Be Happy in the World as Long as You Live

“And what would you do,” the Master said unto the multitude, “if God spoke directly to your face and said, “I COMMAND THAT YOU BE HAPPY IN THE WORLD, AS LONG AS YOU LIVE,’ what would you do then?”

And the multitude was silent, not a voice, not a sound was heard upon the hillsides across the valleys where they stood.”

--Richard Bach, Illusions

 

Have you ever noticed that a foul mood brings more annoyances, irritations, and mistakes?

However, a happy mood usually brings good stuff.

Dr. Gabor Mate’ told of a time when he was an infant. His mother called the Pediatrician and said that little Gabor was crying all the time. The Pediatrician said that all the babies were crying. They are picking up the anxiety from their mothers. The Gabor's lived in Poland, and Germany was about to invade it.

That's the way I have been feeling for the past month.

I wrote a blog yesterday about what was on my mind, then lost what I had written. Was that a lesson regarding my foul mood?

Was that the universe telling me to either shut up or up my foul mood into a tinier fowl?

Once I fed some tiny quails for our landlord in California.  Have you ever seen their cute little spotted eggs? 

Our landlord sold the eggs to a Japanese restaurant, which considered them a delicacy. His little gathering of quails—a bevy is an old-world term for them—was so tame they would flow as a unit out of the enclosure, and I had to push them back in to close the door.  Later, he collected another group and housed them in a business structure on the property. Those young quails were so wild I couldn't open the cage to feed them without fear of losing one, and once I did.

The door to their cage was on top of a low container. When I lifted the on-top-of-the-cage door, an ace pilot quail flew out faster than a speeding bullet, aimed for the door to the great outdoors, and was never seen nor heard from again.

I never told the landlord.

What lesson is there in that story? I don't know—watch which door you open, I suppose.

Yesterday I closed a door on my Real Estate ability to sell. I'm keeping my license current, for I worked my butt off to get it. However, I am dropping my associations.  Fees are due and paying a considerable sum of money for something I don't want to do seemed ridiculous. I was following up on leads that my principal broker was buying and giving to me to call.

How do you feel about cold calls?

“Ok? Don’t bother me? I won’t answer. GO AWAY.”

Luckily nobody got really angry with me.  

I could call ours “lukewarm” for the person I called had filled out a form. I know they wanted information, probably not a call, but then I was playing the game.

No more.

I resent getting calls to sell me something. I figure most other people do too, and I don’t like to bug people. At least here you can read or not read, it’s your choice. Lead gathering headlines were something like this: “Downpayment Assistance, Cash Deal.”

Really? I was a Real Estate agent. Everybody knows that a Real Estate Agent can make a living only by commissions, which many people resent or try to lower. Calling irked me. My procrastination irked my boss.

I felt like a quitter.

But I quit anyway.

That means I cannot list a house for sale, help an owner sell, or help a buyer buy. Agents must belong to the RMLS and Realtor ®, for we are required to use their forms.

My time and efforts belong to what I am passionate about.

And that is writing.

I could continue the Newsletter concept I began when I created our website for Vibrance Real Estate LLC. Our mascot/logo was a Pink Flamingo—thus I titled the Newsletter A Flamboyance—which is a gathering of flamingos. (Those exuberant vocal, chattering birds are sometimes called the long-stemmed rose of birds.) It's odd that occasionally, we see that tropical bird, not indigenous to the Pacific Northwest, perched in someone’s yard.

People do want information. That’s the reason they signed a form to get it. Now if I could get them to sign up for a Newsletter I could do what I like to do and still be in the Real Estate business.  I could tell people about FHA loans, (low down payment, government-insured) or VA loans (no down payment). There are other loans like a bridge loan that will loan you money so you can bridge the gap between the time you sell your house and the time you purchase your dream home. (Once you find a house you love you don’t want to lose it before you can sell yours.) The Real Estate Association recently required a buyer to sign a buyer’s agency, so read carefully.

