Getting what you want
Life is too short to waste and too long to endure.
Being on vacation gives one time to ponder deep thoughts, and right now I need to focus on the small steps I can take to improve my life. Because, despite what you might think, not everything in my garden is sunshine and flowers. Sometimes the flowers wilt, and often the sky is grey.
I’m pretty certain I know who I truly am and what I want, up to and including defining and fulfilling my life purpose, but how do I make it all happen in ways that are congruent with me and acceptable to the important others in my life?
It would seem to be about courage, having faith in myself, and really taking positive actions – however difficult the warrior’s path may seem that’s the way I need to go. It’s time to get more clarity and investigate the important commitments in this present period in my journey.
I need to stop acting emotionally, because my emotions are seldom under control. Instead I should act intellectually because I have, and can use, all the accumulated information / knowledge to get exactly what I want, need, and desire. That’s not always going to be a comfortable process.
But, you know what? I am much happier, and work better when I am well outside of my comfort zone. For example I should have gone parasailing in Turkey, instead of just taking pictures of it.
–
Jack Collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
I will do this next year
Tunes on Tuesday ~ Tina Turner
The harder I try, the better I get.
I may never ride bareback again ~ it’s much harder than it looks.
Please watch and listen responsibly.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
If you want to be a better man,
try reading M. Scott Peck’s ,
On Being Psychic
Almost everyone is comfortable with intuition,
almost nobody is really comfortable with psychic power.
the eyes are windows to the soul
For most of my adult life I have had an uncanny ability to read people, to instantly understand moods and situations, to know that someone is lying to me. Over the past few years I have been in a long distance relationship, and without even speaking to her or chatting with her, I generally know what’s going on with my friend in California. She can wake me from a deep sleep just by thinking about me. If it involves me or my Californian friend, then sometimes I know what is probably going to happen in the future.
These things are not explainable by natural laws, until you get into the world of quantum physics where things like spooky connections, (quantum entanglement), are the norm and not the exception.
I firmly believe that thinking and feeling beings are also affected by spooky connections, and that true psychic abilities exist. Dogs can detect cancer and predict earthquakes~ how?
For example; my personal astrologer knows me and knows all about me, even though we have never met, and the most important information I have ever given her is the date, time, and place of my birth. When I say she knows me it’s almost as though she has bugged my apartment and has cameras watching everything I do. She also predicts my future with uncanny accuracy.
I truly believe that I am also cursed with psychic abilities. Over the past few days I have stopped suppressing my unnatural intuition and allowed free rein to any sixth sense or second sight I may have. It’s already got me into trouble with my Californian friend.
Also, allowing psychic forces to manifest themselves is driving a very strong need for self-improvement and self-development deep within me. Mostly this drive includes the following weird stuff;
- a need to eat less meat
- a very low tolerance of overeating and eating rich foods
- a total repulsion of processed food and junk food
- a total intolerance to booze
- a strong desire to explore, new places, new situations, new people
- an inability to sit still, I continually need to be doing stuff
- my creativity has exploded into fascinating areas
- utter intolerance of procrastination and being late
- a very low tolerance for things that I think and feel are wrong
- utter fascination with self-improvement and self-development
- a need to more deeply connect with my Muse / Goddess / Spiritual Guide
Some say that the Cosmos is filled with unseen energy vibrations. And that what we think, feel, and desire are driven by this cosmic energy. All I know is that it’s better for me if I never tell anyone that I can read them like a book.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
ancient philosophers and modern quantum physicists believe that Time is not a straight line
time is curved ~ the past, present, and future run in parallel
must I always be alone?
the basic nature of a man is constructive, faithful, and trustworthy
If you have been following this blog, you will know that, over the past few years, circumstances, and my own stubborn nature, converged with my incipient depression to create a weird and unsustainable view of life for me. Not only that, I was also suffering from vicious, undiagnosed, and untreated Borderline Personality Disorder, (BPD), and that blessed me with paranoia and a morbid fear of abandonment.
Add those things together and what happened was that I became an agoraphobic, anti-social, celibate, friendless, psychotic recluse.
My door stayed locked, I seldom left my apartment, I avoided meeting people, the telephone remained unanswered, and I deleted unread any emails I received. Quite honestly, I may as well have been dead as to live that kind of non-life.
It took years, and I do mean years, for me to begin to break out of my self-made prison.
