Focusing the mind

Meditation can be used as a tool to focus the mind on a specific thing, for example this maybe on a tarot card or a guided meditation.

Guided meditation

Guided meditation can be used for all sorts of reasons – some people do it because they have a hard time settling down to meditate on their own, and they really like to have someone guide them. I have listened to the head of the OBOD Phillip Carr-Gomm’s  Wild Wisdom meditations. These are a series of meditations focused on the elements.

They are ok, but to be fair I often struggle with any form of guided meditation/journeys. This is because I spend too much time worrying about my reactions to things, that I am going on ahead, that I am generally doing it wrong. Especially when it comes to journeying I tend to be a bit non-linear and I find guided things too prescriptive for me.

As I said, for some people it works really well however – if you struggle with sitting meditation on your own I really do recommend that you give this a go. If you prefer something which is not ‘religious’ I highly recommend Jon Kabat Zinn, in fact I may have to do a post just on him soon.

Tarot (or other)

This is where you use a tarot card (or something else) as the basis for your meditation. When I was a member of the OTO, I would take part in discussions where people said ‘yeah I meditated on that for hours’. I really wasn’t sure what this meant (and didn’t want to ask for fear of looking stupid). But I eventually figured out that it meant think about!

One of the exercises that we did and I liked a lot, was to focus on a tarot and its relationship to the Kabbalah (not the Madonna one) and to spend time in meditation thinking about it and trying to keep a step back and see what came to mind, without you guiding your thoughts. I realise that this paragraph could sound all very woo-woo and hippy-dippy if you are not Pagan, but there you go.

If you want to do this exercise, but don’t understand about the Kabbalah (don’t worry about it for a start, but if you do want to understand it this is by far the best book on the subject in my opinion Understanding Alistair Crowley’s Thoth deck  even if you do not use a Thoth deck) then there is another way to do this exercise.

Get a tarot deck that you have an affinity with (my personal preference for this is the Thoth deck, but only because it is so detailed and beautiful), and spend some time studying a card, what your associations with the card are – if you want to you can look up its meaning, what is on the card, the imagery, symbols etc. Then put the card down and settle into a meditation posture. Let your mind go over everything you thought about the card, try to picture it in as much detail as you can.
Then let go of consciously thinking about it. Try to let your mind wander, but stay on topic, but remember that your mind may go off topic, but actually it is relevant. When you come out of your meditation try to write down everything that you thought of.

It might sound easy – allowing your mind to wander around a card, but it is actually really very difficult. I have to say though that it is one of the most rewarding Pagan practices I do – I find that some really weird stuff comes to me, quite symbolic that needs decoding and other things which are very clear and need to be actioned straight away.

So there you go – another two forms of meditation, quite different to the first one, but I hope you find it useful. 

Fuck me, this is a really fucked up mess of a book. In an extremely good way. I loved it!

So, this one is from the Aurealis Award for best horror list of the genre busting challenge. Not something I would normally choose to be honest, mainly because it is not in my zone, but I have loved it and may well investigate some more of them!

Example from the first page:

What immediately disturbed Jamie was the look in the clown’s eyes, a bewildered galze which suggested the clown was completely new to the world, that Jamie’s car was the very first it had ever seen. It was as though it had just hatched out of a giant egg and wandered straight onto the road to stand as still as store mannequin, its flower shirt tucked in at the wasit, barely holding in a sagging belly, arms locked stiff at its sides, hands bunhced into rat round fists stuffed into white gloves. Sweat patches spread out under both armpits. It started at him through the windshield with ungodly boggling eyes, then it lost interest and turned away from the vehicle that had nearly killed it.

I know, clowns, right!

This story grabbed me by the throat and dragged me through from the very start – Jamie basically gets shang-heid into joining a really screwed up circus, which exists in a parallell world. Violence (really, very violent violence) is involved and a dark, macabre story follows. So. Fucked. Up.

This is a début novel from this author and I cannot wait to see what else he will do. I will also investigate other books from this award.

The Pilo Family Circus – Will Elliott

This one is from the Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel. Rather appropriately!

The summer I was sixteen, the Travelling Vampire Show came to town. I heard about it first from my two best friends, Rusty and Slim. Rusty’s real name was Russell, which he pretty much hated. Slim’s real name was Frances. She had to put up with it from her parents and teachers, but not from other kids. She’d tell them, ‘Frances is a talking mule’. Asked what she wanted to be called, her answer pretty much depended on what book she happened to be be reading.

