Sunday Story...Goats Head Soup

Sunday Story…Goats Head Soup


“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” Viktor Frankl

In every one of our lives we have things that are part of our lives, our traditions. If we don’t have Nana’s cranberry salad it just isn’t Thanksgiving. Or ham at Easter. Or French Toast on Christmas morning. These are the things that create the holiday or the tradition in our mind. If they are not there it just doesn’t ring true.


I hate split pea soup. There is something about the color and consistency and taste that just rubs me the wrong way. Now I have made other recipes with split peas, including soup like substances but there is just something about that soup…this is all in my mind. I know lots of people (most of my family) that love split pea soup. It’s good for you, healthy and nutritious. And I hate it.


I have created a reality in my mind that places split pea soup somewhere in the same neighbor hood as rotten meat. Just plain bad. Is this true? Objectively, the soup is just the soup. Not good or bad…just soup. But I have made it mean something else entirely.


I am a meaning-making-machine. It is the one freedom that can never be taken from me. You can lock up my body. Force the most sub-human circumstances upon me, torture me with inhumane treatment but ultimately I get to make it mean what I choose to make it mean. You can not make me create meaning for myself. Only I can do that.

So what are you making your life mean? What did yesterday mean to you? What about the circumstances of your birth? What does that mean? If you really think about it, objectively again, it just happened…you were born. 10 or 20 or 30 years later you may be railing at a God who allowed you to be born into an abusive household. Or you are wondering why you didn’t get born into the rich family, or the richer family, or why you had to starve for 1 week out of every 4.

R. Crumb had a comic character in his comic books called “Mr. Natural.” Mr. Natural had a long white beard, dressed in a long caftan looking robe, wore sandals and was the ultimate guru hippy looking character. And the question, the cosmic question, he was always asked was “What does it all mean, Mr. Natural?” He rarely answered the question…just smiled broadly like he knew the secret but also knew you knew if you just listened a little. Sometimes he just “kept on truckin.” But when he did answer the question the answer was this: “It don’t mean sh#@.” And right he is. It does not mean anything until you make it mean something.

As you think so your life shall go. Do think you are happy? Unhappy? Lots of friends? No friends? Depressed? Hate winter? Love winter? For whatever you want to find you can find lots of evidence for it one way or the other. Do you see abundance or scarcity…love or hate? How is it people in the same circumstances can have such different experiences? If we all sit at the same table, eat the same food, shouldn’t we get the same sustenance? How can my experience be so different than yours? How can I hate split pea soup and you love it? I get to make it mean what I choose to make it mean.


Your life right now looks to you exactly as you have decided to make it look. You have made certain decisions and done things, said things, went places, all of which put you right here right now reading this particular thing. There are billions of documents on the net available to you right now. And you are reading this one (I am honored by the way). So how is it over how ever many years you have been alive, over how ever many decisions you have made over those years that puts you right here and right now reading this thing I have written for you. Because I did you know…I wrote this just for you. And yes it is written to you. So…take a moment right now and experience the wonder of all the confluence of events that took place for you to be here now.


Pretty amazing, really. What is your life going to look like 10 years from now? How about 10 minutes from now? What decisions are you going to make, what thoughts will you think that will create the meaning you want your life to have? You can control your thoughts. You can create the meaning you wish to create. You can create the life you are living whether you know it or like it…this is the ultimate, the radical responsibility that we must accept to really see the evolution, no the Revolution of our lives. We must accept that we created this life…from the circumstances of our birth, the parents we were born to, the friends we have made, the enemies that have created havoc and drama in our lives, the career choices, the schooling , the marriages, even the children.



Life is fragile at times…one misstep, one zig instead of a zag, a one degree course correction will take you to a completely different destination. Yet you created it, whether by conscious decision or unconscious, it was all you. So what are you going to create tomorrow? You life is a piece of stone waiting for you to sculpt a masterpiece. You can hate it or you can love it. It is just a life until you make it mean something.


“Challenging the meaning of life is the truest expression of the state of being human.”
--Viktor Frankl

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...Awake and Dreaming

Sunday Story…Awake and Dreaming

“Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, if I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take”

I died last night. And the night before. And I will die again tonight and tomorrow night as well. Every night I die. So far I have managed to be reborn every morning. But there will be a day sometime in the future when I will not see the dawn. This is true for each and every one of us. And from the day I came into the world I have been dying.

