Listening to Your Gut

So I think I have mentioned before that I attend bible study. This is a bible study at my apartment complex, but I think I'm the only one who attends who actually lives there. These people are hardcore, conservative, fundamentalist Christians. I am quite different from them, but I attend every week, so that I can expose myself to different people, and so that I understand the bible better, as they usually point out things about it that I hadn't noticed reading it by myself, or mention the significance of things that I wouldn't have known otherwise.

Bible study occurs on Thursdays and it didn't happen last week. The week before that, something kind of weird happened. We start by eating, then we have prayer requests. I had been thinking before I got there that I was going to have them pray for a situation involving some of my friends. But then, as I was sitting there waiting for my turn, I suddenly felt this determination to ask them to pray for the publication of my book. I had previously thought that maybe I should do this, but I had decided against it, because I am very quiet in this setting and I didn't want to draw too much attention to myself. Also, I wasn't sure how they would feel about my book if they actually read it. I mean, on the one hand, it has a message to it and it's definitely a Christian message. On the other hand, I believed I was Jesus and that could be seen as blasphemous. On top of that, my delusions were clever but kind of dirty and sexual and strange. In my book I do a lot of "sinful" things. So I didn't want to have them pray for something they might not agree with, though I knew that I meant well and I didn't have any bad intentions and any power I might receive from having my book published I would use for the greater good. But I wasn't sure so I decided against it.

However, two weeks ago, I randomly felt this determination to just say it and get it out there. I had to wait along time for my turn, and I was slightly uncomfortable, but I was determined. So when it was my turn I asked them to pray about my book and I told them it was a memoir about bipolar disorder. This news that I had written a book was greeted very positively by them and everyone was really excited, which made me kind of uncomfortable but at the same time I felt a great amount of relief that I had said it. One of the women there who is like the main lady said she would ask God about it. Now this lady, and a lot of the people there,  claim to talk to God, and they actually have God respond and stuff. I know to a lot of people this sounds like they are a bit crazy and they are a bit crazy but at the same time I think they really are tuned into something. I don't fully agree with what they believe in but I justify it in my own mind by thinking of the idea of "many paths to the same destination" when it comes to spirituality.

So I was waiting all week after that to see what the God told the lady about it, and I was disappointed when bible study was cancelled last week because I had to wait another week. So I came back to my apartment complex yesterday right before bible study and I was a little late like I always am and I noticed that there weren't enough cars in front of the main building to indicate that bible study was happening. I thought, "Oh no, God told her something bad about my book and now they are avoiding me!" Then I went up to the door and there was a sign that said bible study was moved this week to the park right by the complex. As I walked to the park I was nervous, both about what God told the lady and because I had gotten into some trouble at my volunteering which people at bible study are affiliated with due to a lapse in judgment on my part and I had to find a new volunteering place. Anyway, I walked to the park and found the bible study group and they were all eating, and they warmly welcomed me. I was sort of expecting the lady to tell me right off the bat what God told her but she didn't say anything.

So after awhile it's time for prayer requests, and this is when I find out the reason why I had been compelled to bring up my book at the last bible study. As it turns out, there had been a lady there, an older lady who was someone's relative who was visiting. She had schizophrenia, though she took meds and had it under control. Apparently for the first part of her visit, ever since Monday, she had been acting pretty down and in low spirits. When I mentioned I had written a book on mental illness, and she saw everyone's reaction and how they didn't see mental illness as something to be ashamed of, it made her feel much more comfortable and there was a big change in attitude after Thursday and she was in high spirits for the rest of her visit. So by mentioning it, I had helped her out. Everyone was really grateful to me for bringing it up.

I didn't tell them how I had felt strangely compelled to bring it up, but they did mention that the lord must have been working through me by having me do it. And I know they are right about that.

Lost in the Details

So one day awhile ago I was watching The Big Bang Theory with my dad. In the episode we were watching, Sheldon feels betrayed by Leonard and retaliates by giving him 50 pieces of silverware. I was confused. I asked my dad what was significant about 50 pieces of silverware. My dad, who is an atheist but was forced to attend Sunday School as a kid, told me that Judas received 50 pieces of silver for betraying Jesus. I said, "I read the bible and I didn't get that. How did you know that? Why is the 50 pieces of silver so important?" My dad said that's just the sort of thing they drill into you in Sunday School, the pointless random details.

