The Pussification of Today's Youth, & the Castration of Todays' Rock Music

Part I: Why Today's Music Sucks

"Fuck that! When did mediocrity and banality become a good image for your children?" - Bill Hicks


 I would like to say that todays new music sucks. 

  I would LIKE to say that, but the fact is that I can't because I don't listen to today's music. I don't find anything currently going in music, appealing enough to get me to turn on a radio. 

 About five minutes ago I looked thru the Billboard Hot 100 Chart to see if I could find anything familiar. These are the results. 

Songs I've Heard: 0 out of 100

Artists I've Heard of: 14 out of 100

Artists I've Heard ANYTHING From: 2 out of 14

 I think my biggest problem with today's music, today's musicians and today's youth in general is that their musical tastes are too varied. 

Yeah that's right, I said it...Why am I saying that? Shut up, I'm gonna tell you why!

  It seems to me that all music today is a crossover over everything else. Country music artists trying to cross over into rock so they can target that market of rock fans. Rock fans crossing over into Rap to pick up that new market of Rap people. And since I don't consider rap either musical or artistic I'm not going write about, nor do I give a shit about about anything thats going on with that garbage. 

  If everything sounds like everything else, whats does it matter what the hell you're listening to? 

  What do you think would taste better, mixing every flavor of ice cream into one  unintelligible mess, or one solid flavor that stands out and combines nothing else?

   Music has been taken over  by marketing. 

 'If you're a rock band, you can't be too rock and roll because that will alienate your crossover fans and we need that market."

 "If you're a country artist you have to be rocked out a little because we gotta get into that rock crossover market."

  "If you're a rock band you can't have a sex, drugs and rock n roll image because there's no market in that these days and you'll never be able to get your lead singer as a judge on America's new reality show, "I'm only famous because I'm on TV."

 "If you're a rock band you can't rock out too hard either. We need to water it down, make it a little more 'Pop Music Sounding' because the teeny bopper pop music market is huge and we need to be able to reach that market."

BRING THE SEX & DRUGS BACK TO ROCK MUSIC

Part II: Why Today's Youth Also Suck

  I was recently told by one of these youngsters that being a musician means liking and respecting all genres of music and not being judgmental or negative towards other musicians regardless of genre because after all, they're just trying to make a living.

  Furthermore, I was also basically told that, Sex, Drugs and Rock N Roll isn't cool anymore and that todays music is much better than anything a Guns N Roses or a Led Zeppelin could ever produce. Furthermore I was told that The Beatles never did anything original in their careers, and that todays rock music dominates over yesterdays music for the exact reason that it has been watered down under the ruse that it is 'more eclectic' and therefore superior to Classic Rock. 

  Futhermore, I was also told that being a musician is much cooler than being a rocker and that you can't be a real musician without liking and respecting rap music

  I said that, if thats the case, then I'd much rather be a Rocker then a Musician any day. I first picked up a guitar at age 9 not in hope that maybe one day I would grow up to be a open minded, well-rounded musician that could appreciate and respect all styles of music. I picked up that fukking guitar because I wanted to ROCK!!!

What do I think of that Youngsters Statements? 

What Else do I Think of That?

  Wanna know why rock music sucks these days? because there is no rock music these days! It's all either rock/pop, rock/rap, rock/country...

IN CONCLUSION

   You know that old racist grandfather who always uses the N word and their behavior is always being excused by statements such as,

  "Oh he just comes from a different time, thats all."

   I guess I'm the musical equivalent of that old racist grandfather. In my day if you liked rock, then by default that meant that you hated rap music and you despised country music. 

I DEMAND RIGIDLY DEFINED BOUNDARIES OF MUSICAL PREJUDICE!

   "FUCK THAT I WANT MY ROCKSTARS DEAD!" - Bill Hicks

     I want my rockstars to party hard.

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Don't Look at Your Damn Guitar When You Play.

   One of the biggest things that get on my nerves with guitar players is when a guitarist is performing in public and they can't take their eyes off the damn guitar.

