been. I told Kat that for me being wound tight is a control mechanism, both in terms of not letting people in (or only letting them in so far) but also not letting me out. The problem with this control mechanism is that if you hit it in the right place it comes unwound pretty quick. So allowing myself to feel, to let go of control and be present is really good for me, and I did that today with Kat in a manner that did bring up an awareness of blockages in myself and allowed me to feel them. I still feel uncomfortable with them, but I'm not thinking about them...I'm actually feeling them.

1-28-14 I'm feeling pretty accomplished today. My latest book Manifesting Wealth is now available for sale and as always when I get a book published it feels really good to have it done and know its something else I can take off my project list. I'm looking forward to doing book release parties, something I haven't done in the past, but I'm open to trying. In other news one of my uncles may be dying. Not sure how I feel about it, mainly because I really don't know him. I don't have much contact with the majority of my family. I've always been considered an odd person and a black sheep, so I feel a it weird about it, but more from a sense of obligation than genuine feeling.

1-31-14 As I continue working with movement, what strikes me is how even little movements build momentum. The discrete actions, the choices you make all build momentum toward the movement you are enacting. You live with that movement, become it because of the choices you make and all of it builds up and flows to the outcome that's manifested as a result of building that momentum.

2-1-12 I'm continuing to read Born for Love. They talk about how the first year of a baby's life is the year where the baby is the most impressionable, and also just how selective the baby is about who takes care of it. The baby knows who the mom or dad is, but not really anyone else and isn't necessarily receptive to anyone else. Babies focus on what's familiar and safe and use that to gradually explore the world around them. Now I think about that in relationship to what I know about the first year of my life. I lived with my mom for most of it, but there was a fair amount of moving involved and a lot of stress in the environment. And toward the end of that year, I ended up with my dad and with whoever he was with at the time. There wasn't much in the way of familiarity in those environments and recognizing that and seeing how much that's hardwired into a baby really makes an impression on me about that stage in my life and its effect on my own behavior, my needs and wants. It's amazing to think that a year that you probably don't remember much of has such an effect on your life in a way that moves throughout the rest of your life, but clearly it does.

2-4-14 Further reading of Born to Love has proven quite insightful to understanding some of the neurochemical aspects of love and bonding, as well as what happens when a kid doesn't have those initial bonding experiences. What's really fascinating is that a lot of behaviors even as an adult can be linked back to this early period of your life.

2-5-14 In Born for Love, they describe a person who was raised in an orphanage, who didn't get a lot attention or bonding in her early years. What they describe sounds a lot like me: Physical contact can be anxiety provoking, needs to sleep in absolute darkness, doesn't like bright lights, prefers wearing clothes with soft fabrics, doesn't like to be touched and has had to devise cognitive and intellectual behavior strategies to figure out how to behave in different social situations. Everything described here fits me to a T. Up until relatively recently, I didn't like to cuddle or be held because I found it uncomfortable and felt like the other person was trying to smother me with touch. Even now I find it uncomfortable, but less so, to the point that I can cuddle for a while before I start to get uncomfortable. When I sleep at night I can't touch Kat at all if I want to sleep, though in this last year I've gotten to a point where I can lightly snooze in her arms. And even though I do hug people, it's a learned behavior, like so many of my other behaviors. I find social situations awkward and I've had to really study them to understand how and why to interact a certain way. In reading this book and realizing how much my very early years effected me, it really makes me understand a lot of my choices and interactions with people in a different light. I see how that early period of time, which was so unstable, created an unstable foundation for my life.

