One off the bless list
- 1 cup flour
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 tsp. baking soda
- 1 egg
- 1 can of fruit cocktail
- brown sugar
Mix and bake at 350º for 1 hour with some brown sugar on top.
❝Nature knows best.❞
“Nature knows best.”— Barry Commoner, third law of ecology
❝Everything must go somewhere.❞
“Everything must go somewhere.”— Barry Commoner, second law of ecology
❝Nothing comes from nothing.❞
“If you are drawn to the left hand path, it's usually because you've had some kind of life experience that has shocked you, awakened you.”
A bonding behavior
I've been researching. I've been talking and writing people. I've been trying to understand exactly how we got into this mess with sex where seemingly no one knows what is going on.
I think it's simpler, and then we try to make it complicated.
The two most common purposes of sex are fun (including the hormonal rush) and bonding. The problem comes when we confuse these purposes.
If you are using sex for fun, it's not going to be emotionally fulfilling. It won't be the basis of a relationship.
If you are interested in a relationship, you can't start with sex.
People should decide what they are looking for. Each purpose has different goals and measures it's successes accordingly.
Men who are into Game aren't interested in relationships, they want notches in the headboard.
There is a
Is it about your orgasm? Or is it about sharing?
Every thing I have experienced, everything I have heard, everything I have read tells me that the best sex is a bonding behavior. The more you share before sex, the better the sex. And that is going to be my new #1 sex rule.
Sex can be a bonding behavior. Why fuck someone you don't really like? Do you know if you like them or not?
With that in mind, let's look at how modern Americans get sex.
If you are using sex for fun, you may have a couple of drinks to "loosen up." You may go home with someone you've only known for a couple of hours. And since you don't know them, it's going to be hit or miss. You don't know their non-verbal cues and they don't know yours. You don't know what they like to talk about. But that's not what you're looking for. You want the sex. You want the hormonal rush. You want the fun.
But if you start with a relationship first and add sex later to build that relationship, your emphasis is different. You already know things about the other person. You already share things with the other person. And you're won't depend on porn-star techniques to "cinch the deal."
The important thing is to know what you want. Many think they want fun when they want a relationship. Then they wonder why they wind up emotionally unconnected.
Sex can be a bonding behavior. But not if it's just sex.
Know yourself. Know what you want.
Point of view
❝We define the labels, the labels should not define us.❞
— from the journal of NeoWayland
I don’t believe I should use this blog to teach.
I think the best teachers are the ones you see face to face. That personal relationship helps you learn faster.
But we live in an age of wonders connected digitally across the planet. Even if it’s not my place to teach, maybe sometimes I can tell beginners where to start looking for their own answers and their own path.
So I’m answering my email again, indirectly.
I’m using ideas that I work with most. My WebTree path (not a tradition) draws heavily on Celtic Reconstructionism and modern Druidry with just a smidge more Wiccanism than I am comfortable admitting.
Yule - around December 21
Imbolc - February 2
Ostera - around March 21
Beltane - April 30
Litha - around June 21
Lughnasad - August 1
Mabon - around September 21
Samhain - October 31
You’ve probably seen that list a few hundred times before. It’s obviously the neopagan sabbats. But what the list doesn’t tell you is how those dates interrelate. For that, you need an eight pointed star. I just happen to have one on file.
Concentrate on the list alone and you can miss the relationships. The power isn’t in the list. The power is in how the ideas weave together.
Put Yule at the top point of the star.
Technically you don’t need the star, but it sure helps you see the connections. You can see that the winter solstice is opposite the summer solstice and that the equinoxes are opposite each other.
Yes, I’ve covered this before. Please bear with me.
You can also see that the cross quarter days are really the gateways between seasons. And you can see that the solstices and the equinoxes are really the peak moments and middle of the seasons.
Cross quarter days are High Holidays for my path. The equinoxes and solstices are Solar Festivals.
Now I could explain that in three or four pages. Or I can show you with a single picture and a few sentences.
It’s not enough to know the seasons, you have to know the connections and the relationships.
This isn’t something that is commonly taught in paganism these days. Absolutely I am not teaching it. I’m just telling you where you might begin.
I will point out that the eight-pointed star is just a start. Before the digital age, many traditions would expect you to draw something like this.
That’s a lot more complex.
Notice the relationships.
You just couldn’t draw that right at first.You’d have to start over and over again. You’d frustrate yourself because it should be easy for you. You’re passionate about your faith and you WANT to learn. You’d make many tries. Some of the hardest attempts would be with your teacher watching closely over your shoulder while you got it almost perfect. The slightest flaw means the whole picture has to be destroyed. You’d have to start over again until you could draw it on demand. By the time you were done, you could visualize the connections without the diagram.
You’d understand.
The power is not the drawing. The power is you understanding the connections.
Sure, you could get that from a list, but it would take much longer.
The tools we use shape our thought.
This isn't one of mine. But think about the work that went into this even if you don't agree with the assumptions.
Let me give you another example.
Before WWII and quick mix boxes, recipes were usually by ratios. Sure, you can memorize individual recipies that use 1 cup of that mixed with 2/3 cups of this, but it won’t teach you the relationships.
If you stood in a kitchen full of ingredients but without the pre-measured portions and the oh so precise instuctions, you’d be stuck. You wouldn’t know the relationships.
You wouldn’t know what separated a bread from a cake.
You wouldn’t know what made a soup or a sauce.
One look at a grocery store tells you that there are entire industries devoted to your ignorance and willing to sell you easy to use products so you don’t have to think about it too hard.
Someone doesn’t want you thinking about it too hard. Someone profits from you not thinking hard.
Something really simple looks enormously complicated because you’re stuck with one perspective.
Hmm, that sounds familiar. Somebody out to impress you with what they know and what they can show. Like one of Shaw’s experts.
But the way of the master means do more with less. To do that you need to understand how things interrelate. It’s not about one cup of that mixed with 2/3 cup of this, it’s about three parts of that mixed with two parts of this. The measure isn’t what you need, the ratio is.
It’s about the relationships and the connections. Think in those terms and you’ve expanded what you can do. Do more with less complication.
One last bit.
Environmentalism is about control. Control of the surroundings, control of human behavior, control of the lifeforms, everything carefully monitored and measured.
But that is not the way the world works.
Ecology is about the relationships and tradeoffs.
Guess which works better longer.
Understanding is the key. You can’t go poking around with the primal forces of the universe without understanding.
Well, you could, but it’s much safer if you understand the connections.
Change your perspective, change the world.
Change youself.
As above, so below.
Change.
