Open Forum

Good morning one and all and Happy Friday!

I had another dream last night about having an apartment downtown and also living out here. In the dream last night I was describing to someone how I was buying furniture for my apartment and starting to add in the personal touches.

I have a theory about why I am dreaming about living in two places. First of all, I know it is not literal. I spent enough time in two places as a child and I don't like going back and forth anymore.

I think it is a way that my consciousness is handling the fact that my life can be very different depending on the day. Some days I work, some days I'm with my son, some evenings I'm free, other evenings I'm not. My life is very compartmentalized into brief periods of space.

What I do with that space depends on the demands on my time.

I find the apartment downtown idea really liberating. In the first dream I had just rented it and this time I was buying furniture (and it was pretty cool stuff too) and rugs and so on. I was working downtown and enjoying it and living out here too when I was in my 'Mom' space.

I can't wait to see how it develops in further dreams.

I was spending a lot of time with a friend of mine in the dream too. Talking about work (because we were working together) but talking about life as well. We spent more time talking than working and this has been a trend in my dreams too.

I have been dreaming about friends that I know (they don't always look exactly the same as in real life) and we have been talking and hanging out and connecting.

All I can conclude from these dreams is that I am creating space within my mind for all of my different roles and manifesting the need for connections with people I care about.

The dreams are reflecting the fact that I believe I have the right to do what I want and want what I want in my life. They aren't needy dreams striving for something to fill in the emptiness or loneliness. They are dreams that are already full. The dreams are simply an inner-expression of what is already happening to me. When I wake up from one I feel as if I have been reading a book about myself, it's a most exceptional, wonderful feeling.

I can't help but feel that something awesome (and universal) is happening to me. If I were dancing, spinning round and round that would come close to expressing the way I feel right now.

The Journey

What's my journey been like recently? Eventful, as always.

One of the things that I have noticed more than ever is a continuity of relationships with people that seems to be a pattern of my life.

Many people remain part of my life even if I don't see them for a year or even two. I then suddenly run into them again and the friendship is renewed almost as if there hadn't been a break.

At first I thought it was happening now and then, but it happens with different people more and more regularly.

The friendship is similar to what it was before, but different in some important ways that makes the pattern all the more significant. My friendships are becoming more and more honest and reciprocal and, well, loving. It's as if my own journey is attracting different things from people I have known for years. What they are giving me now is far more mature and long-standing than what we initially shared.

I have 'grown up' a lot over the last year or so and it is not surprising to me that I would be attracting a different level of communication from these people.

I just find it so amazing that it is happening with many different people from different parts of my life.

It is quite liberating because it is direct proof that we make our own realities. The quote from Tolle 'Whatever you think the world is withholding from you, you are withholding from the world,' is proven with my ongoing friendships.

I used to think the world was withholding honesty and shared experiences and love. I no longer feel that way and have made very specific efforts to give all those elements back to the world and in turn I am receiving them back as well.

That's what Tolle said would happen and of course he is right because he already knew it works because it does. It's as simple as that.

The more I learn about the universe, the simpler it becomes.

There are no absolutes, everything is gray.

When we make up rules for ourselves and others, we are setting up walls and boundaries and complicating life. Life is not complicated, it is simple.

Looking within and acting from your own inner-purpose is what makes life uncomplicated.

The path you take should be peaceful and genuine, if it is not then you are getting caught up in the details.

Details are not life.

You should be your own priority. Why?

Because if you aren't you certainly won't be anyone else's.

The Unmechanics Day

Today is yet another day where my schedule is just not possible.

It is on days like this that I have to tell myself 'the only constant is change.'

Hearing that over and over in my head helps me cope with the constant interruptions, the comments like 'I'm bored!' and 'I'm hungry!' and the sound of Sponge Bob in the background.

Luckily, today is a filing day. Now that the taxes are ready for the accountant I can move on to filing 2007 away and bringing in the new year. I find this one of the most boring activities on the planet and one of the most satisfying (once it's done and not before).

So, my office will feel less cluttered by the end of today and I will have said 'the only constant is change' 5 million times (or at least it'll feel that way).

Have a great one all!

The Writer's Weekly

I'm doing my taxes today. I know, I know I'm late (as usual).

See you tomorrow!

The Voice

Good morning everyone. It's Monday.

My routine has been somewhat bizarre recently because my son has been home with a weird stomach thing. Consequently, I don't do anything at the time I normally do and I am interrupted a lot. This experience leaves me feeling like a flag flapping in the wind, a great symbol but not really useful.

I was reading the current blog by Tamara Lee from the Canadian Writers' Collective and it is true that women are more timid about putting themselves out there into the writing world. I am sure there are many different reasons depending on the person and so on but I can think of one that might be universal. Women play the role of peace keepers in families. We help things work better and things run more smoothly and we don't fight for our positions we negotiate.

Men play a lot more organized sports than women. Men fight physically a lot more than women. Men are naturally more aggressive as a gender. I think most men feel they will have to compete and fight and strive for whatever position they want in the world (never mind the fact that they compete for women all the time). So if a man yelled out from the crowd during a reading and said 'You suck!' the guy reading would fight back whereas the woman would wonder where the comment was coming from.

That's what makes men and women so wonderfully different (and why I think this world would be a MUCH more peaceful place if women and men EQUALLY decided on the political decisions in every country).

Women reflect and wonder and then act (most of the time), men do those things too but later. First men react and that's likely why being out in the world is easier for them to just do. I don't believe that women should become more like men. What would be the purpose of that? Women are unique and see things differently for a reason. Men do too.

Thinking that women and men are competitors is really the wrong way to look at things. It's really a yin-yang idea. We complement each other as long as we are allowed to be ourselves whichever gender we are.

It's unfortunate in our world that differences are either ridiculed or feared, at least initially.

The decision by the Catholic Church to not let women become priests is an example of the division, artificially created, between the sexes. Male priests would lose 'control' if women were 'allowed' to be their equals. Ironically male Catholic priests would gain so much more if they could only embrace the other half of the world's population.

Whenever you are faced with a person or group that thrives on separation and division you know it is the ego at work.