Reflections on a life of high strangeness

[Oxajil]

discovering tobacco in 1998 gave me a "fighting chance" against this formidable adversary

I think tobacco should probably be okay because you know your limit and maybe the same goes for a couple of (gluten free) beers once in a while (you'd know best!). But it would be interesting to see what you observe once you cut weed out for some time, as a little experiment.

 

[SlipNet]

I think tobacco should probably be okay because you know your limit and maybe the same goes for a couple of (gluten free) beers once in a while (you'd know best!). But it would be interesting to see what you observe once you cut weed out for some time, as a little experiment.

I think total sobriety and abstinence is what I am eventually working towards, but I need to be realistic about this matter. Cutting down to only having a beer when following the football on weekends is how I currently manage it. The weed needs to be given up ultimately. I actually preferred the old days of sharing hashish with my late brother, we had some good times. He died in 2018, and his loss hit me hard. But weed these days is a bit of a pot-pourri of different strains. I did research on this kind of stuff years back, because I wanted to avoid smoking "high-grade" strains. Way too risky for me smoking that kind of stuff. Anyway, it's got me thinking that these days I use it occasionally for a kind of catharsis, if that makes sense? Just an emotional release that I'm not getting in the natural way? I'm considering a number of options in my mind on how I can find positive outlets in my social and leisure life. I used to play a lot of ten pin bowling, pool too. All that fell away as the anti-smoking laws came in. I kinda miss those days. I was rubbish at bowling, but I loved the act of trying! Pool I was good at, always a fave sport of mine as a younger man. I'm thinking about getting back into these two activities in particular.

 

[SlipNet]

By the summer of 2016 my life had settled down to a gentle pace, and my beleaguered soul was re-adjusting to basic reality. I was out of work, but I had sorted out my financial and mental life very satisfactorily earlier in the year. I was now taking olanzapine and melatonin each and every night, and was sleeping well with far less troublesome dreams. I was working on a number of artistic works as I had plenty of time on my hands, and for some reason I wasn't getting any stress from the voices during this period. I wasn't smoking weed, I'd given up drink after a drunken fall the year before, so was living a pretty clean cut life. I was still a 20 cigs a day guy however, always been my main vice since starting in 1998. I cut my hair short, and shaved off my beard too. Kinda like laying a marker down. A fresh start.

Not all was rosy in the garden however; I was always a person who suffered from a degree of social anxiety, (this in many ways explains how in 1994 when I moved to London, I experimented with booze and smokes to ease myself a little.) and socially I was becoming more of a solitary figure. I just wasn't getting much out of social living during that summer. Much like previous significant summers, there was the Euro 2016 football championships to enjoy. I can perfectly recall where I was and what I was like by picturing any World Cup or Euro Cup championship since 1986, it's uncanny! It's like I have a sporting bookmark that gets a new impression every 2 years! Anyway I had a whale of a time that summer, cheering Wales on in the football. Financially I was living a frugal life, but in general for the first time in years I was happy. Lonesome, but content.

The weather was fine, I was painting, drawing, writing, while also recovering from a prolonged period of traumatic stress. I began that summer taking stock of my notes in my books and journals, creating the compendium of memories and reflections that have been my main resource in this thread. Before I'd heard of Jordan Peterson I'd already divided my journals into epochs;

1974-86 Childhood
1986-94 Teenage Kicks
1994-2004 Young Adulthood
2004-2016 Psychosis and Beyond

slowly I was putting all the pieces together to create a broader picture. That summer I really got things started in that respect, recovering all the memories that I could unearth and putting them into a recovery narrative that could account for over 40 years of living. Past Authoring is a fine art that requires commitment and dedication to succeed in. Thankfully I've been journalling now since 1994 so it's second nature now to go over old memories, experiences or sensations. Making sense of one's life trajectory in digestible epochs was invaluable for personal growth.

Also consolidating my knowledge and being via my art collection was worthy too. In having a vast selection of books, cds and dvds I had all my memories from the late 70s onwards on tap at this point, and for a while at least I wasn't suffering any symptoms of paranoid psychosis. It had taken 12 long years of chaos but I was finally on the mend. It's actually quite emotional reflecting on this period, a time where I retreated from society and into a physical reflection of my "Soul Chamber", that secret place I always held within. Well, glimpses at least. As always, this part of me is mercurial and difficult to figure out. For instance, I can go for months without a meaningful thought and then in 3 days a whole slew of memories tumble out of the old Box! I've learned to anticipate nothing, and always be flexible when approaching the unknown in one's mind and heart. One day I hope to have truly made sense of all this drama, but at this point in the summer of 2016, life was slowly getting better. Already I was making more sense in my written work, a sign that my mind and soul was ready to engage in accounting for all this chaos, finally.

