Into the mind of the Sylph...

Most of what we absorb on a daily basis in our conscious and sub-conscious are untrue messages which unknowingly affect our self-image, value and esteem.

Picture being in a room of noxious invisible fumes…slowly forming cancerous plaques on our lungs.

Ok, maybe not as dramatic but certainly just as damaging.

So, the marketers need to have product desired by consumers (us). The messages are sent in songs, jingles, magazines, billboards etc. This is the thing to have and you are nothing without it!!… I’ve heard the mysterious stories of subliminal messages and while there is some skepticism, there is no doubt that hearing the same thing over and over again will leave any human being prone to believing the message whether or not there is an iota of truth to it.

Multiply that effect exponentially by adding the figure of admiration and authority spewing it out and you’ve got yourself the underlying principle of a charismatic church *giggle* Just kidding – actually not kidding. The thing is, we hear these messages every day, everywhere and somewhere in there we adjust and start to depend on an external voice of approval, not what we feel is good and right but what the masses deem to be good and right.

Add to that my favorite riding horse, “Humans are social beings…blah blah blah….. Their environment influences their behavior blah bi di blah!! [Read: Lifting of the Edges]

So with all this false junk entering unprocessed and definitely not questioned, we end up with a rather lazy thinker or a sleeper as I will describe this passive thinking individual.

The slavery trap: Get a good education, then a good job, then a good mortgage, then a good married, then a good child, then good education for the child, then a good retirement, then a good coffin. Your entire life disappears and you have not grown one bit along your spiritual path. Wake up! You are caught in a net, but all nets have holes, find one and escape. Courtney Kazembe

Seriously,

How many of us would describe ourselves as slaves? We’ve become so good at it that we’ve actually tricked ourselves into thinking we are happy like this.

I was born to dance. I know this by the way my feet and body move rhythmically and uncontrollably over the beats and lines of a song, any song…. I like ballet, dance, rock, modern and I dance all equally well. Because of this I loooooove music and my likes vary dramatically.

I was born to write. I know this because the sight of a starched white empty page pulls me in and I feel joy bubbling over as I fill it with my words (yeah, I’m in bliss now). 

I was born to change the world. I know this because of the way my heart swells and my indignation flares at the mere thought of injustice of those weaker or unable to defend themselves. I know this because in a very controlled (cult like atmosphere) I stood up and disagreed with the main leader (extremely legalistic) even though my heart was trying to escape my chest and I was shunned for weeks afterwards.

These things strike up a passion in me that cannot be put out by failures, mistakes or a mob of townspeople with hooks and pitchforks. (Umm, yeah.. they are there!) 

This is my purpose.

For years I had been asleep. I danced in a tight tutu on a Sunday afternoon to Tchaikovsky (my fav composer) as a six year old. As a preteen there were hours, practicing the positions of dancing, flexing and pointing as I experimented with different music. 

Then started the writing… Pages and pages of books upon notebooks. Pretty soon I would stand in a stationery store and lust after notepads with unusual covers. Just to attack them with prose. I have never considered majoring in Language or Literature or even dance in college. Well, I applied to Edna Manley for Dance major, but was too young to be admitted… the dream slowly died.

Naturally as a sleeping person, I made myself believe that a 1^st degree, followed by a job would be better. After all if I couldn’t be happy I could at least have the respect and prestige that everyone else was using to compensate for lack of true happiness…you know, join the rat race. Plus a degree would please my mom…that seemed good enough at the time.

Through college, I danced in a group, took active part in cheer leading and even did a little choreography. J It so happened I was editor for my faculty in final year as well…Oh well!!

The little hints I got were muffed out by reason and logic and by running in the damn rat race!! 

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Science was interesting and reasonably easy enough, so I did that. Majored in Medical Technology just to later on despise being in the lab! Forensic Science offered another side to lab work but that job sucked (lack of resources) and made me paranoid about crime coming to my doorstep!! I starting carrying around a switchblade in my purse… .oh yeah!

Throughout I wrote, I wrote of steamy experiences (which were later burnt) *giggle* but nothing deeply reflecting or earth shattering….and definitely nothing that changed the world. The thing I have learned is that wisdom comes at a very high price and being a so called deep individual does not happen suddenly by choice.

You have to face your demons… And you just may lose too…. In fact there is more depth in failure than success!

Sick of the superficial club life with no definite meaning, I fell into a legalistic religious organization and promptly conformed to their every whim and fancy (there were many)…That’s where the awakening process began…. 

