Today I am asked what is one question I hate to be asked? I don’t really hate the question, but there is one question I have difficulty answering. It is a very common question, but I am often not honest with my answer. I don’t think the truth is even what they want to hear.
The question is something along the lines of, how are you, or how are you doing? My response is usually something like, I’m doing pretty well, how about you? Or, I might even respond with fabulous! or fantastic!
I might be doing fine that day, but very often I am not having a fantastic day at all. I know it’s a lie, but I don’t want to go into detail about what my day is really like, and I doubt they want any of that baggage anyway. They are just being friendly.
I am reminded of an old comic I once read in a hospital waiting room years ago. The dialog between the characters went something like this.
Sam: "I stopped telling people my problems."
Joe: "Why is that, Sam?"
Sam: "What I discovered is that half the people I told didn't care about my problems, and the other half was glad I had them."
Do you get asked this question a lot? What is your general answer? Do you often conceal how you really feel? What question do you hate the most? Let me know in the comments, and don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe!
This post is part two of a recent post. If you haven’t read that one, this one won’t make much sense, so I am reblogging it here. Feel free to catch up on that one and come back here.
I talk to God a lot, and sometimes he answers my prayers, but not always. I honestly didn’t expect him to answer this one at all. I didn’t know how such an answer would even be delivered. I never heard the loud voice of God booming out of the heavens or anything, so I assumed it might be in a subtle sort of way. Honestly though, it wasn’t very subtle.
After reading the previous post, you might think I received an odd message that I needed to interpret, like what happened in another dream I had. That’s not exactly how the answer came to me though. It was a pretty direct message honestly. No need to decipher it, and possibly get it wrong. It also wasn’t exactly a dream. In fact, I don’t even recall having a dream that night.
Sometime in the early hours of the morning, I was awakened by something in my room. When I opened my eyes, it became apparent that someone in the room had wanted me to awaken. On the right side of my bed was a wall with a window, and a pale light streamed in from the streetlamps outside, but there was empty space at the foot of my bed. This space wasn’t unoccupied at the moment though. I could make out two figures at the foot of my bed, and another figure standing on my left side. You would think it would be very frightening to awaken to three figures surrounding your bed, but they didn’t evoke any kind of fear in me.
From what I remember, they were all dressed in long white robes that appeared slightly luminescent. I did not feel like they were of this world. They seemed like angels to me, but they didn’t have wings or halos or anything. They did have a warm feeling to them though. It was almost like goodwill was emanating from them. It made me feel very calm. I also had this feeling that I was in the presence of great wisdom, like they knew all the answers.
The one standing to my left started speaking to me. He said, you asked about your soul, and I am here to answer your questions. Your soul is a spirit, and spirits are made of ideas. After this message, they remained for a few minutes, telling me many other things. Unfortunately, I don’t remember the rest of what they said very well. Maybe it didn’t make sense to me at the time.
As I was listening to the one on my left, I noticed his speech began to gradually take on the sound of a loud hum. This hum sound grew until his words were no longer discernible. As this was happening, his body and robe seemed to fade away, and a new object started to materialize right before my eyes. This new object was a big electric fan sitting on a chair beside my bed, and the hum was merely the sound made by its motor and blades spinning at high speed.
When their presence was completely gone, I found myself wide awake and staring at this noisy fan. This direct move from sleep to waking state with my eyes open really made me question whether it was a dream or something else. I think this may have been my first visit to the place that exists somewhere between reality and dream.
As I sat there staring into that fan, my worldview began to change. It all started to make sense to me. God knew I was struggling to keep a worldview with him in it, but my logical mind just couldn’t figure it out. My thinking was too focused on the material because science is completely materialistic. The explanation was right in front of me now. I am not made of flesh and blood. I am made of something immaterial. I am made of ideas.
I also began to realize how much your worldview affects how you interpret reality. For instance, I could have seen these visitors as ghosts, not angels. I could have chosen to ignore them altogether and just say it was a strange dream. I might also say that the revelation was just my subconscious mind trying to satisfy me with an answer.
I believe how I interpreted this event is accurate for me, but I realize that many of you will read this story through the lens of your own worldview, and that’s fine. For me though, these were words of comfort that allowed me to keep my faith and better understand myself and the reality around me.