Watch the Video

   
   Do you think The Beatles ever would've conquered the world if Paul McCartney was staring at his bass trying to make sure he didn't fuck up instead of smiling so big that every teenage girl in the America wanted to fuck his brains out?


  If you said yes stop reading right now and go pawn your guitar then use the money to buy new guitar strings so you can hang yourself.

  Don't look at your guitar when you play! If you can't play without keeping your eyes fixated on the neck of your guitar then you need to keep practicing. 

  Who do you think is going to have the better performing career?

Someone Who Plays Guitar Like This?

Or Someone Who Plays Guitar Like This?

 Turn the lights off when you play, it'll help you get used to not looking at your guitar. And in the extremely unlikely event that your lame ass band that plays the Yorgurtini to a crowd of zero, ever made it big, you're going to be playing in big arenas and when there will be little or no lighting at times. 

  I'm suggesting to you that its not so much what you're playing as much as how you're playing it, look at your audience. The majority of the music listening public isn't interested in the finer points of guitar playing. Shit the majority of people don't even play guitar. Your audience wants to be entertained. 

  

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The Doors

There are things known and things unknown and in between are the doors.- Jim Morrison

   Today's entry is about The Doors, why they have always been one of my favorite bands, why their work is important, and what I've gotten out of it - enjoy.

   I always liked the fact that in 1967 at the height of the hippie, flower power, peace and love scene, The Doors emerged as something quite different. The had top ten singles yet they wrote about death and Oedipus Rex. They had a teen sex idol for a lead singer, a drunk with a habit for getting arrested and starting near riots at concerts, yet he was a college graduate, intelligent, well-read and an author of several books of poetry. It was pop music, rock and roll, blues, performance art, and theater all rolled into one unique combination. 

  I like any reaction I can get with my music. Just anything to get people to think. I mean if you can get a whole room full of drunk, stoned people to actually wake up and think, you're doing something.- Jim Morrison

   What made The Doors musically unique were the varied backgrounds and musical styles and influences of its members. Its not very often these days that a classical keyboardist, a jazz drummer, and a blues guitarist combine to form a band. 
 
   The reason rock bands suck these days is that modern rock musicians don't have the wide array of influences that rock musicians in the 1960's had. The original Rock and Rollers didn't grow up with rock music. Before rock, it was classical, jazz, blues and country. These different influences produced highly original rock music. 

BUT HOW UNIQUE AND CREATIVE CAN YOU REALLY BE IN 2012 WHEN YOU'RE INFLUENCES THAT YOU GREW UP WITH CONSIST OF NICKELBACK AND CREED?!

  So here's what you young douchebags need to do

1. Don't be afraid to play with musicians of all styles of music. 

2. FYI: Dave Grohl was in another band before Foo Fighters, look into it. 

3. Listen to Blues. And by blues I don't mean Blues Traveller or your sisters John Mayer CD. I'm talking 1930's Delta Blues. Robert Johnson, Son House. 

4. Read Jim Morrison's biography, "No One Here Gets Out Alive." Actually, read it once a year. 

5. Just because Jim Morrison put on leather pants drank a gallon of booze and became a world famous rock star, doesn't mean you will too if you do the same thing. 

Jim Morrison Predicts the Future of Rock Music

"When You're Strange," A Documentary on the Doors.

 

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Kurt Cobain

If you die you're completely happy and your soul somewhere lives on. I'm not afraid of dying. Total peace after death, becoming someone else is the best hope I've got.- Kurt Cobain

 

   Recently, I finally got around to reading, Heavier then Heaven, what is considered by many the definitive biography on Kurt Cobain. Today I want to talk about all those suspicions and murder theories surrounding Kurt Cobain's death, back in 1994. 

  First of all, do you wanna know what I think about the idea of Kurt Cobain actually being MURDERED?

  Numerous theories about Cobain being killed by someone hired by Courtney Love or others, have been circulating around ever since his death. People cite the fact that he supposedly was attempting to have his will changed to remove Courtney Love, or they point to his decision to pull out of that Summer's Lolapalooza Tour - which would've cost many people many millions of dollars, as motivating factors. 

   There are a ton of books, and websites that go into all the detail, feel free to check them out. 

