Walking Across Fire

Doc says my blood pressure is a touch up.  Started taking yoga classes 2 days a week, to the gym another 2.  Dropped my sodium to almost none.  Upped meditation to twice a day.  It’s funny, lots of folks think I’m a pretty laid back dude.

I eat pretty well, sleep pretty well.  I thought my health was fine.  I guess this whole music career thing got to me more than I realized.  I mean, I knew I was uptight about it some, just didn’t realize enough to raise my blood pressure.  I need to relax, Man!

I’m shifting my focus for next year.  This year it was get 100 gigs, which I did.  I traveled to over 12 states and had a blast, but not always getting the sales I had hoped for.  As it was fun, it was also stressful.

This year I’m gonna go back to having a day job.  I can do computer programming from anywhere and it pays very well.  Probably shouldn’t have stopped, but, I so want to be a full time singer-songwriter, which, is still my goal.  It looks to me that approaching that goal a little slower might be healthier for me.  At least that’s the plan at this point.

Here’s what I learned about myself at this years’ family Thanksgiving gathering.  I still have work to do with jealousy and envy.  On leaving our annual Thanksgiving event, my wife said to me, “We’re the poorest ones here.”

Obviously, besides monetarily, that’s not true.  Kat and I live very rich lives.  But, I noticed the times folks talked about their good fortune and I felt bummed about my own situation instead of happy for them.  Don’t get me wrong, I am very happy my family sibs and cus’s are doing well.  I just also feel the place where my wife and I are “working with opportunities” at the present time.

Here’s what came to me about it, when I’m jealous or envious I am forgetting their good fortune is spiritual food to nourish me towards my success.  My jealousy and envy poisons the very food I could be feeding myself with.  So, I stopped, drank in their success and am presently allowing it to build strong dreams 12 ways (a take off on a very old “Wonder Bread” TV commercial).  I am much healthier for it.

I know I’ve heard that before, it was nice to recognize it for myself and remember that joy feeds joy and joy is a huge component of success.  And, I like being joyous; it’s more fun.

I have basically 2 mantras that drive my day-to-day, moment-to-moment experience.  They are: “What I Embody Manifests” and “Live a Life Worth Living”.  So, whenever I reflect on how I’m doing, which is almost once a day, I put it up against these 2 mantras.

The first, “What I Embody Manifests”, I believe to be the core of Christ’s teaching.  Embody love, I will manifest love in my life, embody peace, my life will be peaceful, embody joy, my life will be joyous.  He embodied all these principles and more, including kindness, connectedness and healing.

For myself, I have a lot of love in my life, quite a bit of joy, a good bit of kindness, connectedness and I’m most proud of my healing; that which I offer to others as well as myself.  I am the healthiest I have ever been in my life.  I could work on peace.  I want to be kinder.  I still deal with depression on occasion; way less than I ever have.  I want to develop my sense of abundance and freedom.  I still beat myself up on occasion; though, once again, less than ever.

By standing up and taking action in what I believe in, specifically the music I’ve created, I lead a life worth living.  More than that, I have remembered my key priority of loving my wife and kids, instead of being right, when it’s mattered most.  Not always immediately, but I come around way quicker than I used to. I am very grateful for that.  I am very proud for how I stand, in this moment, at the fire, taking the heat and moving forward.

To be honest, it’s been stressful at our house.  Embarking on a new career with so many unknowns has put pressure on my family and myself, some expected, some unexpected.  My learning curve has been steep.  But, I know the work I’m doing is important and given how my life has flourished since taking on the teachings of a God within and having that power to affect change in my life, I know that all I’m going through now is just my way of continuing my healing, my learning and growing and my life will continue to flourish.

What I hold for each and every one of you is that, you, too, Live A Life Worth Living.

I played at Riverbend Church in Austin, TX this Sunday and it was AWESOME!!  Everything there is huge, the church, the stage, the band, the sound, the screen, backstage, the message; it was all wonderful to be a part of.  And the best part: I wasn’t nervous at all.  I felt like I belonged there.

When I first arrived the band, which consists of more players and singers than I can count, were practicing another number.  I was met backstage by the stage manager, who had a stage hand bring me a wireless set up for my guitar.  They placed a wireless mike in the center of a stage that was bigger than the first floor of my house. 

When it was my turn, they listened to my song, “Divine Guidance”, once, Carlton, the music director, counted off and we played through it like they’ve been playing and singing it as long as I have.  The lyrics popped up on six different screens around the church, including one pointing back at me and one that was at least 2 stories tall and wide behind the band.  Exhilarating is an understatement, but also doesn’t come close to when we performed during the service.