The fear of death seems to be a great motivator for so many people…”My doctor said if I don’t lose 50 pounds, I’m going to die.” So you go on a diet and start exercising like crazy because you are going to die if you don’t. You are going to die anyway whether you are 50 pounds overweight or not. Maybe what your Doctor should say is…”if you want to live a life of optimum health and fitness lose 50 pounds.” But that would not really get you off your rear end and on the road to health and fitness.

Let’s be honest…if you do not know smoking is bad for you and the people around you, you are living under a rock. If you do not know that eating highly processed food full of sugar, sodium and trans fat is bad for you are living under the rock next to the smoker. We all know these things by now, at least in this part the world. Yet people are still smoking and dying of smoking related diseases by the thousands. Being fat affects your entire being...from your mental outlook to your ability to move in the world yet people are dying every day from obesity related diseases. I guess the Nile (denial) is not just a river in Egypt.

Or is there something else at work? As humans we are in the pursuit of pleasure and running from suffering. It is part of our condition, part of our Being. But lung cancer is painful (so I have heard anyway). So does the pleasure of smoking outweigh the pain of the disease? Does the pleasure of eating a Twinkie outweigh the disaster of diabetes? Does sitting on the couch for hours count for more pleasure than the pain of watching your children play without you because you are sitting down with your oxygen bottle? Because you were too lazy, or unmotivated, or addicted to change your behavior? What?? Are you serious? Quit making lame excuses and be honest with yourself and the rest of the world…
YOU DON’T BELIEVE YOU ARE GOING TO DIE! Dying happens to someone else. Diabetes happens to someone else. Cancer is reserved for someone else. So and so smoked and drank for 80 years and died in their sleep. If you really believed you were going to die you would live today like it was your last day…because it might be. No, really it might be your last day on earth. Today may be your day to die. Or not. Maybe you are going to be the exception to the rule...the person whose body lives forever.

I know I am going to die. I need to be strong and healthy today to enjoy today. I want my mind to be sharp, my body to be in shape and my spirit to be fresh and clear. I want to be able to have the gratitude of waking tomorrow with all the wonder of a newborn, fresh and clean in the world. I want today to be the day that I clean up the wrongs I have done, because I might not have a chance tomorrow. Today I eat the food that nourishes my body and soul. Today I move my body through time and space in ways that feel good to me. I speak kindly to people because I don’t want to leave their last impression of me sour. I feed my mind uplifting messages that create new thoughts in me and have me thirsting for even more.

The fear of death? I think not. Maybe you are afraid of life? Afraid of the sweet pleasure of a fresh picked apple, the scent of lavender in the field, the sunset every evening, the scent of a newborn. Maybe you are afraid of the gratitude you must have to really live your life full out, in a state of optimum health and fitness. Health and fitness is about gratitude, about living a life with purpose, about being calm and centered in the universe, at peace with my choices. Quit being afraid of living. Quit making choices that kill you in mind, body and soul. Get off the couch and start moving, figure out how to create food that serves you, turn off the incessant negative noise box in the room and start listening to the song birds, the laughter of children and the rocks move.

Pursue life. Pursue life affirming choices, not death. Stop grabbing death and calling it pleasure. Stop making choices based on the fear of death. It is irrational. You are going to die. What you do between reading this and that moment will be everything. Decide to live. Decide you are going to enjoy every moment; you are going to live a meaningful life. Which is simple really…you get to determine your meaning. We are meaning making machines. This is what we do as humans. We create meaning out of our lives. So…what meaning are you living right now? What have you made your actions mean? What is tomorrow going to mean? More of the same? Or will you get going and create new meaning, a new story to tell yourself?

Today is a good day to…live.