  I will admit though that the one thing that ever raised an eyebrow for me was the fact that granted the amount of heroin that he had in his system when he died - most people claim as proof that there was no way he could've held and fired a gun after injecting himself. But over the years for every doctor who says there was no way he could inject that much heroin and still fire that gun, there are just as many doctors who say that is conceivable that someone with a large enough tolerance level COULD still hold and fire the gun. 

 I want to just shed some common sense on this whole issue and put it to rest once and for all. Kurt Cobain, was a junkie with a death wish.

1. Heavier than Heaven chronicles numerous times that Kurt Cobain OD'd. Many times his heart stopping only to be revived back to life. Courtney Love has said he overdosed five times, and that she had to carry a can of narcan (used to revive heroin overdose victims.) around in her purse.

2. He used heroin to medicate a serious stomach ailment that plagued him for years. He consulted numerous doctors but it was never officially diagnosed. He had tried every medication and ultimately found that heroin was the only thing that would alleviate the constant pain. 

This is the only thing that's saving me from blowing my head off right now - Kurt Cobain.

3. Kurt Cobain overdosed in Rome in March 1994, one month before he died. In an alleged suicide attempt, he was in a coma for 20 hours after taking alcohol and prescription tranquilizers

4. 2 of Cobain's uncle's committed suicide. 
 

5. Cobain's cousin Beverly, a nurse, pointed out that there was a family history of suicide. Beverly claimed that bipolar disorder and his struggles with drug addiction led him to commit suicide

  

being bipolar myself I have struggled with suicidal thoughts since I was a teenager. I tried to kill myself 3 times after the end of my first marriage, and I spent some time in a mental hospital this past May during a horrible bout of depression where I nearly succeeded in carrying out another attempt.   

6. He wrote a song called, "I Hate Myself and Wanna Die" 

 Seriously, what makes more sense? 

And as far as the whole 'Courtney Love hired someone to kill Kurt Cobain' story...This is the guy that who claimed that she offered him money to kill him...TAKE A GOOD LOOK

  This is Eldon 'El Duce' Hoke.  Now when you think 'HIRED HITMAN' is this the first image that comes to your mind?

  I wouldn't pay this guy to exterminate the ant hill in my backyard much less someone I wanted dead. 

  By the way this guy was such a genius, he died after getting drunk and being hit by a god damn train. 

Ok no more stupid conspiracy theories. Case Closed 

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The Rise and Fall of My 2nd Marriage: As Told by the Princess Bride

When I first met the woman who became my 2nd wife, things were all...

...And then we got married and I was all...

...Then things quickly got all...

So I got sad and quickly turned to drugs and started hanging out with this one guy who was all...

But in reality I was lost, until I ran into this one dude who told me I was all...

And now I feel all...

The Happiness of Uncertainty

We must be willing to let go of the life we've planned , so as to have the life that is waiting for us - Joseph Campbell


   Since my wife has left me, I've pretty much read everything from people like Wayne Dyer, Deepak Chopra, and Eckhart Tolle that I could get my hands on. I've learned a lot about letting go, but I've realized that letting go of your painful emotions isn't enough, and I wanna share that today. But first, let's talk about what letting go means to most people.

    Indiana Jones "Letting Go" and taking a leap of faith

   The term "letting go" is kinda deceptive. Have you ever tried to let go? you can't. The harder you try to let go the more you find out you can't do it. Letting go is more about acceptance, and allowing. Accepting the present moment as it is, and allowing yourself to experience your emotions rather than suppressing, or ignoring them.

   The mistake most people, including myself have made is to ignore your emotions, or numb yourself to them through drugs and/or alcohol until you feel better.

 Then one day you realize, "oh wow, that doesn't bother me anymore! I must've gotten over it!." but you haven't gotten over it. In reality all you've done is anesthetize yourself until you get so used to your pain, that you no longer realize its there.It's kind of like that game 'whack a mole,' if you stuff your emotions down, they will simply resurface some other way. 

 I wish I had learned that lesson a lot sooner...

