My father died when I was around two with no other siblings until after my mother remarried and I was fourteen. Back when I was a young child most families had 3 to 5 children with a few bigger families pushing up into the teens. The curious thing I recall is that in most family groups there were one or more children that looked and/or acted as if they were not part of that package. I thought it odd and no answer emerged from my wondering; the standard adult retort, “Gods will.”
Growing-up provides lots of opportunities to encounter observations and experiences that are void of clear and precise answers. I got used to it for a time but tension built when I found myself going off to college with no true clue what I wanted from the experience. I had been working out in a gym last year of high school and also taking Karate lessons. To add to my confusion the gym made me a trainer and my Karate school elevated me to beginning instructor. At the same time, I got a parttime paid job and moved into a rented house with some friends. We formed a band and got gigs to play. I signed up for classes in hypnosis hoping to find some inklings to what I was doing and why.
When I was accepted to my college fencing team, I dropped the gym and Karate. I discovered that living with a girl was less stressful than the “band house” although the women did rotate. My parttime job became fulltime with a promotion to assistant manager and I married one of the ladies. I went to school parttime and to a different college when I changed my major from engineering to psychology. Perhaps the hypnosis training did have an influence or my observation of human characteristic was an early calling.
Different schools, jobs, wives, life experiences and a couple of amazing children and I still held sacred my curious nature to what and how influences are produced. Busy, busy, busy until I bumped into a health challenge. The logical procedure would have been to cut back on work hours and attend to health. Now that I recognize as an influence. Instead, I opened a center and started working with people with emotional and physical health problems every day after my normal job. I began teaching weekends with programs that I scripted from psychology and dressed-up to market as something new and special. I think it worked well and we all got to explore new potentials and have fun.
Fourteen years later I started to feel the wind of change. Found a special lady and married again closing the center and going on the road. We found a place to settle and wait for this force of change to reveal itself. In truth, the new normal will appear a couple hundred years after everyone alive forgets the old normal. That is a bridge I may not live to cross but I’m not done exploring the nature of influence, the value for life and creating a human story we can all follow into potential.
I’m seeking a range to roam, explore and share without threats and control. This is not about a promised land or a logical story. This is about becoming aware of what is influencing me and tasting it long enough to make a decision to follow a thread leading to a now unknown potential for becoming. There are no directions or maps and the death toll is 100%. I believe that once you feel it you may pursue the path with both caution and enthusiasm.
I’ve been around for so long that I now know a little bit about a lot of different topics. I’m willing to discuss or debate any one of them but I don’t see any of my points as absolute truths. Have you noticed, some processes that we used to be able to rely on are now faltering? I trust moving forward into the unknown, with caution of course. I do like a sense of confidence but new learning is useful and a great tradeoff. Both these options are really amazing influences. This is the year for expanding range and discovering what unknown is in the fringe or shadow at the former edge of yesterday’s range.
Chriss