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...Take This Job

Sunday Story…Take This Job

For the last 15 years I have put on my uniform every day and stood in front of people of various ages, sizes, and backgrounds and tried to teach them something about life through the lens of Martial Arts. I want them to understand the power of doing small things repeatedly adding up to big things. I want them to understand the magnitude of intention in their life. To know that success often lies right around the corner from where you want to quit. I want them to understand that life isn’t just about them and their small corner of the world but it is bigger than that. That the only time you are defeated is when you stop getting up. That you can create meaning in your life by simply deciding to create meaning and the meaning you create defines your life. That super heroes walk among us every day and they don’t wear capes or have alter-egos. I hope to impart some knowledge of the value of fitness, diet and rest on their well being. I live my life as if you were looking at me for that inspiration.

I am a miserable failure.

I battle the twin foes of apathy and cultural decadence. A culture that says it is OK to want more than you need. A culture that permits children to eat edible non-food products and advertise those products to them mercilessly while lying about the healthful nature of those products. A culture that makes it OK for adults to take a pill to sleep, another to wake up, another to feel better and another to get it up when necessary. And sell those products in a mass medium that actually creates diseases that never existed before. A culture that promotes rudeness, crass attitudes, rewards bad behavior and glorifies laziness. And no one seems to care.

Actually it seems people like me are the problem. That I and other like me are some strange insects flitting around the head of the elephant waiting to get smashed for their impudence. When I exhort people to exercise more, eat less, clean up their diet...I get:
It’s too hard…It hurts…Why? No one else does it…I can’t stay motivated…I’m bored…It’s not fun...Eating healthy food doesn’t work for me…If I quit smoking I will get fat (better to be a skinny corpse)…If I quit drinking all my friends will leave (great friends who want you to pickle yourself)…Blah blah blah blah

Enough already! I used to smoke. Quitting was difficult. I used to drink---a lot. Not doing it as much was difficult. I used to eat an apple fritter every morning for breakfast…Imagine…an apple fritter, a cigarette and a cup of coffee for breakfast! Changing those habits was difficult. Making time for a workout everyday was trying. Putting good things in my mind required an effort and work. Shutting off the TV was taxing. All of this stuff is simple. Not Easy, just simple.

But you know what? Hard is watching your child die from starvation. Hard is going to work in the fields at age 5 to help support your family. Hard is not going to school because you have no shoes. Hard is walking miles every day to get fresh water for your family. Hard is a lot of things but it isn’t what we think of as hard. And hard certainly isn’t working out or eating right

How many times this week did you say you were hungry? Or that you or someone else was starving? Guess what? You and I are so far from starvation that it is probably not possible. As a matter of fact we are so far from real hunger that we should abolish those words from our vocabulary.

It hurts? Working out doesn’t hurt, eating right doesn’t hurt, quitting smoking doesn’t hurt. Hurt is losing a limb to gangrene. Hurt is starving to death. Hurt is being left for dead on a battlefield somewhere. Hurt is the pain a parent has when their child dies a slow death from a preventable disease. Hurt is what happens in a death camp.

How about bored? Boring is being locked in a closet for days. Boring is sitting, hoping, and waiting for 3 days for a bus to take you to visit a dying relative. Bored is having nothing to read, no one to talk to and no hope for any change.

I am rich. You are rich. The poorest among us are richer than 98% of the world. We have so many opportunities and abilities and things that we lose sight of the many gifts and presents we have been given. What are you doing with the gifts, skills and talents you have been given? Complaining about the stuff you don’t have? No time? You got the same 168 hours I got this week…as a matter of fact everyone in the world got the same 168 hours last week. Those hours are the one thing you can never get back. Ever. They are now gone forever. How did you spend them? How much time did you spend complaining about stuff you do or don’t have, the spouse you do or don’t have, or the things you did or didn’t do. A minute, an hour, a day…how long really? Much too much whatever it was.

What am I going to do about it? I am going to put my uniform on tomorrow, stand in front of you and teach, talk, and act like you are going to get it. Because you are, I know you are. And you are going to join me in fray, in the noble effort and together we will change the world. Won’t we.

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...Toxicity

Sunday Story…Toxicity

I, you, we live in a toxic world. We are constantly surrounded by toxicity. Bad news barrages our brains. Workplace shootings. School shootings. Bad news accompanied by terrible images hit our television screens and enter our homes on a daily basis. Economic news just drags us down and down.
All Toxic.