   You must allow yourself to experience your emotions. Some people *cough, cough* (you know who you are) like to think they are protecting themselves by locking their emotions inside, but that actually has the opposite effect. You are just locking yourself inside with the very demon you are trying to avoid. It's actually kind of ridiculous when you think of it that way. If you just open the door the demon always goes away. 

SOMETIMES TO REALLY PROTECT YOURSELF YOU MUST BE DEFENSELESS

   You know how a computer can't function properly if you have too many applications running in the background? Every time you experience something and don't deal with the emotional outcome of it, that is one more 'application' running in your subconscious mind. Just like a computer experiences problems when its applications are left running unattended so do we. What are some of the things we experience when we build up emotions and experiences we can't let go of? Stress, Depression, Sickness, just to name a few. 

 Ok so we definitely want to let go of our attachment to our emotional pain by accepting that its there and allowing those emotions to express themselves so they can go away. Then we can have peace. But isn't peace just something else we can get attached to? We let go of our attachment to our pain only to get attached to our idea of peace. Anyone undergoing a painful situation in life can decide to let go of their pain, 

BUT CAN YOU LET GO OF YOUR NEED FOR PEACE TOO? 

  What good is it to let go of your emotional pain, only to become so attached to this idea of peace that when it's inevitably taken away, it causes you that very same pain?

  The only thing certain in this universe is uncertainty. Let go of literally everything including your need for peace. It seems contradictory but I've found that the way to achieve peace is by letting go of it. 

THE ONLY REAL PEACE IS FOUND IN UNCERTAINTY. 

IT'S ONLY AFTER WE'VE LOST EVERYTHING THAT WE'RE FREE TO DO ANYTHING - Tyler Durden

Ask A Guitarded Person

Do you sing, and are you dangerous? - question from youtube.


   Ok, imagine, if you can Johnny Cash on heroin singing Lou Reed songs,
then my singing voice sounds nothing like that.

   Am I dangerous?  ummm...well I don't own any weapons, and if I'm not
required by law to notify anyone if I move. I probably bring a gentler, more
mad/paranoid/genius brand of insanity to the table.


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My "Long, Dark, Night of the Soul"

If you think you are truly enlightened, go spend a week with your parents - Ram Das

   So I was at a real low point a couple days ago. Being bipolar, you experience amazing heavenly highs and crushing earth shattering lows. So as I'm facing a pending divorce, being jobless, penniless, and on the verge of homelessness, it can be hard to keep an even keel most times. I feel constantly tormented by my thoughts...

if only I could get her on the phone - she'd take me back
if only she'd answer her phone - we could work this out
if only I said this, or did that, or didn't say this, or didn't say that - I wouldn't be in this position.

  Then there's the berating myself...

nobody's ever gonna wanna have a relationship with a 40 year old twice divorced looser

you have no job, no prospects, no degree, no money (literally), no place to live, you don't deserve another chance

you blew your last chance at life - you're going to live the rest of your life alone and you deserve it

  I've been scared to death because the last time I went through a divorce, I lost many friends, spent way too much time alone and I tried to kill myself three times. I didn't want to go through that again. Especially since I'm barely 2 1/2 months out of a mental hospital, where I was sent because I tried to kill myself. 

  I will say that for the most part, I'm many ways, I'm handling this go around a lot better than last time. Since I'm literally broke, My massive caffeine intake has stopped cold turkey, I've stopped smoking, I'm not drinking on a daily basis, and I've been doing a lot of walking. 

  I'm at the library every day from open to close. That means I only eat once a day. combined with my regular walks, and cutting out booze, soda and junk food, I've already dropped close to 20 lbs.

  But I was afraid that I was using exercising and not eating as just another way of self medicating, and soon enough I would enter into another relationship, or my wife would take me back (not likely) and I would just end up repeating the same behaviors over and over again that end up driving everybody away and ruining every relationship and costing me every job I've ever had. 

  That brings us to earlier this week. I was feeling real low. My mind is always racing, and it was tormenting me with thoughts, of guilt, remorse, sadness, depression, self-hatred, and I couldn't turn it off. I decided to go for a walk, thinking maybe I could walk away from it somehow, but that wasn't working. It was starting to get dark, there were no cars in sight. I had the whole road to myself. 