So anyway, earlier I was thinking about my previous delusions, because I was editing my book. It seems like no one who reads my book understands it. Sure a lot of people like my book, but they say things that imply they don't understand it. So I was going back and clarifying, revising the part where I explain my delusions and trying to make everything as clear as possible, explaining both the important meanings behind things and the more subtle meanings.

Some people might wonder why I am still so focused on my delusions. What I came up with when I was delusional was actually kind of amazing. It's very clever and it's an extremely powerful story, with good underlying themes and messages. My theory is that people don't understand because they get caught up in the details. I'd like to say that it's just over their heads and they don't understand because they aren't smart enough, but really I haven't done a good enough job explaining. But I am done with explaining my delusions anywhere apart from in my book.

It's kind of similar to how people are about Jesus. It's not about the miracles and supernatural details. Jesus wasn't a great man because he performed miracles. I'm not sure he did perform miracles, but I'm not debating that now, people can believe what they want to believe. People get lost in the details and forget that Jesus preached love, forgiveness, not judging others, and living a spiritual life as opposed to a material life. These are the things that are important. These are the only things that are important.

The Importance of Journaling

Things have been different for the past month or so. I feel like I am operating on a different level. Not that I'm more functional, because I know what that means to other people and I haven't been more of that. There is more depth and spirituality to life. I haven't been manic. Thoughtiness has been normal.

I went to the holistic fair a couple weeks ago, very enlightening. I was going to write a blog about that but never actually did. I was told, among other things, I needed to approach literary agents in person. Which means go to writer's conferences.

Yesterday I went grocery shopping and my mentor suggested we buy a bookshelf for me, so we did. Once home I took it out of the box and put it together, which just meant folding it apart so it stood up. I got excited and immediately found a place in my dining room to put it, but one of my candle holders on the top shelf and started filling it with books. Later I noticed that in the box there were also little metal thingies that were supposed to go in somewhere. Oh well, it stands, I don't think it's going to fall or anything. This is an unimportant side note.

I went into my room, got the large plastic storage container which contains all my books and started placing them on the shelf. I was thinking about how you can tell so much about a person by looking at the books on their bookshelf. Each book represents a part of myself. Of course, some books are just books that other people gave to me and insisted that I read, so I started reading and got about half way through and lost interest. That's why a lot of the books have bookmarks. But anyway, in a way, each book represents a part of myself. And it's sitting there, right in my front room for anyone who visits to look at. Hardly any people actually come into my apartment.

So I got to the bottom, and I was fresh out of books, and the shelf wasn't full, so I put a red candle in the middle of the second shelf to hold the books in place. And I was looking in the box. There were some random CDs, the nutrition software from my one nutrition class, some almost used up sudoku books, and a magazine or two. And then there was a folded up piece of computer paper. I thought: "Oh God... it's one of those old journal things I used to do when I was bored at Hudlow (the lamest Innercept campus). Oh God I don't want to read that." But, of course, I did anyway.

This was one of those wow moments. I hadn't dated this one but I could tell from the stuff I said in it that it was from early November 2008. Back when I had developed a minor case of delusions about my previous delusions. On the paper, I didn't talk about what I actually believed. I talked about a dream I had, which I don't remember having, in which a certain unnamed person in my life told me something. And it brought up an issue in my life, and I was just struck by how important it still is in how big of an impact it had and how it just proves to me beyond any thread of a doubt in my own mind that there is more to the world than the material and that certain things happen on purpose and that anyone who says otherwise is just wrong, wrong, wrong. And I know that me saying I know this doesn't mean anything, because you can be absolutely sure of something and that doesn't mean it's true. But still, I was struck by this thought.

I described what I was going to do next and what my biggest fear was about it. Reading it, I thought, "Boy, I remember how that panned out!" Yes, my biggest fear came true and it was not pretty and it was something I don't want to think about. An ugly situation. When I wrote on this piece of paper, I had no idea.

I described something my therapist said to me about what would happen that absolutely did not happen. Ha.

More than anything, I wasn't struck by how different I was back then, but more by how some things just absolutely do not change. That about sums up how I feel about that.

From this experience I realized that journaling is something that is absolutely important and that everyone needs to do right now. Write down as much stuff as possible about what's going on in your life. Just write everything down, absolutely everything because most things slip away from you at an alarming rate and there is no telling what you will remember from now. And looking back on what you wrote from years back, you will learn things about yourself.