2-13-14 I attended a talk last night at one of my networking groups. The presenter discussed problem solving vs solution finding and made a point that what we focus is on is what we create. I've heard it before, but sometimes you need to hear messages like that again and it struck me deeply when I heard it. I asked myself if I was focusing on my problems or my strengths, focusing on fixing something or focusing on discovering possibilities and my answer is that I do a fair amount of both but also that it can get very easy to fixate on what isn't working in your life because the tendency people have is to focus on the problems...what isn't working as opposed to what is working. What isn't working shapes the narrative of our movement because we know what is wrong...but do we know what is right? Do we celebrate our strengths and let those create momentum for us? That's something I've been learning to do more and I see its effect in my business. I feel more confident and sure of myself this year than I ever have because I feel I know my strengths, know what I am capable of and how I can stretch myself further. And you know I realize that exercising has played a role in that discovery of my strengths, because as I become more physically fit and strong, I feel more confident about what I can do in general. Play to your strengths and let them move you.

2-18-14 I've just gotten back from Pantheacon and a lot has happened since I last updated this post. On the drive down, I got into an interesting conversation with Kat, where I told her that I realized I was comfortable and content with her. I don't think I've ever felt content or comfortable with other people before. As we talked, I explained that I realized that my understanding of what love is seems to be maturing. My relationship with her has been the longest stable relationship I've had. While we've had our occasional issues, overall we get along really well. Being in such a relationship is a bit strange for me. I have to admit I feel a bit scared because I'm in uncharted waters in this matter. Everything I've known has been volatile with ups and downs, with the initial chemistry of NRE and then that chemistry fading and not necessarily being replaced with anything. With Kat, it is being replaced with something steadier and more grounded. I like it, but I'm not used to it. There's a steady movement to this relationship, a momentum which grounds me even as it carries me forward. Later we also discussed spontaneity and affection and I explained that for me so much has been planned in my life because of trying to understand people. With her, I can give more of myself than I've ever given anyone else...I can relax and be at peace.

At the convention, I presented two workshops plus the publishing panel. All of them were well attended and people seemed to get a lot from the workshops. I think I would only change the titles of the workshops. What stood out to me about the workshops is how movement manifested during them. Before each workshop began I could feel nervous tension in myself. I'd move around a lot, make occasional funny comments and basically put myself into the space of becoming the presenter. Then I did the stillness chant and everyone joined in and it grounded me and set up the sacred space. Everyone got into it. Everyone felt it. And the workshops then were paced really well. I didn't get scattered (outlines helped) and I kept the workshop moving in the direction I wanted. On the drive home Kat told me that she felt I was really building momentum for myself and Immanion Press. I agree with her. I feel that the momentum is building up and it's something I've not really done in the past. But now that I'm approaching my writing and presenting in terms of building a brand identity I like what I'm seeing. There is movement and direction and I can work with that.

Elemental Balancing Ritual Movement Month 15: Drive

12-26-13: I'm reading Magician's End by Raymond Feist. He's one of my favorite fantasy authors, in part because he manages to offer some intriguing metaphysical considerations. Any case, in this book, at one point one of the characters encounters a lover who is long dead, which stirs up emotions for him and he remembers something said to him: "Feelings don't make sense, but they can drive us, and that's what you have to understand most of all. People will often do imponderable things because of how they feel, not because of what they think." I read that and I agree. People do what they do moreso because of the feelings that drive them than what they think. We can fool ourselves into believing we make choices for purely rational reasons, but the truth is we really don't. We make choices driven by our emotions and then rationalize those choices afterwards. I've always been a person driven by my emotions and I recognize that and accept it as part of being human. The choices I make are always informed by emotions and I know that consciously recognizing those emotions is important for really being in touch with movement, but also being in touch with what informs the motives for making a given choice.

12-29-13: As I've been meditating further on drive, I've been considering how different emotions drive people. Fear, hatred, love, happiness...all of these emotions drive people and others as well. There's no one emotion that drives everyone, and if anything I think it's usually a mixture of emotions and they change due to various situations. It makes me appreciate how important it is to be aware of your emotions, aware of what drives you and why it drives you. There's no right or wrong answer, but knowing what emotions are driving you can do a lot to help you move consciously instead of unconsciously.

1-1-2014: New Years is always a funny time for me. It feels liminal and yet it doesn't. For me the year starts and ends on my birthday. So it's a new year...and whatever that means. There's a sense of renewal and new movement, but its illusory. One month, one day, could be as good as any other to mark the change of a year. That said January 1st does mark the anniversary of Kat and I's marriage and we are married 3 years now. In February it'll be 4 years since we met.