  The harder I tried to let go, the less it worked. I try to keep my attention on the present moment and bypass my ego, bypass my thinking, but ego kept finding a backdoor to torment me.  My wife has had enough of me, my parents have had enough of me. I miss Sacramento, and I have no way to get down there. I was convinced that when I got remarried that this was would be my last chance at love, and life, and now I blew it just like I always do. I can't live another day with this torment, and guilt.


I reached my breaking point. 


  It was a little after 8pm. I was walking down a mile long stretch of paved road that has the residential neighborhood my folks live in, on one side and a school and some farms on another. It's the dividing line between old, rural Queen Creek, and new suburbia Queen Creek. I walked into the middle of the road, and sat in the left turn lane, legs crossed in the half lotus position. I closed my eyes and told myself that I'm going to settle all these issues, put this torment to rest once and for all, and make peace with whats happened to me in life, and I'm not gonna move until I resolve it all. The cops may end up forcibly removing me, or scraping my brains off this road, but I wasn't moving until I made peace with myself. 


I didn't know what else to do. I was that desperate. 


 I believe in God, but not the Christian God. Not the old, angry man in the sky. I believe God is, as whats been called, "The One Consciousness" or "The Universal Mind" and I believe that we are all connected to that, its just for most of us, that connecting link is dirty and corroded because we either hardly ever take advantage of that connection or we don't believe it exists. I'm not trying to start a debate, that's just my view. 


  I was in tremendous emotional agony. I had tears streaming down my cheeks. I turned to that voice within and asked why have I always been so angry? why have I always sabotaged every chance a happiness in life? Why was everything always so hard for me? Why have I caused so much pain and misery to the few people who have actually loved me? 


  I've asked these questions before to that voice within, but I've never gotten any answers. However I don't think I was asking right all those times before. If I ever asked these questions before, I was asking with an agenda, usually with no other interest than to appease my ego, by getting that person or thing back in my life, and fulfill my definition of what I thought I needed to be happy in life? I never got any answers when I asked from that place. 


  I made my plea to God, and kept quiet. My resolve was firm, I was not getting up and getting off of this road until I figured it out...I kept my eyes closed. I tried focusing on my breathing but my thoughts were too powerful. They kept baiting me into the same old circles of endless self-abuse, guilt and torment. I kept my eyes closed. I have a realization, not a thought a feeling. Maybe I'm not bipolar. Maybe I'm just guilty of compulsive thinking. If I could learn to stop the compulsive thinking and learn to live in just present moment awareness, I could stop tormenting myself. That kind of realization is an attack on the ego, and it was there to fight back. Every time, I tried to let go of my thinking, my thoughts, my ego fought back, each time stronger than the last. 


  It wasn't working. I felt like I was burning inside. I didn't want to go though another 40 years of this kind of torment any longer. I wanted this to stop, and not for any selfish reasons. I was sick of the depression, the misery, the constant mood swings, and highs and lows. Not because I wanted anything, or anyone. I just wanted to be at peace, and enjoy my life, however that looked like. 


  There was no way in hell I was gonna get up and get off this road. I was beginning to think they were going to have to scrape me off of it. There are hardly any lights on this road. I didn't have any ID. I wondered how long it would take to notify my parents. I wondered if they would even bother calling my wife to tell her. Or if she would even care. I was breathing heavy, tears rolling down my cheeks. I stood up and said out loud to that voice within, 


DAMMIT! I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO ANYMORE. I'M TRYING BUT NOTHINGS WORKING. PLEASE JUST TELL ME WHAT TO DO.PLEASE, PLEASE TELL ME WHAT TO DO!


  My head fell in my hands, I was blubbering like a child. I had given up. Then I finally heard that voice answer back for the first time ever. 

Be good to yourself. Do you understand?


  What do you mean be good to myself? What kind of crap answer is that? Why should I be good to myself, I suck right now. I can't do anything right. Nothing ever works for me. I've ruined two marriages. I'm almost 40, no job, no money. I'm nowhere near where I should be in life. Nowhere near where other people my age are. Why should I reward myself by being good to myself at this point! huh?


