GHOST HUNTERS

Here we are, as we come to the earth--unpolished stones. Our parents and our teachers work to polish off the rough spots.  Their intention is to make us socialized, educated, and more like the other stones. For every rough edge they smooth, every bit of protrusion they wear down, they take away some of the character of that stone. Those who wish to become "perfect" believe that they cannot polish their stone enough or make it more uniform and ideal. Then, dropped into a crowd of other stones--they are lost. Let's put it this way: Could you find yourself in the pile of unpolished stones? Could you find yourself in the pile of polished stones?  Every year, I like to go to Sedona on a spiritual trek to renew myself. I go into the new age shops that have huge bins filled with stones. I pass by the stones that are polished and smooth. They hold no interest to me at all. I go right to the raw rocks with their jagged edges, exposure of a bit of beauty here and there, organic a...

Everyone starts looking to the year ahead. There are a few ways we project that year. 1. 2012 is an extension of the patterns at the end of 2011. Doomed, continue to be doomed -- perhaps even MORE doomed. 2. 2012 is a clean slate - anything is possible. I've talked about cognitive distortions before and it's true. Your strongest emotions come from cognitive distortions--beliefs set in your mind that are not based on reality, so emotions are not realistic or, in other words, not logical emotions. 1. The cognitive distortion above is "Because it's been this way, it will always be this way." That is obviously not true. If that were true, we would still be in elementary school. Even if you try to have the same day twice, you can't. Something always jumps into the mix and changes it. 2. This is a logical conclusion. Since we do not have the ability of prophecy (at least not with any testable accuracy), we cannot know the future. There is a chance of bad things an...

How the hell is that possible? You might not believe this, but over 20 years ago, I suffered from panic attacks. With the right direction, I was completely cured within 6 months and have been cured ever since. In fact, panic attacks and panic disorder would never work on me nowadays. I have a skill set that makes it impossible for it to be an effective means to get my attention. I still to this day sponsor people in their recoveries and inspire them. Y'all know me well enough to find it impossible to believe that this high-energy, ambitious, excited about life, goofy, risk-taking gal would ever have been afraid of her own thoughts and her own body! If anyone is a poster gal for complete recovery, it's me! Ironically, the worst things to ever happen to me, happened after recovery from the loss of over a dozen loved ones, a horrible marriage, a divorce, living on my own for my first time--yet none of them made me go under because I changed my relationship with my mind and how I ...

Another in my series about new ways of looking at the world, not just the paranormal one, but the one in which we must travel every day -- life . My mother white-knuckled it through life. She wanted to know exactly what was going to happen, every outcome, even if she had to imagine them to prepare herself for some "awful-awful" that would surely present itself. She had high blood pressure, smoked like a chimney, constantly watched the news, and read the newspapers, combing for signs of impending doom. I'm not sure what preparing her mind for these scenarios did, because she never once prepared physically for such events. There was no hoarding of canned goods, purchasing of guns or storing of duct tape and plastic. She simply entertained her mind with these scenarios and, consequently her body. The body doesn't know the difference from a thought or reality? You don't believe me? How many times have you startled during a scary movie or felt your palms sweat watchin...

( Tom Cochrane "Life is a Highway" ) Here's how I see it. Life is a highway. It's got hills. It's got turns. It's got narrowing. It is scenic. It is monotonous. There's two kinds of people in this world: Ones who use the potholes as proof the whole highway sucks. Ones who realize they've driven 50 miles without hitting a pothole and the highway is safe. Which one are you?

Mantras to live by when life knees you in the groin ( they work for anything that presents itself in your path ): "It's just a scratch!" "Come on you Pansy!" "Had enough, eh?" "It's just a flesh wound!" "I'm invincible!" "The black knight always triumphs!" "Running away? You yellow bastard!"

My friends call me a firestarter. I'm not sure that's really an accurate name. I'm more like the person that soaks you in kerosene. Just call me "Zippo." It's up to you to decide when to light the match. I do like to see people get excited about their lives. The thing is that people are so individual. We aren't human beings having a spiritual experience, we're spiritual beings have a human experience. Some of you readers/bloggers have been the focus of my dousing with kerosene. I'm seeing some of you lighting yourselves up, others saving the match for the right moment. I can appreciate that. Sometimes we fear lighting ourselves up where we might burn others in the process, but then remember when you burn--you're radiant. And, aren't we all attracted to the warmth of a good fire? You warm others when you're at your brightest. How do we find our fire? Spontaneity, the five senses, no more classifying "good and bad," "right...