My escape started because I like to write, I wasn’t writing anything, and so I went to a writers’ group, met a few people, and even spoke to them without my being stabbed, attacked, denigrated….. And then I started to write this blog ~ and trust me to begin with it was terrible. Yet, an amazingly articulate woman in California found something that she liked in the way I wrote. And, as things happen, we became long-distance, online friends.
Those of you who have been in a long-distance relationship will know that it’s fraught with problems, and my friendship with this cool Californian woman is probably no better or worse than most relationships that started on-line. As you would expect from a guy with Borderline Personality Disorder in their background, I became obsessed with her, had unrealistic expectations, and did stupidly impulsive things. I was not constructive, reliable, nor trustworthy. None of that was helpful.
My good fortune is that I spent some time with a therapist, my doctor, and a psychiatrist. The general consensus of their opinion was that I had been suffering from BPD, but I was mostly recovered ~ at the time that was all news to me, (I even had to look up what the hell Borderline Personality Disorder was).
But, if I was mostly recovered I could start to live my life the way I wanted, and not the way a serious mental illness was telling me to exist.
Ergo, I am on a journey of self-awareness, self-discovery, self-development, and self-improvement. Now I mostly say and do what I think is right, and those that don’t like it can just feck off and have a nice day, and please don’t keep in touch. That new and more assertively honest attitude of mine has ruffled a few feathers ~ but I’m never going back to being that agoraphobic, anti-social, celibate, friendless, obsessive, psychotic recluse.
Maybe I need to find some new friends, and maybe I’ll be alone again for a while.
Some say that a friend in need is a friend indeed. And that you should choose your friends wisely. All I know is that I’d rather be alone than have fair-weather friends.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
at least I have a friend in Marmaduke
and he’s always ready for anything
The Shipping Forecast
I must go down to the sea again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
and all I ask is a tall ship, and a star to steer her by…..
At 05:20 each morning the haunting notes of Lillibullero announce the beginning of the shipping forecast on my wireless. Weather reports and forecasts for the seas around the coasts of the British Isles, it’s as reliable as Death and Taxes, and as accurate as an atomic clock. The shipping forecast has to be accurate, sailors lives depend upon it. It’s all about the wind, the sea, the sky, and the clouds.
The shipping forecast has been made available to sailors for the past 151 years, (except during wartime when weather was a military secret), and has been broadcast on the wireless since 1911. In more than 100 years the BBC has only failed to broadcast the forecast once, on 30 May 2014, when due to a technical fault listeners heard the BBC’s World Service instead.
The 31 sea areas reported always come in exactly the same order. Mostly I mentally tune out the reports and forecasts for such places as Southeast Iceland, Faeroes, Fair Isle, Viking….. But I really listen up when the announcer intones Cromarty, Forth, Tyne, Dogger….. because that includes ‘my’ sea area, and as my garret is just 100 yards from the sea I get whatever weather the shipping forecast says is expected.
Utterly reliable, honest, dependable, accurate, and a little old-fashioned, the Shipping Forecast is a rock of stability in an ever-changing world, and I’m probably the only person I actually know that listens to it.
I should learn from the Shipping Forecast. I firmly believe that what women want most in a long-term partner are exemplified by the qualities of that daily radio broadcast; reliability, honesty, dependability, accuracy in thought, word, and deed ~ and maybe a little sense of old-fashioned style.
Some say that women want spontaneity, excitement, adventure, really cool things. And, that most women want guys who pick up the restaurant bill, arrange the vacations and buy the tickets, and who will go to wild parties and pretend to enjoy them. All I know is that when the shit hits the fan women want a guy they can rely on to keep them safe, a guy as dependable as the Shipping Forecast.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talk
the cold grey North Sea is often a very dangerous place to be
Lucky Jack?
Only a fool will let miserable situations run on from year to year.
Despite everything, there have been some dark clouds over my head. Ergo yesterday, on a whim, I took a train ride to the nearest big city to do a little shopping.
More than just going shopping yesterday, and buying whatever took my fancy; in a few weeks I’m going to New Mexico to attend a ‘new-age’ retreat, and I’ve just booked a week on the Algarve for over the Christmas Holidays. That Christmas trip will be my 6th vacation this year. How fortunate is that?
Oft times I tell you of my woes, bemoaning my luck, revealing the darker parts of my psyche ~ and yet there are so many others who are far worse off than I. Even in this moderately wealthy country, this green and pleasant land that is England, much misery abounds. There are those who struggle to find the next penny, let alone have the cash and freedom to just take off whenever they feel like it.