Your friends who complain and moan about their jobs, finances, or lack or either one. Toxic.
You, looking in the mirror, complaining about your weight, height, teeth, or some other superficial complaint. Toxic.
You, looking in the mirror, complaining about your lack of male/female companionship and feeling sorry for yourself. Toxic.

How much toxicity are you going to allow in your life? Some people seem to love toxicity. They start their day with a doughnut (toxic) after listening to an hour of bad news (toxic) while they get ready to go to work. Complain and moan about the traffic while on the way to work (toxic), listening to news/talk radio while getting to work (toxic). After arriving and spending the first 30 minutes on site complaining and gossiping about all the goings on over the weekend (toxic) you finally sit down to work and your attitude in the dumps (toxic). How much of this are you willing to allow in your life? Why don’t you change it?

Why ? Because it is hard. It is simple but it is not easy. And actually it is past not easy. It is hard. Change is hard folks. Transformation is painful. Think about a caterpillar…he spins a cocoon and enters it with faith that he will emerge on the other side newly. In the middle he turns to gray mush. In the end he might emerge as a butterfly and then again he might die. Transformation is work folks and it is hard work. That is why so many people stay on the couch. It is too hard to get up and get moving. Much easier to stay down and bury yourself in toxicity and negativity.

Take gossip for example. Gossip or talking about other people without them present is a bad habit. And it is very toxic. Not to the object of your gossip by the way…toxic to you and the other person you are gossiping with. The two of you are colluding to create an environment of secrecy and hurt for your selves. The two of you are joining a society designed to judge and ostracize others. This is toxic to the 2 of you. Because you and your partner in toxicity are joined in a committee to exclude and disconnect from another being. A being that has only done the best they could do given their circumstances and abilities.

How about the toxic nature of the food you are putting in your body? Every day my students do pushups if they have not eaten vegetables yet when they see me. Every day, I mention how important it is to eat right to my younger students. It is one of the things most of us can control…our diets and what we put in our bodies. Over the years I have fasted, been a vegetarian, ate nothing but chicken and rice for weeks. I have suffered in the abnegation of food and epicurean pleasures. Today, I eat what I want when I want. I have no need to suffer for my desire to be “in shape”. I eat to live not live to eat. I am in control of my nutrition and decide how and when suffering is in order.

What about those people around you who are so toxic? The drama kings and queens, the chronic complainers and whiners, and the energy drains who so love to suck the juice from you? What are you going to do about them? And what if they are really close to you, maybe they are your spouse, your parents, your children, or your co-worker? You cannot always just jettison them off the bus. Throw them over board so to speak… It really is considered in bad taste. Especially because they may have so many good things to offer in so many other areas. You get to tell them you don’t want to participate in their toxicity. You get to stand up for yourself and what you believe in. And you should believe gossip and “stinkin thinkin” simply don’t belong in your sphere of influence. Some of these people you are going to have to deal with. But it will be so much easier if you do it with kindness and compassion, realizing that that person is acting and reacting form some unmet needs and are feeling whatever insecurities that arise from those unmet needs.


Getting rid of external negativity and toxicity is simple and easy. Just turn the TV off!!! Turn the radio station to something uplifting … some music that stirs your soul in new and special ways. Replace the bad news with sources that proved positive and life enhancing messages. If the world blows up you will find out soon enough. Someone will call and tell you, guaranteed.

Get rid of the toxicity in our life. You will find it so hard to transform and evolve with a constant fight with toxic influences. Jettison people who refuse to stop gossiping. Turn off the negative news programs. Stop listening to other people tell you how bad things are. Stop listening to the man in the mirror who tells you all the negative things about yourself. Hang out with people who are positive and want you to succeed. Listen, watch, and participate in programs that are life enhancing and happy making. Eat good quality, organic food, well prepared and served with love. This will de-tox you fast. Eating well, sleeping well, and reading uplifting literature, training for something with goals. Surrounding yourself with positive people will all result in an attitude of gratitude, a positive mental outlook and an unbeatable smile, knowing your community has your back. Transform, be a butterfly, get through the gray mushy stage!!