Have you ever awakened in a state somewhere between dream and reality? Do you think this was some sort of vision? Have you ever considered how materialistic our thinking is today? How do you think your own worldview affects how you see reality?
Many years ago, I was faced with a trial of faith, and this is how it ended, or should I say began.
As far back as I can remember, I was a child with a great sense of wonder. My curiosity about this universe stretched from the tiniest atom to the distant stars many light years away. I wanted to know about everything in creation and understand it completely.
Unfortunately, being a young kid didn’t allow me to investigate everything on my own, so I had to rely on the works of the many scholars and scientists who had lived before me. This caused me to spend quite a lot of my time reading encyclopedias and other non-fiction books. Basically, my intense desire for knowledge drove me to read a lot and become something of a science nerd.
As I have mentioned before, I was also a child with a very strong belief in a higher power. This was not just something taught to me, but something I felt deep within me. As my knowledge of science grew through reading and study, it was inevitable that I would eventually run headlong into the atheistic world view promoted by many prominent scientists.
I knew in my heart that God was real, but science did not, and so a deep rift began to form between my mind and my heart, and I didn’t really know how to get past it. Should I abandon my faith and accept the scientific worldview? That just didn’t feel right to me. I wasn’t sure I could even picture my life without God in it. This inability to harmonize my belief in God with my love of science troubled me for many years. The best I was able to do was flip back and forth between worldviews, depending on what I was studying.
Then sometime in my late teens, I was vexed with an odd question right before bedtime. The question was a simple one, but I didn’t really know the answer. I had heard the term soul used a lot in religion, but I honestly didn’t quite understand what it was. At the time, I honestly considered a soul to be something like a ghost. Unfortunately, my scientific mind had trouble believing in something like that. Is it like in Ghost Buster’s? Is there some sort of etheric or ectoplasmic thing inside me that is my real self? Does it ooze out and carry me away with it when I die and become my new body?
God, what exactly is a soul?
I could have pondered this question for years to come, but for some reason I took a very different approach that night. I thought if there was one person who might know what a soul actually was, it would be the one who created it. God would be the one to ask, so I did just that. That night, as I closed my eyes and prayed to God, I asked him a very simple question. I said, God, what exactly is a soul?
Have you ever asked God a question? Were you also a science nerd? What is your worldview? Do you find yourself flipping back and forth between worldviews? Are you atheistic, agnostic, or religious?
Today’s question is what are my favorite animals? I have had quite a few pets, as mentioned in a previous post. I hate to play favorites, but I would say that my favorite animals are, dog, cat, goat, and bird, in about that order. I would need a farm to keep a goat though. I had a few growing up because I grew up in a rural area. A dog would really be best for me now, as they make excellent companions. My least favorite pets would probably be snakes, spiders, and reptiles. I just can’t see myself having one of those for a pet.
What are your favorite animals? What are your least favorite animals? Did you have a variety of pets growing up? Let me know in the comments, and remember to like, share, and subscribe!
The question for today is which historical figure would I most like to meet? I don’t think there is one honestly. Meeting a historical figure would just be like meeting any other person to me. I know they are human and therefore don’t have all the answers. I am also not prone to seeing one person as higher or lower than another. There are interesting people all over the place, even in our own times. I meet them every week. Meeting someone from the past would be entertainment at best.
Meeting a person with infinite knowledge and understanding would be more far more useful to me. I could ask them deep questions like, how did my soul end up in this place? Are there better planes of existence? How do I get to them? Or, how does one actually grab that greased pig called happiness and hold on to it eternally?
What historical figure would you like to meet? Do you think anyone ever knew all the answers? Do you dream of a better existence? How does one find everlasting happiness? Let us know in the comments, and don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe!
The subject of this post is whether I need time. When someone asks me a question, I first think of the most obvious answer, but then my mind does this funny thing where it deeply evaluates the question to determine if I am not just repeating the accepted answer. I often find ways to make the total opposite of the accepted answer make sense. I think this is how wisdom begins to develop, not by giving the answer, but by creating an even deeper question.
With that in mind, I would say that the most obvious answer is yes. Everyone wants more time, right? Isn’t time the most precious commodity? Isn’t time the only thing you can’t get back when it’s spent? Maybe those things are true, but do I really need more of it? To me, the real question to consider is, do I have enough of it already?
