PREPARING FOR TRIP: THE PHILOSOPHICAL STAGE

The smoke clears and we find our hero destined for Jinzhou, China. I am going to use this Blog to leave a little paper trail for myself.

Aging is change. It changes your brain. This change, some argue, make it absolutely impossible for an individual to have a flawless memory. When you change your brain, you change the way you perceive the world and more importantly, yourself.

After I have been in China for some time I probably will find it difficult, if not impossible, to gauge how the move has changed me. All thoughts of the past will be tainted with new memories. All dreams of the future will be tainted with new aspirations and failures. Consequently, we are close to truth only when we are experiencing. The moment the NOW is the only moment where any of us can conceivably express our free will.*

The sad news is that the past is truly dead. Your memories of the "good old days" have their luster only because they have been polished in the tremble of time. Your dreams cannot come true. Life is like throwing darts from a moving car. Even if you are lucky enough to hit the bull’s-eye, your perspective on that bull’s-eye changed before your dart even hit.

The good news is that we have sanctuary. We have the infinite potential of experience in front of us each and every moment that our hearts beat. This is where I want to live.

TREE-HOUSES:

It seems that many of us go through life asleep. So many people shop through life fixated on past experiences or moments. Entire lives are spent attempting to build a tree house in a growing tree. The reality of a simple childhood hideout gets stretched beyond its limits. New boards and new nails are constantly needed to fill in gaps as the growing tree spreads the walls and floors. The amount of space we labor over increasingly grows. We find ourselves scrambling to seal leaks in the roof over a part of the house we no longer need or use. For some, maintaining and protecting the sanctity of the fort becomes more important than the fort itself. For many, the demands simply exceed their capacity and they fail to function in a meaningful way at all.

The futility of this effort seems so obvious when you think of one simple fact: We do not have to add boards when change threatens the safety of our shelter. Instead of getting more boards, simply pull out the displaced boards and pull them back in close to you.

The lesson: As we grow through time, our understanding of what we consider necessary and safe changes. The way we humans experience of life, especially those of the Western tradition, leads us to think that we must add more to maintain the safety of the "treehouse" of truth and safety."

If you are challenged by changes in time, think first whether you need MORE to meet your essential needs. Consider the option of bringing your foundations back to you.

GARDENS:

Avoid the temptation of maintaining shelter for gardens that have long since given up their yield. At the end of summer a farmer does not add acreage to the farm. Instead, the field is tilled. It is given nutrients in preparation for the next harvest. If, with time, the field will no longer produce yield, the crop is rotated. You do not have to change the field to plant another harvest. You do not have to change the field to plant another crop. All you can do is make sure that the field you have is healthy and cared for. Life, like a seed, has a way of finding the sun and producing a yield. You can't change growth and you can't change changing. But, you can make sure that you do not have a field of weeds or a field stripped of its topsoil by over tilling.

Plant your garden, let it grow, harvest your yield and always remember that there will be another spring.

Peace out. Kelly Frazier

PSYCHO MOTHERFUCKER! paulfdoig@aol.com

Man, I am liquidating my shit for my trip to China and accidentally sent some people the wrong CD. I actually refunded ALL the money to the people and let them keep the CD. How could anyone bitch? Like this: CHECK OUT THE EMAILS THIS PSYCHO SENT!!

MY EMAIL ABOUT MISTAKE:
Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2007 18:36:02 -0800 (PST)
From: "Kelly Frazier"
Subject: DECADE & TEMPLE OF THE DOG CD MISTAKE - REFUND
To: "paulfdoig@aol.com"

I sincerely apologize for the mistake in the shipping
of your CD. I sent about 20 people the wrong CD. The
list of CDs was one line off in the spreadsheet.

There are way too many people for me to even dream of
managing this. I would need to receive and then remail
20 pieces of mail. That is 40 more shipping charges in
addition to the 20 I have already suffered. OUCH.

The only real option is to simply refund the money to
you and the other 19 people. My only hope is that you
won't leave a negative report on my sales. I screwed
up, but I didn't keep any money!

I hope you enjoy the CD! Peace. Kelly Frazier

EMAILS BACK FROM PSYCHO
From: PaulFDoig@aol.com
Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2007 10:55:48 EST
Subject: Re: DECADE & TEMPLE OF THE DOG CD MISTAKE - REFUND
To: rrlawyer@yahoo.com
refund my money and rest assured you cunt, I will do what I can to stop you from ever selling on amazon again!


From: PaulFDoig@aol.com
Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2007 15:40:57 EST
Subject: Re: DECADE & TEMPLE OF THE DOG CD MISTAKE - REFUND
To: rrlawyer@yahoo.com
reported you too cunt! and I am sure a horrible seller being reported will go a lot further than someone who calls a cunt a cunt and pays for items. Like they care if I tell you I will leave you negative feedback and call you a cunt. Eat human feces bitch!