And, in America, that Land Of The Free there are more people living on the streets than a supposedly civilised country should countenance. Some say those people are just down on their luck ~ some bad luck America.
Without revealing too many confidences; yesterday I had to give a friend enough money for petrol, (gas), to allow her to visit her son who had been rushed into hospital. Even some of my friends aren’t as fortunate as I.
Maybe I want so much that I aim too high, and just going off shopping, or taking a vacation, is ultimately less than satisfying for me. Those foreign trips may put me under a different sky, but I still often feel alone and unsatisfied. Perhaps this is because I have unreasonable expectations, or that I am acting with selfishness, or it may be that I am not living a mindful life anyway.
One hope is that my upcoming New Mexico trip will give me some new psychological tools to put in my bag. Another is that as I become more self-aware and more self-confident, I will be able to look at my life, my relationships, my wants, needs, desires, and dreams in a more honest and mindful way.
Some say it’s not what you keep that matters, it’s what you are prepared to leave and lose. And, that if you have doubts about people it’s time to walk away. All I know is that the harder I work at things, the luckier I get.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
Living on the streets is not much fun
Through a Glass, Darkly
From Hell’s heart I can almost see future’s truth.
~
as in a winter mirror
I perceive my soul
shadowed not clearly
reflected never whole
my world nearly gone
the invisible and unholy
through a glass, darkly
I see the eternal terror
of living without her
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
if you’re walking through Hell,
keep going.
Project: Jack Collier
I you try you risk failure, if you don’t you ensure it.
In order to truly become a better man I’ve had to fall back on some of my past strengths and abilities. Back in the day, I was paid stupid amounts of money to invent, develop, organise, and run major projects ~ ergo I’ve decided that I should treat my becoming the better man as a project. Think about it, it sort of makes good sense.
It is less about becoming a better person, and more of being better, as a person. ~ J.R. Rim
This self-improvement, and self-development project would seem to have the following elements;
- Embrace change to avoid slipping back into my old, negative patterns of behaviour.
- Have more confidence and self-reliance in my own innate abilities.
- I should always speak up for myself, and always speak the truth, strive to communicate well with others, especially with those I care for.
- Keep my close relationships in focus, neither neglect the people I care about, nor have unrealistic expectations of them.
- Conversely, have increasingly ambitious expectations of myself, and what I will be able to achieve.
- Get some balance and stability into my life ~ and I may need a lot of help with this.
- Remain grounded, balanced, and in control of my thoughts, feelings, and actions.
- Be in touch with the Universe and accepting of the realities in every area of my life
- Develop the endurance to plan and successfully achieve long term wants, needs, goals, desires, dreams, and ambitions.
- Get fitter and healthier so that I have the controlled energy to make the fullest success of Project: Jack Collier.
Written down like that it seems I have a lot to work to do, and I’m certain that if I thought harder I could add more bullet points to that list. But, 10 difficult things to work on is more than enough for now.
My Life is changing day to day, sometimes in small ways and sometimes in quite scary ways. I need to find my path forward, and be the captain, master, and director of my own life.
It’s not about taking control of my life in the sense that I am trying to control everything and everyone around me, it’s about me deciding what it is that I really want, and then striving with everything I have to get it. I I really want something, I should let nothing stand in my way. My life is a reflection of my choices, and how I use my strengths and abilities to achieve success.
The goal of life purpose is not what you will create, but what it will make you into for creating it. ~ Shannon L. Alder.
Some say that success is getting what you want. And that happiness is wanting what you get. All I know is that my strength will not come from winning, my strength will be the result of trying very hard.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
parasailing was so far outside of my comfort zone that I didn’t try it
I should have
Confessions and Mistakes
How many bad decisions seemed like a good idea at the time?
Over the years I’ve made some really bad decisions. From time to time I got angry and subsequently did some reprehensible things I now regret. I have reacted with nasty spite when I should have stayed calm, and I’ve felt resentful for no good reason, which usually turned me into a dangerous Mr. Hyde or a rabid black dog.
