In the midst of the turmoil and world chaos, I see that deep down I am as calm and centered as can be. How could I be anything else?

Maybe it simply boils down to what is made available to us as a whole. I feel it is more about what we chose to concentrate on. Turn on a TV, if you still have one of those things and you can see a constant stream of negative news and entertainment designed to make you want more. The same thing happens on social media. My Facebook wall is so polluted with negative finger-pointing, uni-level points of view, and well-meaning intentions. It is so ugly, I do not read a thing on it. It is hard to not walk away feeling it is the end of the world. And perhaps it is but an end of life, it is not.

I was born in a world where people used rotary phones, did not lock doors and electric magnetic fields (EMF) were few. Today, we are bombarded with the next greatest and "bestest". G5 promises faster connection speeds while many sound the health and environmental alarm.

The tough part is that the vast majority everywhere listen to mainstream news. Considering five companies hold all news outlets in the US, it is hard to imagine we have access to fair, impartial, and unbiased news. Considering how big businesses conduct themselves and looking into their business model, it is not too difficult to see there is a fundamental underlying problem. Between what they say and what they do, there is a world of differences.

Still, within the safety of my "inside", there is calm. It is almost as if there is a wise person sitting, looking. observing, and not getting excited about anything. Neither happy nor sad, this inner entity watches with an anchored confidence. There is a hint of a "make the transition now or wait for a few more decades", but overall, things are going according to divine Universal intention.

The human makeup is perfectly well made up. We can handle a lot, process almost anything, and establish healthier foundations. But stand in the way of processing, push it away to eventually deal with it later and the problems exponentially grow. In other words, chase away unresolved problems, they will come back with insistence. Might as well resolve it now. It only gets tougher the longer you wait.

Cannabis and alcohol are strange substances. Alcohol is perfectly accepted in most cultures and even has medicinal values. Cannabis is not as accepted and has medicinal values. Both work wonder in temporarily putting away problems to the side. But problems do not resolve themselves on their own. That is why we sleep. So that we can process, order, arrange and learn from what we experienced. Without sleep, we put things to the side. We might use cannabis and alcohol to alleviate stress, but the problems remain.

EMDR (Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing) was invented in order to deal with old traumas that were not properly processed earlier. The reason why it works is that it lets us re-experience a traumatic event and letting the human psyche deal with it in a natural way. Progressive Counting also works very well I hear.

The human psyche is well done. It can tolerate so much and when limits have been reached. It can turn itself off. That is why so many who have been molested or raped talk about not being there, being removed from the event, as if their mind had been removed and taken elsewhere. It is the way our psyche deals with traumatic events. It shuts down temporarily and deals with it later, usually at night during sleep.

Welcome to Brenda's Blog

One of the things I love about getting older is revisiting things that were once part of my life. This has been happening lately and now the I Ching is coming back into my life, except this time, it is with a deeper appreciation and learning experience behind it.

And Thus, The I Ching Walks Back in My Life

A few weeks ago I an I Ching book, the famous Chinese Book of Changes. I used to have one in my twenties. It is great to revisit it with a fresher perspective, more experience, and hopefully distilled into wisdom.

Lately, a few things have made their way back into my awareness. Taoism particuliarly and now the I Ching. It is interesting because it is happening with fresh new sets of eyes. And I love it!

The I Ching is the ancient Chinese book of divination also called Book of Changes. It is used to get a sense of how things are going and if the path you are choosing is auspicious or ominous.

The gist is simple but a little preparation helps eek out more from the experience. As a matter of respect, the book should be kept above human shoulder height when at rest. Use a silk cloth, ideally white, to wrap it in.

In order to prepare for the divination, set yourself in a quiet place where you will not be interrupted. Light an incense stick. You can add a candle if you feel it is appropriate. Connect with the Universal energies, your guardians, and the I Ching guardian lineage, if you can. The idea is to turn it into a ceremony and make it as special as it should be.

The rest is simple. Traditionally, the ancient Chinese would use a turtle shell and throw sticks in it. Although that could be a hard thing to do for most these days, sticks can be used on two open bowl. But if you are like most modern I Ching users, three coins will suffice. Any coins will do. I will write about the coin method here to get you going.