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Walk a day in my shoes
They’re old and worn
and sometimes pushed aside or go unseen
See life through my eyes
passed the dysfunction and sound times balanced on top of an emotion
that occasionally temper my judgments or make me look like a fool
I hold out my hand in peace
You are you, and I am me
Because we both know there is no other true way to be
Two kinds of mindsets. Those who want, take. Those who want, work. We all fall into those two categories, no one is spared. I fall into the Want/Work side. There are always sides. True more so for people who say they don’t take sides or invalidate the sides.
Each side holds a list of personal requirements/beliefs that help a person live and move forward. Claiming a side is not how it’s done. No. To know a person’s truth, you have to listen and observe before speaking. Edits or challenges change the path to truth. To correct thought or observation or point of view in a conversation is fruitless. You stop listening and start dictating. A lot of information is missed when you edit a person’s words to fit your criteria.
That is not a conversation. That is a debate.
Now, I will be challenged. And I should. I grew up in a low to middle class family with its share of dysfunction. Our dynamic included lies, trauma, and the struggle to exist in a narrow-minded system. I didn’t know how narrow-minded it was until I matured. I want push back. Tell me what you really think.
I started life on these misunderstandings:
I didn’t know what cancer was or its severity until my mom was diagnosed and died.
I didn’t know what gay was.
I didn’t know about racism, discrimination, and about religious control or how they negatively affected my childhood mind.
Yes. In my point of view and from what I know after 53 years of living and experiencing, these edits to natural existences, tampered with my growth. Rather than excepting nature’s forever existences like homosexuality, interacial interactions on all levels, jewish people don’t have hooves and horns(not my experience, but a revolting taught lie all the same), god hates, god punishes through murder of the innocent rather than the criminal(Passover), and worst of all men rule. I pushed back on that last one at a very early age. I must have been male in my previous life.
I’ll stop here. For us to live in a symbiotic nation, WE must accept who we are and allow everyone to choose who they are so we can focus on how we are treated by those whose power stems from materials and not honor.
I paid the price of childhood. Grew from love into an angry, watchful protector who bristled bigger and more dangerous than those who dared to stroll into my circle. Married with children, I alone fought the demons that taunted me in my dreams and in my childhood home. Love was sacrificed for stoic indifference. Affection I gave to those I bore and no one else. A warrior from birth I surged into the fight that was life, baring teeth and exposing claws. No one would get near, not even those I held dear. So, alone and determined I kept safe the three lives I would die for.
Fate is not written in stone or blood. Fate, I believe is the outcome of each and every decision a person makes. It’s not fate that knocked me off the path and tore up my feet and soul as it sent me rolling over rough and jagged grounds. Breaking my will, beating my solitary ways to a pulp, just so I could see what kept me distant from the ones I loved. An unexpected kick in the teeth gave me quite the unique 4d perspective. I examined the thick hyperbaric chamber I’d constructed out of fear and ignorance. I didn’t know that there was more out there. The kind and compassionate they made of most of the world.
Ay first, I felt defeated. Tied to a bed by my own body and mind, I turned further inward away from even those I loved because I’d felt that I betrayed them. My only job…gone. My strength and control ripped out from beneath my feet. That little door between me and mine and the rest of the world, closed.
I sank into darkness.
And everyone I pushed away, reached in and dragged me out!
Miraculous patches, Animal medicines, Rieki, spiritualism, karma, chakras, reincarnation, god, the power of the human mind. You get it, right? What is true? Hell if I know, but maybe it’s whatever gets us through life without bowing down to paralyzing fear. Wait…is it fear that brings us to these answers? All I know is that I won’t bow to someone else’s answers. You won’t make me believe if I don’t want to. We all do it. Why? We’re all afraid of what will happen if we don’t. Letting go to be true to ourselves and no one else is the scariest leap any of us will ever endeavor to take.
