Life vs enlightenment

God help you guys now I've got broadband- this thing's on all day and I just have to come in and click to write here instead of dialling up, waiting, waiting a bit more and then loading the create page. This took me three seconds just now instead of maybe five minutes plus. In absolute time, not a lot, but as a proportion it's hundreds of times quicker (as I've added the few minutes to dial and connect to the extra seconds to load each page, for the pedants out there).

Anyway, I've done little of note today but used the time at home for one client, mowed the lawn, washed yet more sheets (lot 3 from 4 I suspect, boring but can't be selective in my reporting), and nearly finished my first pen and watercolour picture which will be posted here next week. I also said about seeing a friend regularly since my regular haunt closed due to emigration. Instead I see my mother or grandma most nights, they're both alone as well and are now only too pleased to see me, so as long as I've got someone to visit I won't mind too much not following my previous routine of 30 years.

Otherwise I'm practising not looking ahead, it's a lifetime's bad habit and only leads to worry, and achieves absolutely nothing. I have to pull myself up every time and stop when I catch myself doing it and most of the things I fear the most don't happen and vice versa, the worst things are nearly always a surprise (as are the best). We can't control any of it, and becoming fed up with such chaos is probably the reason many others like myself are drawn towards the promises of enlightenment. I've crossed a barrier there as well, thank goodness. My last barrier left is believing it exists at all. Like anyone born missing a sense, you only trust others have something you have no concept of, and hearing the peace and silence behind our being is the nearest we know tells me even less as why would anyone want 'nothing' all the time? So it can't really be that, just a bad description of something almost impossible to put into words. So any teacher is judged not on the results I get from their teaching, but whether there is really something they are teaching at all. And that means I now have no doubts about my own teacher's teaching, as as long as enlightenment is a real state, I won't get there any quicker with anyone else. What I follow now is the best way for me and has unloaded all my intellectual baggage previously collected around it, as if unless I could juggle all these weird concepts at once it couldn't happen. But that's not the case. You experience it with your awareness, not your mind. That's all I'm told you need to get to that state, and add myself 'if it exists'.
Much like the alleged alien abductees I interview, there's no more evidence for that than enlightenment. In the case of the aliens, if they are really abducting people they choose to hide and we can't do a thing about it. But enlightenment has been described in the same way from the first vedic texts thousands of years ago. And meditation and weightlifting produces gradual results with regular practice, and I presume whatever some teachers say, it's the same with enlightenment. You can't give up if you've started that path as there may be no signs at all despite working at it for years. Nick Roach says it took him 13 years of regular practice to reach a constant state, though shifts occurred before that. So if my own teacher had to struggle and not give up for 13 years with one teacher, that's the best example I've got to follow, and though I've followed other teaching for 8 years I've only focused on this for a year so may have some way to go. A little shift would be nice, (all the coincidences are meant to be part of it, though fascinating don't make me feel any different), and if I had a few I'd be in no doubt what lay ahead, and would probably be almost there anyway at that stage.

So, my next project in life as opposed to inner work is earning some money. I've been more or less broke now since May, and I'm looking ahead and realising something has to be done as nothing is guaranteed ahead. No full time work for me, long past that malarkey and would heartily recommend a three day basic week for everyone, especially as when we had it 30 years ago people crammed a week's work into a few days and little time was wasted as a result, proven by production figures. House prices of course would have to fall as if everyone earned around 40% less the whole economy would have to shift in response, but unemployment would compensate by sucking in many more workers to fill the space left by increasing the workforce by 40%. And yes, I did study economics just long enough to justify these calculations. They both work and show radical policies are there but inertia keeps us in the same practices as in the industrial revolution more or less. Estonia has just brought in a 17% rate of income tax for everyone, and the admin savings alone plus the fact no one can avoid tax as there are no exemptions means they are now taking more than they did earlier. A few countries are closely watching and even a few of our own Tories are considering trying a similar thing. At present most jobs are 40-50 hours a week, and the few part time are for secretarial or other jobs only women with kids are expected to take, not for me. If all jobs were part time I'd do more or less anything I was able to do as long as it was easy to get to, as that's what I did till I was getting on for 40. But in the real world if you don't fit in, you fuck off. Literally. These exploitative wankers who are stuck in the rut of conformity see a male graduate apply for a part time clerical job, piss themselves and while throwing the screwed up application in the bin, laugh out loud 'Fuck off!'. This happened to me about 400 times between jobs in the last 13 years or so, and as now am desperate for money all the ghosts of the past have come back to haunt me. Of course capability has nothing to do with it. I'm well marketable for writing, as well as having pictures in a gallery, as long as I do it for nothing, and I've only rejected playing the piano for money as when I have it's taken all the fun out of something I do for pleasure. But ask for money up front to do exactly the same thing (as I have been for a couple of years) and you're back to 'fuck off' territory. This also applies in counselling, where a sizeable proportion of job ads are for volunteers. I literally know no other profession (minimum two-three years part time study, average degree plus three years part time plus continuing education) where you'd even see one ad for voluntary workers- dentists, accountants, can you imagine? You're on a low income, don't worry, we'll give you two gold crowns for £20, I'll put back something into society as I earn (as dentists do) £100,000 a year. Now it's my turn, fuck off!