New and blinking in the light of day

My new book – Cast a Long Shadow II - has just been published.

By the miracle of technology, it’s not only here in the US, but also published in Europe as well – how cool is that!!

The original cast a long shadow – which started life as one of my blogs, came out last year, and this new edition carries on with another 90 daily readings of reflection and – I hope - inspiration.

Here is a quote from a review that the first book received on Amazon:

I bought this book a couple of months ago; I believe the thoughts in this book about Willingness are worth the cost of the book…but one sentence under the area of Wisdom is worth more than the books weight in gold.

Here are the ways to get your own copy:

Direct from my e-store

From Amazon.com

In England, Scotland and Wales from Amazon in the UK

In the rest of Europe, from either Amazon France or Amazon Germany

 The original “Cast A Long Shadow” is still available from my e-store, on Amazon, Amazon UK, France or Germany, and as an e-book

August 13 Daily Meditation Writing: Head

You are reading the ongoing writing process for a new book of daily reflections/meditations. Already published by this author is “Cast A Long Shadow”, 90 daily reading for our journey through life. This book is now available as a Kindle e-book, (you don’t need to have a Kindle to download and read it on your computer) as well as still being available direct from the publisher, on Amazon.com,  Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon European sites

Head

Head knowledge is a wonderful thing.

We need to learn and understand so many things in order to go about our daily lives.

There seem to be so many facts and figures to learn, so many laws to understand, and so much of everything that is needed to be done.

But there is a different sort of knowledge too – one that is somehow separate from this head knowledge.

It is like looking at an old master painting.

We acknowledge the wonderful craft of the artist that created it.

We may wonder at the ingenuity of the modern owners to keep it intact and on display.

We may even think about the value of the masterpiece if it were to come onto the market.

But all of that we do with our head-knowledge, with our understanding of how things are made and the monetary value of things.

And if that is all we see and understand, then there is nothing else to say – but often, there is something more to understand.

Not just more to learn – for there will always be that; we may seek to learn more about the technique of the artist, or the materials used, but that is still head knowledge.

What makes it a great work of art is something on a different level – it is the way it talks directly to us – in our soul or in our heart.

This is somehow apart from the artistry of the piece – more than the canvas and paint that any of us could learn to do, given enough time.

No, the thing that makes it great is how it affects us emotionally or spiritually – how it transports us from the day-to-day to a different plane of existence.

The knowledge of that is not something we can learn from reading or studying – it is part of who we are.

Sometimes we understand a thing with our heads; but often, to really appreciate it we need to use our hearts.

August 12 Daily Meditation Writing: Social

You are reading the ongoing writing process for a new book of daily reflections/meditations. Already published by this author is “Cast A Long Shadow”, 90 daily reading for our journey through life. This book is now available as a Kindle e-book, (you don’t need to have a Kindle to download and read it on your computer) as well as still being available direct from the publisher, on Amazon.com,  Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon European sites

Social

We are all social beings, even those of us that act in ant-social ways.

Some of us choose to live alone, and many of us that do are happy with the arrangement and do not crave more company.

But even then, we are still social beings, and we do seek out the company of like-minded people from time to time.

The simple fact is that Human Beings are a pack animal, most at home with our own tribe.

Back in prehistory it would most likely have been literally a tribe, but that connection changed over time into families, countries – even football teams and gangs that we can align ourselves to.

We not only belong in these small groups, we as a species does best when it cooperates – and also act at our worst.

We can use our social skills for the common good, and grow both as individuals, and as a community.

But we can also use our social skills to exclude people, to make them feel out of the group and not included.

This is the unpleasant side of Human Beings social nature – that as well as feeling that we belong, we can also feel that others do not belong – we can actively exclude people that we consider to be “other”.

Given our need to be part of a social unit, to be excluded from one is one of the worst things that can happen to us.

If we are not able to find a “tribe” to belong to, all too often we go to extremes to try to fit into any group that seems less hostile than the others.

This can lead to what we would define as “antisocial” behavior – but is really just another aspect of the social need in all of us.

That is not to defend the behavior – merely to say that it is the result of a natural Human need to belong being thwarted, and being turned into a destructive force.

We need to accept our nature as social beings, but also to accept that the results can be good and bad, positive and negative.

