Forty-day aim to control specific areas of talk:
1. Avoid unconscious use of slang language and swearing.
2. Avoid aimless talk. Recognize gossip as a descending octave.
3. Avoid complaint or 'moaning'.
As a general guide: Stop talking before they stop listening.
And pray.
During Lent Sundays are not counted as they are always taken as days of remembrance. As this aim follows Lent, Sundays are counted as days of effort.
I haven't said it, and in the fire it may be missed. This aim assumes the daily practise of self-remembering:
- whilst reading scripture
- during the efforts to make this aim real
- during seven routine daily tasks & events
Luk 21:19 In your patience possess ye your souls.
Notes
- Think of The Odyssey, Bk 17
Argus the Hound, there at the end of his days. Odysseus returns after 20 years, the man that bred the hound - it's extraordinary to see a beauty like this lying in the dung. Eumaeus the swineherd: This dog did have a master but it's all too obvious he died abroad.
I am in the fire. By 0800am I was in a major conflict with several people, outnumbered and losing control. It came from nowhere, unexpected side swipe. The heat is on. I spent the day attempting to resist some major force pushing me to identify. Probably I am lost in a state of identifying with only some occasional breath of air. I'm sinking. And I know it. How did I cope controlling my mouth? Pretty poor. Maybe some control but mostly none. I watched myself cussing and bitching. I was out in the battlefield exhausted, drained, wanting to run home feeling that I'm not cut out for this. (I'm at home now feeling just the same.) Overwhelmed, bruised, out smarted.
I have this picture of an innocent walking into an ambush without any awareness of what is lying in wait. Having been assaulted he spends the rest of his time reeling from the shock, and feeling woefully inadequate to the quest as it unfolds. He leaves the battlefield like a whimpering Labrador mauled by a Pitbull, head hung low, hunched shoulders, tail between legs, licking his bleeding wounds in disbelief and with a degree of fear. Is this an exaggeration? It's an emotional state. It's what you get when you are measured and cut to size without even knowing what hit you. Innocent? May be not, but in the context of the assault, woefully inadequate and unprepared. And now, where next but to rest and return tomorrow and to care less for what the world will do. An aim was set, a trajectory defined by an effort. Nothing else exists. The forest is in darkness and there is a hush. Take your victuals, dust off your jacket, rest and prepare. A journey has begun and only through Our Lord, will this crossing be taken. Amen. [060208] And admit it, you can't do it alone. - The calm after the storm. It had to be so. I was too battered for anything else to be possible. Yet on reflection, you can't knock these opportunities to experience serious friction generating events. Win or lose, you have to know that such things have to occur. [070208]
- It seems I swear a lot. I knew it. I know why too but that's nothing. I don't control it. It's the biggest area of weakness out of the three listed at the top of this post. It has to be clear - observing myself swearing is not enough. There has to be control. I have to be present to prevent it occurring. It's dumb, almost literally. I saw today how I lose energy as I swear. [090208]
- Three strikes against me. Yet, other events were controlled. For the record, the two events which are most likely to catch me out are: a) recounting past events, or someone else's story, or b) as an exclamation - something goes wrong and I blurt out "Shit!", "Fuck!", etcetera. [100208]
- Another day another war. What do I do? It seems worse, or no better. Nothing has changed. I'm still banging heads with people at 0730 am, (and that, by any standards, isn't worth it). It is interesting to observe though. Interesting how it steals energy, not obviously but it leaves one weakened and feeling less sure, more wobbly. You just can't afford to be wobbly. Forty-nights out in the wilderness with the Devil tempting you is a long time if you start wobbling within the first seven days. It's a long haul. I swore today in a way that I just didn't yesterday. If nothing else at least swearing is a good pointer to the state I'm in - it's a sure sign of sleep. It's easy to be innocent in the midst of these events. Did I say innocent? I meant foolish and duped by one's rational blood & soil thinking. (Not that I want to encourage anything specious but we can understand that there is an order of creation that is supra-rational, burying our heads in the sand of reason is no salvation). To read times of intense strife and friction as if routine daily events of no particular order or value is neither clever or savvy. OK, so it was draining, and the day went pear shaped, but so what? How many other people have daily lives that mess up as soon as they step out into the world? You are just a statistic, one of any number. And, this may be so. You can believe it. Or not. I had to consider, given the nature of my Work, this assault comes from that same generation of vipers, that same godless progeny that were building the civilization of Cain in the blood of his brother. These out of control, out of nowhere, assaults upon our Work - upon my Work - have the tell tale signs of the Rulers of the Darkness of This World that lurk with the intent of smothering all signs of Light. This may all read as highly paranoid but in the heat of the battle, this feels more like a truth than entertainment for the stressed. I recollect a line, a decree given for the Wayfaring Man: The Unclean Shall Not Pass. So with prayer and the help of the Most High God and this decree, I build my defences. For the record, no sooner had I declared that decree than I was racked with physical sensations that appeared to affirm something real in this working. When we step out into the field of battle, when we declare our aims with actions and efforts, be sure the Devil and his children will have your name. (Your fellow sufferers may not know what you are doing but these dark angels most certainly do.) [110208]
