Lockdown has been Instituted on my Wallet

January 6, 2013 by My Experiments with Sanity

I’ve run out of pot. That doesn’t actually mean I’m not still smoking. Who knew you can get a hit from the other orifices of a bowl? I never thought about it, and it’s what I’ll do today. Then crawl around and look for some scrapplings. Then scrape some and smoke that. How else do you stop smoking? And then. And then it’s the tell tale time. Do I call the dealer? Or do I go and meditate? Go create art? Go and do something dapper?

I’ve also instituted a spending lockdown. I fired one crazy client and unexpectedly lost another client in the same month. Then the holidays came, I didn’t pursue work so aggressively. I got a new client recently, he called me! How cool is that that people call you to work for them? Sorry, that may be the norm to you but I’m used to being a useless dust speck, contributing nada to the world. I should be able to send out some invoices in a couple weeks.

But for now? I’m on lockdown. Spending lockdown. I want some cereal, but I’m being too lazy to bake my granola. Now I’m Ms. Fancy Pants, baking and shit! Well, I guess I would be if I actually did make it, and not just push around the carton of oats I left out as a reminder.

Now I feel accountable, to Blogville, to you guys. Honestly, I’m not really held accountable too much. I live alone with my dog, I work from home mostly, I have clients, not bosses. My family is thousands of miles away, for a reason. It’s hard working the dapper program alone. And that’s why I’m so grateful to be a card carrying member of Blogville. Seriously. Check my wallet. Proud resident Blogvillian, I yam!

I pledge a spending lockdown in honor of being Dapper and being the best I can, owing nothing to Mr. Visa and Mrs. Mastercard, and having paid off the ridiculously expensive piece of paper framed in the office. Lockdown. For 30 days. I’ll have to confess here if I broke down and bought a coffee or any other gaping hole I have in my budget.

Who’s down? We could lockdown together! Who doesn’t need a lockdown post holidays? I’ll start today, even though I haven’t bought anything over the past 4 days. So till 2/3/13. I think that’s 30 days.

I’m already tired of this leftover mashed potato hash thing I made. I may or may not have eaten it for the past couple days. I kind of don’t have much by way of groceries, since I knew I was leaving for 8 days and now I’ve been home a few days. But there’s still food. I share this because I may break down and buy some food. Point being food, not the grocery store. The way I shop, my buggy always looks like I feed an army at home. Such great intentions. And then I just push the healthy stuff around to get to my whipped cream cheese frosting and it all gets gross and moldy.

Such a waste, I know. I’m working on it. I am. So if you’re down to lockdown with me, comment below. We can rally each other on and cheer loudly when you were able to step out of line for that coffee and get back going wherever your going.

I do this every couple months, after a spending spree. I reevaluate the damage I did, return what I can return, accept what I can’t. Then lay out the numbers on the dry erase and start chugging away. I call it the Abundance Paradigm, not the get out of debt paradigm. Abundance. Have to think Abundance.

Happy Lockdown! Mazel Tov! Lock, Lock, lock…lockdown is ON…

B. Wright

I’m going to Stop Self Medicating…tomorrow.

January 4, 2013 by My Experiments with Sanity

Hola crew! You down with my blogging crew? Yeah, you know me! Ok, some throw back to start it off. I’m cheesy, I’m well aware and loving it.

I’m going to keep running with the what worked for me. I’m so stoked someone found value in my last blog and will probably rock her world. Stoked, for sure. I’m honored to be of service and I intend to help as many people as I can. Stop thrashing through the thorns and pay heed to the ones who have already, almost, made it out. You never really do. Make it out. The foliage just thins out, sometimes to where it’s barely even there.

I’m going to try and start my blog with a review. They say if you don’t review material after learning about it, you forget pretty soon after. If you review something, you smoosh it a little deeper into the crevices of your brain, make it so it doesn’t blow away as easily. So much blows away. But we already know everything, so fuck it if it does.

I’m in a strange mood, as you may be able to tell. Way too wound up and really need to stop and take ten breaths. The real deal deep breaths where you fill and unfill every nook and cranny of your body. Suck it all in and spit it all back out. Do it with me…..

Damn, what did you have for lunch?

Better. Calmer. I think my heart rate may have dropped a few points. Ok, so what’s worked.

1) Control your thoughts, control your world. Easiest way to tell what your thinking is to stop and analyze what emotions you’re experiencing. Good? Keep at it. Bad? Reframe it to be good.

