Soul Food

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experiment;

Jordan Bernt Peterson, Canadian professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, Clinical Psychologist and published author, wrote the Book, “12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos”. The Book aims to assist us with guidelines to alleviate suffering. Peterson makes mention of the fact that most people hate rules and regard them as a means to control and rob us of fun. For that reason, most people hate the term rules. However the fact is, the only guarantee we have in life is that there will be pain, suffering as well depending on how we respond to that pain. There are rules, such as his that are simply tried and tested methods that can facilitate a life in which we need not experience as much pain and we need not suffer. The rules that follow are not all of Peterson’s rules, but some have been incorporated. What I found to be interesting is that with most of the rules, there is a strong requirement for a foundation of faith. This is likely why religion has played the massive role in society, which it has.

Rule #1 Embrace Uncertainty

Throughout one’s life there will be changes. Our ability to thrive will be dependent on whether we can go with the flow. When we resist change, we create tension in our bodies which is damaging to our health. We also prevent ourselves from being present and open to new opportunities that only arise due to changes in circumstance. The strongest among us are those that constantly challenge themselves to grow and evolve. We cannot grow and evolve, if we do not embrace change. People cling to old, outdated patterns, the familiar, due to fear of change. They miss out on a better job, better suited partner because they are too afraid to let go when necessary or to move on when the situation has become painful. We don’t listen to our intuition, we shut out our emotions and we suffer as a result. Those among us who are able to avoid suffering, do so by embracing the changing tides and not getting attached to any outcome because they understand that understanding and perception of reality is subjective and limited. In order to embrace uncertainty we need to develop faith. Faith is the remedy for uncertainty because without it, we cling to what is safe, what we know. We don’t dare change for fear of loss. Fear of lack. Faith will remind us that in the end it will all be ok, and if it’s not ok, it’s not the end.

Rule #2 Your life will change for the better once you learn to delay gratification 

The Stanford marshmallow experiment was a study on delayed gratification in 1972 led by psychologist Walter Mischel, a professor at Stanford University. The purpose of the study was to understand when the control of delayed gratification, the ability to wait to obtain something that one wants, develops in children. In this study there were 32 participants and each child was offered a choice between one small but immediate reward, or two small rewards if they waited for a period of time. During this time, the researcher left the room for about 15 minutes and then returned. The reward was either a marshmallow or pretzel stick, depending on the child’s preference. The results indicated the exact opposite of what was originally predicted. Instead of the rewards serving as a cue to attend to possible delayed rewards, the rewards themselves served to increase the children’s frustration and ultimately decreased the delay of gratification. The results seemed to indicate that not thinking about a reward enhances the ability to delay gratification, rather than focusing attention on the future rewards. Years later, after the children had grown up, the researchers then went back to see how they were doing in the adult world. What they found was stunning. The children who were able to resist the temptation of the marshmallow were doing better in life. They went to better schools, got better grades, had better relationships, made more money, and were happier and healthier. Delaying gratification also requires faith because if we don’t believe we will be rewarded for our efforts with greater happiness and success in the near future then we won’t give up the treat or the opportunity that is available to us in the present moment. Peterson mentions in his book that people coming from a “higher class”, where there is wealth, are generally far better at delaying gratification. They don’t over eat or abuse alcohol because they know there will be opportunities down the line for more food, drinks and fun. Alternatively those who come from poorer backgrounds don’t have any guarantee that an opportunity or good food will come around again and therefore will grab whatever they can get, when it arises. For the poor, survival is paramount, pleasure is scarce. If alcohol is presented to them, they will grab the opportunity to indulge in some escapism and this often leads to alcohol abuse. Contrary to popular belief will power is not the issue here. If human beings were at the mercy of sheer will power alone, few would succeed. What studies have found is that those who develop healthy habits, leading to their success (this could include restricting sugar, exercising, restricting alcohol or engaging in hard work), do so because they enjoy it. They enjoy these behaviours and they feel good knowing that the rewards are going to come. Incidentally the serotonin and dopamine release present after engaging in much of these activities leaves them feeling good straight afterwards but that isn’t always the case, especially when diminished dopamine levels present in those who have suffered addiction prior. In those cases faith plays a much bigger role at the beginning, only until the rewards become apparent.

Rule #3 Love everyone but chose your crowd carefully

I am a spiritual person that believes that we are all the embodiment of God. That we are all one. In an idealistic world, we would all love one another. Loving others is not always easy, some people make loving them extremely hard to do. I do believe it is helpful to retain this idealistic belief as It affords one much empathy, compassion and tolerance for those around you. When you have this attitude people pick up on your loving nature and are kinder to you as well. That being said some people are quite simply addicted to being victims, they are addicted to drama. Negativity surrounds them and they refuse to take the responsibility required to change. Those people will drag you down and prevent you from achieving higher levels of personal development and achievement. We live in a quantum universe. The law of Physics tells us that everything is energy, vibrating at different frequencies. Everything that we become, everything we perceive will be directly affected by our energetic vibration. Matter is just energy in motion. Energy mixes and has to meet. That means when you engage with someone of a higher vibration they will energise you. When you engage with someone of a lower vibration they will drain you. Your energetic vibration will be lowered to that of the person who is hell bent on staying a victim. All your efforts to progress will be halted and made infinitely harder. We don’t exist in silos, our decisions are influenced by those around us, our habits too. You become the sum total of the people you spend your time with. Choose wisely.

Rule #4  Treat yourself like you would someone you deeply love

Part of the deal when we embark on this human experience is that we are given egos. Our ego drives us towards survival and procreation and is thus necessary. The problem is most of us become slaves to our ego. The ego operates by driving us to strive for better. The problem with this is when we never feel as though we are good enough. The ego tells us that we will be happy once we achieve success and then once we achieve some success the goal post gets shifted. The ego lives in the future, it cannot exist in the present. We also live in a society underpinned by rigid religious ideals and rules, when we fail, as we all will at some point, we feel immense guilt and shame. We are taught that God is outside of us and that certain behaviour will render us worthy and others not. The result is that few of us connect deeply enough with ourselves to gain any self awareness necessary to cultivate a relationship. Without proper self awareness we cannot gain self acceptance, and without that we invite self condemnation. We dont believe that we are worthy of love, respect and good treatment and we become the first to facilitate our destruction. Most of us would never treat our loved ones the way we treat ourselves. We give great advice to loved ones but we don’t follow that same advice. You are acutely aware of your own faults and flaws, so you imagine yourself to be worse than others. That is not true, you are human, we are all human. We are not our pain, we are not our trauma, we are not the choices we have made that lead to suffering. We are more. So much more. We are God incarnated in human form, all of us. We need to treat ourselves as such.

Rule #5 The truth will set you free

The reason why there are cliches such as the above, is because someone before us realized they were useful after likely encountering some painful life lessons. Whether it’s a job you hate or a relationship with someone you aren’t compatible with, we waste a lot of extremely valuable time on the wrong path because we failed to be honest. Again faith is our foundation. We allow ourselves to operate from a mindset of fear and lack as we feel it necessary to grab what we can get regardless of its suitability for us. We do this by being dishonest, because we fear honesty would cost us that job or that romantic partner, and we fear that another, more suitable job or partner wouldn’t follow. Even if you cannot master the art of faith. You need to master the art of truth. Eventually the lack of skill required in that job will be revealed and you will be fired. The person you are dating will realize you aren’t who you pretended to be. When this happens, you will have to face unnecessary pain and humiliation, as well as time lost pursuing a path that wasn’t yours. You have been created the way that you are for good reason, trust that. It is said that the path to our purpose is paved by that which brings us joy. You have a unique energy signature for a reason. If we were all intended to be exactly the same then that which excited us would be exactly the same too. Our biology would be the same, but it isn’t, there has never been two biologically identical people. Embrace all that you are, the good and the less desirable. The fastest path to achieving success is by finding a sense of purpose. You can’t fake that. It is linked to your authentic self. Anything requiring you to be different is not for you and will never bring you true fulfillment.

Rule #6 Try to see beauty in every person you encounter

There are a lot of people that will challenge us and our serenity. If we remind ourselves that this person is a part of us, a part of God, then we will find it easier to see past the initial challenges they present. I find imagining the person as a hurt little child helps me practice more empathy. In Robert Redfields, ‘The Celestine Prophecy,’ “When we dislike someone, or feel threatened by someone, the natural tendency is to focus on something we dislike about the person, something that irritates us. Unfortunately, when we do this–instead of seeing the deeper beauty of the person and giving them energy–we take energy away and actually do them harm. All they know is that they suddenly feel less beautiful and less confident and it is because we sapped their energy. When we sap others of their energy we are harming ourselves as well. When we see the beauty in others, we feed them energy and in doing so feed ourselves. You will find that when you energise another, they will have a message for you that will help you along your journey. At the very least you will likely learn something. 