So, from now on, I'll be taking some of my writing offline. Though, I will still blog, but there are some things that aren't right to say on the internet.

Psychic Abilities

So recently I had a massage where I got relaxed and got thinking about things, realized things about my life and the nature of my soul and the universe. This has brought the whole idea of metaphysics to the forefront of my attention. My mentor tries to talk to me about activities to fill up my schedule, but really I'm not interested in anything that isn't related to spiritual development.

Something that happened awhile before the massage was that I started getting a sense of what people were feeling when I talked to them. First it started where I could feel people pulling away, either because they were losing interest and their mind was going off on a different track or because something I said turned them off. This feeling of other people has gradually been getting stronger. It's still incredibly weak though. The thing about it is it usually goes along with peoples' facial expressions/voice expressions/body language. Sometimes these feelings are hard to read. My parents were visiting, I walked by my mom and I felt frustration in her energy. I asked her if she was frustrated. She said she was because she couldn't find her hairbrush.

Nicotine seems to make it weaker. I chew nicotine gum. I have to have it or else I get pissed off then really depressed. When I feel disconnected from people, the feeling also gets weaker. I got frustrated today because I went to class and I could hardly feel it at all. I have become dependent on this feeling. When I started talking to my table mates more, it got a bit stronger. If I sit and talk to someone for awhile I start to feel it. I usually don't feel it right off the bat. There have also been other minor examples of psychic things, nothing very convincing though.

I went to a psychic/metaphysical message board because I heard it was a way of getting free psychic readings. I found out the advantage of talking to these people versus paid online psychics is they don't sugar coat. But they are amateurs too. I got a reading and I sort of got the impression that they were just going off what I said and not really reading me, though they did mention one detail that was true that I hadn't told them.

So I went to another section on the message board where they do picture readings. I posted a picture of myself. I got responses I felt were more accurate. The first person who responded emphasized introspection, which is very true because I am a very introspective person, but even more so recently. The next person mentioned that he sensed a lot of resentment and the need to hide something. This was also true. I was trying to hide this weak feeling of being psychic because in the past to my parents and doctors that has been a delusional thing. What this guy said was absolutely true. Both of them I think said something about having talents and expanding my inner self. I wondered if they meant psychic abilities.

But anyway, it's been weak today so far and I don't like that.

Massages and Old Souls

So my parents and I went on an excursion to Leavenworth, Washington. My mom scheduled massages for the both of us at the hotel. Lately I've been noticing a lot of things have centered around the subject of massages. I've never had a professional massage before. I went in, not knowing what I was going to do with my mind during the massage. I could practice mindfulness, or I could search for answers in my relaxed state of mind. I decided on the latter.

Something about the setting was more conducive to looking inside one's own mind. I try to do it at home sometimes but I never get anywhere. So first I concentrated on what I was experiencing physically as the masseuse massaged my back. Then I thought about petty issues in my life, and tried to let my brain drift to the correct answer. I didn't get very far with this, and without meaning to I advanced to examining the Core Issues.

You know, I have to be careful about what I say on here because my parents and people in charge of my treatment read this. I worry that if I say anything that doesn't indicate that I agree fully that my "mental illness" was strictly the result of a chemical balance that could have been avoided, people will view me as confused and delusional and in need of a med change/increase.

That said, I got some answers that I'm not entirely sure are true but might be true. I'm sort of like a teacher. I don't know if I've mentioned it but I absolutely believe in past lives and reincarnation. I already knew that I'm an old soul. I've been told this by unreliable sources but I didn't need to be told because it was something I just intuitively knew. So anyway, I knew I was an old soul but I didn't realize the extent to which the issues I face were designed to help other people. I got a better idea of the role I played and it sort of made me uncomfortable and left me with feelings of self-pity and I left the massage place with a lump in my throat like I was about to cry. Is this what you're supposed to get out of massages?

This wasn't a typical low though, because I wasn't left thinking I was a pathetic loser who would be better off dead. That's usually what chemical lows are like for me. I started writing a blog yesterday but I stopped and decided to hold off on it to see if this feeling lasted. I wake up today and I realize that these things still seem true to me. I don't feel self-pity anymore, it's kind of cool in a way.

I'd like to get more massages.