WELCOME TO 2007: NEW DATE AND IDENTITY

1/10/06

HOWDY AND WELCOME TO THE NEW BLOG. I TELL YOU WHAT, YOUR ATTITUDE ABOUT YOUR BLOG CHANGES IMMEDIATELY WHEN YOU DISCOVER THAT YOUR MOM READS IT.

For those patient enough to be checking, things are looking good for 2007. For the first time in my life I concluded and acted independently in my struggle for sobriety. I relapsed in late January 2006 and just didn't want to have a full year of relapse under my belt. After a year I don't think you can call it relapse. At that point you are just drinking again. I admit it is an abritary line.

I am happy about the decision, but I have to take it in perspective. I made the decision based on a simple and almost instinctual consideration of the burdens and benefits.

On the benefit side was the fact that I enjoy being drunk. It is a wonderful short-term experience for those who can control it. If the low points aren't too low, the high points make the buzz worth it. All the calculus of burden and benefit polarizes the second the issue becomes a physical one. At that point, instead of bartering the low points against the high points changes from the low points of using to the low points of NOT using.

When you can avoid the low points by not taking something, it is easier to make the decision not to take it. When you suffer the low points if you do not take, you have an obligation that supercedes your other decisions.

MY DRINKING TRAIN OF THOUGHT: If you are too sick to go to work you lose your job. If you do not take a drink you will be sick. If you want to keep your job you have to get up 45 minutes early so you have enough time to drink and vomit. Eventually you get puked out and the warm feeling begins to work its way into your body. You get goose bumps and in 20 mintues you are wondering why it was such a big deal. Everything's fine. You made it to work, you worked out over lunch and after work. If you go home and have a few shots and beers, you've earned it. You did good today.

The burden side took over when I never felt good, whether I drank or not. That is basically what saved me. I have defeated the psychological and the phsyical effects of addiction before. I have just never defeated both at the same time. I still haven't. The psychological need for the drug was gone because I no longer got psychological satisfaction.

In the end it feels good that I made the decision without checking myself in for help. However the practical decision to quit doing something that hurts strike me as the sort of instinctual behavior woven into the DNA of anything with a nervous system. Even a worm crawls away from the sun. I have yet to hear people say "wow, what a smart worm. It doesn't want to die! Hey worm, I'm proud of you."

[I was going to delete the last paragraph because was written by a mean "internal dialogue" that follows me like a tail.]

MEAN INTERNAL SPEAK
I realize that not feeling proud about quitting is, in itself, as stupid as a worm getting a suntan. I have given myself the opportunity to feel good about making my first independent leap into sobriety in my life. For some masochistic reason I refuse to allow myself pride and hope. Instead of congratulation myself, the "internal speak" works consistently to deprive me of the things that give me hope and pride and help me stay sober. It is like an evil monkey that lives in my closet that comes out and says "well it's about time dipshit."

The true challenge of staying sober will require that I internalize the ability to take pride in my behavior. From my youth I have been conditioned to believe that there are two ways or reasons to feel good about yourself.

PUBLIC PRAISE
The first is labor that is externalized and praised by others. When your work earns praise, you can be proud.

SPIRITUAL PRAISE
The second is labor that invested in spiritual growth. When God is happy with your work, you can be proud with a bonus: "you are a good person, you get to go to heaven" (this is penciled in).

This appears to be an "internal" process, but in reality it too is an externalization. Just as I must display my labor and have others praise it, the internalized praise takes my "morality identity" (a very complex and fluid sense of self) and holds it on display to "God" for praise.

Spiritual praise is more satiating than human praise because of the sheer uniqueness of our identity and our overpowering sense of ego.

People who have unique and unsurpassed human traits are a true rarity. The number of people who have unique and unsurpassed spiritual traits is virtually infinite. It is always exactly equal to the number of people who choose to have faith that they have spiritual identity that has this quality.

Plainly put, having your soul and your individual value as a human being praised is much more satiating than having even your most special physical trait praised by other people. It is the "crack" of praise. Many are hooked. I am in recovery.

It is a fair trade: Spiritual labor is externalized for God to praise. His praise is evident in the amount of spiritual comfort you take in return for a reduction of the fear of death or "evil."

My decision to quit has to be independent of these two sorts of praise. If it isn't, it's integrity will always be threatened by a factor external to my direct control.

My identity requires that I expand this equation to all aspects of my life. Through meditation I hope to strengthen my awareness of how I sort shit as I experience it. I, like so many others, am so busy integrating the past and preparing for the future that I simply "cache" the moment and plan on getting back to it later. I have no "now." That must change.

SO: I HAVE QUIT DRINKING - DAY 10.

BEST NEWS: I RELAPSED AFTER OVER 1000 DAYS OF SOBRIETY ON JAN 20, 2006.
I HAVE NOT HAD A DRINK IN 2007. I STOPPED THE BLEEDING BEFORE AN ANNIVERSARY.

WELL....NOT THAT THERE WAS ANY POINT TO THIS, BUT I AM UP AND WRITING AGAIN AND I WILL ANNOUNCE ADDRESS OF MY NEW CHINA DIARY BLOG WHEN I GET IT STARTED. PEACE OUT. KDF