Rule #7 Appreciate the value of every experience

It has been said that what many old people say when they are on their deathbed is that it felt as though they had blinked and it was over. Life is short. Every experience, good or bad is worthwhile and if we embrace it we will enjoy the journey that much more. People yearn for the safety and comfort of a relationship when they are single and yet when they are in a relationship, they miss the excitement and freedom of being single. People strive to land impressive jobs when they are studying and when they are in them they miss the relaxation and rest they had as students. We yearn to travel and to emigrate and then once we have, we miss home. If we adopted an attitude of embracing every experience then we would allow every experience to bring us joy. We would remain fully present, life and time wouldn’t move so quickly.

Rule #8 Treat everyone and everything in your life as though it could be taken away at any moment

Every self help book says it. Every spiritual master preaches it. The key to joy is through gratitude. In order to attract what we want we have to begin from a place of gratitude for what we have. The fastest way to experience gratitude is to imagine a life without what you have right now. When we are grateful we treat others better. We aren’t left with regrets after our time with them is over. When we are grateful for the things we have, we stay present instead of endlessly planning for the future. We save more money. We aren’t constantly desiring that which we don’t have. Planning is great, wanting is ok but when it consumes us, it robs us of the most precious resource we have, time. It robs us of the only moment that matters, now. We can’t become who we wish to become if we are never in the now. Better thoughts lead to better behaviour, better behaviour leads to better habits. Your thoughts, behaviour and habits are what you do right now.

Rule #9  Set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world

Some of the most terrible acts of violence on humanity have been committed by those who had undergone terrible mistreatment. But such evil experiences have the capacity to birth goodness and righteousness, not just the desire to pay the abuse forward. In your own life, you might be finding that the constant grind, endless news cycle, and the pressure of an angry society is making you bitter and resentful. instead of blaming the world, just consider your own circumstances. Whilst it is incredibly tempting to take to social media and rant about the shocking government or the heinous crimes committed by others, it does absolutely nothing to solve the problem at hand. What you successfully do is encourage everyone who reads your post or engages with you, to feel negative, drained and depressed. You have only worsened the situation you find yourself in. Instead, be a part of the solution. Where can you make small changes to improve your own personal experience? How can you take more advantage of your current situation? How can you be of service in a world that desperately requires love. Furthermore, if there is something that deeply bothers you about another, ask yourself why that is. Is there a part of you that can relate, are you perhaps projecting. After all that which bothers us, tells us far more about ourselves than it does about the other, keep that in mind. Set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world. If we all did that, things could fix themselves.

Rule #10 You are responsible for your life

It is a tough pill to swallow at times but the truth is such. We are responsible for the reality that is before us. Every one of us will encounter pain, inconvenience and stress. We always have a choice regarding how we view the circumstances that exist and how we respond to them. There are basic universal laws and one of them is the law of cause and effect. For those of you that need a refresher: The law of cause and effect states that: Every effect has a specific and predictable cause. This means that everything that we currently have in our lives is an effect that is a result of a specific cause. “For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction”.  Every human thought, word and deed is a cause that sets off a wave of energy throughout the universe, which in turn creates the effect whether desirable or undesirable. Until you fully embody this truth you will never empower yourself to be the person you desire to be. You will feel yourself a victim of fate and circumstance. To live the life you dream of, achieve the results you are aiming for and even simply improve yourself, starts with first taking responsibility for your life. 

Rule #11 If you don’t like your life, change yourself.

As it states in the text based on David Eaglemans, ‘The Brain, the story of you’, our experience of reality is a construction of the brain. The brain cannot stream all the data input back to us and thus has to summarise. The brain picks up on data streams brought in by the senses but most of what we experience as reality is based on what the brain guesses. These guesses are based on expectations brought on through your thoughts, past experiences, beliefs and values. If the reality you see before you, isn’t one that you like, the only way to change that is to change yourself. If you wish to attract a better outcome in this quantum universe, where our thoughts alone set outcomes in motion, we need to think better thoughts. Start by paying attention to your thoughts, making the effort to remove the ones that are limiting or negative in nature. Then change your habits. In order to change your habits, it is necessary to become conscious of what  it is you value. Your values may need to be changed. When we were young, we didn’t know better and our lives were not in our hands. We were reliant on adults for our survival. We would have experienced hurt and trauma which led us to develop certain trauma mechanisms, beliefs and expectations about the world. A template of how we believe things to be, which is likely subconscious. One’s beliefs and expectations can be very limiting and they also ensure that the brain keeps us locked in a reality. If we want a different reality, we have to start with ourselves.

Rule #12 Pursue what is meaningful.

“There are many problems that money does not solve and others it makes worse. Rich people still divorce each other, alienate themselves from their children, and suffer from existential angst, and develop cancer and dementia, and die alone and unloved.” As Jordan Peterson says, one should pursue what is meaningful, not what is expedient. When I was little, I used to watch the models on a popular travel show, they were being captured shooting swimwear in beautiful locations abroad. I remember thinking, gosh one day I want to be one of those models. In my mind, modelling abroad, being beautiful and having a husband was all it would take to bring me joy. As I got older, I was able to achieve my goal of modelling and travelling. I attended great parties and had lots of people around me. I met handsome men and got into relationships. I’d book a great shoot and enjoy a temporary rush of happiness, but the modelling industry mostly left me feeling very insecure. I picked up a cocaine habit. I felt as though my worth was tied to my beauty, nothing else, and many people didn’t even see that worth. My anxiety was high, I was at the mercy of outside opinion and my happiness was tied to it too.  None of my relationships were healthy, they were built on very shaky, superficial ground and whilst the traveling was wonderful (as were the parties), I felt more alone, more empty than I had before. It wasn’t until I found myself at the end of my tether, suicidal, that I realized I had been doing it wrong. When you pursue meaning, you naturally land up making better choices. Quality time with loved ones becomes what is most important. You pay attention to the present moment, understanding that time passes, life is short and soon it will be all over. Ultimately the path of meaning leads you to a place where the peace resides within, as does the happiness. Your intentions come from a place of love and gratitude and less from ego. 

For as long as I can remember I have had a troublesome relationship with food. The idea that food is simply consumed in order to nourish and sustain one, is foreign to me. This has been a great source of shame, guilt and self-loathing for me. I obsess over food, it is my first and greatest love and yet I am a prisoner. I think more about food than I do anything else. I plan my next meal. I fantasize about what I could eat and salivate at the thought of the delicious tastes entering my mouth. I spend most moments each day craving and thinking about chocolates, cheese and breads. I have been to a dietician, she did DNA testing and she attributed my problem to be associated with the heightened response triggered within my brain chemistry when I consume sugars. For me, when I eat sugar or refined carbs, the response is similar to that of a cocaine or heroin addict getting high. I have tried every magic pill that promises to take your appetite away, every new diet hack, to no avail. 

Before I go any further, I wish to clarify, I don’t believe a love of food is the problem here. In fact, I have thought many times about whether I would wish to be free of the passion for food and I wouldn’t. I derive a lot of pleasure from food. I celebrate life through indulging the senses. I would, however, love to direct this passion to healthier, more nourishing foods and to be able to master the elusive art of balance. I don’t want to suddenly wake up and hate chocolate. I just want to be one of those people who can eat a slab of chocolate and be content. I know that to those of you who don’t have a sweet tooth or who are lucky enough to find balance an easy and attainable goal, my aspirations may seem totally bizarre or dysfunctional. There are people who believe that no sugar should be consumed and that one chocolate is one too many, let alone a slab! Those same people would be horrified to learn that to someone like me, a slab of chocolate would be considered an accomplishment for which I would feel very proud of myself. 

It started when I was very young and my Mom or my Stepmom would reward me with a treat if I had behaved well or if I had been upset and had a bad day. For my Mother, chocolates were regarded as the cure for everything. If I was in a fight, she would suggest taking a chocolate to the other kid at school, in a bid to mend things. I suppose from then on, I realized that chocolate seemed to fix everything. At that stage, the repercussions of sugar dependency were not yet apparent. As I got a bit older and more body conscious, I learned that sugar could give me pimples. I suffered with acne at about the age of 12, so I tried persuading myself to resist. My Mom would buy my siblings or friends chocolates and then urge me not to have as  it was bad for my skin. I don’t remember her ever having been successful. In the end I always gave in to my cravings. As I got older, it became about weight gain. I began noticing the opposite sex and I believed that in order to gain any attention or interest from them, I had to be thin. As I wasn’t able to practice restraint, I sought out other tools to assist me. This involved binging on food and chocolates and then extreme exercise after. I would jump up and down for ages in the toilet cubicles after a meal at a restaurant. I remember going on a school tour and insisting on doing  jumps before bed after dinner had been consumed. It worked, I was skinny but  it stripped me of a lot of life enjoyment, and it was embarrassing. People  thought I was Fucking weird. My Stepmother picked up on my behavior and began to monitor me closely which didn’t  deter me, if anything, my behavior was fueled. I suppose that was due to the close link between eating disorders and control issues. As I entered High School I was ridiculed and bullied for being skinny. I soon realized that a little bit of extra weight might not be a bad thing. I then took up Athletics, discovered that I was extremely good at it and on the plus side it ensured that I was getting a great amount of exercise each day to burn up the food I was consuming. With time I became less anxious and more lax with regards to my standards of how thin I needed to be and I began putting on weight. I would enter into these cycles vasilitaing from being too thin, to being too curvy. Upon recognizing this I was always able to restrict myself a bit so that I could get back to an acceptable size.