1-6-14: The last couple of days have been heavy. Kat helped me with something that no one else has ever been able to help me with, that no one else has ever really been able to handle. She helped me with my emptiness. Deep down, when you really get into the deepest movement, the underlying motive for everything I do, it's all about the emptiness, all about that feeling at the center of my being, that gnawing, gaping emptiness, that cutting edge of zero bleeding me out. And while, in the last few years, I've come to a better place with it than I had before, it's still something that I live with. The other night Kat brought up a tough subject for both of us and as we discussed it at length, I ultimately pointed her to that feeling of emptiness and how much it drives me, how much tension there is in dealing with it, how much it hurts to feel it everyday. Later on we did a meditation around it and she helped me realize the origin of it.

Before I was even born, but when my mom was pregnant, she was going through a very hard period of life. She was depressed, and she had a virus, which actually ended up partially blinding her in one of her eyes. She was also dealing with my dad's philandering. Kat mentioned to me that an unborn fetus ends up soaking up a lot more than just the food the mom provides, but also the emotions, energy etc. I'm going to actually look up some of that information, because I think it could explain a lot about that feeling of emptiness. We also discussed my first memory, which is a memory where my mom gave me to my dad in an airport. I was about one and they were both angry at each other and I was crying a lot. I actually have a dream of that event where I vividly remember it. Kat thinks that also contributed to my feeling of emptiness and me trying to find ways to fill it up via love.

It's a lot to process, and yet I feel that what she pointed out makes a lot of sense. I have felt this sense of emptiness for as long as I can recall. I want to do some research on this, and I'll undoubtedly share what I discover, but Kat said something else I've taken to heart, which is that I can take this feeling of emptiness and make it into an ally that helps me connect with other people. She described some of her own work around that and I've seen it first hand. I know I can do this and I feel it is an integral part of my work with movement.

1-10-14 The other day, my friend Erik pointed something out to me that made sense when I heard it, but hearing it made me recognize it consciously. He said that I'm the type of person who has to agree to the boundaries that I have in my life. That if I don't have that agreement then I resist those boundaries. And he's right. I've never been one to accept other peoples' boundaries lightly. When I was a child and was told what I couldn't do, I went and did it. One of the reasons I'm self-employed is because I like to work on my own terms. I've always been driven by a need to establish my own boundaries and rules. And yet, in thinking about what Erik has said, I also realize that sometimes I have agreed to boundaries presented to me by other people. What's gotten that agreement to occur has really been more of a consensual agreement than anything else. We came to the agreement together. If we didn't come to the agreement together, then it was a boundary imposed on me and that's what I take issue with. I want to be brought in on any boundary I'm going to live with. This realization helps me recognize that drive for freedom and for consensual agreement as something essential to who I am and to my sense of happiness.

I told Kat today that I was ready to let her love me. That probably seems odd, but in some ways I've always kept a part of myself locked away from anyone, and not allowed that part to be open to being loved. That part is the emptiness and as such its not really a surprise that I've had such an antagonistic relationship with it. I'm not sure how to love or accept it, and I say that even after having worked with it extensively. I don't expect that Kat loving that part is the solution, but I feel it's part of the solution to making peace with that part of myself.

1-11-14 One of the things I've realized recently is how much a person's wounds can end up wounding someone else. You are wounded and you are living your life trying to work that wound out or acting it, and other people around you get wounded because of it. I know I have wounded people in my life with my wounds and I also know they have wounded me with their wounds. I suppose its just part of living life, but when you own your wounds and actively work on healing them and coming to some peace and resolution its good to let other people help you with it. You don't have to be alone with your wound or try to heal it on your own. For so long I've felt alone, but I realize that much of that loneliness has been self-imposed by myself. At the same time part of owning your wound is recognizing how you've wounded other people with it. I feel like I've recognized it multiple times, in all honesty, but that each time I've recognized it, I've developed a deeper understanding of the wound that I lacked before.