Here's the question-- is there such a thing as fate or do we make our own destinies? Julie and I on last week's road trip started to notice a phrase we said over and over and over again, " you just never know ." We started out on a road trip to Tucson. About 30 miles out of town, Julie realizes she doesn't have her phone charger. I don't have a cell phone. We need the phone to make contact with the person we're meeting in Tucson. Hmm... Option 1: Turn and go back home. Get the charger and get back on the road. This is the "set in stone" mentality. We are always fluid, so we choose option #2. Option 2: We pull into the small town nearby and go to the WalMart to find a charger. Now, Julie has a spare to keep in her purse instead of her car. And, being in this town reminds Julie of a reader of our abandoned book who lived in that town and mentioned an abandoned site Julie and I didn't know about. I suggest we now plug the phone in and give the...

Find the right music, drive the roadway. Let the songs and the scenes you see become a music video that tells your future path. What did you learn on this exploration of self through music and distance??? Report back .

Periodically and randomly, I give the people close to me a list of the 10 things I most admire about them. There is something about sharing what you're thinking about people that can change a person completely. Just knowing that things they hoped people noticed about them were noticed and appreciated can give them a confidence that they needed. We keep a lot of thoughts to ourselves. I, personally, because of many losses in my life, have come to live my life where if I'm thinking something nice about someone, I share it. I don't keep that to myself. What good does that do? Everyone should know that spontaneously, someone thought something nice about them. It is so crucial that, to withhold those thoughts, is to kill a relationship. I know that because even under great duress, my ex could not give me a compliment. One time, when pressured, he said one day he was thinking my hair looked nice, but said nothing. That neglect was stacked atop another and another until it spell...

In Deepak Chopra's Book "Ageless Body: Timeless Mind" he mentioned one of the important qualities to people who lived past 100; adaptability, acceptance of change. This brings to mind older folks walking around with cell phones, dinking around on Facebook and listening to current music, but adapting to change doesn't necessarily mean being up-to-date on technology. Adaptability to change means that you know life will be filled with changes all the time, roadblocks, detours, and giant brick walls with smooth surfaces that say "Dead End!" You know those disaster movies of the 70s like "Poseidon Adventure"? You had your folks who feared moving from their spot on the dance floor ceiling and those who realized that to stay there was to be deeper in the water and to climb was to get closer to the surface. Some folks stop in the midst of a change in their plans and either freeze, unable to make a decision, or stubbornly stay with the course they were on, ...

I've never been accused of taking life so seriously that I had a sour face, an angry disposition or a "this isn't fair" attitude. It's a decision to laugh when others would cry, scream, or break something. Some ways I'm able to laugh about life: When I see people do asinine things, I can't help but think of comedians who point out what idiots human beings can be. I feel like I want to turn to someone and say, " did you see that? " Yup, just more evidence of what a crazy world we live in, in which no one does what you expect them to do and upon occasion do things so stupid, it's incredible. According to The Journal, a teenager was arrested by the Pennsylvania police and charged with felony daytime burglary. How did they find out? Well, the victim noticed that someone had broken into her house through a bedroom window. She also happened to check her computer…which had the burglar’s Facebook account still open. Apparently, after snatching two ex...

Life is a body of water. You get into it a step at a time, but when you're an adult, you step down and find out that--whoops! The bottom of the pool is deep. What you do next determines your life course. One person will step off and drop like a weight, expecting a bottom, refusing to give up that hope and drowns. One person will flail in panic just trying to survive until exhausted and then sinks to the bottom. One person will float on his back with no direction, but staying afloat and alive he is alive, but he is directionless. One person will figure out what keeps him afloat, figures out how to cover some distance and then thinks to set a course. Which one are you right now in your life?

Fate: The belief that the order of things is predestined and unavoidable. Destiny: Predetermined course of events. I get asked about destiny and fate often. What is it with people wanting to hand over their past, present and future to some sort of organized plan? Perhaps it helps to take personal responsibility out of the equation. Let's look at something practical and real world like divorce. Should our fates be to have troubling relationships and our destiny be to divorce, then why is it that one hundred years ago, divorce was rare and now it is so common? Has something about the universal fate/destiny system been changing? Is some omnipotent poser of human's comings and goings bored and wanting to stir up the pot? Or are we, the people making decisions, changing? Are women able to support themselves and no longer have to stay in a bad relationship? Are men now free to leave and see lots of women as is their deepest desire? Ultimately, we aren't fated to get hit by a ca...

