My Personal Celestine Journal

The Second Insight: The Longer Now

This awakening represents the creation of a new, more
complete worldview, which replaces a five-hundred-year-
old preoccupation with secular survival and comfort.
While this technological preoccupation was an important
step, our awakening to life coincidences is opening us up
to the real purpose of human life on this planet and the
real nature of our universe.

Discovering My Past Preoccupations

Workbook Questions
Using "The Celestine Prophecy: An Experiential Workbook"
by James Redfield and Carol Adrienne

A. Independence. I have always felt a need to work in
conjunction with others, especially with a significant
other, or someone else who is important to me. But at
the same time, I've felt a need to be independent, to
follow the road less travelled. And I've experienced
situations which allow me to work with a person who is
important to me at any given time of my life, but never
with a person who would be my life mate. My wife, and
later my ex-girlfriend, were always jealous of anything
I did that didn't interest them, even though I tried to
get them to join me in it.

Independence has added to my life by demonstrating to me
that I can accomplish whatever I reasonably set out to do,
even if I have to do it by myself. But it has hampered
my life in a way that closed off my endeavors, and hence
my self, to those I cared the most for and about, my wife
(while she lived) and my ex-girlfriend.

B. Resistance to authority. This has been a major theme
of my life, but only when those in authority infringe on
my sense of right and wrong. The earliest example of this
that I currently recall was when I was 17 years old in
high school. I was an audio-visual assistant as one of
my classes; I had shown a film to a class and was on my way
with the film cart back to the library. This was during a
split lunch cycle; the students who had finished their
lunch had to wait for the bell to go to their next class,
going no farther than a specific hallway juncture. I had
to go past that juncture to return the film cart by the
time the bell rang.

However, the assistant principal tried to stop me from
doing so, stating that I didn't have a hall pass. I said
that the film cart was my hall pass and proof of my
responsibilities as an a/v assistant, and that I was
returning the cart before the bell rang. He insisted
that I wasn't going through, and I said, "Yes I am, and
you're not going to stop me from doing what I'm supposed
to do." (This is not an exact quote, as the time frame
was so long ago, but that is the gist of my words.)

Whenever I've been in conflict with authority, it has been
from this perspective of right and wrong. It has enhanced
my life in that it always resulted in gaining the respect
of some person I wanted respect from (not to mention others
of passing acquaintance who didn't really mean much to me).
And the fact that I've always been successful in standing
up for myself from this perspective has strengthened my
resolve to continue doing so.

As for hampering my life, well, authority sometimes
rebels against rightness, and those instances have
literally changed the direction of my life. In light of
the first insight, I feel I must conclude that those
few instances were in reality synchronistic events that
forced me to change course to some path more in keeping
with whatever I was supposed to be doing at the time,
as opposed to what I actually was doing.

C. Perfectionism. I've always tended to get bogged down
in detail, crossing every "T" and dotting every "i" along
the way. This has enhanced my employment performance to
a great extent, as many employers declined to replace me
when they had originally assumed I wouldn't work out but
changed their minds when they saw how well I did with the
tasks I was assigned. And the few romantic situations
(dates, if you will) went well as a result of this
predilection.

But I also tend to shy away from things that I feel
I can't do well (or perfectly), and therefore I've
passed up opportunities to advance myself in employment
and in social situations.

D. Emotional dramas. These tend to be traumatic for me, in
that I've always believed there is a reason for everything,
even feelings. I've tended to search out the reasons for
my own feelings, and I tend to insist that those close to
me (and sometimes those who aren't that close but still
impact on my life) do the same. For example, when my wife
would become distraught, I would ask why she felt the way
she did. Once, in response, she asked me why I always had
to have a reason, stating unequivocally that she didn't
need a reason to feel a certain way. These incidents
always tended to become power struggles.

Sometimes these dramas will give me further insight into
my own feelings, which in turn helps me to cope with the
often (to me) irrational actions and attitudes of others;
I've been able to just walk away from a situation that
threatens my own sense of balance when it doesn't appear
to affect me directly.

Unfortunately, I've also developed a tendency to walk
away from things I need to deal with as well, in order
to maintain a sense of emotional equilibrium that perhaps
should be upset on occasion (I've been called "cold,"
"unemotional," and a few other things because of this.

2. More preoccupying ideas

A. Things I'd like to change:

1. The often undiplomatic way I tend to deal with
situations;
2. My unwillingness to put myself into potentially
rewarding situations because of my feelings of inadequacy;
3. My tendency to shut down emotionally when the going
gets rough, or conversely, to become over-sensitive to
certain situations and thereby become too aggressive.

B. I'd like more:

1. Financial stability;
2. Emotions balanced by reason in my relationships;
3. Courage to do whatever I see needs to be done.

C. I keep thinking:

1. Why can't I find a woman I can have a "share everything"
relationship with?
2. How can I buckle down and break out of my financial rut?
3. How can I react in a more balance and diplomatic manner
to potentially threatening situations?

D. In six months I'd like:

1. To quit smoking;
2. To spend more quality time with my son;
3. To find another life mate.

E. The most important things in my life right now are:

1. My son;
2. My spiritual growth;
3. My job.

F. The qualities in people I admire most are:

1. The ability to stay calm and still express
honest feelings;
2. The ability to see things through to completion;
3. Honesty, forthrightness and integrity.

G. I'd be delighted if my life included:

1. A woman I can truly share my life with and vice versa;
2. A better relationship with my son;
3. A clear and ethical way to gain financial security.