Each morning I am going to spend 30 mins focusing my mind and feelings.
- Write down any dreams;
- Write down my thoughts as they appear in that time;
- Note how my body feels – how I feel about any thoughts and ideas;
- Observe myself.
- Particularly see what my feelings and reactions are to thoughts and ideas (especially about plans for the future), that originate with myself and others.
The idea is that guidance comes through feelings, emotions, body sensations, ideas and images in the mind. This guidance is not my own intellectual faculty in origin, it is separate, but obviously my intellect is involved in the process.
Not to say it is entities beyond myself communicating. I do believe in spirits and a Creator, so I do not discount contact from them. But it is not what this exercise is about. What it is about is being in touch with my own being and abilities and learning to trust in them without interfering in their process through my own overthinking and learnt concepts being imposed on my life and processes.
Core to this is the idea of a morality – there is a wrong and a correct path for me. A lot of this is about discerning, or sensing, what moral path is particular to me. It is also about allowing me to create without hinderance from my conscious mind. For me a lot of the problems in my choices are that I have ideas about myself that are derived from society and my culture and are not anything to do with living my life as I should. It is more about subconsciously want to fit in, impose current societal goals on myself that are completely inappropriate for my needs. So I want to clear them out of my life.
After this 30 minute period of reflection, I will pray and ask for help. I am of the belief that there are spirits who are benevolent and want to help mankind, and there is a Creator who is Good. In my view all things material, and all things in this world, originate in thought. This thought is in us humans, and in all other creatures on this earth, and in the spirits and Origin of all things. Some of the spirits (which I believe are just consciousnesses without a material aspect) are able to have influence for us, and some are suffering and need our assistance. So that is my overall perspective, and I want to work with this connecting to all parts of what I understand to be in existence. So for me ‘prayer’ is communication with all the conscious entities that do not have a material aspect.
In life I also link to a limited amount of the physically present conscious entities – other people and animals, and plants too.
So…the day begins with 30 minutes of reflection and notation…and then some prayer. I am hoping this will give a better direction to my life. For so long life has been just about getting through a series of struggles and hardships, surviving. Trying to figure out how to recover, get some energy, and go back into the battle. There has been little direction. There has been little opportunity to find other people to work with. Positivity has been non-existent, it has all been about surviving and defending self.
Essentially I have been alone in my ideals, my beliefs, my work. In being alone and isolated I could barely cope and stay balanced, or even avoid getting crushed under all the pressures of life. I did not know what caused this. So, when suggested, I pursued the Autism diagnosis. It has helped a lot, it explains the situations I put myself in and my responses, and difficulties. Difficulties in coping with outside influences, but also very much difficulties within me in processing and thinking in a balanced way. It has been exhausting, confusing, disabling.
With this new information I want to approach my life and have another go. This time accepting my thinking is not balanced, it is skewed to negativity and often a false perspective. I want to stop fighting my inclination to a quiet life, but I want to integrate that need with some level of a social life. I understand now why I have had so much trouble in employment, and I want to allow myself to work with the desire for more independence and autonomy in my vocation. I want to not chase money and allow it to influence me. To not try to be normal and give up on my differences.
Nigel, the Autistic Companion 