I have been distracted and posting a lot less than I have in the past.
In the spirit of Samhain and also the 5th of November, I have spent much time in reflection. I recognize the world is out there, not here. I have been busy doing, accomplishing. I’ve been trying to gain in practical experience. Life is meant to be experienced, not to be thought about from the arm chair. People forget about it to much.
But lately and also considering it is fast becoming winter, I will be spending time researching and putting together various materials that have influenced me. I will be trying to reflect and respond more from what has influenced me, Buddhism, being a Luciferian, and the ONA. I have no means perfected this path, but this is a life long journey with the aims in being an Adept. The Buddha is in each of us, but to become self-aware, to recognize your Self, and be Master, to be God, is by no means a journey you can complete in a year.
On Pride
There is nothing with pride as Lucifer often has reminded me. Pride is good, having a healthy respect-love for your accomplishments but knowing it’s not the end. Pride is good when it doesn’t lead to a Ego-Cyst (full of the nasty pus of to much arrogance) or when it turns into Special Snowflake Syndrome (which I’ll rant at some point separately about).
Pride should not stop you from moving forward.
Pride should not make you feel so completely superior to others. Yes you can be superior to others, but there is also someone who will always be better than you are, even if you have not found them yet.
Pride shouldn’t make you avoid embarrassing things. “Break a leg.”
Pride shouldn’t make you think you are ‘all that’ and that you have no weaknesses.
A well balanced pride goes a long way. It’s something I’m cultivating because I spend to much time with my eyes on the ground and not looking up.
From the Depths
| — | A Dance With Dragons |
This reminds me of trauma or shadow work. Our lives are filled with conflict. The darkness of our lives, those conflicts, those times of great turmoil, they give us many lessons. They nourish us. They teach us of how to say goodbye, of how to let go. It teaches us how everything is transient. That our lives go on. That we are survivors and we have unyielding strengths and hearts that won’t falter. It show us our strength of mind, of will, of heart. It pushes us to our limits. We learn to manage, how to go on. How to deal and cope, how to solve it.
While darkness helps us learn and nourishes us too. People do as well, family, friends, happy memories, dreams, and hopes. They are a light in our hearts. They are there for us to grasp on to, to let us guide to. Together this light, this dark, are to natural forces that form one into our lives.
Experience, Fleeting Emotions
“Let everything happen to you, beauty and terror. Just keep going, no feeling is final.” – Rainer Maria Rilke
There is so much to life and so much of it, kind of contrasts. It is beautiful and completely terrifying. Yet these moments, these days, they pass us by so fast. It is all so impermanent even if our memory is (don’t tell me it isn’t, because what happens as a child, even if you can’t technically recall it, it’s there in your mind, just buried deep down under time and affects you psychologically).
I often think of this quote “And this to shall past.” Every time, I get angry, or upset for whatever reason, I often do a bit of self-reflecting. I can’t stop my feelings, no one can. The fact is, you keep hanging on, going on, pushing on, even pushing back at the world as it pushes back.
The fact is, as much as I never thought I would make it out of my depression, I did. I never thought my life would end up where it has, but it certainly did. I’m not a graphic designer (yet), I don’t have that degree I want…but I hit a spot where I’m like, “okay, okay…this is…okay.” I’m actually pretty happy to. I’ve hit this spot where I am accepting (not defeat mind you), but accepting and I move forward, because this too shall past. I keep saying I’m 21, but now I’m 23.
Addiction
Mom and I were sitting in front of the tv and she had Fox News was on. It went from welfare to addiction. I had one of those “Oh I see moments” in the midst of talking it with my mom. I forgot what they were saying (something about not going after drug users or drug dealers).
Anyways one day my co-worker comes in bawling her eyes out. Apparently her son did a hard narcotic and something happened and now the government or some place wants to send him to kind of camp or rehab. She’s a heavy alcoholic, like buys a bottle of vodka every two days so this alcoholic is not a good role model for her kids.
