Tag: Trauma

Inevitable Moments

There are these inevitable moments in life. Today I got word that a 3rd member of my family has died. My poor father is shaken with grief as this was his older brother. It seems there was a lot left unsaid. And, honestly I don’t blame that on either one of them. I blame it on life. This is the 3rd unexpected death in 9 months. To be perfectly honest, I began heavily medicating after the second one back in December. And, I don’t mean I’m staying high. I’m just taking a lot of prescriptions to hold me steady so I can still function mentally. I still haven’t regained my ability to walk more than about 1800 steps per day with lots of rest periods and that still carries a bit of repercussion with bouts of tachycardia at bed time when my body is trying so hard to recover from the strain of movement on top of the emotional trauma of the past year. My cat died, my mother died, I lost 2 vehicles, almost got evicted, had to move in with a relative because I can’t afford rent anywhere anymore due to soaring cost of living and I’m not able to work right now and won’t be able to for quite some while. I lost a younger cousin. The last surviving son of my elderly uncle. I can’t believe he lost both of his children and faces his elder years without them. I can’t believe me and my mamaw and brother have to face the future without my mother. There’s just so much. And, while I’ve said since 2017, “I can’t take anymore.” I do. I’m writing this because I’ve just taken so much more than I ever dreamed possible and still survive it. Granted, I have lost my mobility to emotional trauma and stress and I am heavily medicated and have packed on more weight than I thought I ever would. I have taken a toll. But, I’m here. Writing.

There are these moments in life that are inevitable. And it sucks when they all pile up together rather than being spaced out allowing time for recovery before the next crisis. But, here I am. Doing all the nervous system things, leaning on my friends, loving on my family, appreciative of the shelter, helping where and how I can. And, writing. Oh, I also made the Dean’s list at University and am about to publish my first book in about a week or so. All this during the hardest years of my adult life. And, I’m middle-aged and that sucks honestly. Because of the crisis I have not been afforded the opportunity to find the “finally don’t care” attitude that I hear women talk about when they get a certain age. I haven’t found the solidity women say they feel at my age because to walk in my world feels like the globe has been greased and I too have been oiled and walk on it slick and naked. Vulnerable and no balance. My world feels like a greased pole where the floor is lava.

There are these inevitable moments in life. And, when they come…you can’t pray them away, you can’t manifest them away, you can’t cuss them away, you can’t wish them away, you can’t science them away, you can’t psychology them away, you can’t religion them away, you can’t God them away, you can’t spell them away, you can’t gather an army of friends, family, or politicians to resist them or tell them to go away, you can’t write them away, you can’t therapy them away, you can’t spiritual them away, you can’t atheist them away, you can’t hide from them, you can’t run from them, you can’t deny them, you can’t sublimate them, you can’t pay them away, you can’t doctor them away, you can’t medicate them away, you can’t exercise them away, you can’t work them away, you can’t sleep them away, you can’t drink them away, you can’t starve them away, you can’t not see them.

But, you can allow your friends to love you through them, you can let your family hold you through them, you can let your cat or your dog lay on your chest and lick your tears as they fall. You can open your chest wide and accept that these moments are life too. You can acknowledge that your steps are in sync with the march of humanity and that your footfalls imprint the human continuum and whether it feels like it or not you are right where you’re supposed to be. You, me, we….are part of the marvel. The dynamic, diverse, prism that is humanity. One massive, non-congruent, yet deeply cohesive at the same time, collective unconscious, reflectively conscious, forging forth for a better day.

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Cozett Contemplates Being A Healer

You used to be so nice~ It was because I was afraid of the implications of displeasing you.

You’re so strong & such an inspiration ~ It’s because of my survival instinct and because I’m naturally a good person

You’re so brave~ My nervous system would no longer allow me to tolerate the confines of the box people wanted me in. It was either tear it apart or continue to betray my emotional well-being

You must be an empath~ I’m hypervigiliant. I’m highly attuned to the energy of others because I was traumatized as a child.