I could continue with this story and talk about my gap year in London and how I spent four months there, essentially eating everything, realizing I had gained too much weight and flying back to South Africa but in the interest of getting to my point, I should fast track. At some point I discovered intermittent fasting and it was great. I would binge and fast, binge and fast and this seemed to work wonderfully when I was younger and not drinking(that’s another blog for another day), however since taking up boozing again, and entering my 30s my body has become less forgiving. It has become painfully apparent to me that I am a slave to food. I am an addict. Recently after a few weeks of overindulgence and having put on 4 kgs, I decided no more and began to enforce a two day fast. At the end of the second day, a hideous day and the onset of PMS, the cravings began. Ordinarily I would give in with little care or concern, because the fasting was keeping my weight at bay, but now I felt like I was losing control and believed that giving in to this urge for some food and chocolate would be detrimental to my weight. I decided to give in to the urges but to take 7 laxatives before, to hopefully counteract what I was doing. I  know better; laxatives don’t prevent the absorption of calories. I simply succeeded in losing sleep that night, due to frequent use of the toilet and spent the next day feeling the way one does after contracting a bug. I effectively lost water, nutrients and electrolytes. 

So now here we are and having not written for quite some time, I felt compelled to write about this, because after much reflection and discussion with many other women, I realize that this is actually a problem far more common than I had previously thought. I won’t speak on behalf of women around the world (although I definitely believe it’s prevalent), for the purposes of this blog I will focus on the women in South Africa. Very few South African women don’t have a love, hate relationship with food. They have all had some form of an eating disorder at some point in their life, have tried a range of diets, including the use of diet pills. Why is this the case? I believe that it might boil down to the following points:

1) An Imbalanced Root Chakra: We have 7 main chakras located at different regions of the body. Each chakra deals with different emotions and governs different organs in the body. The chakras are formed at different stages of our life. The root chakra based at the naval forms from conception through to the age of 7. These are regarded as the formative years. In order for us to grow and thrive as we should, we would ideally have two loving parents attending to our needs and who are emotionally and physically available and attentive to us. When this doesn’t happen (and it usually doesn’t simply because our parents are human), we develop unconscious fears. These fears, among many things, go on to affect our ability to healthily attach to another in a romantic relationship. This includes opening ourselves up to being vulnerable with another, establishing our independence and allowing for the formation of a secure bond. Imbalances in the root chakra typically stem from unconscious fears about safety. This includes our emotional and physical safety. The belief that we exist in an environment that we can survive and thrive in. Living in South Africa, we not only contend with emotional feelings of safety, we live in a country and are surrounded by a collective consciousness that is in a permanent state of fear. We aren’t able to safely walk the streets. We have to remain vigilant at all times. In South Africa a woman is murdered every three hours. This is, according to the World Health Organisation, more than five times higher than the global average. Even if you feel a lot safer than your average counterpart and are living in an enclosed estate, with 24/7 security, we don’t exist in silos. We are all a community of cells banded together, working together. We are all connected, biologically and energetically. We live in a community plagued by fear. Eating makes us feel safe, that is why one of the symptoms of root chakra imbalance are eating disorders .

2) The curse of the Millennial generation: Our parents and their parents… grew up in an era where pleasure and reward weren’t expected and they weren’t freely given either. Hard work was the norm and if you worked hard enough you would eventually receive some benefit for that work. 

Human beings and especially Women had less freedom. Nobody expected to be able to reach people the moment an urge arose. You didn’t  have endless options in the form of romantic partners, simply because there was far less accessibility. Technology wasn’t what it is today and there was no social media. Millennials are bombarded by external stimuli, making focusing on any one thing, increasingly challenging. We want instant gratification. If you are to research how an addict is to overcome addiction, the following remedies are commonly suggested; being present, the ability to sit with discomfort and pain, delaying gratification. Millennials are challenged by all three of the aforementioned remedies, those are not conditions, we are accustomed to.  

3)  Poorly functioning brain chemistry: The massive rise in technological advances and the pressure to grow with these advances and the expectation to be available and on the go 24/7 means that we have more stress than ever before. Chronic stress changes the chemicals in the brain, which modulate cognition and mood including serotonin. When we experience a dip in our serotonin levels our brain urges us to replace that serotonin and the quickest fix is refined carbs. Chronic stress has a shrinking effect on the prefrontal cortex. The prefrontal cortex offers an individual the capacity to exercise good judgment when presented with difficult life situations and focus our attention on one thing. It is responsible for the setting and achieving of goals. It manages impulse control and predicts the consequences of one’s actions. Further to that the Amygdala, which is connected to the prefrontal cortex, is vulnerable to stress-dependent disruptions in neural development. This makes us that much more vulnerable and ill-equipped to deal with stress. We then turn to sugars, to raise our dopamine levels and thus quickly alleviate the stress. This is a short term solution as excess sugar leads to poor gut health. Although serotonin is a brain neurotransmitter, it is estimated that 90 percent of the body’s serotonin is made in the digestive tract, so our poor gut health leads us to feel worse, more depressed than we were before, as a result we comfort eat and the cycle continues.

4) Poor nutrition: Fasting has many health benefits. It cleanses our body of toxins. When we fast, the body does not have its usual access to glucose, forcing the cells to resort to other means and materials to produce energy. As a result  the body begins gluconeogenesis, a natural process of producing its own sugar. During fasting, our basal metabolic rate (the amount of energy our bodies burn while resting) becomes more efficient, thereby lowering our heart rate and blood pressure. Fasting assists us in fighting free radicals. There is however a negative aspect to fasting. We may find ourselves starved of certain minerals and nutrients, disrupting our brain chemistry and leading us to want to binge on refined carbs for a boost of energy.  Having fasted we feel that we have earned it so we land up indulging in more junk  leading us to binge and fast all over again.

 5) Emotional Suppression: I am of the opinion that in the Western World, traits such as intuition, empathy and creativity are not regarded as highly or celebrated the way scientific reasoning, fact finding and logical application are. As a result we suppress many of our feelings and our intuition. Our intuition alerts us to circumstances that need to be changed like potential threats and danger and people that aren’t to be trusted. In modern day society one’s intuition is regarded as unreliable, and those who follow it  crazy. Your intuition will speak to you regardless of your efforts to ignore it. Emotions are necessary for similar reasons, they alert us to what our values are, what we need to change and the state of our physical well- being. A common behaviour associated with suppression of feelings is overeating in an attempt to numb, suppress and distract ourselves. If you are like me, then you might battle with feelings of empathy. I say battle because empathy is a wonderful trait but if one does not have boundaries you can land up feeling as though you have the world on your shoulder and when that becomes too much you may want to create additional insulation through eating.

I have read about the importance of staying present and remaining conscious when we wish to fight any addiction or compulsion. When we do so, we make decisions that are healthier and less attached to our ego or past traumas. Bad habits are formed through defective subconscious programming. In order to rewire that programming one has to consciously create new habits and stick to those habits for 21 days. I have heard that meditation using sounds designed to induce theta brainwaves, followed by positive affirmations also works well. I have never successfully managed 21 days of healthy eating. I have meditated with positive affirmations, I believe it may be helping. What we should not do is hate ourselves, reject and condemn the parts of us that we feel are bad, defective and not up to societal standards. Rejection and repression only seem to create a stronger beast. If we are to beat this beast, we need to do so with love.  As Jordan Peterson says, in his book, the 12 Rules for Life, an antidote to Chaos, “Treat yourself like you are someone you are responsible for helping”. We need to nurture and mother our little child within. That doesn’t mean starving ourselves or eating everything we can find, but rather giving ourselves the health and nutrition it needs to feel good and to thrive. If we need some ice cream after that, then that’s ok, just not the whole 2 litre tub. If we do eat the 2 litre tub then we simply forgive ourselves. Being human is hard. We just need to strive for tiny improvements every day. Today it’s a 2 litre tub, tomorrow it’s just 4 scoops- Voila, progress! 