Not in the enlightened world of flashy city Kingston, 

Not in college (great place to find oneself) ...

...but in a very dark, cold and superstitious place of mystical beliefs and rules that stretch the holy book and lump over into tight traditional, patriarchal opinion. …That world of anarchistic control rooted in fear and almost every psychological principle of social cognitive behavior….

Now this was the real learning ground.

Naturally there was no dancing…. That was not allowed as discussed I a very divided, heated debate aptly called Agree/Disagree.[ I can barely write this without the stirrings of some subtle symptoms of PTSD].. sigh

It was here that every truth I was to ever accept was to be tested, stretched, examined, discarded and regurgitated….

It was here that I understood how Adolf Hitler could get peaceful Germans to rise up, assume superiority and at the flick of his swastika tattooed wrist, exterminate an entire race!

 It was here that the psychology of human behavior became so palpably real that I feared for my own imagined perception of reality.

 It was here that I grasped how charismatic leaders got others to kill themselves (the Kool-Aid guy, Hello!!), kill each other without remorse but with an air of authority and justification…. And feel closer to god for it!

In whispered tones, we discussed what was wrong with everyone else and why we were perfect.

Why love was indeed conditional and giving to someone should be predetermined by whether or not they paid their tithes.

Grrr… PTSD kicking in! Must abort post!

The lifting of the edges....

A man told his grandson: "A terrible fight is going on inside me -- a fight between two wolves. One is evil, and represents hate, anger, arrogance, intolerance, and superiority. The other is good, and represents joy, peace, love, tolerance, understanding, humility, kindness, empathy, generosity, and compassion. This same fight is going on inside you, inside every other person too."

The grandson then asked: "Which wolf will win?" The old man replied simply:  "The one you feed."  -Anon.

The fight has been heightened inside me these past few months. I have been directly and indirectly exposed to many stories and experiences shared by persons of several faiths and I must say I have found a common trait. I have come face to face with the lowest, most embarrassing and sickening aspects of a movement I have supported and promoted for years.

I have had to face myself too. My own prejudices and intolerance, which have slowly melted away. Then the most wonderful thing happened…. I fell in love with humanity. I could now see a man not with all his shortcomings and sins. But instead I see a man, subject to the challenges and inevitable scars of a past, a childhood that he had no control over. I now see every human being as having a story just like my own. I have fallen in love with the rights of those who cannot cry out for themselves. But now I feel more concerned with their plight than with their presence in a pew.

I remember a graphic picture in class that left me weeping for hours at the condition in which people, children live. My heart breaks for children especially since they have less say and apparently less rights. I see their large innocent eyes, wondering and waiting for the love that each human being deserves regardless of race, religion or creed.

I see myself in the eyes of many suffering and confused, not necessarily physically but emotionally or mentally or even the socially rejected. I talk big about not caring what people think; all my friends know this. The truth is: I bash my image preserving friends real hard because on the inside I really care even more than they do. I am terrified of being rejected and in the past have taken drastic steps to avoid it. I have the same priority in church. The crowd changes but the principle remains the same… I tried as soon as possible to fit in… My clothes had to be just right to not stand out too much and the behavior had to be in sync with what everyone else was doing… whether it was getting married, exhorting or being actively involved in a department.

But whose life was I touching? I shunned my neighbors because they didn’t have the spiritual revelations that I did. They were obviously heathens with an agenda headed to hell. I could argue on any point of doctrine expertly and rarely lost an argument. Still I rode on this self-proclaimed righteousness, believing that my improved religious status gave me the right. I also found that over time it became harder and harder to love and show the love of Jesus but easier to stick to persons of my belief.

Humans are social beings. Any social organization or group accepts members based on some qualifications and after the period of initiation is over (Proving oneself) then you are slowly integrated into the system of thinking, behaving and speaking. 

No matter how much of a rebel you try to be against these ridiculous traditional practices, the environment gets to you. If it doesn’t grate on your nerves, it slowly integrates you until you speak and look just like everybody else. Its not an environment that those who are ‘different; can survive in for very long. You either wont be allowed to actively participate in anything or you will be ignored or spoken badly of. The social part of any human being cannot withstand being ostracized for very long.

I think the root of the problem is that we have placed the rules and regulations on such a high pedestal that love takes a backseat. 

Ghandi said: “I like your Christ, but I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are nothing like your Christ”