My daughter and I could give tips. Want a brainstorming session to make that oblong room look more inviting? Daughter dear and I once flipped a house where we touched about everything except the roof. We did siding, flooring, tiling, painting, carpentry and installing. A sledgehammer with my daughter’s muscle behind it bashed out a wall, opening the living room to the kitchen. We found a beautiful piece of Tiger wood” that made a bar to separate the two rooms. Daughter’s mantel over the kitchen range sold the house. (A single lady—first time buyer bought it, and we helped her find downpayment help.) That was a thrill. We were not real estate agents at the time, but we still made a profit

I learned to use a table saw and make mitered corners. The worst of the flip was installing a garbage disposal. Well, hanging kitchen cupboards was no piece of cake. But we were proud of our accomplishment and loved the design aspect. Maybe that's what we can do. Have people send us pictures, and we will critique the house and offer ideas. Sometimes a little runt of a house can transform into a jewel.

When everybody wins business is simply more fun. (Aka, the Pink Flamingo.)

I General Contracted the building of our log house. That went from getting a forest Land Use permit, to building a road (hiring contractors) to the finished product—with a little help from another general contractor who took me under his wing, including taking me to the county to get a septic drain system permit.

(You know what a “French drain is? Ask me. You know about rock dust, and road fabric? Ask me.)

One of the fun things about writing is it clears the mind and sweeps the house so the muse can enter without soiling her gown.

 

Richard Bach, the author I quoted at the top of this blog wrote Jonathan Living Seagull. “A nice little book,” said Ray Bradbury. “It will probably sell about 15,000 copies.”  Jonathan was first published in 1970 with little advertising or expectations, by the end of 1972, over a million copies were in print. The book reached the number-one spot on bestseller lists mainly through word-of-mouth recommendations. It is about a seagull trying to learn about flying, personal reflection, freedom, and self-realization.

Bach's following book, Illusions, is my favorite book of Bach’s. Released in 1977, Illusions sold 15 million copies in 35 languages.

'What if somebody came along who could teach me how my world works and how to control it? ... What if a Siddhartha came to our time with power over the illusions of the world because he knew the reality behind them? And what if I could meet him in person, if he was flying a biplane, for instance, and landed in the same meadow with me?"

I'm going to reread Illusions.

 

 

"Don't ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is more people who have come alive."

 --Howard Thurman 

Claiming Your Power

 

How about "claiming your power "instead of seeing a situation as hopeless?

 

And then as I saw control all over the place and stumbled right into a quote from Terry Cole-Whittiker, (The Inner Path From Where You Are to Where You Want to Be, 1987) and fell on my face.

 

 "The chance that we all have is the chance of a lifetime to step out of the world as it is and create the New World as we would have it be."

 

I don’t know how that will happen, or how to do it, but I see that it will. We believed that world transformation would come from the top down—from world leaders, religious figures, poets, philosophers, scientists, and songwriters. 

 

Now we see that it will come from the bottom up.

 

We are learning that change comes from within, from the people, like the many who started grassroots movements. Who began screaming about the air quality? Not the industries. Who wanted organic food? Not the chemical producers. Who wanted to save the whales? Not the whalers or the perfume industry. Who is concerned about global warming? Not the highest of officials but other individuals in the sciences, arts, and human welfare who took it upon themselves to bring that attention to the masses. And who taught people about chimpanzees' intelligence and their social structure? One person, a little secretary named Jane Goodall. And then two bicycle makers from Kity Hawk, South Carolina, showed that man could not only fly, he could apply a motor to it.

 

What about the people who rallied behind John F. Kennedy when he said, “We will send a man to the moon and bring him back alive, by the end of a decade?”

 

Scientists, inventors, mathematicians, and engineers, a small group of people rallied behind –yes, a leader who had a vision and motivated people, but they were little bitty bunch. They reached down into the depths of their souls, and made it happen. (Of course they had a little competition and fear whipping them into shape.)

 

It will be the people who get it. We don’t need to be forgiven for our sins, when we can’t even remember ever having one. Do you think a God would put a beautiful person on a beautiful planet then tell them that life was a veil of tears and that they were sinners? It defies all logic. We have a body, but were made to be ashamed of having one. It defies all logic.

 

When Jesus called out for the cross, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.” He understood. He came here to remove the curse. The curse was the curse of a vengeful god in which all of mankind believed. Jesus said he came to put away the law, but people didn’t get it. When they believed in a vengeful god it gave them permission to be vengeful.  When they believed that disobeying a ridiculous command like do not eat of that tree, and they did, it was a reason to curse all mankind, babies, women to a lifetime of work and worry. It is beyond all that is holy.

 

No, change will come from the folks. The god of the old testament is not the God we are learning about today, one in which we are all a part.

