In this book we're taking spiritual law to the true nitty-gritty of life--like corn cobs out in what grandpaw called, "the outhouse."Have you ever used an outhouse? I have. Sitting on that rough wood hole sawed into that board, wondering what may be crawling on the bottom side--half expecting that whatever it may be, will bite me on the ass.
Besides the stink, there are the flies--Yeah, that's what this book is like--the REALITY of life! Spirituality is not something you only experience on Sundays. Life--all of it--is a spiritual experience. And those spiritual laws--you better believe they are REAL. Break them, and your ass will indeed get bitten, and your life will stink. But those Spiritual Laws are the simple truths of life. Know them, and you can see the lies.
And those flies? They're like your acquaintances, and maybe even some relatives. Those folks who still covet the lies we've all been taught to believe--- buzzing around, trying to distract and invite you back to be like them--to be who you used to be. Most are unable to see how functional your life has become. Or, if seeing it, are jealous: they lack your courage to evolve.
PART ONE
Introduction
This series is set up according to depth, the concepts in each higher-numbered book getting deeper. Welcome to the deep end of the spiritual pool of life.
Setting Up the Win
Want to change your life? That’s what reading self-help books is all about, what this Redneck Spirituality series is about. But nobody wants to change their life if it works for them. So why are you reading this? What is it that doesn’t work?
I’ll simplify it in the most obnoxious of terms repeatedly. Here it is in a nutsack. No matter how miserable one’s life is, it is familiar—no threat. They know the score and are afraid to make changes. The threat is concerning the unknown, the change.
Looking inside and using your ability to respond is the scariest of things ONLY because you know it will demand change. Most people won’t look until their shitstorm of a life has hit the bottom of the cesspool, and they are drowning.
It’s reeee-uul simple, folks. That happens when your soul has decided to hit your RESET BUTTON and is giving you one final chance.
For me, my chance occurred in a hospital ICU with the Grim Reaper staring me in the face. Will it happen differently for you? Will he wipe your shit in your face, as he did mine? It will be multiple times here in this book—the SAME shit, different hand. His is not so gentle.
This whole series has been doing this same thing in progressively deeper ways. My greatest wish is that you get the point—my WISH, not a DEMAND. My ego does not hang on your decision. This is YOUR life, YOUR decision.
Before that ICU, I lived a selfish life. My wife was pretty much the only person in it to whom I offered my love. But shit! What did I know about life or love . . . certainly not the good shit?
I know a lot more now. At times, this book series may come across as rude. Just know it is from the love that I bother to write about it.
Love. Real love? I loved my wife. She didn’t love me back in the same way—the way I wanted it. That does not mean she didn’t love me, nor did it define my own for her.
Everyone who plays a part in your life has a lesson—a gift for you.
My wife’s lesson was perfect. You see, you don’t have to accept, or RETURN, the love I offer in these books MY way. But love IS the gift offered here. Spiritual Law states The energy out, returns in kind. But it doesn’t have to come from you. Love is a gift, and gifts don’t require paybacks.
One great truth of life is that it’s about getting your soul’s lessons. Significant others are perfect for rubbing those lessons in your face. I don’t regret even one second of loving her. She taught me so much about myself, and best of all, she taught me how to love.
Questions:
· What change DO you want? It’s okay if you don’t know right now. After all, this IS a self-help book and knowing the answer to that question may be the help for which you are searching.
· And the question right now? Are you just going to READ this workbook, or are you going to DO it?
Action:
Ø These questions are about your intentions. After all, what self-help is all about is DOING not LOOKING. You might look at that now before you begin.
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Playing in Rumi’s Field
This may be your first book of this series. I have attempted to lay it all out by book number as to the depth of the concepts presented. With this book, you are jumping into the deep end.
Just know that with self-help workbooks, there are two basic types of people: There are those who come to the game to sit in the bleachers above it all and enjoy themselves, and there are those who come to play, down here on the field of life.
Sometimes there are bumps and bruises, but any roughing up is done by you, for you. For purposes here, consider this field as Rumi’s Field—a thirteenth-century Persian poet and Sufi mystic.
“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and
rightdoing, there is a field. I’ll meet you there.”
Rumi
But you may be a third type who comes to the game and from the bleachers develops a yen to play in the game. It’s your life. Do it your way.
If you intend to play, you will want a notebook in which to record your answers to the questions. Answer the questions and include any thoughts you may have about them. If more questions are then raised in your mind, write them down as well. Write only on the right-hand sheet.
After you have completed this book, go back and answer any questions you may have skipped. You can use the left-hand sheet for doing this.
As to the notebook? I suggest it be a loose-leaf type, something you can add pages to when later something strikes you. I don’t expect, or want, you to just accept what is said here. I have only one hard-and-fast rule, and that is: Do your own fucking thinking!
This last sentence is stressed purposefully for you, redneck style. If you took offense to my use of language, just know that there will occasionally be more to come.
The offense part? That will be a priceless eye-opener for you later. Taking offense does something to one’s psyche that most people don’t realize. Seeing something differently is what self-help is all about.
And speaking about seeing something different. . . I will be offering up many of the Spiritual Laws for you to consider. All are simple truths of life and can be addressed with a short sentence or two, but there are only a few upon which I will concentrate. Those will be presented in different scenarios and repeated often.
Because they are deep, very few people will get them with only one pass or realize their depth. Bear with me on that. Here is one: Your world is not “OUT THERE,” rather, it is “IN HERE.”
And its depth? Everything begins as a thought. Changing even one thought in your mind will change your whole life.
This book is intended to plumb the depths of your life and illuminate it with the light of truth. By that light, your life will look vastly different. You will see things you had no ability to see before. While the Spiritual Laws are about the simple truths of life, those truths are like an interlocked fabric. Some of the threads are identical in the application, just a little different in color. In the three previous paragraphs, I used three different laws to illustrate my point.
In presenting it to you, you will find that I repeat myself often. Have you ever noticed that in commercials, something is often repeated—sometimes word for word, sometimes just slightly different in the circumstance or words used? The person marketing whatever doohickey being sold is trying to drum it into your head and/or make it personal to your life.
I repeat the same laws and concepts often. And yes, usually in different circumstances, applications, combinations, or even wording. Like that salesman, I am offering it up in different ways in an attempt to touch you in your life. Like an experiential seminar, I need to make a connection with your experiences for you to want to look.
This book is about self-help. It is written by and for rednecks. They are folks who give it to you straight, the reality as that redneck sees it. That’s not to say it will be the same for you.
As the Spiritual Law states: Your world “in here” is composed of how you see it—your perceptions and beliefs about everything. Nobody’s world is ever exactly the same.
For the most part, people expect books to be uplifting. That’s especially true for self-help. But the truth about changing anything in your life is that you’ve got to look at all the shit you have never wanted to see . . . shit that is there, but ignored, no matter how badly it stinks up your life.
In looking at it, you will NEVER see it as uplifting—not until AFTER you have changed your thinking. That is the only way: Change your perception, change your life. If something is stinking up your life, you have to make it unacceptable and flush it.
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