Be good to yourself. Do you understand?

  I suddenly remembered that David Icke video I was looking at the other day. He said everything we see and everyone we meet in this world are just projections of whats going on in our own heads. If somethings not right in our life and we try to solve it by changing whats on the outside, its like combing the mirror. When we change whats inside, then we change whats on the outside. 

Be good to yourself. Do you understand?

  If that's true then maybe everything I complained about and accused my wife of doing to me, happened because I was doing it to myself. I accused her of being overly demanding with me, impatient, not understanding, not nice or affectionate. But in reality I was being overly demanding with myself, not nice to myself. 
  She accused me of being impatient and too hard on Ava. In reality I was actually being impatient and too hard on myself. This marriage doesn't look the way I want it to so I can be happy.  

Be good to yourself. Do you understand? 

  Shit. I start to rewind the clock. I see that every relationship I've ever had, both my wives, every girlfriend I ever accused of being, mean, bossy, demanding, rigid, having a love that was based on conditions. That happened because I was doing it to myself. 

  The more relationships that failed the more hard I was on myself therefore more relationships failed. It was a sick, cycle of dysfunction and self abuse. 


Be good to yourself. Do you understand?

 I was starting to understand. I haven't experienced lasting love or goodness or happiness in my life because I've never gave it too myself. I was punishing myself. Time to turn back the clock some more. Where did this all start. When did I start punishing myself, and why?
 Every time I was picked on at school, I didn't fit in, I was a minority living in white suburbia, going to mostly white Catholic schools, I didn't fit in with the other kids, I wasn't smart enough, I didn't have as many friends, I got turned down for dates. My parents didn't show the affection or understanding that I thought they should. I didn't finish college like everyone else. Nothing is going right, I'm not as far ahead as everyone else in life, 
   I've been frustrated and impatient and demanding of myself ever since I was a child. I had this solid, inflexible idea of how I should look, how my life should look, how my relationships should look, and when that didn't look exactly the way I wanted it too. I punished myself. After all why should treat myself good when I've failed in all these areas. I must punish myself so I'll try harder. 

  And if something good did come along, then I would tell myself. Hey remember you don't deserve anything good, you suck,  you're a failure, so I would punish myself even more by not letting myself have anything that was good in life. 

  But that shit don't work. Like combing the mirror. I'm beating myself up, then looking at the mirror and what I see is beat up, and I get mad at myself for that and beat myself up more then just get more confused when I see that everything I'm looking at in the mirror is beat up too.  I've been beating myself up for shit that's happened ever since I was a child. 

THAT'S IN THE PAST, AND EVERYONE HAS MOVED ON BUT YOU. NOBODY IS PUNISHING YOU, OR TORMENTING YOU BUT YOU NOW. DO YOU UNDERSTAND?

 
  OK, so maybe for once in my life I can start loving myself. I never knew what that meant to love myself. It means to be accepting of myself, be understanding of myself. Encourage myself, not put harmful things in my body, Not berate or call myself names. Be flexible with myself. 

  If I'm good to myself, then others will be good to me. Others are good to me because I am good to myself. Stop combing the mirror. 


Be good to yourself. Do you understand?

 Thank You, Thank You, Thank You. Yes, I understand now. 

 This didn't all happen instantaneous. It was a long process, it was painful too realize the truth, my ego didn't wanna believe it, I was in denial. I was wracked with pain,and tears as it seemed I was purging myself of my inner demons who didn't go without a good fight, all along just that kind, deep voice from within, patiently repeating, "Be good to yourself."

  I don't have to cope with this situation by reading every damn self help book in the library. I don't have to search the Rig Veda for special Sanskrit Mantras that have special powers. I don't have to have Eckhart Tolle's Audiobooks in my ear 24/7. Thats just self medicating just like how I nearly drank myself to death 12 years ago with my first divorce. All those authors, all that advice can be summed up with just 4 words - Be Good to Yourself. 