Huuuuge book!

I liked this book. I was pulled through the story, which grew and twisted along the way, completely not to my predictions at all. I really liked the characters, it was nice to have some strong women in here, especially as this is a book with a first person narrative from a teenage boy. Although at that point I would like to say ‘eeww, gross. Are all teenage boys this sex obsessed?’. But apart from a few ugh points it was ok. Although, one guy beats up his sister quite badly and then rapes an unconscious woman, not an ugh point, but a nasty one, although he gets his comeuppance in no uncertain terms.

It is set in the sixties in America and as a result there are some things that are lost on me, but I know that they have some significance, even if I don’t quite get them. There is a lot of emphasis placed on swearing (as in, how bad it is) and how they are not allowed in the same house alone with a member of the opposite sex and they are not allowed upstairs at another persons house. I am not sure if this is a sixties thing or an American thing. Although having said that I used to get told off for saying ‘bloke’ or ‘gross’ when I was at home.

All in all, I really enjoyed this one!

The Travelling Vampire Show – Richard Laymon.

Then I started to think about it some more and I realised that I did used to read a range of crime novels, although the authors escape me right now. So, this really has made me reassess my reading habits and next time I go to the library I might well head onto the crime section as well.

Anyway – onto the book. The first award that I looked at was the Mystery Writers of America and Ruth Rendell was the 1997 winner. Now these awards are a bit different in that it is not given for a specific book, but a writer. I searched at the library and realised that Barbara Vine was a pen name for her as well, so I decided to get one of hers as I wanted one which interested me. So I chose ‘A Dark Adapted Eye’.

Quote from the first page:

In these circumstances alone one knows when someone is going to die. All other deaths can be predicted, conjectured, even anticipated with some certainty, but not to eh hour, the minute, with no room for hope. Vera would die at eight o’clock and that was that. I began to feel sick.

Hmm, interesting – no?

Now, I have to say that this was hard going at first, mainly because of all the names and who married who and who was related to whom, not helped by the fact that lots of people changed their names, over and above getting married. It made it rather confusing.

However as I went on I started to get more engrossed in the plot and the book, I started to care about the characters and wanted to know more.

The plot twists were brilliant – you are never quite told what is going on until later when you realise and it all makes perfect sense, or not as the case maybe.

I am pleased that I read this book and I will certainly investigate more of her books (under both names).

It is the story of Tim Parks – who is a journalist and writer (as is the way of the world I finished the book and the next day read a Guardian article by him, even though I had never heard of him before).

He gets chronic male issues – lots of peeing in the night and general pain in his groin region. He spent a lot of time in the best consultants’ rooms, who were unable to help him at all. He eventually came across a book which helped him, basically by getting him to sit still.

Radical – right?

The reason I really identified with him is that he says he is generally a stressful person, he doesn’t sit still, even when he is writing he is bouncing or banging his hand. His way to relax is to run or do white water rafting. He also is not into dippy hippy things.

I got it.

Teach us to sit still

I never sit still – I am constantly on the move and to relax I run and get high on adrenaline.

He got really rather ill. When I read the book I was in the middle of the lurgy, which lasted well over a month and counting.

Hmmmm.

It really made me realise that maybe I should relax every once in a while, just do something for fun, instead of it having a goal and a aim. My meditation needs to come to the fore of my life a little more, along with general relaxation. I told my OH my revelation and he was so pleased – as he is constantly telling me to relax and it is not something that comes easily to me.

So, I decided to make a really simple patchwork quilt which was focusing on my embroidery.

I had no idea it was going to take as long as it did, or be as such hard work as it was. I think if I had known, then I probably wouldn’t have started.

It took me through to March 2011 to complete it, although it has taken me months to get around to photographing it. As usual the light in my house is rubbish for photos.

Here it is, complete with imperfections and mistakes, because if I had gotten hung up on perfection I would have thrown a temper tantrum and it would have never been finished. I handed quilted it, as well as hand embroidery it, so this represnts hours of work about 40 minumum I think by me and about 10 hours of patient coaching and adivce from my mum.

modelled by the handsome OH (hands and feet just visible!)