As a trauma survivor you find yourself on a continuum. There is a linear space, thread, that runs from your childhood, into your present, and reaches out before you in the time to come. Like a train track you can stand on any point of it and feel the vibration of the train whether its behind you or has passed you. It doesn’t matter if you can see it. You can still feel it its vibration. Its energy.

As if in a dream, you find yourself experiencing an alternate reality than that of those around you, and you’re constantly teaching yourself what’s real and what’s not, what to hang on to, and what to let go of.

People who have experienced emotional trauma have brain changes, similar to those who have had concussions.

Emotions, feelings, are so powerful they can physically reshape the structure of your brain and thereby color your reality. Thankfully, neuroplasticity is a thing. But, healing is something that needs support and takes work. And while the trauma isn’t your fault you are the one who will have to take the responsibility to heal what you didn’t harm. That feels unfair and is traumatic in its own sense.

This is why its imperative…..to not feel like you have to be nice to everyone. Because everyone….isn’t supporting the healing of your brain and nervous system. Everyone isn’t guarding your heart and prioritizing your well-being or creating safe spaces for you or trying to understand the decisions you make.

In fact, most people aren’t critical thinkers. For many it’s never occurred to them how they could make the world a better place by looking through the lenses of others and a lot of people have zero desire to do so even if it has occurred to them. The fact is, that those with narrow emotional experience, narrowed and selective perspectives that require people to believe the way they do, behave the way they do, see the world and others the way they do creates disenfranchisement because it automatically has the implication that there are consequences for people who aren’t like them.

So here we are as trauma survivors. Healing from harm we didn’t create. Creating corners of safe space from spaces that others assume should only belong to them.

I want to take this post and tell trauma survivors how amazing, dynamic, multi-faceted, emotionally intelligent, beautiful, powerful, and expansive they are. You have amazing qualities that evolved on the inside of you. You are an evolved human being. You have space on the inside of you. That space is capacity. Capacity for good. Capacity gives you the ability to receive that narrowness cannot afford you.

I believe that humanity has begun a massive shift. A shift that values emotional intelligence and expansiveness and tolerance. A shift of conviction.

There will be a collective of humanity who deeply hold the belief that it is better to be a bridge builder for every chasm is better than clinging to feeling superior because of what “sets them apart.”

There will be a collective of…us…who deeply believe that to be a healer isn’t something relegated only to licensed professionals or the “spiritually” gifted. Healing belong to humanity. Period. It is expressed in community not division. It is given and received in relationship with those who understand that though we are many, ultimately we are one.

I refuse to be anything other than safe. I refuse to be anything other than a healer. I refuse to be anything other than whole.

And, if you’re not of this same energy you can’t be in MY energy. At all. My health cannot afford you.

The community I’m creating, the circle I’m curating, the reality I’m shaping is necessarily humane, good, sovereign.

Cozett Contemplates the conviction of what it means to be a healer

Yours in emotional intelligence,

Cozett Dunn

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The Greater The Depth The Darker It Gets: Pioneering The Pathless Path

Whether the ocean, the earth, the cosmos or the psyche….the greater the depth the darker it gets.

Shadows still exist because they are the egregores of our ego. But, their borders bleed into the blackness. Doing the inner work here is harder. You can’t see anything at all. You can’t feel anything at all. You can’t smell anything. And, there is no flavor. Yet it is not “nothingness.” When taken to this depth you experience sensory deprivation and your integration process looks much less coherent than what is trending and being discovered in even the health and holistic wellness world. Things like Kundalini awakening, or plant medicine trips, or exorcisms, carry a busy energy of a human life trying to survive and progress. There is a frenzied, frenetic, frantic, or even euphoric feel to these processes.
And while they all are wonderful rites in and of themselves they are also in and of themselves mere entries into a life that is pure consciousness, awareness. They can serve as portals to important journeys but they are just that….keyholes through which we get to peer into what’s next….beyond the body and beyond the mind.