Our goal must be to work towards a situation where we use our social humanness for the good of all – because our tribe is the Human Race itself.

August 11 Daily Meditation Writing: Speculation

You are reading the ongoing writing process for a new book of daily reflections/meditations. Already published by this author is “Cast A Long Shadow”, 90 daily reading for our journey through life. This book is now available as a Kindle e-book, (you don’t need to have a Kindle to download and read it on your computer) as well as still being available direct from the publisher, on Amazon.com,  Amazon.co.uk and other Amazon European sites

Speculation

I really think that more harm is done by speculation as by outright lies and gossip.

In our news organizations there is always much speculation about what may or may not happen – what policy may or may not be implemented.

Whilst some of this talking about what might happen is reasonable, it is often taken to extreme lengths, and becomes a feeding frenzy, rather than a rational discussion.

But it is not just in that arena that speculation is rife; in our personal lives we fall pray to damaging speculation too.

Of course, to look at all the options, and to take into account what may happen in the future when making a decision is a good thing to do.

We can even speculate reasonably that if X happened, then Y may be the outcome, but not if we did Z.

It is where the speculation becomes a thing in its own right that we can start to get into trouble.

When we are unable to settle on one thing, because there are so many other things that we could speculate about, it becomes not a reasonable look into the future, but just another means of procrastination.

When we hear about the actions of someone else, and start to speculate on their motives, we can be in a vary dangerous area.

Not only can we never fully know the motives of other people, we are more than likely to project our own feelings about that person.

If we already dislike them, we will assume their motives to be bad, and in that light the speculation can go off the scale.

Once we have “proved” through our speculation the bad motives of someone, all of their actions will be seen in this light, even the best of them. Equally, if we have speculated about motives of someone we like, we may give them too much leniency, and not call them on things that should be spoken about.

It is better to deal in the realm of knowledge and feelings, rather than speculation, which will always prove to be wrong.

 

August 10 Daily Meditation Writing: Position

You are reading the ongoing writing process for a new book of daily reflections/meditations. Already published by this author is “Cast A Long Shadow”, 90 daily reading for our journey through life. This book is now available as a Kindle e-book, (you don’t need to have a Kindle to download and read it on your computer) as well as still being available direct from the publisher, on Amazon.com,  Amazon.co.ukand other Amazon European sites

Position

Have you ever been stopped by someone carrying out an opinion poll and asked your view on something?

What I find amazing is that all of us will come up with an answer to the question, even if, a second before, we would have had no position on the matter.

It is as if our minds are wired to always need to give an answer to a question, and so, when asked about on a certain matter, it comes up with a position to take.

This may be of little consequence in most cases, but sometimes this inner need to have a view can be actively harmful.

Sometime, we can take a position on the spur of the moment, and then our minds start to rationalize it.

We come up with any number of reasons why our position is correct, and why other views are at fault.

But actually, this is all ego based – it is us wanting to be shown to be right, even when we suspect deep inside that we may be wrong.

In fact, it is often when the position we have taken has little foundation that we feel the need to shore it up as best we can, rather than admit that we may have been wrong.

In order to keep ourselves protected from any suggestion of being wrong in our position, we can become overbearing, or overly insistent, or just down right rude.

And all because we once took a position on something, and are now too scared to re-think it.

Because there are very few issues that are so cut and dried that there is only one right position.

On most things there can be a number of views, all of them “right” in their own terms; and all of them “wrong” in some part of their argument.

When we take a position that the only way is our way, we close down any possibility of change or growth.

We can learn from everyone, and from every point of view – we do not need to agree with everything we hear, but we can at least respect the person saying it.

When we insist that there is only one position possible on a topic, we close down the world, and make it a smaller place.

August 9 Daily Meditation Writing: Attack

You are reading the ongoing writing process for a new book of daily reflections/meditations. Already published by this author is “Cast A Long Shadow”, 90 daily reading for our journey through life. This book is now available as a Kindle e-book, (you don’t need to have a Kindle to download and read it on your computer) as well as still being available direct from the publisher, on Amazon.com,  Amazon.co.ukand other Amazon European sites

Attack

All of us from time to time can feel that we are under attack, and this may be physical, verbal or spiritual.