These are the lyrics to the song, Running by popular singer, songwriter Beyonce Knowles. The song goes: “I’ve outrun the fears that chased
They’re standin’ still
I’m runnin’ still
I’m runnin’ still
And every voice that cried inside my head, forever drives
Forever drives
I’ve killed the lights, oh

Where else can I go?
And where else can I go?
Chasing you, chasing you oh

Runnin’, runnin’, runnin’, runnin’
Runnin’, runnin’, runnin’
Ain’t runnin’ from myself no more
Together we’ll win it all
I ain’t runnin’, runnin’, runnin’, runnin’
Runnin’, runnin’, runnin’
Ain’t runnin’ from myself no more
I’m ready to face it all

If I lose myself, I lose it all”

I think back to the last 32 years of my life and from as far back as I can remember I have felt entirely at the mercy of the moods, opinions and actions of others. This made growing up for me entirely unpleasant. This also meant that romantic relationships were always a double edged sword for me. On the one hand, I needed one as desperately as I need water. I felt empty, incomplete, sad and a failure, without one but at the same time, once I got into one, my sense of stability and serenity would be under threat. This lead me to suffer greatly during my romantic relationships, which would inevitably end and leave me devastated. I have had my heart broken so many times. I believed that I would eventually meet the right man and would no longer suffer as I had. I would feel safe, good enough, worthy, love- able. I would feel happy and fulfilled. It wasn’t until December last year or so that I began questioning this belief. It occurred to me that whilst others could maintain a relationship for many years, I could not. There was a pattern. I would desperately yearn for love, to meet someone that I had a “connection” with, and at first it was euphoric and fun. Until I would develop feelings. I would feel vulnerable and this would terrify me. I would then begin to fear abandonment and rejection. The fear was crippling. I began actively and aggressively looking for all signs that I wasn’t good enough, wanted or loved. I believed that inevitably I would be rejected, and deemed not enough for this other person and that the relationship would end. Believing that this was inevitable, I lived with this debilitating anxiety that lead me to flee at the first sign that this was happening. I thought rather let me leave on my terms than risk the rejection. Believing that once this happened I would never recover because my inner most fears, would be confirmed.

These signs I sought would come in the form of this person being too preoccupied at work, needing space. Wanting to spend time alone with friends, placing too much importance on other priorities. Their inability to express certainty regarding our future as a couple. Any doubts they had about me or us. If they were unhappy at all, I always circled it back to it being about me and me not being enough or them not wanting me. If their friends or family members were “off/distant” for any reason it was again, a personal attack against me. I believed this to be a complete threat as I believed that my lack of real value would make me vulnerable in relation to the opinions of others, when it came to my partner. That if they, for any reason didn’t like me or feel that I was right for him, that my place in his life would be threated. This was draining because I would try my absolute best to be perceived well, liked, approved of and if for any reason I wasn’t, it would crush me, again confirming my inner fears.

These fears were that I am not enough. I am not worthy of love. I am defective. I hold no real value, I am useless to the world and others. I take up space. I am a burden. I am not safe in the world. These crippling  and unconscious (for the most part) fears lead me down many self-destructive roads, involving the frequent abuse of drugs and alcohol in a bid to escape these feelings and my thoughts for a while. I would settle for the attention of those who, themselves were very hurt and in need of healing and as a result would allow and entertain abuse and disrespect. I would actively seek opportunities for validation from anyone. This could mean flirting with the wrong people, posting pics on line to get comments or likes. In the case of my relationship this meant the constant need for reassurance of my partners love, attraction and commitment. I would frequently break up with them, to test if they would fight for me. I would fight with them into providing more daily reassurance. I needed ongoing sexual intimacy, and would engage in this with them even if it would hurt me or I didn’t want it, simply because I believed that without doing so, they would simply find it elsewhere or I would be rendered useless. This also meant that at the first sign of neglect from them, I would need to ensure I had a contingency plan, in the form of another interest from the opposite sex.

I believed that the right person would heal me of these feelings and this behaviour. I believed a marriage proposal would have me finally feeling safe. It wasn’t until December last year that I began to question these beliefs and more importantly my behaviour. I had been through so many relationships, all that battled similar problems. If there weren’t any problems, simply because the other person was besotted enough with me, or I suppose dysfunctional enough to be at my beck and call, then I would get bored. I needed and expected far too much out of a romantic relationship. I began to realize that I would never find happiness, a sense of purpose, inherent value, self-love or safety through another. These had to be cultivated within. Understanding this now, has helped and I try to remain conscious of this. It is so easy to understand and know this until one re-enters into a romantic relationship and the inner wounds are triggered again. The fears re-emerge and I unconsciously slip back into my usual default defences, which involves vacillating between being at my partners beck and call and giving too much of myself and then resenting them for not reciprocating or ensuring I feel all that I believe I should feel.

The realization of the importance of staying connected to oneself is resounded through the lyrics of Beyonce’s song. I cannot give from an empty cup, as cliched as that sounds. First I need to take care of me. I need to give myself the love I seek, I need to take care of and nurture myself in order to feel that inherent love and value. I need to pursue my own goals and sense of purpose. A purpose separate to my role as a partner. It needs to be me first. If I am unhappy I need to fix that through my choices, habits, actions and thought processes. If I feel unsafe then that is a sign that I am not rooted in myself. I need to ground myself, stay present and remember that at my core, I am infinite, connected to the source and to all. I need nothing outside of me. When the void returns and it will, because that’s life then I need to simply, come back to me.

“The first half of life is dedicated to forming a healthy ego. The second half is about going inward and letting it go- Carl Jung”

And here we sit…  The backdrop for my last 2 blogs was the Covid 19 pandemic, as I write this one, we are still sitting in lock down. It is likely this will continue for then months to come. The egoic walls are crumbling down and society is left scrambling for the shreds of its identity which can get assembled. Jobs have been lost. Nails and hair cannot be done. Distractions are not as readily and easily available. It is stating the obvious to say that this is a challenging time for everyone. Something I have observed from amongst many of my peers, aged between 33 and up is that this process is seemingly more gruelling for the millennial generation. We are the ADD generation. We thrive on instant gratification. We get bored quickly. We require frequent praise and validation. We are the selfies generation. Psychologist would call many of us narcissists.

I started my journey of ego destruction last year and gosh it wasn’t fun. I had been working for a company that didn’t value me and left me feeling very anxious about my future. I was responsible for bringing in sales, in a competitive industry. Either their rates were not competitive, or I am useless at what I do and trust me I often asked myself that question. Stressing about my job security didn’t help my performance either. Apart from that I had nerve damage from a botched wisdom tooth extraction which was too close to my nerve, leaving me with a skew mouth. Being a former model, this took its toll on my self-worth which had previously been closely tied to my appearance.  I was still unmarried and without kids at the age of 32, this is a big deal in South African culture. At that stage I was in a relationship with someone who left me feeling that I was someone who was very hard to love. He refused to say he loved me frequently. He would say it once a week under duress and would spend a large portion of our relationship being rather cold and cruel to me. This was difficult for me, as I now understand I am someone who has always had an anxious attachment style.  Anxious attachment is one of four types of attachment styles. People who have an anxious attachment style may have a hard time feeling secure in relationships. This is common for people who come from divorced parents, where typically both parents were not frequently attentive to the child during its formative years. There is a great article on it in Psychology today: https://www.psychologytoday.com/za/blog/compassion-matters/201904/how-anxious-attachment-style-affects-relationships

While it may seem that an anxiously attached person would seek out someone who was nurturing and available, oftentimes they wind up being drawn to a person with an avoidant attachment style who has trouble meeting their emotional needs.

The relationship ended and I left the company that I was working for. I became aware of my anxious attachment style, which allowed me to understand my unhealthy patterns and the role I had played in the demise of my romantic relationships. I eventually grew tired of obsessing over my skew mouth. I had been desperately seeking self-acceptance, security and self-love in all the wrong places. I was exhausted. The more I needed a great paying job and status, the more I needed to be gorgeous and receive confirmation of that. The more I needed a reassuring partner, the more it eluded me. Furthermore, I realized that even if I had those things it would never be enough. I would never be enough. Whilst my ego was the master the goal posts would always be shifted. The remedy could not be sourced externally. I learnt through a psilocybin mushroom trip, which I am quite certain I mentioned in a previous blog, that the answer to all my problems lay in simply connecting to my higher self. My higher self is the God that lives within me, within us all. The higher self is connected to all that there is. The void I had spent my life feeling was just the space between my ego and my higher self and the more I tried to fill it with stuff, the greater the space became.

So now I get it and it is not easy, but this awareness has brought me a lot of peace. I still experience rejection and feel inadequate or fearful at times, but I can see those emotions for what they are. They are visitors that will come and then go. They don’t form part of me. My mind will still go to dark places, but I also realize that I am not my mind. It all begins and ends in the mind. I can choose what I give attention to and yes, I still give attention to the wrong things. But I now understand that those bad decisions do not define me either. I am infinitely more than a societal label or egoic construct. Regardless of what happens I am enough; I have always been enough. I am the universe manifested in human form. The irony in understanding this is that I have never been more eager to be of service to my fellow man than ever before. I realize I am not here to further my own agendas but rather to enable in my own small way, the greater good of the collective. I am here to love. When I am making choices that are out of alignment with the greater good of the collective, I feel that I suffer. I have disconnected from my higher self and the void returns, I feel alone. The beauty is that when this happens, I need to forgive myself, give myself love and start again. Tomorrow is a new day. We aren’t on earth to be perfect; we are perfect, and perfection is where we will return.