In reality, the answer is actually no. I don’t need more time. I often struggle to make it through a whole day, especially if that day is Monday. Honestly, a day is painfully long most days of the week. I sometime wish a day was reduced to just one hour, not the sixteen hours I’m expected to be awake to endure.
There are several factors that might influence us into thinking that we need more time. It might be because we are focusing on our own mortality and the shortness of our lives. We might also come to think that if we had just a few more hours to work each day we could finally make enough money to break out of the rat race. That probably won’t work though, because the economy will likely just adjust itself to the new influx of income. By far, I think the best reason to desire more time is the thought that if we had a few more hours a day we could spend it on personal things or with our family. Unfortunately, I fear something else would come out of the woodwork and eat up all the time we gained.
If rather than adding four hours to the day, I could, let’s say, make the same living I make now while working four hours less than I currently have to work, wouldn’t that really solve the whole problem? Now it would appear that I don’t actually need more time at all. What I actually need are more boundaries on how my time is consumed.
This is really one of the premises behind a book I read a few years ago called The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss. I think it became very popular because there’s quite a few people who would like to take their life back from their corporate overlords.
Forget the old concept of retirement and the rest of the deferred-life plan–there is no need to wait and every reason not to, especially in unpredictable economic times. Whether your dream is escaping the rat race, experiencing high-end world travel, or earning a monthly five-figure income with zero management, The 4-Hour Workweek is the blueprint.
This step-by-step guide to luxury lifestyle design teaches:
How Tim went from $40,000 per year and 80 hours per week to $40,000 per month and 4 hours per week
How to outsource your life to overseas virtual assistants for $5 per hour and do whatever you want
How blue-chip escape artists travel the world without quitting their jobs
How to eliminate 50% of your work in 48 hours using the principles of a forgotten Italian economist
How to trade a long-haul career for short work bursts and frequent “mini-retirements”
In the end, I don’t think I need more time. Time is important, but it can all be taken away if you have no time boundaries. Freedom is way more important. With absolute freedom, you would have an abundance of time. Imagine a life where those sixteen waking hours in a day belonged to you exclusively to do whatever you wanted with them. You would probably have so much time you wouldn’t know what to do with all of it. On the other hand, having an infinite amount of time with absolutely no freedom would be an utter nightmare. It would literally be eternal slavery.
Do you have enough time? Are you effective at time management? Do you set effective boundaries to ensure a work life balance? Would you enjoy absolute freedom? Let us know in the comments, and don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe!
A few weeks ago, I ventured down to a local cocktail bar that I had started frequenting on weekends. The seat I took happened to be right next to a blond-haired lady who seemed sort of interesting to me. She was talking to one of the bartenders when I took a seat beside her, but I left one barstool between us because I didn’t want to crowd a stranger.
I remember she seemed like a very jolly person, which is a characteristic I tend to like in people. I also noticed something else about her that caught my attention. She had a deck of cards sitting in front of her on the bar, but they were not playing cards. I recognized them as being what are called tarot cards.
As fortune would have it, we soon struck up a conversation. If I remember correctly, she said she had moved into town to work for a lawyer. I believe she said it was a woman lawyer. The lady did some sort of office work for her, I think. She said she moved there specifically to work for her, which I thought was interesting. I don’t think I would move to a place just to work for a particular person, but I guess that made sense to her.
It wasn’t long before I had to ask her the question, what are you doing with those cards? She told me she was really into them and came to give the bartender a reading, which I presume she had already done prior to my arrival, but we didn’t really get into that, and the bartender sort of wondered off to leave us talking.
There was a small group of what looked like young college students at the back of the bar by the fireplace. Yea, this bar has a fireplace. It is decorated like a living room, having couches and chairs, and the walls have bookshelves with books on them. It sort of feels like you are having a party at someone’s house, only it’s not a house, it’s a cocktail bar. I also noticed the group at the back were very nicely dressed and looked affluent, which wasn’t uncommon for this bar, as it is kind of fancy.