I was still painting, and sold a few pictures that summer too. A few punchy poems were written also. I may share some of my work on this forum at some point. For now this written account of my recovery process is keeping me busy enough though. But yeah, the summer of 2016 was a great period where I finally found a bit of order amidst all the chaos. Within a year I'd be rechristened SlipNet as a new member of the forum (actually my 4th incarnation though!), and I once again set to work on understanding my machine, what floated my boat and what made me tick. A hefty task that I just knew would never end....

 

[SlipNet]

So far in this thread I've covered the years 1974-2016 in detail, and now the period of 2016-24 needs to be accounted for. I spent these years painting/drawing, writing extensive notes from my journals into a coherent narrative, and occasionally working some lamentable jobs. But the quality of my life improved significantly when I finally decided to register on here as SlipNet in 2017. I missed the feedback on my current thinking, and I've long valued the qualities of a network so it seemed to be a logical progression for me as I continued my slow process of rehabilitation. I was also by this point assembling a selection of short stories for an upcoming collected work, but this has been an "on/off" project which I fit around my usual schedule. I'm in no hurry to finish this task, and in any case I'm still recalling old events and memories on a regular basis, so cutting edge data points are constantly turning up.

But the pace of my life has slowed down, and my effort level has improved during these recent years. My schizophrenic symptoms have not totally gone away during these times either. In around summer 2016 I was walking home from my town centre into the suburbs. I noticed a golden glowing figure manifesting on the horizon. It was a clear day with strong sunlight as I saw this. The tall glowing figure wore a toga upon closer inspection, carried a staff and was also holding a baby lamb. I saw this figure a few times in the 2016-17 period. I heard no voices at this time however. Obviously I was cognisant of the Christ/Caesar theory by this time so maybe it was a projection of my subconscious need for a leader at this time? It's certainly possible. Anyway, my journal notes make mention of this sight a few times, and I even did an acrylic painting of Caesar that summer, which was wild and psychedelic. My mind was returning to the whole 4d/UFO subject after years where I placed my emphasis on personal matters.

I continued throughout these years to take Olanzapine daily, though my sleeping was erratic. I was an occasional drinker by this point, and would often smoke a joint with my late elder brother, until his untimely death in winter 2018. We got on well in those later years and I really miss the guy now looking back. He was never one for complex ideas, but we shared many social interests and hobbies. I have always been able to provide social outlets for my soul to enjoy despite the mental health troubles. Ultimately I'm a social creature despite my social anxiety, so it's been good to report that life has been fine in this regard in recent times. Many members of my extended family have migrated to 5d in the last 5 years or so so, well, one's mind naturally turns to one's own eventual death. As an idea, it's become a regular pattern these last few years in particular. I've kinda made my peace with "my maker" now, though I should pray more often I suppose. I don't want to ever take the spiritual aspect of my life for granted. Thankfully my journals (which I have condensed for this thread) have given me a spiritual asset, because I can get this window into the imagination and logic of countless iterations of my younger self! Whilst not being a particularly religious person I retain a kind of reverence for the soul.

It's also interesting to note that during these recent years my UFO/4d/Pandora's Box selection seemed to have slowed down to a trickle. I haven't seen so much weird stuff during these years, though it remains true that I see the little 3ft transparent figures floating in the air sometimes still. Just out of the corner of my eye sometimes. I also made the effort to eat more meat back in 2016, and good meat is a part of my daily regime now. Maybe this has had an effect on how I am and what I see? I plan on working through my final notes on the period 2017-24 in my closing points on this thread soon. After several years of a swirling chaos, everything just settled down and I could then recover what I needed. One of the toughest aspects of going through all this info is the suspicion that if I'd just been a little smarter, more cautious and less self-indulgent over the years then perhaps I'd have suffered less? The lessons have been ambiguous, and slow to reform in my mind. How things have improved since 2016 is that I own up to things I've done now. Before I'd say "it was my predator/4d STS/program" and not take responsibility. And then this creates dualities in the mind where things can calcify and fragment, and then you have people with split personalities. An unbridgeable schism. Not good. So, as a recovering "sinner", I am older, wiser, and more forgiving than I perhaps used to be. I've never been "bad" per se, but I have sailed a little close to the wind vis a vis drugs etc.