Death. It seeks all of us. Death = Fate. True and tried. It is the last event of our lives, yet, in most cases, there are more mind changing events before it. Being born is one of the first. Some souls end just before or after. That’s their earth fate. (Read between the lines. I believe in reincarnation. The terrifying idea of death is alleviated by the notion that, one day, I’ll choose to return or remain (Wherever) to party with deceased relatives.) My belief stems from family stories and several personal sightings of ghosts. My conclusion—-reincarnation. I haven’t the foggiest idea how seeing ghosts equates to reincarnation, except as a additive I have dreams of deceased people who give me premonitions into the future. Yup. I do.
Now I’m weird? I believe in ghosts (because I’ve seen and heard them). I trust in the power of the human mind, the power of helping healing energy. I also know that absolutes don’t exist, we are not alone, and we all need help at one time or another. Shame stops us for asking for that help. Fear divides us. Those who perpetuate shame by using fear divide and conquer the brave and courageous among us.
I don’t know if what I believe is true. It’s a belief. Everyone has them. Yet, we are divided, attack each other, have created an us or them mentality. It takes one person to divide thousands of people. There’re no real differences that should cause such a break in society. We all want to be safe. So, do what makes us all safe. How difficult is that? You don’t like something—-don’t do it. If there are things you don’t understand, then accept there not for you. You can want things without them hurting others. If it hurts others, maybe you need to rethink what it is you want. Compromise over selfishness. You are not your sister, aunt, neighbor… Not everyone should be an artist, or heart surgeon. Our differences strengthen out community—-country. Who we love is no one else’s business. Everyone has a right without a fight to their own bodies.
I find it amusing that we, as a people, have fallen into a pick-and-choose religious belief. Religions and churches pop up like weeds and people flock to the fields of wild notions. I’m my own goddess, my own beliefs. I am personally responsible for everything I do and every choice I make…good or bad. I don’t always get it right, and sometimes my actions hurt others. That is my shame to bare, my amends I need to make. You are not me. I am not you. So, why do i sometimes take what someone else says, personally?
I wish I knew. I doubt that 100 years of therapy would bring me to that answer. I only know that I’m wrong for judging how someone else feels because of some deep seated resentment or horrible event that escapes my memory. Observing others while keeping my own mind quiet is revealing. I learn more about someone when they don’t know they’re being watched. I learn even more when I listen as they speak to me, or someone else, without interruption. Facial expressions, hand gesture, and natural mannerisms are telling. My own included.
I’m at the point in my life that what I feel during an experience or conversation, whether it is anger or joy, is significant to learning about myself. Isn’t that what matters most? I have enough to do in my own life than worry about someone else’s….even my children. They are adults now. And yes, it is hard to stay quiet when I believe something that differs from their belief. Unfortunately, if you don’t learn from experience… you won’t learn at all. That’s the burden we all must suffer through.
Okay… I’m done. For now. Peace!!!!
So, we come to me. I am responsible for my actions, reactions, and decisions. I sit on my couch, in this place and time, a culmination of who I am. I won’t say all my decisions were thought out. I’m scarred from childhood drama. Back then, I’d inserted myself into adult subject matters at the lowly age of ten. By thirteen, I’d kicked my father out of the house. Well, more like yelled at him to leave when I’d discovered his infidelity. My heroic gesture opened up a whole new can of maggots. I’d learned just how detached he was to our family. But this isn’t about him. I realize now how detached I’d become to every one else on earth, including my family. My rights became everyone else’s wrong. I became a laughing stock and joke fodder. Miss righteous. Misunderstood. Misguided. I got lost in my tiny pristine world of “if I won’t do it, neither will you.” Is it surprising that i was a republican back then?
I remained stifled until High school. I heard terrible words, insults, judgements…from the adults around me. From my father to the the pope, I learned hate and intolerance. My best friend smoked weed and I almost ended the friendship. Why? Ignorance. Not willful. The difference being I’d no inkling that I could be wrong.