I battled with living a balanced life prior to Covid 19. I am extreme. I am all or nothing. I am either feasting/binging or I am fasting. I am either totally abstaining from all alcohol or I am getting drunk. I am either madly in love or I am disinterested. I am either hyper focused or distracted. You are either in or you’re out.  I have spent so many days and nights praying that I would be free of my compulsions. Trying intellectually, to understand why I cannot function as others do. Have just one chocolate, have one drink. There are times when I think I have finally managed to get my compulsions under control, for example, when I am on a summer holiday. Perhaps it’s because I know that I am going to the beach daily and so cannot afford to binge to the point that I cannot wear anything tight fitting the next day. I can lie in the sun which relaxes and gets my mind off food too. Being present is far easier and more pleasant.

I have always found that drugs and alcohol are easier to abstain from, because you can completely stay away in order to recover from the compulsion. Food and sugar are different, they cannot really be avoided, and one cannot abstain completely. Prior to Covid 19 I had methods that helped me control these compulsions or addictions. They involved keeping myself busy and staying connected with others. This included seeing friends for a coffee, going dancing, going for a run or walk, bathing in the sun, etc. Occupying my mind with excitement around a future event also helped. This pandemic has removed the false sense of connection generated through social interactions as well as the false sense of certainty I previously deluded and comforted myself with. Without these quick fixes, I would have to turn inward and find the connection and faith in something greater.

Now in a very shitty turn of events, there is this pandemic and we are on lockdown. South Africa has implemented very harsh, restrictive measures until this pandemic is under control. God alone knows when that will be. There is no vaccine. We can only leave our houses to get essentials and food or to see the doctor. We cannot visit friends or family or exercise outside. I am stuck in my apartment on the 3^rd floor, feeling like a caged animal. Whatever version of balance I thought I had attained has now come crumbling down.  At first it was the booze. I decided that I might as well treat myself with a few drinks during these uncertain, apocalyptic times. Unfortunately, with me, as has always been the case, I do not ever just have one drink or two and one day of drinking leads to more days. Eventually I was taking MDMA during a public holiday with a friend. At least I was not alone. I have been in lockdown alone but with frequent visits from friends who would stay for days and bring along booze and narcotics. None of this is legal of course but I honestly did not care. It was that or my sanity or so I felt. During these occasions where I became intoxicated, I behaved badly and was reminded why I do not drink or use drugs. I contacted my AA sponsor again and asked her to take me back. I had met with her at the beginning of the year and told her that I had no longer required her services as I was cured, or I never had a problem to begin with. Obsessing about alcohol and drugs was no longer an issue. I had to crawl back to said sponsor with my tail between my legs.

 Next up was the binge eating. Yesterday it was a public holiday and I decided it fitting to spend the day curled up on the couch binge watching a great series and eating everything that was in my fridge and cupboard. This consisted of biscuits and cheese, avocado, gherkins, chips, popcorn, ice-cream, chocolates and rusks. During this lock down I have gained 4kgs. Apart from that, cigarettes that I had quit smoking back in December and had since become repulsive to me, were now appealing again. Cigarette sales are prohibited during levels 5 and 4 of lockdown but despite this I was able to get hold of a box. I would love to say that I have been reminded of how disgusting cigarettes are, but they have been a pleasant outlet for an otherwise grim situation.  On Friday, our level 5 lockdown lifts to level 4, which means we are given more freedom and more businesses are permitted to operate again, not all but some. However, it is more of the same thing, most of us must continue to work from home, that part I do not mind. We are not allowed to visit friends or family. Public transport can operate again, I never used public transport anyway, and supposedly we can exercise under strict instructions. No gyms, no group or organized sports and possibly not jogging or walking either but this is to be confirmed. At this stage I could pull my hair out, my split ended hair, that badly needs a trim but cannot get one because we are not allowed to visit hairdressers. I spoke to my sponsor this morning about my recent “outburst” and she suggested I keep a food diary and that I do not purchase any junk food or sweets to keep in the house. I will try this. I cannot tell you how badly I wish I were one of those people who was content to just Be. Those very people that have confessed to enjoying this period of lockdown and have spent their time studying, reading and exercising. I enrolled to study Christianity and after starting it decided that it was the most boring load of rubbish I had ever tried to get through. I have not also read any of the books that I had started prior to lockdown.

Honestly, I do not know what my problem is. I feel like my ego is being roasted on a slow cooker and during its last moments is tearing apart the apartment, destroying the furniture and shooting through the roof. It has really got me thinking about the connection between our ego’s and addiction. To me it is more apparent than ever before that addiction is a close attachment to one’s ego. The ego constantly fuelling a need for more. The ego’s incessant need for pleasure and instant gratification. The ego’s inability to just Be. I have spent a great deal of time attempting to transcend my ego, identifying the role it has played in human suffering and in that my own suffering. I preach words of ego transcendent wisdom to others and yet I am evidently far from cured. The situation we currently face globally and even more so within our country has brought a lot to light. Forced to stay put and with less distractions at my disposal, my ego has been more dominant than ever before. Desperately seeking an available outlet, a distraction from self. I record videos frequently for Instagram, these videos contain motivational content but really are just a platform for my ego’s need for importance and praise. I am full of shit. Prior to all of this I believed I was more “together” than most, spiritually awakened with less baggage than my peers. I can toss that notion out now.

The other outlet commonly used by the ego, for gratification and distraction is romantic love. During lock down all romantic love has been poured down the drain. We are unable to meet new people in person, if we do so then it is online, and one must duck and dive the law in order to be able to meet thereafter. If you do meet it is at your home or his. It is not romantic or exciting and people are forced to get familiar far, far quicker. Even relationships are under immense strain, as people are confined to their homes all the time, together with their partners. New relationships that should be enjoying the honeymoon phase have been fast tracked into what feels like a boring routine and mundane marriage. That one toilet in your little apartment must accommodate the two of you. You must allow the person to sleep over because they are not allowed to be driving on the road and visiting people. They see you dressed in comfortable attire and no make up the next morning. You are limited to activities that include making food, eating food, watching movies and talking. You must constantly clean up unless you want a infest of cockroaches to add to your list of problems. We have no idea how long this will all go on for and my only hope is that at the end of this, my ego will be dead and buried. Having finally been able to clearly see the role it plays in my human misery.