And when he was good he was very, very good, but when he was bad he was horrid. ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Not every time things went badly pear-shaped was my fault. Not every person I’ve hurt was an innocent bystander. Some of the people I’ve had uncharitable thoughts about actually deserved my condemnation. And there have been some people I wouldn’t cross the road to spit on. But, and here’s the thing, all the time I was an angry, judgemental, resentful, dangerous bastard person, I was still suffering from Borderline Personality Disorder, and / or, Bipolar Disorder. I was always afraid, and I was always running away.
Add the whole lot together, all the anger, resentments, mental illness, and it’s not surprising that I used to be hypercritical, lacking in understanding, and totally unwilling to accept anyone who didn’t measure up to my warped standards. It’s not surprising that from time to time I could hurt the ones I love. Sometimes the only things I was good at was causing pain and heartache.
It only takes one word to hurt a woman, a matter of seconds, one stupid, impatient sting of the whip. But winning back her trust takes years. And sometimes there isn’t the time. ~ Nina George
I have actually made a list of all the people I believe I have hurt over the years, (that’s the difficult step 8 in 12 step programmes), and thought about the what, why, when, how, where, and if of making amends to those people. Of my original list I’ve crossed off some names, because I’m not a saint, so I’m not making amends to everyone I’ve wronged. And, I’ve underlined some other names, of women I really do need to make immediate, meaningful, and lasting amends to. (my Goddess Aphrodite and The Girl Riding Shotgun spring to mind.) But as the quote from Nina George says, sometimes rebuilding trusting relationships takes years.
I have spoken in haste too often, spoken from negative and dark emotions too often, and been thoughtless too often. But, the recent paradigm shift that I experienced from being way outside of my comfort zone for a week should mean that I don’t make those enraged mistakes again.
Some say there is no such thing as a mistake or a bad decision. And that the consequences of a really bad decision are a learning opportunity. All I know is that if I go off the rails there is going to be a painful disaster, and someone will get hurt ~usually including me.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
Nobody likes to be with a dangerous jerk.
Be that guy, and be alone in the dark.
Empowerment
Don’t be satisfied with how things once were, unfold a new story.
In the last few days a great deal has changed for me. Circumstances of my own choosing forced me well outside of my comfort zone, and made me escape a prison of my own making. And coming down the pike like a runaway a great deal of transition is heading right for me.
It is time for me to embrace a life path that is more true to who I am, and the grounded, enlightened, successful man I want to be. Now is the hour for me to grow in courage and mental strength ~ no longer allowing my doubts and fears to undermine my dreams, desires, hopes, and plans for the future. Now is the time for me to be who I truly am deep inside.
You have the freedom to be yourself, your true self, here and now, and nothing can stand in your way. ~ Richard Bach
That means ridding myself of the emotional burdens of the past. It means ceasing to be reckless with the feelings of others. Ceasing to be negligent when it comes to accepting, cherishing, nurturing, understanding, and supporting those I care for. And it means embracing harmony, strength, and fortitude. All the mistakes I made in the past are now just learning tools for the future. Each time I fell off the rails and turned into Mr. Hyde are salutary lessons and cautionary tales ~ reminding me that those dark places and negative feelings are to be avoided and not encouraged.
Hard work bears fruit, and the near future will be bright for me and those I care for as a result of my hard work in the past paying off. I have tried so hard to be the best version of me that I could possibly become, that I have earned the right to enjoy life now that I can finally see the results of my efforts. My ‘new’ personality, attitudes, demeanour, heart , and soul means that I can express myself with greater clarity, confidence, and strength today and into the future.
My core values, the things that really matter to me, are what I will live by today, tomorrow, and in each and every day to come. I need to spend some time in walking meditation to reflect more seriously on my ethics and ethos, to truly identify what I am willing to tolerate, and what I will just not accept. It is so ingrained in the habits of most people, (myself included), to put everyone else’s needs first, and then forget to take care of themselves. Yet if we don’t take care of our own needs, our physical, mental, and spiritual health, we cannot grow nor prosper nor be truly happy. Today and into the future I will take care of myself first, and then nurture and support those I care for to the very best of my abilities.
Un-winged and naked, sorrow surrenders its crown to a throne called grace. ~ Aberjhani.
Some say I am worthy of a life full of friends, loving connections, enlightenment, and spiritual empowerment. And that there will be a new love in my life, either platonic or romantic. All I know is that I am not just going to sit back and wait for things to happen ~ the cosmos does not roll out a red carpet for anyone.
~
jack collier
jackcollier7@talktalk.net
A new day has come.
JackCollier7 
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