As one who speaks from the deep….I’m understanding there is a disabling stillness that overtakes the psyche that forces the soul to switch off to allow our spirit to come online. We depart from understanding the world and the people around us physically because we experience a break, a disconnect from the physical even while we are still in the body and we sojourn into a metaphysical knowingness.

From physical understanding to metaphysical knowing. This is the path of shamans, healers, oracles, prophets, and poets. This is where the pathless path begins. This transition is the junction where we meet other souls who are longing to go deeper but need the guidance of those of us who had no choice but to pioneer the poignancy of what its like to live between worlds.

For years I’ve felt a jealousy, a scornful envy even of those who never seem to venture below the surface. The ease that they experience in their unawareness has seemed so unfair to me. And up until my mother’s death, which has carried a level of complexity that no one should have to experience, I didn’t get it. I didn’t understand why so many people get to walk around having done little to no inner work, existing in pure ego completely unbothered, and untouchable in spite of the harm that their willful ignorance has caused.

But, now I do. I do get it. I believe there is a subconscious mechanism within each of us that will allow us to go only so far into understanding humanity, emotions, spirit, soul, shadow. It is the “thing” within us that determines when it is our own unique time to learn certain lessons. And until it’s time to learn those lessons….these people act as lessons to those of us who are inwardly turned.

We learn how to deal gently with a collective that isn’t ready. We learn how to meet people where they are….without judging who they are. In the end its all about survival. The survival of the body. The survival of the psyche. The survival of the soul. The survival of our spirits that get so attached to the identity of our physical existence and feel terrified at the thought of the moment it loses the body. Because that will happen for all of us. We are all moving towards that moment of no longer being “the us that we know.” The us that is grouchy when we wake up. The us that looks in the mirror and sees thinning hair, banging bods, stretch marks, chiseled jaw lines, on point brows, and unwanted chin hair.

There is life in the deep. Beyond the body. And, beyond the mind. I’m here. But, I’ll be back. And, when I come back…I’m bringing my soul with me. I’m not politically correct. I’m not religiously correct. I fit in no where but because of this I’m equipped to go everywhere. Spreading boundlessly as threads of my energy finds the energy of other wandering souls like mine.

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No Water For The Wolves

Lying in the silence. All is black around me save my phone and wifi light. And all I can think about is how my mother’s death is stirring in me an even greater fire and resolve to be living light. I want my light to shine into the cosmos and to be a home to every human without exception.

I want to be….wide, long, deep, tall, ever expanding light, warmth, and peace and safety.

I want my table to extend into the nations.

Where there is light people feel seen, where there is light there is clarity, there is life, there is strength, and hope.

In a world filled with humans who despise what they don’t get, fear what they can’t understand, and murder either with their thoughts or hands those who are divergent…..I want to be different.

Love is beautiful anarchy

Light is the epitome of rebellion against darkened understanding

Brilliant bright light so the world can see
Recklessly loving us all into anarchy

While the planet is threshed wheat from tare
I’ll gather and glean to me those in despair

It is enough for those standing accepted in the sun
To carry the status of a chosen one

I’ll cast my lot with the vagabond parade
I vomit at the charity of pretentious charade

Babylon, Babylon, can’t you see she’s imploding?
Or are your ears deafened from your own gloating?

Superiority, elitism, white washed graves
Their throats lie open like wilderness caves

But they won’t catch me or mine
Unbeknownst to them we are made of brine

And, I refuse to give them water…

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Cozett Contemplates: Your Write To Heal…

Cozett Contemplates writing to heal trauma…

For trauma survivors it’s hard to feel like you can ever again be fully safe. High-alert is a constant state of being. And, appearing relaxed and “normal” becomes a survival skill.

This has been one of my most honed life skills. I learned early on that to show disquiet…distress…or to speak out…would rock the boat. The fact is, is that when people become uncomfortable…things slow down as they try figure out:

1. What’s wrong with the person who’s upset?
2. How do I feel about what I’m hearing and seeing from this traumatized person?
3. Do I believe what I’m being told by this person?
4. How can I help in ways that won’t disrupt my own life?
5. Should I reach out to others to aid me if I help this person?
6. Are there problems too much for me and should I just keep moving and trust someone else will help?