Today I was reminded of the Book of Joy, a collaboration of his holiness, the Dalia Lama and archbishop Desmond Tutu, written by Douglas Abrahams. There is a chapter titled, “Despair: The World is in such Turmoil.” People from around the world were invited to ask these two spiritual leaders various questions. The book talks about how to attain a state of Joy, one of the questions was how one could live with joy in a world that is in such turmoil. We have war, starvation, terrorism, pollution, genocide…To this the Archbishop responded, “by how you see yourself, not as apart from others, but from your connection to others. “When a disaster such as 9/11 happens, we realize we are family. Those people in the twin towers are our brothers and sisters. I read somewhere and I can’t remember if it was in the same book, is that what the world needs is an alien invasion. This would unite all of humanity against a common attack and in so doing bring us together and remind us of our oneness. I thought about this as I tried to do some yoga in my room, whilst being quarantined. The rampant spread of Covid 19 has turned into a national disaster for many countries, including South Africa. People are having to live differently for the time being. There are precautionary measures in place, such as self-isolation, working from home and avoiding contact with others. People are scared, uncertain of what the future will bring as this pandemic impacts us in several ways. Our very survival is at risk. There are economic ramifications. This is an event that none of us have seen in our lifetime. It feels like the onset of Armageddon. Peoples’ panic has led to the bulk purchasing of food, flu medication, hand sanitizer and toilet paper, making it increasingly difficult for the rest of us to get these essentials. Others have taken to social platforms to rant. Yesterday I saw and then shared a post that said, “ One of the most disappointing things in this whole saga so far is that no one needed to buy bulk but they did, which then led people to panic buy and now some have to go without things they need. We’re the virus. We are the weakest link. Fear and greed will always be our downfall. “
Despite all of this, today as I did my yoga, I felt such a sense of connection to my fellow man. I thought about it and I wondered why this would be the case. It seems totally paradoxical. I live alone, I am isolated, I have less contact than ever before with anyone and yet I feel more connected, more at one, than ever before. Is it because we as humanity now face this pandemic together and for once it doesn’t feel like it’s me versus you or you versus me? The book of Joy also mentions new studies conducted by psychologist researcher Joseph Forgas, that shows that mild sadness can have several benefits. People who were in a sad mood had better judgement and memory, were more motivated, more sensitive to social norms and more generous than the happy control group. People who are in a negative state of sadness were more discerning about their situation, better able to remember details and more motivated to change their situation. The brief sadness might generate more empathy or generosity. I myself have found that during times of difficulty and great melancholy, what helps me greatly is to be of service to others in some way. The book of Joy says that the formula to attain a state of joy, boils down to 3 factors:
1) Being present
2) Maintaining a positive state of mind
3) Being of service to others
I also thought about some other stuff that I’d read and watched on a video that a friend shared. There is this theory that the world has been shifting from a 3-dimensional reality to a 4 dimensional one since 2012. In order to better understand how dimensions work and what it means to be living in the third, fourth or fifth dimension, we must think of a dimension as a point of perception rather than an actual place to travel to. Living from 3d, or 4d consciousness allows us to experience the same reality (on some level), but our perception changes.
In the third dimension you see yourself as a separate entity in comparison to other people and the universe. Because of this you still feel part of the physical world and quite entitled to judge people based on the colour of their skin, gender, age or financial status. At this level one believes that one’s thoughts are one’s own alone. Happiness and fulfilment are sought externally. We battle to separate from our ego. We rely on labels to identify with in order to feel of value. The concept of competing in order to get ahead or have enough is rife and there is the belief that things are either good or bad. People are either good or bad.
As we shift into a 4th dimensional reality, we may begin to regard all our previous beliefs and structures as ludicrous. We become more aware and conscious. As a result, we begin to question the ethics around eating meat and the effects of plastic manufacturing on our environment. We understand that the material world doesn’t yield much lasting satisfaction and as a result begin to seek knowledge and truth. We begin to look inwards for a greater sense of purpose and meaning in the world. The ego becomes the enemy and many of us may begin to judge others who are still “asleep,” still eating meat. The next stage would be to shift to a 5th dimensional reality however I don’t want to start delving into what happens as we enter the 5th dimension because I want to focus on where I believe we are at now. We as a collective are waking up. We can no longer lie to one another as we were once able to as we will be more in tune with one another. History has shown us a world where man harmed and killed one another as means to expand and gain power. This will no longer be an option for us. Our mindless manufacturing, destruction and building at the expense of our environment and rain forests will no longer be as acceptable to us. We will be able to manifest the reality we choose far quicker than before. This is all incredibly positive, and I believe that what we are dealing with now is a universal reboot. A death before our rebirth.

2020 is now in full swing and one can identify certain trends for the year. Last year’s economic downswing in South Africa meant a lot of retrenchments so this year a lot of people have decided to take the plunge and start their own business. Political uncertainty has resulted in a lot of people putting measures in place and starting proceedings to emigrate. The release of some alarming content on Netflix highlighting the quality of our meat and the truth about how much protein we require, together with revelations that the source of that protein being as effective if not better, if it comes from a plant, grain or nut, has led many people to opt for a more plant based diet. Alongside these trends is the rise of dating platforms and the need for them in order to meet a suitable mate at a time where people aren’t seemingly able to do so conventionally or organically anymore. The reason for this is debatable but speculation might suggest it is because we now live in a world where both men and women are very career focused. Women no longer wait around for the man to get home from work. We also spend less leisure time at the local sports club or pub, waiting for a sweaty suitor to offer us a glance. We all have very fast paced lives. The rise of technology also means that we are permanently on the go, responding to emails from work at all hours or WhatsApp’s from family members and friends instantaneously. The development of dating apps has meant that men no longer feel obliged to try to speak to women or court them in order to get sex. In the past when men or women required sex, they would at the very least be present when they ventured out socially, as opposed to being glued to their phones. Men would make the effort to speak to a woman, to find out about her interests, wants and needs in a bid to win her over.

Alongside the above-mentioned trends for 2020, is the new hook-up culture. This includes but is not limited to men and women outrightly expressing their sexual desires and needs. The loose distribution of nude pics. Men and women engaging in highly obtrusive sexual behaviour. The practice of dating and courtship has seemingly fallen by the wayside to make way for the very explicit communication of one’s desires. Gone are the day’s where men tiptoed around their true intentions until the time was suitable. We have seen the rate at which most marriages fail, both men and women no longer require the other for much. The world has enabled us all to get what we want and need independently. True love is proving to be less and less realistic or sustainable. Whilst all of this may appear to be really sad for some, it doesn’t need to be because we still have a choice around what we want for ourselves and our lives. If we want depth, romance, meaning and true love, then I believe we can have all that but the way we live our life and the choices we make must differ. I am neither condemning nor condoning this hook-up culture, I am simply stating what I have observed. This may be a product of the millennial and generation Z’s access to instant gratification. The inspiration for this blog came about as a result of many discussions with female friends, all of whom are in their late 30’s. Being rather old school in our approach and ideals, there is a lot of frustration with the manner in which men relate and engage with us. I am not a prude at all, quite the contrary but my frustration is more around the lack of awareness that men seem to have around, what they want or what women want and the best way to go about getting their needs met.

There is nothing wrong with a man wanting sex from a woman, in the same way that there is nothing wrong with a woman wanting sex from a man. I wanted to find out what the factors are that determine the nature in which men and women engage with one another when it comes to dating and casual sex and so I did some research among several male and female subjects and was able to get some insight into the minds of both. When it came to the men there were some who said that they could engage in a purely sexual manner quite easily with young women, in their early 20s. These women were naturally more open to it and more sexually explorative. There were some men who said age played no role at all and that their style of engagement with women varied based on the woman’s character and in saying that, the choice to engage sexually with a woman was due to him believing that she was purely interested in sex . One man said that he found that with younger woman he could be honest about what his real intentions are, and with older women he found that he had to engage in deception, being aware that an older woman would not find his intentions (being that they are purely sexual), alluring or enticing. One of my subjects said that he felt the problem today is that people are trying to force connections where there aren’t or where there shouldn’t be. People in today’s age, get bored far too easily and are always looking for the next best thing. The perception being that women too, at times just want sex, nothing more and so there is no point in beating around the bush.

At this point I thought it best to get some insight from women on how they feel about casual sex. I spoke to several women and got the following insights. One said that as she is now in her late 30s, she is in her sexual power and as such, can causally engage with a man for sex. There would, however, need to be a type of love that existed between them in that moment. A connection and the casual sex engagement would be reserved for someone that she didn’t see long-term potential with despite the connection. If she did see long-term potential, then she would wait before sleeping with him. She also said that when she was in her 20s, she couldn’t do this as sex was always tied to a deeper attachment and expectation of more, thereafter. Another woman, who is currently married said that if she ever found herself to be single again, in a fulfilled career, with a great support structure from friends and family then she would be very keen to engage in purely casual sex. She is a very independent person who enjoys her alone time. She would have to have alternative support structures in place and the man would need to be the type of man that at the very least bothers to find out more about who she is as a person before sleeping with her. Another woman said that she went through a phase where she was happy to engage in purely casual sex and did so with a married man, but that after about 2 months she got bored with it. She did so because she found the man incredibly sexy but knew she couldn’t get anything more from him, beyond sex. The last woman said that she has never been able to engage in casual sex as it would bring up issues around rejection for her. As a result, every man she sleeps with she dates. Even if she sleeps with him on the first night she meets him, there must be an indication of a deeper emotional connection. If the sex didn’t lead to dating beyond that, she would feel immensely rejected as a person.

 I am of the belief that no woman is ever solely interested in only getting sex. We may comply with a man’s advances or give the impression that we only want sex but this is mostly due to a lack of confidence or a lack of self-awareness. I say lack of self-confidence, because women often feel they can’t get what they want or need from a man, being connection and companionship, if they don’t put sex on the table. Lacking self-awareness results in some women consciously believing that what she wants is simply sex, but It isn’t sex alone that she is looking for, it is validation, gratification, intimacy and as I mentioned before connection and companionship. Therefore, a man needs to offer us more, if we are to indulge him sexually. Even if that is simply a dinner, and a deeper enquiry into who we are as human beings.

In closing I will say this, with the rise of technology, people are on the go all the time and instant gratification is rampant. The development of platforms like tinder means that people don’t need to make the effort to connect and communicate organically anymore. People aren’t present when they socialise because they are glued to their phones. The rise of social media has resulted in people feeling more inadequate than ever before and the fear of rejection is at an all-time high. People don’t want to put themselves out there in a social setting. Whilst all of this seems negative, there are some positives. Women are empowered now to be far more independent and so we are far less available than we used to be. We are now more likely to choose a partner based on the right reasons, such as shared values and compatibility. We now have access to people all over the world, whereas in the past we were limited only to those surrounding us.