 

 

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

—Margaret Mead

 

 

”The notion that we are products of our environment is our greatest sin; we are products of our choices.”—Mead again.

 

 

P.S. I revamped our Real Estate site Vibrance Real Estate.com

No search engine, no popups, no sign ins, only information. And remember, if you are buying a home, you don’t always have to put a 20% down payment. Check https://vibrancerealestate.com to see how.

 

Write your own memoir, I dare you. I double dare you.

"Obi-Wan, I Need Your Help."

 

"The curiosity and connection that create the Eureka effect rely on parts of the brain that don't feel fear."—Martha Beck.

 

 

Really?

 

I thought fear was all-pervasive. Yet, as I think about it, fear comes from our primitive brain stem, the part that's into survival.

 

Martha is right; it doesn't come from the creative side. 

 

That must be why we feel happy when we are into some creative endeavor or when faced with a problem whose solution has stumped us, if we let it sit a while, Eureka, "Out of the blue," comes the answer.

 

I know, however, that while the right side of our brains is creative, and it's so much fun to be in that space, I did not know it was fearless. The other side must creep in.

 

I've been hearing more and more that scientists are trying to pinpoint where consciousness lies and, so far, haven't been able to do it. They are pretty sure it doesn't reside in the brain as we have been led to believe. 

 

Don't we think with our brains? Doesn't it feel like it is coming from our heads? Yes, but what about those moments of transcendence where something comes to us from out of that blue space?

 

The first time l experienced an out-of-the-blue thought where I got the message that we can KNOW as a teenager.

 

This is silly, a trivial little thing, but it impacted me.

 

I had taken a knit dress to the cleaners, and when I picked it up, it was wrapped in brown paper like a package. I absolutely knew the belt wasn't in that package. But I didn't want to tell them, thus committing to such boldness, so I went to the car, opened the package, verified that the belt wasn't there, returned to the shop, and told them the belt was missing. They found it and gave it to me.

 

I have mentioned I am writing a memoir. This memoir could also fit into the Memoir/autobiography/travel/adventure/special interest categories. Every time I say I'm writing a memoir, I sound arrogant. Then I remind myself I do not know anyone better than I know myself.

 

Perhaps people will want to read it; perhaps they won't. Perhaps it will inspire others to write their memoir; maybe it won't. Either way, come hell or high water, I'm doing it. I mentioned I wrote 50,000 words in 30 days, but that doesn't mean it is complete; it just means I got words on the page, and now I am faced with a mess. 

 

Natalie Goldberg (Old Friend from Far Away), my inspiration, says you can write many memoirs in your life; every time you write one, you will be at a different place. And don't write about dreary stuff; you can write about pain, for that's a part of life, but generally, write about what takes your breath away.

 

Yesterday I was writing about Spankings, and I made this statement: 

 

"I don't know why it is embarrassing to be spanked like it is embarrassing to be bullied, molested, or unloved."

 

The moment I wrote the above sentence, I got the answer. 

 

When Joseph McClendon III talked about sleeping in a box in Lancaster, California, after somebody tried to kill him because of the color of his skin, he thought, "If someone would do that to me, there must be something wrong with me."

 

That's it. 

 

As McClendon erroneously thought there was something wrong with him, kids probably think there is something wrong with them and that they deserve punishment.

 

There was nothing wrong with McClendon, as there is nothing wrong with kids who get hit for some infraction. They are kids, remember?

 

I wonder how much punishment contributes to our culture's prevailing "I'm not good enough" syndrome. I'm not good enough to be loved. I'm not good enough to find a mate. I'm not good enough to write a good book, a play, a symphony, paint a picture or start a business. 

 

"I've been bad and deserve to be hit. I am a girl, a less desirable weaker sex, and I must keep my mouth shut. Boys will be boys, you know." 

 

Auugh.

 

That's the biggest Bullshit I have ever heard. 

 

I told you I was a Badass in training.

 

I will ask for pre-sales for the book PAINTING A LIFE from a Badass in Training by Jewell D. That way, I can hit the ground running when the book is launched. Getting sales right away is the best way to get a higher rating on Google.

 

"Obi-Wan, I need your help."

 

You can tell me you're willing to join my pre-sales campaign if you want to. Pre-sales are only charged once a book is launched.

 

So, nobody will be charged if it never gets off the launching pad.

 

Over and out, have fun, be creative, do a little dance.