As I conversed with the lady, she sort of leaned in and said, those people at the back have a very negative vibe about them. I said, so you are able to sense negativity? She said, yes, and they also wanted a reading, so I gave them one. I didn’t think it was all that bad, but one of the girls didn’t like it, and gave me bad looks, so I came to sit over here. Then she said, they have lived a very privileged life and they believe they are higher up than those around them. I turned to glance at them briefly and casually, as not to attract any attention, and yes, they looked exactly as she described them.
After this conversation, I asked her, do you feel like you are psychic? She said something like, I can just feel things about certain people. I then asked, so what do you think of me? She said, you seem very positive. I don’t sense any of the negativity in you that I see in them. I would also say you seem very grounded. I believe you are probably an Earth sign. I responded, yes, you are correct about that.
To be honest, I don’t usually find fortune telling very interesting, though I can see how it might be entertaining. I like the idea of being in control of my own fate, and honestly, I don’t know if I really want to know the future. I also know something about self-fulfilling prophesies. Basically, if you believe something is going to happen, you start to subconsciously adjust your behavior until it actually does happen, which might not be something you want at all.
That being said, fate did seem to have its hands in the happenings of the evening already. I mean, this wasn’t a typical day for me to be at this bar, and I just happened to sit down beside a fortune teller, who just happened to be there that night too, and she just happened to have her tarot cards with her. I have also never seen her before or since that night either, so it must not have been her typical place to be. After taking all this into consideration, I figured, the universe is trying to tell me something. I might as well hear what it has to say.
She said to me, what question are you seeking? What do you want this reading to be over? I said, I want to know about my life. How’s it going to turn out? She shuffled the deck a few times, and asked me to cut the cards, and then she laid out three cards from the deck, one at a time, and face up. As the cards were laid out, she began to try and interpret what they were saying.
A smile came over her face, and she said, this is a very good reading! It means you are experiencing a new beginning. You are an Earth sign, and so that is the source of your power, and these are Earth cards, which makes them even more meaningful for you. They are saying the Earth is going to give you great abundance, so you need to plan for it and others are going to help you, and you must also be prepared to defend your territory when you receive it.
I got chills when she said it honestly. It perfectly fits what I have been feeling lately. I knew I was experiencing something knew, because I was starting to feel stronger, more solid, more stable, more grounded, and more… like Earth. That being said, I’m not really sure I want to be like Earth, as it can make me appear cold, hard, and impenetrable, and I’m just not like that on the inside. There is one thing that comforts me about it though. Earth means new growth and healing, and that’s something I do need desperately.
Though I can definitely feel my life changing, it also scares me badly, because every new beginning means the end of something that came before it. I’m still not sure if I can let go of the last chapter of my life. I am about to turn to the next page, maybe the most abundant one yet, but I’m still scared to death that it means letting go of something I don’t ever want to lose.
Tarot Card Reading
Here’s a summary of the cards, and how she arrived at her conclusion. The first one was the Ace of Pentacles, and Pentacles are Earth cards. The hand is extending a large coin to you, which represents a new opportunity that Earth is granting. It is often associated with great wealth and abundance. The second one was the Three of Pentacles, another Earth card. This represents you working with your people to achieve great things. It represents planning and working together to achieve the abundance that is being offered in the first card. The third card was the Seven of Wands, which is a Fire card. This card indicates that you are becoming much more enviable, and that you will need to be prepared to defend the territory you have gained.
After the reading, we chatted for a bit, and then a couple of other people ventured into the bar inquiring about her cards. Since the hour was getting late, I decided to bid her farewell and let her get to another reading. She definitely left me with something to ponder that night.
Do you believe in fate? Have you ever had a reading from a fortune teller? Do you think belief shapes your future? What’s your sign? Let me know your thoughts, and don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe!
There are many things that can motivate a person. Below is a list of some of the most important human motivators.
Living. When people are alive, they tend to want to stay that way. The will to live is a fundamental motivator. There may be a time when extreme suffering eliminates this motivation, leading to extreme depression and sometimes death. If you lose this one, the other motivators might not have much of an affect.
Survival. Everyone alive needs to survive. This is a base need. Some people have more difficulty with it than others. It might be because of health issues, food shortages, extreme poverty, homelessness, etc. If you still have a will to live, you will be motivated to survive.
Liked. People want to be liked by others. They will often go to great lengths to be liked. Sometimes it is because they want to be accepted by their peers, be one with the group, or in some cases, just have mass appeal and popularity. The like button is popular for a reason. People are motivated to be liked, and it improves their chances for survival.