I wasn’t aware of race or homosexuality. Today, I remember hearing derogatory words spoken beneath a dark spotlight. Generations of hate past forward to their children. One defamatory twist of perspective (No facts in sight) taints what is a natural phenomenon, disgracing and distorting its truth, to give power to the ignorant and sometimes willful ignorant power-seeking history-falsifying Marauders. As a human under the burden of others, I was one of them.
Because of the fog hate, though there were many instances of love and affection, I embraced fear and not love.
Fear drew my mind, my health, the safety of my children inward. I saw predators everywhere, therefore it was not I who had to change, but everyone else. I lived in Misery despite adoring my children. They were the only ones who saw my loving nature. I’d die for them. Accept them as is. Unconditional love. Only I could protect them. No one but a few people and for short periods of time, watched them when I’d no choice but to go out. My husband, a good daddy, didn’t fit my idea of bodyguard. To others, I looked unapproachable and intimidating. And then something happened that entirely decimated my already fragile world. Cancer.
Some would say that fear and misery became the cells that threatened to overtake my organs. Eat away at what I couldn’t live without, until I no longer lived. Cancer forced me to make a choice. Continue protecting my children in til I died in a year or so, OR trust others to protect them while I sat in a room for four hours a week, with IV pumping poison through my veins. Who knew that the only way to stop the spiritual darkness destroying my soul was a disease that ate me alive from the inside out. Because of my children, I chose to trust others so I could get better and return to my children. For a year and a half, nauseated, barely able to get out of bed, no hair, puffy complexion, no resemblance to my formidable self, I stopped thinking. All my fears were contained inside surviving, and for the first time in my life, I felt free to just love. Love was what got me through, made me see, and caused me to abandon the path paved by others to make my own path.
to be continued…
As I said, my subconscious is burdened by input from a thousand experiences, some not my own. Even though I’m fully aware of the influence other’s have on my decisions, transitioning from their beliefs and stories to my own is difficult. My mother raised us with affection tainted by her own past fears. She wanted us strong and independent, yet (I didn’t know this until she died) her fears sowed by her childhood corroded the way she raised us. (I have one older sister and two younger brothers).
Did I have a good childhood? Better than some. Worse than others. Every stage of our lives get several small challenges, or one large one we have to overcome to gain a soul level. You know, like in video games, only when we refresh after death, we’re in a different life. Same challenges but with contrasting influences and set of beliefs. According to some religions, we’re born sinful. The natural act of procreating blackens our souls before we take our first breaths. I dropped that belief long ago. In fact, within the last sixteen years (I’m 52), I cleansed my belief system down to one that make sense to me. Really, that’s all that matters. How? My decisions, my thoughts, my actions and reactions…all mine. My soul is my guide. Does it help me knowing this? A little. When I close myself off from everyone else I let my truth surface to engage head-on with anger or happiness, whatever it is I need to face, I do it on my terms.
For example, If I become enraged by someone’s actions, reactions, words, that hurt others despite the judgmental’s unaffected personal life…I, about half the time take a step back to balance my wildly protective instincts.
My mom protected us from everyone and everything except the one person who hurt us most, our father. His childhood molded the way he acted later in life. Religion, indirectly and directly had a lot to do with his dysfunction, but his choices in life were all his own. For years I ignored the contrary mindset. At times he’d say love god and all will be well. On the flip side he’d go on a hate-dripping tirade about other people in and outside of the family.
Do I wish I had different parents? Ha, I chose them as influencers before I returned to the game board. I imagine a meeting of the souls. Contracts are drawn up, roles are picked, and so are our starts and finishes. Though I’d accepted this belief, I had a hard time accepting the roles of the most heinous soul-players pedophiles and psychopaths, but If we are to learn everything, we must experience everything. Knowing this, doesn’t make my anger less sharp or my actions less violent towards these wild cards that are put in place to create lessons. Perhaps not accepting those pedophiles who pose as church clergy or good deed dads in boy scouts etc, is a level I passed in a previous life. Could be I played the role as the molested, or a molester many lives before. All I know for sure is that’s one circumstance I protected my children from, fiercely. I saw predators everywhere I went., even in the family. The threat of death was known to all who went near them without my permission. I didn’t go out. I guess some time in my past I’d been prey to a violent predator, so much that the experience is burned deeply and still painfully in my soul’s memory.