Writing has proven (along with art and music) to be a crucial part of the learning process. Along with having a good memory for details. Reading is all well and good, but for a few years back then I was a bit of a "reading machine", and I was just spreading myself too thin across myriad subjects. Now I read less, but I understand more. I think overall it's reflective of my age now; I am 49, approaching the milestone that is 50, and taking stock of life matters has become a big personal project these last few years. Basically, if I can look back on this thread in 10 years time, read, understand, and not cringe, well then I would be satisfied with that. Hopefully by then I'll have a whole new slew of challenges to face as I think we are fast approaching a period of considerable chaos. Thank you for reading.

 

[SlipNet]

I've also managed to gather 2 old dreams, 2 memories that have tumbled out of the Box and into my conscious recall. Such days I live for! The first one is incredibly bizarre. In the dream I'm a soldier and travelling by helicopter to a remote base on the Pembrokeshire coastline. It's a busy scene, I'm with about 3 other people, and they constantly transmogrify before my eyes, even switching gender and facial details. Very weird dream! Anyway we land at this base and I'm taken down into a lift and before I know it I'm transported from this base to a small town on the west of Wales, Camarthen. I know this building well, and I am walking up a familiar staircase to see my manager. When I reach his door, I knock for permission to enter. The door opens and I am beckoned inside. Inside the room is a makeshift medical set-up, with a large glass tank holding what looks like an alien torso. Loads of little wires are connected to it and they crackle and snap and the alien twitches away in front of me. There are 3 men in lab coats holding clip boards and gesturing to me to help this alien. I just stare in wonder at this alien and say little else, just gob-smacked. Then I wake up from the dream and write it down in my journal. This dream would have been from around 2008. A truly weirdo experience!

The other dream I had was the "Ghoul Dream". I am invited to a remote house to stay for a night, but inside the house there is a Ghoul who, if he finds you, well he will kill you, dismember your corpse and most probably eat you as well. I recall travelling to this remote house in the dream in an old white British sports car. I said to the driver that I have no idea why I am going to this old house, but here I am travelling there. This dream terrified me at the time. I can recall the environment with remarkable detail. All the stairs and floors are made of an old creaky wood. It only makes muted sounds but it's enough to properly scare you. Naturally in the dream I'm walking around this old house made of wooden flooring, desperately trying to find an exit and get the hell out of there before this raving Ghoul finds me and eats me! In this dream I was moving around in a frantic fashion for what seemed like an age, trying to find a way out. I'd be going down stairs, checking every door, occasionally getting shit-scared because I heard a creaking in another room, man it was probably the scariest dream I've ever had. After what felt like an age, I open one door which then takes me into a cramped kitchen of a London townhouse. That's 2 dreams now where I'm just magically transported from one place to another. I anxiously try to find my way down the hallway to get out into the London streets and feel somewhat safe. I do actually manage to exit the house and I awaken from the dream frantically pounding the streets of Inner London, fearful of the Ghoul! I wrote about these 2 dreams in my journals years back, but had to make mention of them as I was recently reminded of them by some mischievous part of my soul!

Once again I am thankful to my crazy subconscious being for coming up with 2 crazy, ultra-realistic dream environments. Both felt totally real when I was involved in the dream, and the second one was probably the scariest dream I've ever had. The production values of dream states is a little pet hobby of mine. I've been watching great movies since the late 70s, so I think I know a good scene. Both these dreams were tip top, and powerful experiences. The helicopter felt real. The alien felt real to behold. The sports car in the second dream rattled as we went over bumps in the road! Whose mind would come up with this level of nerdy detail for a freakin' dream? I've long been of the opinion that if we had full dream recall we would have a revolution in consciousness within years. These 2 dreams were primal and powerful, and incredibly intense to revisit even! I recall how bloody relieved I was waking up from the Ghoul dream! I'm happy to be looking at these 2 dreams from the 2000s, knowing full well that they were only tests of some sort I guess. I was bang into my "Alien" phase of reading back then, so it must have fed into my dream states too. The Ghoul dream was more a test of whether I could keep my nerve under extreme pressure. And the funny thing is that it was all done implicitly. Nothing actually happened, but I was freakin' terrified during that dream. 10/10 to the Director of that little horror classic!

Anyway, just 2 wee dreams that made an impression on me back in 2008 to want to write about all these long years later. If any more come back to my recall I may note them down. Back in around 2008 when I had these dreams I was very focused on proving the alien hyperdimensional hypothesis, and it clearly fed into my dream world in a smooth fashion. Now I know more, but my dreams aren't so intense. And for that I should be thankful actually!