Love. Some people are engaged in the pursuit of finding true love. This is a pretty big motivator for me personally, I must admit. It’s very elusive. It also requires a mutual feeling, which makes it even more challenging. Even when you have it, you question, are they in it for the same reasons? Will it last for both of you? It can be very fragile.
Sex. It is often associated with love, but is definitely a different thing. It’s also closely related to lust and beauty. It can become an obsession and lead to addiction, constantly pursuing the next conquest, living only for sensual pleasures. It’s definitely a huge motivator for human beings.
Materialism. I’m not a very materialistic person, but a lot of people are highly motivated to buy material things. They are like a maximalist I guess. Their garages become brimming over with junk at some point, then it’s off to the landfill, but it keeps the economy going I guess.
Wealth. Not everyone wants to collect tons of material objects. Some people want to collect money, and lots of it. When they get there hands on it, they invest it to make even more money. It might eventually become even more money than they can spend. It can greatly aid survival, and is definitely a huge motivator.
Power. Wealth can lead to power, and money might actually be a storage system for power, because if you have enough money, you can get people to do things for you. Power is the ability to control those around you, and society at large. It is definitely a big motivator, especially for the control freaks.
Perfection. Making really bad mistakes can reduce your chances of survival. Most people try to act wisely and make good decisions. This can be perfection in daily tasks, or even extend into the realm of morality. Perfection can never be had, of course, but perfectionists are highly motivated by it.
Meaning. Sooner or later, someone will ask the question why. Why am I here? What is the purpose of all this? For some reason, people get tired of doing the same old thing forever if there is no greater meaning to it all. Having a sense of purpose is a great motivating factor, and can come from various sources, like family, religion, afterlife, humanitarianism, spiritual attainment, etc.
Possible discussion ideas.
Do you think this list is accurate?
Would you add something to this list?
Which are your biggest motivators?
Do you think your motivations change?
Are any of them irritating to you?
What is the meaning of life?
Can’t wait to hear what you have to say! Let me know in the comments, and don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe!
I’m curious about a lot of things because my mind wonders a lot. Today, when I woke up, there was a question in my mind I was wondering about, and I was curious as to the answer. The question was simply, do other people actually feel empathy? Is it real, or just something we do to be nice when we feel like it?
The other day I was messaging a friend of mine and I mentioned something that was deeply troubling me. She glossed right over it. It was like the message wasn’t even sent, or it slipped through the crack into the twilight zone. If she read it, she would know why I do what I do. I’m sure it was because she is completely submerged in her own painful feelings and oblivious to mine. There’s really not much bandwidth left for anyone else’s feelings. That’s what I tell myself anyway, because it’s easier to accept, but I honestly can’t prove she feels anything about me.
You can be in a room full of people, and still be utterly alone.
We can be surrounded by people who we presume love us, but do they really have any feelings for us? Can they actually feel what we are feeling, or are we going it alone? It also makes me ask the question, are there people sitting right next to me who are quietly suffering and trying to reach out? Does it really do any good to tell anyone anything? You can be in a room full of people, and still be utterly alone. This is what a lack of empathy does to people. It shuts them inside themselves with feelings that can never be released or heard, and eventually it eats away everything inside you.
I know it’s kind of a depressing thought, but when you experience and ponder everything, you eventually run into a few negative ideas and feelings. I was just curious about this one this morning.
Discussion Prompts
Do you ever feel like no one is actually listening?
Do you think people actually feel what you feel?
Have you had someone totally gloss over what you said?
Do you find yourself too occupied with your own feelings?
Do you ever feel alone, even when you are around others?
I’ve been told that loneliness is actually a growing problem, agree?
Are there feelings you have no way to release?
Let me know what you think in the comments, and don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe!
Just out of curiosity, what do you like best about this site? Was there a post (or posts) or type of post that you enjoyed the most? What will you remember from this site? Was it easy to read? Is there something I can improve upon? What would you like to see more of? Or less of? What makes you want to come back? Will you continue to read? Now’s your chance to fill me in on what I’m doing right (or wrong).
Thank you so much for visiting! Let me know what you think in the comments, and don’t forget to like, subscribe, follow, and share!
Ken's Life 
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