Isa 35:8 And a highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for those: the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein. - There's no telling what places you are going to find yourself roaming when you get involved in efforts to awaken. Stranger still, almost paradoxical, you become alert and awake to certain events and conditions which would lull you into mechanical states, you are vigilant like the night watch at dawn, yet your vulnerabilities in other areas are all the more exposed. Not surprisingly given recent events, I have been waiting for the next onslaught expecting it from the external world, I've braced myself for the inevitable vicious assault. Yet, today I realised much of the past 24 hours I have been smothered with the blanket of internal considering. I have been spent high on the scale of identifying with every passing emotion, trip wires around various individuals, all living and familiar to me in present time. All of this goes on, the Green Knight wants to destroy us, he is the agent of destruction, an enemy on the way. Yet what has he and all the devil's agents? We have in our possession everything we need, even the mystery itself belongs to us. We are great accumulators, it is a divine gift. What has changed? Five years ago I would be here or I would be identifying, now I am here or I am identifying and that part of me that would be here appears to watch that part of me that is identifying. [160208]
- I absolutely and completely lost control and flew into a near rage this evening - as close as I can get to fury. Full on melt down, burn up, blow out, incendiary device thing. Total and complete identification with a state of frustration-anger-annoyance-madness rolled into one. Open warfare in the trenches, dirty dog fighting. Black fiends falling. [210208]
- Something utterly mystical as if regenerating the whole time body took place this day. The details too acute and personal to put down here. It began early in the morning, a cascade of events that took me from Ludgate Hill, around St Paul's cathedral into Watling Street (a discovery in itself) arriving at St Mary Le Bow for Holy Communion. I was never particularly drawn to Wren's churches personally yet repeatedly my spiritual destiny is woven a little more tightly to his elegant symmetry. I had attempted earlier in the month to arrange a tour of the Whitechapel foundry, where so many of the greatest bells originate, but they were booked months in advance. I was disappointed. What have any of these things to do with this aim? Everything. We must learn to inhabit deeper parts of centres. I'll leave it like that. [220208]
- Lot of lessons revealing that I cannot control my mouth. I cannot shut up when I need to. I push things, events, with the things I say. I draw events towards conflict by my inability to shut up. And the words I choose being almost intentionally insulting/challenging/ threatening in ways and turns. Sometimes manipulating sometimes provoking. I let the small man have dominance. Although not wholly. I know for certain that I might choose a particular word to get someone's heckles up because I cannot tolerate their vanity and self-love and it needs kicking. Wrong or right, I can provoke from Work I's. Not certain that should be permissible? Still, I could defend it by saying that the result is a lot of friction which is good for me, but really? I'll leave this note floating because I'm somewhat ambivalent about this matter. I think the first point, at least within the context of the current aim, is that whatever is being vocalized is to be controlled. Beyond that I might look at what is vocalizing, who is doing the talking. [260208]
- Another 19 days to go ... and I'm feeling like I've reached a temporary plateau. I daren't say the external assaults have diminished but it is as if those fires I ran through in the early phases of this effort are somewhat below. They were grossly stupid and crass, not especially subtle. Blind and brutish darkness flailing desperately. Well, maybe that type of event is enough to effectively stop some wayfarers? The lesson is simple, welcome all that hits you, receive it as a gift. Friction creates energy. See all negativity as a gift. Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, (EPH 5:20). In anycase, the challenges become increasingly subtle. My struggles are now much more with rapidly emerging states of identifying (with ultimately small trivial interpersonal events) which rise like rogue waves from deep within. Calm waters that suddenly threaten to pound this little ship in two, wine dark depths that would swallow 'me' whole, it only takes the smallest leak. What's to be done? Move fast, remember, consciousness is an under utilized energy - it doesn't belong to us (any of us), it isn't located in some part of the brain - it's 'out there' and free for the effort of taking. You must take it, own it, or fly low with broken wings. Get on your wedding shoes. Harps and bells moving like a wind, here am I far from dry land ... [030308]
- Just a short note. Got home from work last night, changing out of my work clothes I placed pocket notepad & pen (which I use to record self-remembering efforts) on the shelf. Having changed went downstairs and got on with life and the evening passed. Went to bed late, slept soundly and awoke, opened my eyes. Instantly like a slap, a shock wave hit me - I was 'out', not present through all yesterday evening. I had forgotten myself for a very long time. That's the thing, it is very easy to forget oneself and when it happens and you experience that initial shock of awakening you realise how little you appreciate or understand what it means to self-remember. Interesting. Remember that shock.
- I noticed yesterday, and less so today but then again odd times throughout the week gone, I'm swearing again. Also, never really strapped down the use of slang and catch-phrases and all that lazy stuff that we do with language. In fact, on consideration I reckon the best method for tackling that sort of thing would include an effort to expand one's vocabulary. In truth, a forty-day aim is always a difficult enterprise and this is no exception. I have probably lost a lot of the original impetus and focus. It has become more an effort to self-remember. On the other hand, the unstated aim which coincided with this effort has been most successful. One benefit of a long aim is that one gains a perspective over the journey taken. All those early struggles and dog fights would have no meaning now but they are part of a story and most certainly are meaningful because of that. Events are bracketed. There is a point in the work where life can be anything. I hardly think it matters any more what circumstances or events befall one. I even see how often I intentionally orchestrate events to create situations for myself that are bound by laws that are sure to grate and cause friction - there is something beautiful in willing bondage and knowing that one is liberated and free already and all these worldly things are merely exercises in non-identification. Literally, tests. I could learn my prayer a little better. I could give up yet more of the territory that I spent my entire life protecting. So much has been wasted. Conscious love has no requirements. Now, there is an all embracing rule if one is able to meet it. The future is above us. [150308]