Sit down some time and write a list of 10 things you've always assumed about yourself; 10 negative things. .. 1. I'm lazy. 2. I'm immature. 3. I'm irresponsible. 4. I'm inpatient. 5. I'm not smart. 6. I'm a baby. 7. I'm not talented. 8. I'm plain looking. 9. I'm boring. 10. I'm awkward. This was an exercise I did over 20 years ago. I did it at a very stressful and insecure time in my life. I had no idea how many of these things I carried around. I stopped and asked myself first, who made me believe/assume these things? The answer became "my family of origin and my husband." The way they treated me, the way they approached me, the things they complained about, the way they neglected me, told me that these were the things that were all wrong about me. Yes, that was my list above of assumptions about myself. I then sat down and put my beliefs on a witness stand and, like a lawyer, I disproved the points with examples that they weren...

When I was little, I was going to grow up being one of Charlie's Angels. I got a little older and I was certain I would be an archaeologist in Egypt. When I thought about falling in love and getting married, I imagined some romantic proposal, a man madly in love with me and a wedding to end all weddings. When I was younger, I did modeling. When I got a little older, I became a medical transcriptionist. I made a practical relationship decision with someone who did not find an even remotely romantic or enthusiastic way to propose, was married by a justice of the peace and catered my own wedding. I hear from other women all the time " what if Mr. Right and I don't meet? What if I make a wrong decision and we pass each other on the street? " You know what I have to say to that " So? " We spend a lot of time fussing and worrying about whether we are making the "right" decisions as if there is some grading system for life. There is no "right" d...

Tao: Metaphysical eastern philosophy term for "way," "path," or "route" The Tao of Autumnforest: Do it once with confidence. Trust your first gut instinct. Be fearless ( of embarrassment or ghosts ). Stay in fighting shape. Punctuate everything with a laugh ( it attracts spirit activity and open-minded people like yourselves ). Always be your genuine self ( then everyone knows what they're getting into when they befriend you ) The Tao of Scooby Doo: Keep your circle of friends to include a jock, a cheerleader, a nerd and a stoner. Don't go anywhere without munchies. Everything can be explained, but until it is, it's pretty scary. Everybody looks better in turtlenecks and headbands. When all leads fails, the butler did it. Taoists are have an interesting approach to the world and to their place in it. They use poetry a great deal because it is a more visceral way of portraying things that are not easy to explain in regular words. They also go...

Yeah, yeah, it's a sign of the times. People are rushing to get iodine tablets and know where the nearest nuclear plant sits. So far as I can tell, it looks like central northern Wyoming might be your safest bet, if but if you don't see a real industry there to draw you to it, just invest in some iodine tablets and sit where you are. Well, I hear a lot of people saying this is some sort of sign that all hell is breaking loose. First of all, these disasters have been happening forever and even to the extreme of wiping out the dinosaurs, so let's quit bellyaching. We've had plagues and natural disasters always. The problem now is that a huge majority of the people in the ring of fire live near the water where there will be the quakes and the tsunamis. In the old days, perhaps a small village went. Nowadays, it's likely to be an entire industry that's obliterated or an enormous population. Truth be told, it only seems horrible because now everyone has cameras and ...

Hey, I want to thank Timoteo for this concept. He said I should write an instruction book on females and their mysteries and I figured I have more secret knowledge about women than I'll ever have about the ghost world. Let's assume your purpose in understanding the female is to make a relationship and "get some" regularly, and perhaps not be in misery once achieving these goals. Here's what you need to know about the female before you go hunting: Your woman dresses up to go out. She does this so you know what a prize you have, but also because she knows you want to show others your status as the man who can get such a prize. If you tell her that she needs to dress down because you want to wear jeans, don't expect to get any that night. If you forget to tell her that she's so hot you don't know if you want to share her with the world, don't expect to get any for the next week. If you DO tell her that she's so hot that you don't want to shar...

( At a desert dump, I found some nipples. Most folks walk past them. Not me, I think, "Hey nipple shot!" ) I remember the day I packed away my Barbie dolls when I was turning 13. I looked at them and sighed. It was sad. No more make-believe. No more trying out real life scenarios in the safety of a Barbie townhouse. Now I had to live in the “real world.” Well, one thing I've found about ghost hunting and exploring the world of the paranormal is that there is no need to grow up. As adults, we have a lot of responsibilities. Really too many, but we do miss those days when we had summer off and our biggest concern was whether we'd hear the ice cream man when he cruised too fast by our houses. The last frontier for those of us who want to stay young for life is to explore. To ask questions. To seek knowledge. To go on those adventures I'm always pushing on my Adventure Sunday posts. Ask my dear friend Julie and she will tell you that I am a big excited kid. I want to ...