2) Believe in something bigger than yourself not for religion but so you can realize that the world does not revolve around you and that you’re just some dust speck, so stop being a useless dust speck, wake up…and believe in something greater than yourself so you can find your true calling and make your soul sing every day. Instead of a sickly soul. They were designed to sing.

3) Address physical and/or emotional pain. Emotional pain, you have to work thru. Get a therapist yesterday. Physical pain, you’d be amazed what you can learn with just a little curiosity. Google is my best friend. I’ve been the hot mess sprawled in the tall dusty stacks of whatever town library I may find myself in, piles of books strewn around me. I’ve been an avid gorger of information all my life and I just credit being really curious about almost everything. Some shit I don’t want to know about. Like shit. Don’t want to think about it. What worked. Focusing here…

4) Self-medication may be immediately gratifying but portion control for my fellow travelers is an elusive pipe dream. Plus different strains, if you blaze like me, have different effects. Like the dooky shit I have now that just makes me want to sleep. But of course I can’t.

Can’t nap anymore. Not bitching, just observing. It’s been months since I’ve napped. I used to nap daily, no joke. Daily for like years and years, and pretty much my entire life. But now, no naps. Sleep awesome every night, don’t hate. Eyes usually heavy as hell when I crawl into bed and when I hit that pillow I’m out in milliseconds. I totally get that I’m lucky as hell I sleep as well as I do. I think it’s because I have a pretty clear conscious, I try to live in communion with my fellow travelers and say what I’m thinking instead of short stepping around what’s bothering me. And my meds are working good.

Much easier just to swallow 2 purple pills, ½ a yellow pill, ½ a white pill, throughout the day. And my vitamins. Don’t forget your vitamins! Fish oil and 1 a day multi-vitamin. Good combo. It’s legal and I don’t have to go the exact speed limit so I don’t get popped for blazing in the car.

Today’s lesson? Stop self medicating. I will when I run out of this last bag of pot. I really think my new meds, maybe slightly increased, will make me better…for now. Ahhh, the gift of being bipolar and the cocktail of pills that is our reality.

I am so grateful to all of you out there who are reading this and all of you that are writing about your travels as well. Because that’s what life is, one big long trip. I’m stoked to be travelling in good company,

Sincerely Yours,

B. Wright

Believe Pain is a thing of the Past

January 3, 2013 by My Experiments with Sanity

Pain is a huge factor in self-medication. Emotional pain, you have to work through. No way around it. Physical pain can be removed. This is pretty obvious, but we’d all be shocked how many out there do nothing about pain. They just accept and move on. Deal with it every day instead of intensely for a period until it is resolved. Often times a pain somewhere can be treated.

I grew up with scoliosis, a crooked spine. It was in my hips so you couldn’t tell but it was about 25-30 degrees tilted with a rotary aspect. I learned about it by happenstance in a clinic in the Carolinas. Most of my life has been spent making drinks, serving food, and hustling to make that money. Well, scoliosis and kegs don’t mix well. I used to have daily chronic pain in my lower back, where my main curvature was. To look back and see how long it took me to get better is shocking. Why I just dealt with it is beyond me. But I think a lot of people do. We’re told life is hard, you have to struggle and so we do. We struggle to go beyond our small bubble consumed with an omnipresent aura of pain.

But you say your pain isn’t curable? I heard a man speak who fell from the sky and crashed a plane. He was a vegetable. All he could do was blink his eyes. The docs said no hope. But he had his mind, sharp as it ever was. He made up his mind he would walk out of that hospital by Christmas. So in no more than a year, a man rebuilt his crumpled smashed body back to life, walking and talking and most important of all, living in a much better state of being. All you have to do is believe.

I got an x-ray to see how my spine was crooked about 8 years after learning I had scoliosis and living in pain for most of that time. I saw and understood how I could correct the curvature. I continue to correct myself, especially when I’m tired. I just completely slump over. But in doing this, I get compliments on my posture. I even grew just under an inch.

I also have been getting Rolfed. Rolfing is structural integration, which realigns your body if it is out of whack. If you, or someone you know suffers from scoliosis, seek a Rolfer. Or hell, just because if you’re like me, you’ll try anything to make it better, go get Rolfed. It just might change your whole world.