It was close to this time last year that I sat crying on the phone to my mentor at the time. “There is all this talk about loving oneself. You need to develop self-love. Love yourself before you can love another, blah, blah, blah… but how the F&&%$**CK do I achieve that!? How do I gain this elusive self-love that everyone talks about, and for the love of GOD why is it so hard to achieve? I don’t even remember what advice she gave me, but I remember there were a lot of tears. I remember I jotted down the following words, which I still have on my notes stored on my cell phone, the words read, “what is my value if I am not loved by anyone? If I don’t have a job, or a good job? If I don’t have money, or a lot of money? If I am not pretty or sexy? If I have no kids or a husband to attend to? If I don’t have any great skills? If I am not loveable or likeable by societies standards?” At the time I didn’t quite realize it, but the reason I was battling to attain this self-love was because the standards I had set for feeling loved, for feeling worthy or for feeling enough were all based on external factors. My achievements, my appearance, my relationship status, these were all rooted from my ego. The funny thing I have since realized is that had I achieved a greater job, more money, a husband and a child, this would have again been insufficient.

For the longest time I believed that people who had self-love, had so because they had an impressive degree behind their name, or a really great job. They had achieved something that clearly deemed them worthy by the world. I believed that those who didn’t have a degree but had managed to stay in a committed relationship with someone who had turned them into a wife, had the evidence required of their worthiness and value. I used to believe that if I could just get someone to bend down on one knee and proclaim their desire to spend their life with me, I would finally believe that I was worthy and loveable. I had this idea that, due to the fact that I didn’t have a degree, a fancy job that paid me a lot of money, I wasn’t a virgin and I had done drugs in my past, that I was unworthy of love. I also believed that all the sins I had committed were further confirmation of my unworthiness. For the record, my sins never involved killing someone, but there was a time, once or twice where I had intentionally hurt someone out of rage and what was worse was that those were often people that I had loved or love rather.

When this mentor had first spoken to me about loving myself more, I believed that I would achieve this self-love through never sinning or rather avoiding sin at all cost. That way I would eventually and hopefully deem myself worthy of love. The problem is that I am human, and I am flawed, as is our very human condition. The difference was that when I would mess up, I would reject and condemn myself, I sat with so much guilt and shame for any wrong doings on my part and was never given reprieve. I had to live my life by certain guidelines, guidelines based mostly on societal norms and standards. I would even condemn myself for ill and impure thoughts I would have. I believed that the thought alone made me evil, horrible, unclean and unworthy.  I then came across a course on mindfulness which helped me greatly. They spoke about our thoughts and how most of our thoughts aren’t in fact ours and that a thought only becomes ours if we choose to act on it. This has given me some sense of relief. The other hurdle was my impulses. Part of the criteria I had placed on myself was that I wasn’t to engage in drinking alcohol, drugs or casual sex. If the urge arose, I would shun, reject and condemn that part of myself, lock the animal in its cage was the analogy I would frequently use and make it feel shameful enough that it wouldn’t dare ever escape. This seemed to work well for me except for the fact that when we reject and shame these impulses, we cut off parts of ourselves, our shadow self, better known by psychologists and In the end we feel incomplete and desolate because that shadow self is still part of you. All parts make up the whole and the whole, believe it or not, is necessary and perfect.

It really wasn’t until I did a psilocybin mushroom ceremony last year that I began to see things differently. For one thing I now understand that when an impulse arises the worst thing to do is to reject and condemn it, in doing so we only make the urge stronger. Instead what I need to do is give that part of me love and acceptance, listen to what it has to say and then simply say to it, I love you, I hear you and thank you but today I am going to choose a different option. I also realized that had I chosen the impulse, the undesirable urge, that it wouldn’t make me any less loveable, it is simply a choice that will have consequences, and I will have to live with whatever the consequences are. The choice will also set about a chain of events that will become my future life. Neither choice is ever good or bad, some just result in pain and others don’t but the choice itself doesn’t take away from the love and perhaps that’s what they mean when they speak of God’s unconditional love that is given to us all. I have also learnt that when I identify with my ego and operate from there, then no accomplishment, partner or possession will ever be enough for me. I will forever live in a state of lack and fear, but my ego isn’t the only part of me, in fact it is the smallest part. My higher self exists too, and that self is my essence and my core. If I operate from that place, I won’t feel a need for more, I won’t feel inadequate, scared or alone because my higher self is my connection to God and to all that is, my higher self is love. I don’t need to find love because I am Love.

I have learnt that the pursuit of self-love really involves living in line with my truth, if I am being true to my values and my beliefs then I am on the right track. This varies for everyone because everyone’s values and beliefs differ. The other part of this involves me showing kindness to myself. Not abusing my body with substances it doesn’t enjoy, making sure I give it rest and not allowing just anyone access to it unless they are someone, I feel a connection with and who has shown me care and respect. Situation’s that I feel comfortable with based on what my needs are, not due to any other reason or for anyone else’s approval. I realized that like with any other relationship that requires time and attention to thrive, my relationship with myself requires that. I need time alone to be with myself and my thoughts. I need time to recharge. I need to discover who I am, all the many facets that make up the whole, I believe we spend our lifetime doing that and it is our most precious endeavour. I can’t fully connect to me if I am never alone with myself, the same way a couple would suffer if their relationship never involved time alone. Our relationship with ourselves directly translates into our relationship with others, if I cannot show myself love and compassion, how can I truly offer that you. If I cannot accept myself, how can I ever accept you. You are an extension of me. I need to forgive myself and love myself for being human, flawed and all, so that I can forgive and love you for being the same.

Lastly, I will leave you with this. The more I love me, the less I need you too.

I posted a piece from Ram Dass on Instagram about 2 days ago, I had seen it posted via a friend that I follow and felt it resonated with me. It read, “Take My Advice

Don’t sell yourself short by thinking you are only your body or your personality, no matter how intriguing and dramatic they may be. For behind them, there lies a more profound part of your true self. Call it ‘spiritual’ or call it ‘higher consciousness’… call it what you will, but… Call it!

One of the doorways to that higher self is through the cultivation of your intuitive wisdom. As you learn to listen to and trust your intuition, you will find a quiet place in the heart of your being that is wise and can guide your actions. One of the things it will remind you of is your interconnectedness to all things. And out of that appreciation will spontaneously arise compassion for those who suffer; for the earth, and for all living things.

When that happens, don’t be overwhelmed by the suffering you see, by the darkness that exists in the human condition. True, there is much of it. But so, too, is there much caring and compassion in the world. Mahatma Gandhi said, “What you do may seem insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.” It is important for yourself, as well as for the balances in the world. As you let your compassion guide you into action to help heal the earth and those who suffer, your very acts will feed your own compassionate heart and in so doing, open the inner gates to knowing your own highest self.

I promise you that plumbing the depths of your being is an unparalleled adventure. I wish you well on the journey.

In Love,

Ram Dass”

What astounds me more than anything is how evident this connectedness is. I find myself having certain thoughts, revelations if you will, beliefs that seemingly spring out of nowhere. Sometimes these revelations come from a mushroom trip, and sometimes not. A thought or belief will arise and not long after that I will find a book, a quote or a post that shares the same sentiments, thoughts and revelations by some published author, or renowned spiritualist or guru. This particular theory around us having a higher consciousness came to me during a psilocin mushroom ceremony last year and after sharing this piece on Instagram, one of my friends who currently lives in Thailand sent me a message, which landed up being the inspiration for my blog today. He said, “I like this so much. Can this be practiced, this sort of Philosophy? To this I responded, of course.” He then asked me to lead him in the right direction which got me to put down, as simply as possible what I discovered during my psilocybin mushroom trip.

This understanding all boils down, I believe, to vibrations and the belief and understanding that everything in life is energy, and energy vibrates at different frequencies. You have an ego, also known as your primate self and that is what we are given when we embark on this human experience as souls, and then you have your higher self, from where your connection to everything resides. We are all connected, humans, plants, animals and the universe in its entirety. Your higher self is also your direct connection to God, and God dwells within all of us and in everything. When we operate from our primate self also known as our ego, we experience fear, guilt, shame, anger, apathy, despair, inadequacy, lack. Nothing will ever be enough and you will never be enough. The gap that exists between the primate self/ego and the higher self will leave you feeling a void, you feel empty. Society will tell you that this void can be filled through finding a partner, your magical other, a drink, a drug, food, a better body, better job, more money, sex… but this remedy will be temporary and thereafter we are left feeling emptier, more unfulfilled. This is because the more we operate from our egos/primate selves, the further we drift from our higher selves and God.

The cure is to vibrate higher, so that we can integrate with our higher selves or at the very least draw closer to it. When we operate from our higher self, we feel a sense of oneness with everything and everyone, we feel fulfilled. We are connected to everything and everyone. We step into our power, which is the universe. We want and need for nothing as we are one with everything. When our mind flairs up with negative chatter or our ego wants to trigger an unhealed wound, we can observe it and disregard it, seeing the mind and the ego for what they are, parts of our primate self. We can observe the thoughts that occupy our mind, observe the triggers from our ego and see them instead as servants, that serve a purpose at times such as when we have a goal we would like to reach in our careers or need to make a decision based more on logic and rationale. Instead of allowing the mind and the ego to be our masters ruling our happiness and sense of wellbeing, causing us much suffering and further trauma. Observation without judgement is presence. We can live as the observer. Life is meant to be experienced and celebrated and we are all the universe in human form.