  I was amazed at how simple, yet elegant God speaks. Encyclopedias of information conveyed in just 4 little words. A lifetime of therapy wouldn't have given me that kind of insight. 

  Now it's not like I'm crapping rainbows of pure conscious, light, love and sushine. But I've stopped that bad habit of compulsive thinking. In my experience thinking is overrated. I've started to let my gut, my conscience start handling  my problems instead of my mind. Sure I have dark thoughts like everybody I'm human. But thats just what the mind does, and I can let it be and I don't have to play into that. Thats being good to myself. 
  I'm not in pure bliss or anything. But I've decided to just let life take me where it wants to. As long as I'm being good to myself, I can set goals and I will achieve them. But I don't get to decide how long its going to take to get there. That's for God/The Universe/whatever you wanna call it to decide. I don't have to beat myself up because its taking too long, or it doesn't look the way I think it should or because other people have more than I do. Thats not being good to myself. 

  You may be all JOE ATHEIST and think thats all just a bunch of bullshit, and you'd be absolutely right. I'm only trying to share my experience. I can honestly tell you it's true. Thats too complex to have made up. I'm not trying to entertain anybody so much as I'm just trying to share my story. Let anyone who cares know, that I'm going to be ok, and by writing this I'm kinda purging myself, getting rid of all this baggage once and for all.

 
 
 Personal history must be constantly renewed by telling parents, relatives, and friends everything one does. On the other hand, for the warrior who has no personal history, no explanations are needed; nobody is angry or disillusioned with his acts. And above all, no one pins him down with their thoughts and their expectations. - Carlos Castaneda

  If you give up your personal history then you don't have to live up to others people's opinions of you, and mostly your opinion of yourself. 

  PS: As I was writing this, I was called and officially offered the job that I had been wanting. I start tuesday. And I was called by the other people I had applied to for a second part-time job, who I'm meeting with on Monday. 

Very cool indeed. 
   

Combing The Mirror: The State of My Union Address: And Why I PrettyMuch Suck Right Now

  Thought I'd post this on my blog, so no one can accuse me of using Facebook as a platform to whine and cry. At least if you're here, you're here by choice.

   My wife is divorcing me. I haven't been home in 2 weeks, I am not being spoken to. Calls are not being returned. Emails not answered. Doors are not being opened. You understand?

  I'm penniless, and soon to be homeless. Just as my wife finally got tired of my bullshit, my parents have pretty much tired of it too.

  The good news? It appears I've found a job. It's not the greatest job. It's a dead end job with little pay and no room for advancement, but its doing something I'm really going to enjoy. I am looking for a second job too. However I may not have enough time to get the money together that I need to move out. I'm waiting to pass the background check so I can hopefully start work next monday, but we'll see.

  I feel like the boy who cried wolf. Similar situations have happened so many times now that nobody really gives a shit how I'm feeling. It's just crazy old me, being his crazy old self. But this is different.

  I'm experiencing fear: 

of being 40 years old and alone, 

who's gonna want a 40 year old two time looser.

of being homeless,

 fear of being unloved/unlovable,

 fear because I don't know what the hell I'm going to do.

  I'm experiencing guilt:

that I was a total asshole and drove away the very people I didn't wanna loose. that I                               

the same shit that I always do
and blow it every God damn time.

 I'm beating myself up: 

for blowing what I sure was my last chance at a happy romantic life.

  I'm experiencing incredible sadness

:because I have no one to talk to. that just like last time, this divorce will cost me my friends,

______________________________________________________________________________

Now the video on top is interesting. What David Icke says about the human soul is what a lot of Eastern Religion and people like Deepak Chopra, Wayne Dyer and Eckhart Tolle have been saying for a while now. But I love the image that he tells of trying to change your world by changing whats on the outside is like trying to comb your hair by combing the mirror. Unfortunately, if you continue to read into David Icke, you'll find he has a wonderful view of the human soul and spirit but his message is also sprinkled with tales of aliens, conspiracies, the illuminati, and reptile people. But what he says about the human soul and consciousness is spot on.