The thing is, what got to me, is that addicts are trying to escape their reality. We all want to escape at some points, some more than others. It’s a stress relief, a way we cope, but it can slide into addictions too. You drink to forget. You get high to forget or feel good. The problem with these escape methods if often we feed it more and more and more. It begins to consume us. It begins to bury us under. You want to keep that high, you want to keep forgetting, sometimes it takes more and more to give you that feeling. Your life gets worse and worse as you keep feeding the problem making your life worse. Instead of just dealing, we fall further and further and further into an abyss.
The only way to stop ‘falling’ is to take action. To do. You have to face the problem head on and use all those problem solving skills. Ask for help. Take a break. Try something new. But always try, try, and try again. The problem never goes away if you ignore it. Even if it does go away, it often leads to another problem.
LHP & Helping Others (A Q & A)
My friend: A lady came to me with a problem. I was pragmatic in how I felt she could handle it and the lesson to be learned from what had already happened. I found her annoying and ignored several impulses to send her to someone that could help. After sending her to someone that could help. I found myself thinking… I kind of cared about whether or not this lady got good help.
… Except I’m Left Hand. I think I am? Middle hand doesn’t seem right. I am very self serving in the majority of magic I practice. In all honesty… I want to become a kinky sex Goddess using the Left Hand Path. For those that know me? They know I am not joking. (Male body, female spirit. Get over it.)
So, I’ve narrowed this down to one of two things. Either, a lot of people who are Left Hand give the other Left Handers a bad reputation. Or, maybe I’m still Middle hand in some ways. Perhaps both?
I like to help people. But I am self serving and Left Hand. … Or so I think Left Hand. I can’t see any reason why these actions wouldn’t be fitting for Left Hand. I was polite but very directly honest with her.
I’m looking for opinions and thoughts so I have reflections of truth from other people’s minds to help me think.
My answer: Well let me put it this way, does it really matter? You can care and you can be self-serving. In fact it can certainly be self-serving in making sure she gets the help she needs, because it simply makes you feel better.
The fact is, with every religion, every path, if you will, there are those who are give said path a bad name. But there also comes a certain stigma for a “Left Hand Path” because of it’s association with the taboo, being a revolutionary. In the eyes of the Church, Galileo was a heretic.
Being Left Hand Path doesn’t make us not care. Mostly of how I think about it is, we don’t pretend everything is love and light and beautiful laughter. We are often honest and even brutal to a point. You want a good opinion, you usually come to someone from the Left Hand Path. We aren’t the humble type. We are the type that questions.
The Crowd Is Everything
I used to love going to a club, or going to a rave. But now I’m a bit picky. See, I like it for the crowd. I mean I love the music, don’t get me wrong, but the crowd makes or breaks the event.
Like tonight at Elements. I went one time in the long ago and it was great. Then I went back this February for Black Sun Empire…the set was great, but I had a horrible time and by horrible I mean, I regretted going and wasn’t to keen on going back. But then I went tonight for Culture shock and I had a blast. As my friend said, everywhere you looked, people were smiling.
I was really apprehensive and almost did not go because I really wanted to have a good time. I’m going about an hour and 45 mins away to Cambridge, Mass for a show and paying $10. I’m so glad I went though, not only were the crowd vibes wonderful but the local DJ and Culture Shock (the headliner) killed it. Their sets were delicious and tore up the floor.
But anyone who doesn’t care about the crowd, shoo. The crowd is really important. Yes, people want to go, because they like the music, but some people are super aggressive and ruin an event. That is what happened with Black Sun Empire. My friend said it was because Black Sun Empire is like an old skool name in dnb and people of the old skool dnb crowd came out and they are aggressive people. I did try really hard that night to have a great time, but it really did not work out cause of how aggressive and mean the crowd was.
On Pride
While Ze and I do not always talk the most and he certainly does not add commentary to my life, sometimes when we talk, he looks annoyed. Because I’m not very….well I have issues revolving around pride, self-esteem, and self-confidence. I mean…
I am smart. I’m not a genius.