To Be Continued…
We hear about someone’s best laid plans going up in flames and often think, well, that’s not the path given by “God”. “God helps those who help themselves”. The holes in those theories left me wandering in a lonely place with a collar and leash choking me in directions I didn’t wish to go.
Then it hit me.
We are here to make progress. perhaps, other souls are here to challenge/block us or help us move forward. Soul Contracts. The theory then becomes the best laid plans of the soul and how the human mind thwarts our attempts at success. Who is who? That’s the puzzle we created for ourselves before birth. To start, we are given two pieces when we are born. Those two pieces we choose right off the bat. A mother and a father. We’ve picked them specifically to help us grow into our true selves. Remember, depending on how well you listen to your instincts/higher self, the part of you that connects your mind to your soul, you will grow in small increments or leaps and bounds. Your time limit for that those lessons is the duration you’ve planned to live in one lifetime. Don’t worry, there’s no such thing as failure. You’ll have to do it again in your next life. Personal soul growth is what it is. In my case, one parent was loving while the other hateful. I grew up dancing on opposite sides of the emotional spectrum.
So, how did I end up here? And where is here? It wasn’t until their deaths were their lives revealed. Imagine as an adult, a mountain of knowledge falling on your head, that coincide with some memories but not others (as related through a sibling) and certain events finally making sense. Does the knowledge help me help others. Yes and no. Depends solely on the path of the soul you want to help or warn.
To be continued.
First, I want to point out that I struggle with the concept of “A God” You’re thinking that something happened in my life to question a divine-intersex’s existence. Yes, but it’s not what you think. The battle has to do with the use of the word vs action.
Everywhere I go, I hear, “Thank God.” A baby falls out of a three story building and lives, by a feat of heroism or—dare I say—a miracle. Who do we blame when the baby dies? We don’t scream at the devil. And what about those people who saved the baby? They are thanked but only as a tool of God. People devote many years of their lives studying ways to save human lives. Most police officers understand that their job sometimes require the ultimate sacrifice. Our military suffers the most yet when they manage to survive and make it home, God is nowhere to be seen, to ensure the healing and gratitude they earned.
Now I want to tell you a story/joke. You may have heard it somewhere before, but It’s a story/joke that’s stuck with me. I, of course, am adding my own twist to make a deeper point.
A man stood on his rooftop surrounded by rising water. He prayed to God. To help him.
A man in a rowboat came by and told him to hop in. The man refused, saying God would save him. The water rose higher. A man in a motor boat came by and told him to hop in. Again, the man refused saying that God would save him. Just as a helicopter flew to him and hovered a few feet above his head, the water rose up over the man’s ankles. A rope ladder was thrown down to dangle just able the man’s head. A woman yelled for him to climb up and instead of grabbing hold of the ladder. He pushed it away and said, “I don’t need your help. God will save me. The helicopter pilot flew away.
The man drowns and goes to heaven where he meets god. The man is furious. He yells, “I had faith in you! I had faith that you would save me, and instead you let me drown!” God smiles and says, “I sent you a rowboat, a motor boat, and a helicopter.”
“But that was not you,” the man whined.
“Of course it was,” God replied in a voice that projected a murmur of many tones, female and male. “Every choice you make brings you closer to us or further from us. It is not the acts thrust upon you, but the reaction to those acts that define who you are. Together we are invincible, apart we are vulnerable. That is why we test each other. We are the good actions and the bad actions that stand at every crossroad. On earth, our choices affect all like they do here, but there on, on earth, you think you’re alone and that makes you prey to fear which leads to hate which causes pain to millions who you refuse to see or know. If on earth you can see others outside of your skin, then ascension has begin. For, if you can feel beyond the limits of your body you will never feel alone again.
“What does this mean for me?”
“Back down you go.”
”Noooooooo.”