Sometimes we may well be correct – people will attack us from time to time, this is just part of life.

But often our feeling of being under attack comes from our inner insecurity, rather than from a real threat.

Often =, when we are in a position of relative privilege over others, our instincts to protect our position cause us to see as an attack anything that challenges that power.

It may be that others have had a rough time, and are now trying to improve themselves, but we interpret this as an attack on our standards, and react accordingly.

We may see anyone with a different opinion than ours not as just another person trying to find truth, but as a threat to us – we feel that our very existence is under attack.

From an outsiders perspective, it is sometimes difficult to understand the vehemence with which some views are expressed, and other people vilified and viewed with contempt.

It seems that, hearing another persons views with respect – accepting that there may be more than one opinion on a matter – go completely out the window in these forms of “discussion”.

Indeed there is no discussion, only a louder and louder shouting of the set opinions of the person who feels under attack.

But in these things, we need to remember where the attack really comes from.

Because there should be a difference between attacking someone’s views, and personally attacking them as a person, and questioning their motives in having that view.

When we do this, we take on the position that we can never be wrong – that we are infallible and what we think at this moment is the final answer.

Often, the attack we feel is actually an internal battle between our sense of us as fallible human beings, and our desire to appear right.

August 8 Daily Meditation Writing: Miracles

You are reading the ongoing writing process for a new book of daily reflections/meditations. Already published by this author is “Cast A Long Shadow”, 90 daily reading for our journey through life. This book is now available as a Kindle e-book, (you don’t need to have a Kindle to download and read it on your computer) as well as still being available direct from the publisher, on Amazon.com,  Amazon.co.ukand other Amazon European sites

Miracles

Some say that the age of miracles has passed, others that everything is explainable and natural, and that there is nothing that cannot be rationalized away.

But I believe that this is to miss the point about miracles, because a miracle is something that can only happen one person at a time.

When a child is born, it is possible to say that this was a purely physical and explainable event – and from one point of view that is clearly correct.

And yet, for a young couple to hold in their arms their own much wanted baby feels to them truly miraculous.

Are we to say that this feeling is incorrect?

When someone has been held in the grip of an addiction, to even think of becoming clean is something that can only be imagined.

When that some person follows a path of recovery, and becomes clean and sober, a skeptic could say that they had at last come to their senses, and worked hard at recovering.

At whilst hard work is necessary for recovery, it is also true that this seemed impossible before, and that to now be free from their addiction is a real miracle.

The true miracles are all around us, every day, if we choose to find them.

The flower growing in a war zone, a bird singing their song when all around is destruction, the particular way the sun sets on a significant day in our lives – all these are explainable, but also miracles.

And the reason is, that even when we can understand the reasons for something, that does not explain it away.

The miracle is not, perhaps, that a child is born, but that THIS child is born to THESE parents.

The miracle is not that another addict becomes clean, but that THIS Human Being found the path to recovery.

Because we are all miracles in our own way – whether we are dirt poor or fabulously wealthy – whatever we do, or don’t do for a living – we are all little miracles forming a part of the big miracle that is the Human race.

Every day we can be sure that miracles are all around us – all we need do is be thankful for them.

August 7 Daily Meditation Writing: Only

You are reading the ongoing writing process for a new book of daily reflections/meditations. Already published by this author is “Cast A Long Shadow”, 90 daily reading for our journey through life. This book is now available as a Kindle e-book, (you don’t need to have a Kindle to download and read it on your computer) as well as still being available direct from the publisher, on Amazon.com,  Amazon.co.ukand other Amazon European sites

Only

There is a great mystery of Human existence – that we are the only one like us, and yet we are all totally similar.

We are the only people to feel the way we do – and yet all of us feel the same way.

Only we have the experiences that we do – and yet these experiences are shared with hundreds of other people.

Because our uniqueness is not in what happens to us, but how we react to what happens.

Most of us will fall in love at least once in our lives – in that we share our common humanity

But for each of us it will be different, because we are the only ones with the exact set of feelings and perspectives.

That it why we can both relate to others and be distant from them at the same time.

To the outside world, our life will look much the same as other people’s love, there isn’t anything particularly different about the external trappings of the way we live.