I have to say I really enjoyed having a project to work with my mum on – I learnt a lot and we got to spend lots of time together, so thanks mum!

I tried to schedule some posts, then ended up posting them all in the same day by mistake. Other times I forget I have scheduled them and write another post!

There is a backlog of written posts at the moment and I have lots of ideas for new ones. I am in a writing frame of mind at the moment that is for sure! What I have done is scheduled back ones for Monday and Friday and I will try to remember to post other ones on the other days.

Hopefully I won’t burn out and end up with no posts later in the year!

So, rather than flooding out this blog with book stuff, what I have decided to do is to continue doing the reviews for books which are part of the genre busting challenge (mainly because I have written most of them!) and keep the page summarising the 2012 End of the world challenge up to date, but post all of the reviews over at my new Good Reads account that I have set up. That can be reached at my Darkpurplemoon page over there.

I will be posting quite a few reviews, mainly because I am reading a hell of a lot for my Masters. And I am lucky in that the vast majority of them are books that you can sit down and read. Although, if I am being completely honest I have been known to sit down and read text books covers to cover, diligently taking notes. That is the reason I am a geek, and why I could, if I had the money and the time, be working on a PHD and/or several degrees and Masters at once.

Do you have a Good Reads account? I would love to find out if you do!

I didn’t get around to making anywhere near as many presents as I wanted to this year, time ran away with me. I hereby resolve to start making them as of February this year!

However, I did make these lipbalms, which I wrapped using a small square of fabric and coloured embroidery thread. I think that they look lovely all together like this and I have been surprised by how much people like them! As well as the lipbalm inside is a piece of paper saying:

Jen’s Beautiful Balm

For lips, nails and horrid bits!

• Girls only to be given abstinence sex education - because you know, boys NEVER push girls for sex, its all because of the little whore-girls
• She thinks that teaching children to say no will cut down on sexual abuse – because I am sure they were begging for it in the first place
• wanting to make abortion illegal
• failing that to reduce the abortion time limit

******in case it is not obvious there is a heavy use of sarcasm in the first two bullet points*********

If you want to email your MP please please do so – there are details in the article above. Here is the letter I have sent to my MP based on the template linked to in the article above. She didnot even attend the last vote on this (probably because she is conservative and doesn’t feel that she can vote against it).  I have said at the end to contact me by email. This is because each time I write to her she sends me a postcard saying ‘thanks for the contact’ and then later sends me a letter. In this day and age, when I have used the internet to contact her, I think this is a waste of limited resources (mainly money to be honest).

Dear Jackie Doyle-Price,

On 20 January 2012, Nadine Dorries’ proposed amendment to sex education, Bill 185, which suggests GIRLS be taught abstinence, is due to get a second reading in parliament. I know that you were absent last time this came up, but I really hope that you will vote against this bill this time.

A demonstration opposing the bill is being supported by Youth Fight For Jobs, The British Humanist Association and Queers Against The Cuts.

The bill is sexist as it positions girls as being solely responsible for decisions about sexual activity and boys as having no responsibility for ensuring that sex is mutually wanted, fully consenting and safe. Dorries even said that teaching children to ‘say no’ could reduce child abuse. This victim blaming is dangerous, incorrect, and offensive to survivors of abuse.

Abstinence education on its own is ineffective in reducing teenage pregnancies and STI rates. Good quality comprehensive Sex and Relationships Education (SRE) should already explicitly address the option of abstinence as part of decision-making about sex, and safer sex.

SRE should be informative and fact based. Some of the most important bits of SRE, which really helps young people to take responsibility for themselves and make healthy decisions (namely the relationships and communication aspects), are optional for schools and this bill will not change that. If this bill passes, some schools could end up only teaching the biology of reproduction and STIs (within the science curriculum) plus abstinence.

If Dorries really wanted to help young women to stay safe and healthy she would be advocating for statutory, comprehensive sex and relationships education for all young people, of all genders, and in all schools whether they are faith schools, academies, free schools or community schools. Her party in Government has already stated that they have no intention of making SRE statutory.

I call on you to vote against this archaic ideological bill on its second reading on Friday 20 January 2012.

Please respond letting me know your voting intentions regarding this bill. Rather than wasting tax payers money on a postcard, followed by a letter, please just use email.

Sincerely,

Jen XXXXX