I’m a decent artist, but not the best.
I’m well grounded, despite I like to daydream.
And it isn’t the fact that while I am kind of proud of myself, there is a bit of rust around it. It isn’t all shiny. I’m not talking about merit badges though. I’m talking about how you carry yourself.
I got reminded today while I was talking to someone from the First Dynasty. He demanded to know why I was worthy of being a Dark Knight. He commented on how I have a lot of restraint as a knight. And I’m like…I know I’m not the most confident. He thought I was never taught self-confidence or self conviction. I mean…that’s nothing something you can easily teach. It’s something that has to grow within you. It does not help when you have people stepping all over you who should have been building you up.
But it’s growing. It’s there. That makes Ze proud. Ze knows that I will never let pride become arrogance. I will retain a quiet pride.
I’m wasting my life! Not.
There is a vicious cycle our thoughts often get trapped into. I’m wasting my life because all I do is work, all I do is goof off. The key word here is acceptance. There is a balance to our lives, we need to spend time exercising, eating, goofing off, and working. It’s an ends to means and for each person it varies. Somehow this all translates to, the thought of we aren’t good enough, that our lives are a waste.
Well, our lives aren’t a waste, even if we seek it out in pleasure, in working, in being a mystic, or an artist, a blogger, loving our fandom. Your life is yours, it is for you to live. Our society is incredibly judgmental and the expectations is something we have grown up with and has become inherent to our nature. I often see customers commenting on how my co-worker works so much. There is nothing wrong with it. Some people certainly find it fulfilling to work 80+ hours a week, some don’t want to work at all.
As an artist, this is a thought that has crushed me. I am not good enough. There is no place for me in the world. I am just wasting my time because I will never be good as X or I will never be able to sell my works. Which is not true. It is not a waste. It is how I de-stress and how can you get better if you do not practice? How do you get noticed if you don’t put yourself out there every day. Its a means to an end.
I have been involved in a Sith/Jedi Realist communities and one of the people who “taught” me said that energy work/magick/spirits is a waste of time. This does not quite have anything to do with why I ran away from it all in the first place. It does serve a purpose, which that purpose can vary. By finally accepting and dealing with this part of me, I have finally started growing into myself. Working with Lucifer has been incredibly rewarding. My mentor can even comment on my growth. Even if somehow Lucifer is someone just in my head as an archetype and not a deity (he is a deity to me though), it has helped me grown.
The fact is, it is more when something is unhealthy to your being that you should be concerned about wasting your time. Relationships can be toxic, ideas can be toxic, jobs can be toxic too. I can’t tell you what is toxic for you, because you have to judge this for yourself. When people are incredibly dramatic and negative, to me that is toxic and I want little to nothing to do with it. So I ask myself, why do I waste my time on X ?
Gaming to me, I love to game mind you, is unhealthy. Oh I will get up eat, go to the bathroom, but it consumes me and not in a healthy way. I have a problem with being addicted to various activities. It’s all ‘healthy’ in some ways, like reading and researching and writing and doing art, but my path is that of sophrosyne, healthy-mindness with moderation.
Higher Self versus Lower Self
I remember reading an entry somewhere talking about spirits/deities/entities having a higher self and a lower self. Now normally I avoid shit like this, because it’s like zomg new agey crap vomits everywhere. Normally anyways. But lately I’ve found it to be very true.
There is a “base” self and then there is the “higher” self. The base self or lower self is more like for ‘jealousy’ and such to be more fickle and mercurial. Nothing is wrong with either form in my eyes, as long as you don’t let it go ruining the relationships you have. I hate when I feel jealousy honestly, it’s something I normally don’t deal with, you know? But hey, thanks for the lesson Guys. I get it, I have a base self, but I prefer acting from my higher self. Not that I am love and light and everything, but petty emotions, I just got no time for that.
Frisson 