The energy soared 10-fold. 1,300 folks leaped to their feet.  I was awestruck by my performance, the band and the audience reaction.  Certainly what one might call a peak experience.

My brother and his family, who were integral in setting up this date for me, said it was rare to see a standing O happen with that level of energy there.  Man, oh, man.  A guy could get spoiled playing gigs like that.

I’m writing today to cheer myself up.  I’ve had a hard couple of days.  Been on the phone a lot working on booking for next year.  Going slowly.  Working on a couple of new songs.  Going slowly.  Had a bunch of rejections.  Comes with the territory. 

Okay this isn’t the part where I cheer myself up. It’s the part where I state why I need cheering.  My wife’s been sick for over a month.  Our finances are extremely tight and we may have to sell our house.  My wife’s business is having some difficulties as well.

Okay, here comes the cheering up part.  It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood.  Besides the usual assortment of birds, we’ve got blue jays.  The cardinals are back.  There were at least 6 different species of birds at the feeder right outside our bedroom window this morning.

My son got a flat tire yesterday.  The same tire that went flat the day before, when he took it to a local place that charged him $15 to fix it.  He used the compressor in his car to fill it enough to take it to a different place, they fixed it, said the plug was leaking, wrote that on the receipt, he took the receipt to the first place and they gave him a full refund.  He was very proud of himself.  I am proud of him, too.  16 and learning his way in the world.

Got a call from a friend I hadn’t heard from in a while.  Just called to say hey and we set up a dinner date with him and his wife.  Kat and I like those guys and look forward to seeing them.

Getting better and better at relaxing myself to fall back to sleep when I wake up at night.  Twice last night I awoke and both times the technique I used put me right back to sleep.

My email program is finally sending an important email I’ve been trying to send for the past hour.  YAY!

I’m getting along with the folks I love and I have some exciting gigs coming up.  Life is good.  Man, stating gratitudes really does help.

My cousin called me to ask for help.  She’s moving into a new apartment, wasn’t going to be in town when her furniture arrived and asked me to meet the movers.  She said they’ll be there by 10AM tomorrow and it’ll only take a few hours.

I had a lot of work to get done, but, I wanted to help her, so I said yes.  The following morning, as I’m getting ready to leave, I get a call from the movers saying they’ll be ½ hour late.  As I’m running a few errands, I get another call from the movers saying they’re a little lost, so it’s now going to be an hour.  An hour later I get another call saying they’re lost.  I give them directions as I discover they are actually an hour and a half away.  By this time at the apartment.  I also discover that the battery on my cell phone is running low and I don’t have my charger with me.

I live a little over ½ hour from the apartment, so, running home and back seems silly.  I have no more errands to run, so I take a walk around the neighborhood.  I return about an hour later, get another call from the movers saying they got lost again, I once again, give them directions and learn they are still an hour away.  I sit down and meditate.  They finally arrive at 12:30PM.

The driver states it will take a little over an hour to unload and set up everything in the house.  We finished at 6:30PM.  The driver was right, it took a little over an hour, in the scope of a week, month, year or millennium.

Now, here’s the thing.  I am very well aware these type of favors can go this way and yet did not prepare properly.  If I had brought my charger, my guitar, my lyric book and a few other choice items, I could have been a happy camper, so, I really have no one else but me to blame for any misery I experienced.  I was a boy scout (yes, truly, I was), I know how to be prepared and yet I didn’t.  Another learning opportunity.   I’ll bet dimes to donuts I’m better prepared the next time I’m asked for one of these types of favors.

In case you’re wondering, these type of favors is anytime someone asks to use your time for something that must get done in a single day where how long it takes is not in the hands of the person asking the favor, so, when they tell you how long it will take, they really don’t know.  I don’t mind helping, I just like being clear with myself what’s really going on and being prepared for that.

My wife and I had dinner at a friend’s house Halloween.  Another couple we like to hang out with was there as well.  We’ve gotten together, the 6 of us, every few months for a couple of years now and we’re getting very comfortable with each other, which makes for deep and interesting conversation.

We spoke in depth about the differences between Eastern and Western Philosophy and disagreed a lot; also, agreed a lot, never heated, always fun.  We ate soy cheese pizza and an organic chocolate cake to die for.  The folks who hosted this gathering had turned their wood fireplace into a gas one and with a remote heated up the room wonderfully.  Very cool.  I’m sticking with wood, but, I still thought it was very cool.

I’ve never been a very social animal.  Mostly, I like to hermit.  I travel so much, interact with folks regularly, I like my down time.  I’m also very grateful to have these friends and look forward to our time together.

Kat and I host the next get together.  I’m cooking salmon, one of the few things I cook well.  They laugh at me about that, but I don’t care.  I really like salmon, and so do they.