My body will over time return to it’s curved state if I don’t remain mindful and get Rolfed. What’s all this got to do with your pain? I’m just saying that if you seek, ye shall find. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. And you can start right now by Believing that life can be better. Once freed from pain, the soul is able to look up, out and around, becoming part of the we over the me, me, me.

Sit back, relax, breathe into your body. Scan and find what ails you. Recognize instead of ignore and mask with whatever your poison may be. Acknowledge and then learn. This is it. One body is all we get. Maybe we come back, luckily are born human again, but all we have is Now. YOLO. I’m going to change that to YOLON, you only live once now. Why not make this now the best it possibly can be by removing pain so our spirits can look up higher. Don’t be limited another moment. Let the healing begin right now. Only you can truly heal yourself, but of course you already know that. Find that little light inside you, dust it off and watch it glow brighter and brighter, sending healing energy all through every cell of your body. And then flowing out of you, into the chair, into the floor, into the ground, out into the room, into your fellow travelers, up above your head connecting to source. Once you make that source connection, you’ve tapped into an infinite abundance of love, yours for the taking. Make pain a thing of the past, now. Find peace, enjoyment and ease in life. We need you to so you can open to the world. Pain keeps you closed and the world needs you open, shinning, beaming, loving.

Sincerely Yours,

B. Wright

The chaos known as Me to the energy wave of We

December 22, 2012 by My Experiments with Sanity

I got to thinking about how far I’ve come over the years. I decided to share a glimpse ‘o me, what I was like, etc. and who I have grown into today with much difficult work. Although you know, of course, everything awful that has happened to you is a blessing in disguise.

When I discovered that, man did life become instantly better. A flat tire? Great, I need practice. Broke the screen on my iPhone and feel ghetto? I need some work on humility and don’t forget being grateful for the bounty I have available. We all have available. This abundant world. All this abundance shit? Law of Attraction? New to me in the past few years. But I’m running with it.

It totally makes sense to me and I’ve seen it work more times than I could ever remember. Not as much as I would like it to occur but I’m a believer. Rambling. Again. For some, the rambling is normal. How else does the mind work? To those dear readers that aren’t blessed with bipolar, I apologize for the digression and lets get on with this reflection.

1995: 15, sophomore in high school, smoking pot numerous times a day, dressing ridiculously scandalous at 90lbs and 34C, skipping class most of the time, “dated” guys who either dealt drugs or came from money so they could buy drugs. I put quotations around dated because getting smashed and fucking isn’t dating per se but I know there’s some fain of heart out there. Don’t read my shit then if you’re one, or at least at your own risk. There. Warning issued. Now I can finally sleep. Kidding.

1995: big into acid, big into getting fucked up as much as possible. I bussed tables at a once shwanky restaurant in my neighborhood. A night’s tip out was perfect for a pack of Reds, a little to pitch in on a bag with friends, get a 40oz. of some malt liquor and tip the bum for getting the smokes and booze. Ahhh, the good old days.

I guess I started to work for my meds pretty early on. I also babysat a couple times a week as well. I also got lunch money and sometimes when my dad would have a big wad of cash all rolled up hidden somewhere for some reason beyond me, I’d slide some bills out. It’s all about revenue streams flowing.

I also had a big klepto problem at this age. Shame to admit, but I even stool from people I liked who hosted soirees, aka keggers, while their parents were out of town. But only if it was a house where there was plenty. Fish tanks for walls and such. I’d like to send out an apology to all those out there, including the big corporations. Stealing is wrong. I would never do it again and stopped when I turned 18. Not worth it to get busted for another pair of expensive risqué panties.

My older brother ratted me out once when he got caught for stealing hood ornaments. He went thru a brief rebellion period, skateboarding and such. He got jumped by his rebellious friends and then that was the end of that phase. He said how do you think she can afford all those things she has? She steals them. Thrown under the bus for sure.

My parents are perfect and exactly who I was meant to be born into. In fact, I believe I chose them, as we all choose our parents for they have a problem that we as the next generation must solve. Or shit, at least try to solve. Then if you breed, you shit your problem/burden onto your child and so on down the line until we’ve solved all issues. We will evolve to such a high frequency of love and deep understanding of our connection with ALL that is, we just become some ginormous (wow, no spell check? That’s a real word now? I thought it was slang.) some ginormous symbiotic energy wave spreading love deep into the cosmos every which way. Wow. Won’t that be fun?