To be one with our higher selves we need to ensure that our energetic vibration is at a high enough frequency. The world vibrates at a low frequency and so we cannot do as others do, generally speaking. By others I mean what is typically observed on mainstream media and the news. That beings said, the world is rising in collective consciousness, the world is vibrating higher than it did before. This should give us all a lot of hope. In order to raise ones energetic vibration you would need to consume fresh fruit and vegetables. Drink and bath or swim in water, entertain positive and loving thoughts, spend time in the outdoors, and among the trees. Walk barefoot on the grass, spend time close to a mountain range and climb a mountain. Spend time close to the ocean, do meditation, yoga and reiki treatments. Substances and behaviour that lowers our vibration would be alcohol, drugs, refined carbs and sugar, negative thoughts and gossip, meat, these are just a few examples. It can be difficult to maintain a high vibrational lifestyle and I certainly don’t do so myself, unfortunately. I am just more conscious of what I am doing now and what the effects are, really it’s all a choice. My goal is simply to make you aware of the repercussions of some of these choices, based on my life experiences. Some wisdom I would like to believe I have attained and now would like to share with you. I don’t believe in right or wrong or even in the religious concept of sin, but only in choices and vibrations, each choice has a consequence and each choice will lead us down a certain path. The point at which one vibrates will determine one’s perception of the world, the opportunities available and the experiences life will then give you. One cannot, I believe, manifest if one is vibrating at a low frequency. The higher we vibrate, the easier, more peaceful and joyful life becomes. I believe this is what is meant by the concept of heaven and hell.

It’s been a rough two weeks since I returned home from the best holiday in Cape Town, as a lot of “stuff” came up for me, emotionally. It started on Friday, the 10^th January where I suddenly felt myself feeling run down, as though I was coming down with flu. So I went home, got some vitamin C and got into bed. I ordered food from UberEATS and put on a series to watch while in bed. At some point in the evening I began feeling emotional, hurt and angry. I began recounting the last few years of my life and the amount of crap that I had endured through my romantic relationships. This was all exacerbated by the fact that I had just ended a very short, casual relationship with someone earlier that week, that had left me feeling very taken for granted and abused. I decided that this night would be the night that I would give him, as well as my ex before him a piece of my mind. I sent them both heated WhatsApp messages, telling them exactly how I felt, I also got into a fight with my Mom shortly after because she happened to call me whilst this was all taking place. She insisted on knowing why I sounded down and so I told her about my feeling hurt, brought on by my past disappointments in the love arena. She then proceeded to tell me how her and my sister had been speaking recently about how my Instagram posts may drive potential suitors away and that I should re-think how I am positioning myself as a “brand”. My Instagram posts are all very inspirational and spiritual in nature, their argument was that it may present me as someone who is unhappy, searching for happiness through these posts. This really pissed me off, so I told her off and we landed up having a fight. The days since, haven’t been much better and some days have been worse. I miss being in Cape Town, the beautiful mountains and the coast. I find myself hating the energy in Johannesburg, hating the city, everyone is so anxious, the streets are so loud, there is nowhere beautiful to run and there is nothing to do. None of that is true of course but in my opinion the place does pale by comparison to Cape Town from a beauty perspective. There is a lot less to do here, apart from going to a shopping mall, restaurants, or maybe visiting a park.

In the past weeks having felt disconnected and alone. I felt in need of a strong and masculine presence, or so I thought. I needed the comfort, I yearned for Cape Town and I felt desperate to move there as soon as possible. I tried to rent out my place here as quickly as possible, thinking that as soon as my place was rented, I could bugger off to the Cape. Unfortunately my boss had other plans and asked that I please stay put here in Johannesburg for at least a few more months, for the sake of the business. He needs me to close more deals and bring in more business as 2019 had not been a good year, economically at least. Reluctantly I agreed because I do enjoy my job and because as beautiful as Cape Town is, I need money so that I don’t become a burden to those around me. This transpired in me joining various dating apps in an attempt to try and ignore or rather fill the void I was feeling, and then something happened, seemingly out of nowhere. I had read the Celestine Prophecy this past December and it got me thinking, Celestine Prophecy talks about the different stages that society/humanity have gone through, the evolution of humanity if you will.  It also talks about 12 spiritual insights, they are:

• Noticing Synchronicity
• The World has a “Spiritual Design”
• “Giving” The Karmic Design
• Human Control Dramas
• The Spiritual Connection
• Sensing A Life Mission
• Following Intuition
• Giving Energy Increases Synchronistic
• Fulfilling Human Destiny

You can read more about the insights here: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/12-spiritual-insights-current-times-celestine-fiona-van-rensburg/ you’re welcome.

In one of the insights, I think it’s the 5^th insight the book talks about the aspects of feminine and masculine energies. All men and woman each, have masculine and feminine energies present within us. These energies need to be as balanced as possible if we are to feel harmonious and at peace. It is rather difficult to achieve and unlikely that one will ever attain complete balance, but one can work to attain better balance of these energies. This is yin and yang; yin refers to the feminine energies of life and yang the masculine. According to the celestine prophecy the universe can give us all the masculine and feminine energy we need, we simply need to learn that it is possible and how to do it. Women are born with a greater amount of feminine energy, which is why little girls have an “attraction” or are drawn to their Dad’s and men have a greater amount of masculine energy which explains the concept of Mommy’s boy and little boys being attached to their mothers. When I refer to the masculine and feminine energies here, this has absolutely nothing to do with gender. We all have the potential to lean more towards one polarity or the other regardless of our gender. We then grow up and yearn for the missing part of ourselves and we wrongfully believe it can be found in another, a member of the opposite sex. Once we meet someone and form a romantic relationship, we focus all our energy on them, we draw the masculine energy (if you are female) from our partner and they do the same thing to us, drawing on our feminine energy. This leave us feeling depleted and we land up engaging in a power struggle and forms of manipulation in a bid to draw the energy we require from our partner. We become addicted to our partner for our “fix”, hence why we tend to feel completely lost and empty if the relationship ends, we have actually lost parts of ourselves.

It got me thinking to the type of men I have attracted of late and that they have been very ego driven. I am so committed to trying to transcend my ego, I am intuitive and as such make most of my decisions based on a sense or a “vibe” I get, I feel a lot, I can be very vulnerable, I am transparent and honest.  The men I have found myself drawn to and attracting have been quite the opposite to me, they were far more rational and logical. They were very career focused and driven by a need to accomplish. They also had this need to constantly conquer, always needing to climb the corporate ladder, make lots of money, look good, and achieve in order to gain external accolades. What this meant for our relationship was that I was also another goal that after reached, needed to shift. This may not and in fact probably was not a conscious process and had I engaged in some form of game playing and made them feel like they hadn’t quite attained me, then the relationship would have probably lasted longer as they would have likely, continued to fight for my affection. This was a suggestion, advice given to me by other women.  Instead I freely gave them my time, attention and love, I tend to have poor boundaries, a sympton of not enough masculine energy and I became insecure and needy. This drove these men away because, I believe after having conquered me, they required a new goal post to reach. For a while I labelled these men as narcissists, but the truth is they weren’t and aren’t, they simply have an imbalance of energies, too much masculine energy, not enough feminine energy. The fault wasn’t on them alone, I too, have too much feminine energy. I was being drawn to them for their masculine energy and neither of us had enough of a balance of the two energies to sustain a healthy relationship. It also occurred to me that places and cities have a dominant energy surrounding them too. Johannesburg is very masculine, being a city that drives one to build their career, achieve, accomplish, make more money and drive the economy. Cape Town being far more lifestyle and quality of life oriented, is more focused on living a life of balance, work but enjoy yourself too, enjoy the outdoors, climbs a mountain and meditate.

Aspects of feminine energy are; unconditional love, nurturing, empathy, kindness, creativity, feeling, sensitivity, emotional…

If wounded these can be; needy, co-dependent, overly sensitive, manipulation, victim.

Aspects of masculine energy are; protection, clarity, boundaries, focus, support, logical, responsibility, inner strength.

If wounded these can be; dominance, control, aggression, competitive, avoidance, abuse, criticism, unsupportive.

I am feeling a lot better now. I realize, again that it all comes back to me. I need to balance these energies for myself. I haven’t been good with boundaries, I have battled with clarity, I have felt such frustration at the universe’s lack of delivery when it comes to my career, my life, my relationships and yet I haven’t been clear on what I wanted for myself. I lack logic at the best of times and yes, I have sought out a sense of safety for myself externally, through a man. Never quite attaining it and remedying that sense of lack in all the wrong way, binge eating for one.

That’s all for now.