1-15-14 I've been doing some thinking about the neurotransmitters and hormones behind that feeling of emptiness I experience. I've been meaning to get back to that work for sometime, but this provides further motivation, because when I feel empty, I know what it feels like on a physiological level as well as an energetic level. And if I pay attention that feeling, then I can take appropriate actions, such as exercising, which does a lot to change the physiological experience in my body each time I exercise.

1-17-14 I've recently started doing a more intensive version of Tae Bo. I've alternated between the original Tae Bo exercise and the new one, but I'm noticing that the original exercise doesn't require the same amount of effort anymore. There is still some effort, but it comes pretty easy, whereas the other is a stretch, but is also starting to get a bit easier. At some point, I see myself phasing the original version out for the more intensive one and then adding another, even more intensive version to that one. There's momentum in all of that and I feel excited to have hit this place where I am feeling able to push myself harder and as a result doing more intensive exercise. Movement, once resistance is tipped, becomes much easier with the right momentum behind it.

I went to a Venus ritual conducted by my friend Erik Roth and a person he was co-leading the ritual. They did a good job with the ritual and explanations . At one point there was a pathworking to meet your inner Venus, your anima really. In my case, it was a tall, steely eyed, dominant woman, with dark hair a subtle, sensual strength to her, my inner woman, and I felt her engage me and tell me that I could draw on her support with the work I was doing around emptiness, but also in any other area of my life. I've always felt in touch with my feminine self, but meeting her in this way was really intriguing in its own right.

1-18-14 I'm reading Born for Love: Why Empathy is Endangered and Essential. The first chapter talks quite a bit about the way babies learn and the bonding experiences they have as babies with their mothers and how essential this bonding behavior is because of what it teaches children about love and empathy. And I realize, given what I know about my very early childhood that I didn't really receive the essential bonding I must have needed. I don't believe I was even with my mother by the time I was 1 and even if I was, from the stories I've been told it was a very chaotic period of life for her and I was a very unhappy baby at that time. And what does all that have to do with love and empathy? From what I can tell this early time is so essential that it plays a significant role in how a person handles love, gives love, etc., and also plays a role in how empathetic a person is. So I wonder then how this has or hasn't effected me. Certainly when I look at the emptiness and my relationship with love, I am struck by how much I am driven to find something to occupy or fill up that sense of emptiness and how my experiences with love have been less about being present with someone and more about filling that sense of emptiness. Being present seems to me to be more about feeling a sense of empathy and connection...wanting to know how the other person feels as opposed to just wanting something from the person. Being present is something I'm still figuring out, and truth to tell I think that if you have a well developed sense of empathy its easier to be present with yourself and consequently with other people as well. Still I'm willing to learn all this and I'm not backing away from the need for it. I'd like to think it could help me be a better person as a result.

1-20-14 I've been meditating a lot on what I read the other day and my reaction to it. I've come to the conclusion that I've never really been present with myself or any other person. When I look at my life in general, let alone relationships with other people, I'm struck by how I'm always focused on the next thing, person, projects, etc. as opposed to really being present with wherever I'm at and whoever I'm with.  To some degree, with Kat, I've learned to become more present, but even so I still find that I'm not really present with myself. Part of it definitely goes back to some of those early life experiences, but part of it also is something within western culture...we haven't been taught how to sit still with ourselves, how to just be. Each day, when I do Zhine meditation, I'm struck by how this meditation is probably one of the hardest for me because it involves just being as opposed to thinking or doing or anything else.

This month has been about drive and I think I've learned a lot about what drives me. I'd like to change what drives me though or learn to work with it differently than I have. I feel that the experiences I'm having as I work with the element of movement and navigate my astrological dark night of the soul are providing a path toward such work. I feel tumultuous and stormy, and yet I also see sunlight peeking through, realizations coming, and an inner sense of self emerging that has more clarity than I have previously ever had.