But our internal world – the universe each of us creates as we grow and experience life – is unique to us.

This simple fact has a profound impact on how we respond to other people who interact with us.

Our partner, friend or fellow worker will have reactions that we could interpret as being the same as those we know inside us.

The same is true of strangers, and those we feel distrust for – we can assume we understand their motives, because we know what ours would have been if we had done that.

But only that person can truly know what they feel and what drives them.

Their life experiences may have taken them to a totally different understanding than ours, since they are the only ones who experienced them.

When we understand this, and work together for a common goal, we are better because we need no longer rely on our selves alone.

August 5 Daily Meditation Writing: Acts

You are reading the ongoing writing process for a new book of daily reflections/meditations. Already published by this author is “Cast A Long Shadow”, 90 daily reading for our journey through life. This book is now available as a Kindle e-book, (you don’t need to have a Kindle to download and read it on your computer) as well as still being available direct from the publisher, on Amazon.com,  Amazon.co.ukand other Amazon European sites

Acts

Does how one acts reflect one’s mood, or change it?

I’m sure we all know of times when we have felt below par, mentally drained, or otherwise not our “normal” selves.

At these times it can be hard not to act in a way that reflects the mood we are in, to be sullen or withdrawn, morose or lifeless.

And in acting in that way, we only reinforce the bad feelings we have, until it seems the world has lost all its color.

On the other hand, many of us have had the opposite experience too – when we feel hyper alert and really appreciative of the world and all around us.

The we tend to be smiling and outgoing, happy and alert: we feel that we can make the whole world happy just by the sheer radiance of our own happiness.

But strange as it may seem, the opposite effect is also possible.

There are times when our good mood seems inappropriate, and we stifle our actions to fit in with the rest of the world around us.

In so doing we tend to find that our excitement is diminished, and will eventually go entirely, leaving us with a sense of loss.

Equally, when we feel that there is no point in going on, and nothing to be cheerful about, acting in a positive manner can somehow help to make our day seem better.

Out actions and our feelings are like a closed system, both affecting the other.

How we act in the world directly affects how we feel about the world, and how we feel about the world affects our actions.

It’s therefore good to remember that, although we cannot always control our feelings, we do not need to act on them; and that taking proper action can help to improve our feelings.

I may not be able to think my way out of a bad mood, but I can act myself into a better one.

 

August 4 Daily Meditation Writing: Judge

You are reading the ongoing writing process for a new book of daily reflections/meditations. Already published by this author is “Cast A Long Shadow”, 90 daily reading for our journey through life. This book is now available as a Kindle e-book, (you don’t need to have a Kindle to download and read it on your computer) as well as still being available direct from the publisher, on Amazon.com,  Amazon.co.ukand other Amazon European sites

Judge

It is all to easy to judge other people; to be the prosecution, jury, judge and executioner.

Because we know what other people are thinking; we can tell from how they act and what their expression is, what is going on inside their heads.

Or we see what they are wearing, what type of car they drive, what sort of music they listen to – and that tells us all about the person and what they think and believe.

We make these judgments all the time, and we assume them to be more or less accurate.

And yet, when other judge us we feel unjustly accused.

We know how our own mind is working, and yet others have made judgments about us based on our appearance or other outside factors, and come to quite erroneous conclusions.

In fact, we rarely have enough information to truly judge anyone.

We may assume from a person’s vehicle that they are rich, whereas it may be that this is the one luxury they allow themselves, and they are struggling to meet the payments each month.

Or because another person has an old beat up vehicle, we may assume that they are hardly able to make ends meet, whereas it could be that this is an old treasured car, one of the many in the person’s collection.

Any judgment we make about another person is almost bound to be off the mark, simple because we do not know that person.

And when we do get to know someone, it is often apparent that our first judgment was incorrect – we may like someone we thought we would not, or find that we have a lot in common with someone we thought totally different from us.

And yet, in order to get along we need to make value judgments all the time about people.

Should I stop and ask this person for help? If they ask me, should I give help?

We are bound to make mistakes in our judgment from time to time – the important thing is to recognize that our first judgment is not going to be the whole truth.

We can rely on our judgment to an extent, but we need to remember that this judgment can, and should, be changed over time.