  

  It's true that while the eyes take in the light of objects, it's the brain that does the "seeing" the brain is telling the eyes what to look at! What it decides to look at is based on our past conditioning. It's literally true that when we change the way we look at things, the things we look at change.

  I'll give you one better. You don't actually SEE anything! Your eyes are only taking in the light reflected off an object, light that is ultimately interpreted by the brain. You may see my soon to be ex stepdaughters play room and think, "oh how cute!" while I say, "Sheesh what a frikkin mess!" 

  And I'll give you even one better than that! we don't touch anything either. Before I can touch the table, the electrons in my hand react against the electrons in the table. Our brain is conditioned to believe we touch. Kinda like the matrix. 

  So we live in a world where nobody touches, or actually sees anything other than what mind believes is going on. We live in a giant hologram. This is all an illusion, and what we are is just one pure consciousness experiencing itself in different ways. What we see and experience is the reflection of ourselves. If we don't like what is happening then you gotta change whats inside. Otherwise your just combing the mirror. 

  I can understand that from an intellectual point of view. I have a knowing deep down inside that tells me this is so. But then my ego, takes over. My view of myself as only the body and mind, then it's like,

   well great we live in a hologram well right now my fukkin hologram of a wife is about to divorce me and my holographic emotions are making me feel like shit about it!

 But you gotta look within, otherwise all youre doing is combing the mirror.

  And don't worry, even though it was only two months since I was institutionalized for trying to kill myself, I'm not going to do anything stupid, other than sit around and pester my wife with text messages she's never going to answer, and read every god damn self help book in the library and watch every guru on youtube. 


  I'm trying not to comb the mirror.

The Godfather Theme: The Guitarded Version

Guitardedblog's Multi-Annual Pledge Drive

  I've officially on my own. I'm not with my wife, and I've got a deadline of a few weeks to get out of my parents house then I'm officially homeless. I've found a job but I don't start for another couple weeks and  I'm looking for donations for clothes, gas so I can get started in a good way for this job.

  I'm going to be doing data entry for a law firm. Not the most well paying job, but I'm working on my own, little supervision, no customers, no distractions, kind of a perfect job for me. I'm very excited about it. 

  I'm also running low on some of my medications, I have no health insurance yet, and my last inhaler is about to run out.

  All donations are accepted and appreciated. I have nothing to offer you in return at the moment except my gratitude, good karma and my promise to keep this page up and running and hopefully as entertaining as possible.

Thanks, and God Bless.

The Meeting of the Blogs

   OK so I've decided to start another more serious type blog.

 www.zencustomerserviceblog.blogspot.com draws on my customer service experience both in retail and in call centers. Call centers have some of the highest turnover out of any job around. It is a thankless, underpaid, under-appreciated, dead end job. Learning how to deal with abuse, and humiliation for hours on end, on a daily a basis is not only necessary, its practically a job requirement. In this blog, I try to draw on basic tenets of Eastern Philosophy to create a more enlightened approach to customer service.


   Unlike other blogs or books on customer service are written by academic and business people with degrees who may know all about businesses and customer service, yet have never worked in a call center a day in their life. I'm a soldier, who's been in the trenches and can speak from experience.


Please have a look over there and let me know what you think.


Thanks

www.zencustomerserviceblog.blogspot.comwww.zencustomerserviceblog.blogspot.com

Picture Day

Movies at Guitardedblog: What The Bleep Do We Know

Wanna see a movie, that will change your life forever? Then the real question is:

Just how far down the rabbit hole do you want to go?

   For those people who aren't spiritual or religious. This movie presents scientific proof of the connection between all humans, quantum physics and consciousness.

Some ideas discussed in the film are:

• The universe is best seen as constructed from thought (or ideas) rather than from substance.
• "Empty space" is not empty.
• Matter is not solid. Electrons pop in and out of existence and it is unknown where they disappear to.
• Beliefs about who one is and what is real are a direct cause of oneself and of one's own realities.

Peptides manufactured in the brain can cause a bodily reaction to emotion. 

Enjoy, and please leave your comments after watching, thanks!

 

What the Bleep Do We Know? - full movie