Love doesn’t die—-
I’d put off getting my new driver’s license for weeks. Why? I needed a notary to apply for an original birth certificate. Why they couldn’t acknowledge my existence when they’re the ones that sent me the reminder to update my license, is beyond me. Had my date of birth and everything on my old one, oh well. Why am I telling you this? Well, I hadn’t planned on doing that today, until, who I like to call my muse, intuition and sometimes Mom, pinged my brain with a sense of urgency. “Do in now,” it said. “And don’t go where you’d planned. Go to the library.” Even from the beyond, when she says “Jump.” I say, “How high.” So pushy…
And this is what happened—-
The notary recognized me. I felt bad that I couldn’t say the same. She told me that our children knew each other 15 years ago and that, during an elementary school event, I told her something that helped her through a tough time. She remembered the story I told her about how my mother, who died 22 years ago, kept coming to me like she needed to tell me something. She entered my dreams at night and played with my anxiety during the day. Finally, I made an appointment with a medium so I could speak with her. (I’d never been to one before, though I do believe.) I’m glad I listened. She told me I was sick and it had to do with female issues. Well, she was right. With no symptoms to speak of, my very first mammography revealed I had an aggressive form of breast cancer.
(Back to today and the notary) She remembered the story and in fact kept it close to her heart al these years. What I didn’t know was, at the time, her father had passed. They were close. She thanked me, rendering me speechless. That alone can be considered a miracle.
So, if you haven’t guessed, I follow the from-the-beyond signs and paths.
The first pick up line used by the male species started with ugh and ended with an unconscious female being dragged by her hair into a cave. A few of these same immoral, unethical males still exist and use drugs and alcohol as their reel and hook. There are articles about how they hunt for drunk women in bars. Fortunately, more and more parents are teaching their children respect. Respect for themselves and respect for others. But there are those men/boys who can’t control their urges.
When my daughter was 15 she started dating a boy she’d met online. He lived close by so they met up in person at a Friendlys restaurant in the next town over. Me and her father dropped her off at the entrance. The kid sat on a bench waiting and got up as soon as he saw her. I glared at him through the driver’s side window. I’m very protective and this was her first date ever. Well, I’m not one to hover but I do watch and take note of people’s actions and what they say. I use these bits of information as puzzle pieces as a way to create a personality profile. Well, I had him pegged within a month of their relationship. He was a narcissist. During my daughter’s 16th birthday, he made my husband drive him to the store to get soda HE wanted and then to his house when he ripped his pants. (He was very Lucky I wasn’t there. My daughter went with them and it took a long time because (As was explained to me) he had to match his new pants with his jewelry and shirt. She missed a good portion of her own party!!! My daughter would invite him to family events and he’d lay across a whole couch with his head on her lap. I would tell him to get up each time but he’d always do it again. My daughter didn’t know how to say no. His disrespectful behavior shot a blazing red hot flag into my core.
One day soon after the mental warning, my instincts flared into overdrive. I pulled my daughter aside and told her what I was feeling. I told her he was going to try to have sex with her. She alluded to the fact that he was getting more handsy than she liked. It took every bit of willpower not to hunt him down and rip off his testicles. Instead, I gave her the ammunition to shoot him down. I told her, “He’ll say that he loves you and it’s what people who love each other do. I want you to say, that since he’s had sex with other people, obviously Love was not a factor.”
He did try to talk her into it the exact way I said he would and he did not like her rejection.
They broke up after that conversation, or rather he broke up with her. She was devastated despite the fact that he was an conniving asshole. Of course, she didn’t tell me the truth about why they broke up until fairly recently, but it was a win for her.
She’s 24 now, hard working, intelligent, and compassionate to a fault. I can no longer offer guidance, (She resists like a woman brainwashed), point out inconsistencies, and ultimately remove the current self benefiting person closing off her eyes, mouth and ears from reality. The words “I love you,” has yet again taken hold of her heart and closed off her mind. I can only hope she sees the truth before it’s too late.
Mel Evers wonders about it all 