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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Sunday Story...Doctor, My Eyes

Sunday Story…Doctor, My Eyes

Sometimes you can’t see the forest because of the trees. In other words, your “big picture” view is obscured by all the “little picture” details you are involved with day to day. What we are thinking, doing, and being today affects our reality tomorrow and further down the road. Our modern life is so involved with the minutiae of daily life that it is a small wonder that we can even consider life 10, 20 or 50 years down the road.

I read recently that we are educating our children for a world that does not exist yet, to do jobs that won’t exist for another 5 or 10 years. The top 10 in demand jobs in the world today did not exist in 2004, a mere 5 years ago. How about you? Are you ready for a world that does not exist yet? How will you survive in those uncharted waters?

Although the rate of information is doubling faster and faster with each passing year, there are some things that will be constant. Knowledge may increase. We may “know “more things than ever before, and have more information right at our fingertips, but there are a number of things that we need not worry about changing. The moral codes we live by are not going to change or shift. The ability to hold your center and do what is right is not going to change and your moral compass may be more important than ever. And the person with moral convictions and clear limits and boundaries will be more and more necessary in a world of shifting allegiances, extenuating circumstances and morality of the moment.

Your health and your ability to manage your well being will become ever more critical in tomorrow’s world. The choices you make today around what you eat, how and when you eat it, your exercise regimen, your mental state and the intellectual challenges you set forth, your spiritual ease will all have a hand in determining your happiness and well being in the years to come. These are choices we are making today. Those choices will have a direct correlation on who you are tomorrow, next year and 10 years from now.

You can choose to put good quality, organic locally grown food into your body or you can put pre-packaged, processed, edible non-food substances in your body. One will fill your body with energy and vitality and the other will contribute toward all the disease and malaise we suffer from in modern life. There is no triscuit tree, no candy bar bush, or no fast food field to pick from. Eat identifiable food---food you can identify the origins of, food that will bring the energy of life and sunshine and rain and the cycle of the earth to your body.

There is a thing called the yoga of taking food. This speaks to the awareness we all must have when we are putting things into our bodies. By maintaining present moment awareness we will be filling our bodies with the tools it needs to heal and grow for the future. When we take in food and drink we are, in essence, taking in the energy of the things we are putting in there. So keep in mind the importance of what you are putting in your body. Do I want this energy to be carried in my cells for the next decades or so? What will the substance I am about to ingest look like on me in 10 years? Will I be a processed piece of machinery? Or will I have maintained my inspiration from the earth and all the creatures of creation?

The same question goes for your mind, your intellectual stimulation. What are you putting in your mind? Who are you allowing in there? Are you listening to uplifting messages? Or are you listening to negativity, the droning drivel that calls itself news and information. Who you hang around with will have a direct effect on your mental state as well as the state of your intellect. Are you reading literature with an uplifting message or the National Enquirer? Are you watching educational television programming or Jerry Springer? Are you reading literature, recognized as well written and put together in a way designed to enlighten and edify or are you reading dime romance/western/horror throw-aways? The people we hang around with are not limited to those in our physical presence. It includes the people we let into our living room through the television. It includes the people we let into our mind when we are reading. It includes the music we are listening to. What is the message you are sending into your brain? Who is the gate keeper of your mind? You are the gate keeper and only you. Take responsibility for what and who you are letting into your thought process. Again, present moment awareness will carry us far in this pursuit.

Spiritually, are you connected to the divine? Are you in awareness of the wonders of the world? The truly amazing place we live every day. Again, present moment awareness will help you get there with this. Meditation and prayer are 2 ways to connect with the divine source that moves through us all. At the very least expressing gratitude for the gifts we have, however meager they may appear to be, is the quickest way to happiness. An attitude of gratitude will take you places that a million dollars could never hope to reach. An attitude of gratitude will have your inner landscape always in bloom, always sunny, and ever happy. Be thankful for what you have, for who you are and for the world around you.

What are your eyes seeing? What are you setting forth to be your reality in the world that will be unknown until it is known? These are exciting times…you get to create the life you want. So what do you really want? You better start deciding because you are going to get exactly what you want to get if you know what it is and truly believe you deserve it. Take a look into the future and find your world today.

Namaste
John
“Teaching Focus, Inspiring Transformation”
www.martialartsnevada.com

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