These are just a few of the processes people sort through when thinking about how to help the traumatized.

As you can see not only are trauma survivors sorting through a lot of emotions and questions but so are those with whom we open to.

Because of all those processes and the time and energy it takes I decided as a child that I wouldn’t seek help. I couldn’t waste energy getting rejected over and over by people who didn’t have the capacity to hold space for me. I needed that energy to keep moving. Because life doesn’t stop. Even for the wounded.

As I’ve sojourned into middle-age and resolved to become more authentic, unapologetic, shameless, proactive, and courageous….I face the challenge that vulnerability brings.

Vulnerability, even for non-traumatized individuals is hard. But, as someone who has known what it is to be stripped bare of any ability to trust and feel safe it is especially…hard. I know I’m not alone with this?

This is the original reason I began to write to begin with. It was never because I thought I was good at it, or because it was a hobby for my free time. It was never because I had writing peers or was part of a book club or even a poetry lover! If you know my poetic soul that may seem surprising. 😆

I began to write because there weren’t enough tears. I couldn’t cry enough to even come close to releasing and processing all I’d been through and was going through.

I had so much pent up pain and agony that I needed the entirety of my being to release and cry as much as I did it just wasn’t cleansing me.

So I took to my keyboard. While hot tears streaked my face the fire of my words set ablaze my laptop and phone screens.

I held nothing back. There was no person who could hold space for me….so I created my own space. Private. Free from scrutiny. And it was as wide and as long and as endless as my pain.

My writing space could hold everything. And therefore it could hold me.

I want to encourage you today, if you’re a trauma survivor to know that even when humans can’t hold space for you…that there is a wide open and endless space available to you that can be curated by and for you.

Maybe you’re not looking to publish but you would like to heal? And you’d like to not do that alone?

I’m offering spaces for you. If you’d like to write to heal…alongside me….I’d be honored to hold, share and lead that space.

Reach out to me if this sounds like something your soul is calling for and together we will create the space for you to be held, seen, understood.

I love you. I really do.

Cozett Dunn

#cozettcontemplates #traumasurvivor #writingtherapy #lifecoach #author #healer #traumahealing #traumarecovery #traumainformed #mentalhealthmatters

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Sleep Trauma And Resolution: Shadow Work For The Shadowscape

Lack of sleep has been a growing crisis. Globally, since the 1970’s there has been a sharp decline in quality and duration of sleep. And, if you’re located in the U.S., the U.K., or Japan you are even less likely to be able to obtain more than 6 hours of sleep per night.

Sleep deprivation has been a factor in some of the planet’s greatest disasters. The nuclear disaster at Three Mile Island in 1979, the nuclear meltdown of Chernobyl in 1986, and the massive Exxon Valdez oil spill all had at the center of the incident…sleep deprived humans. (https://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/features/10-results-sleep-loss). So, why don’t we hear about that? There is a consensus amongst sleep scientists that citizens of capitalistic cultures are more prone to miss out on sleep due to the productivity demands of their jobs. Additionally, capitalistic cultures are known for “sleep machismo.” The old, “sleep when you’re dead” adage stems from this culture. Capitalism depends on 2 things: productivity and consumerism. When someone is sleeping…neither of those things are happening. And, so we find ourselves traumatized, and feeling guilty for this very necessary need. Now we even know that there are different sleep chronotypes and that we don’t get to choose whether we are a morning person or a night owl! So much has been discovered about the necessity, benefits, and genetic dispositions about sleep! But, it seems since most of us are sleep deprived and zombified we aren’t getting the education we need to experience better sleep. Our minds are numbed out and we are losing touch with the voice of our biological rhythms.

Because I had a childhood filled with frequent trauma, one way that my precious mamaw cared for me was by protecting my sleep. She knew if I was asleep I was healing from the stress and pain that constantly swirled around me. She knew if I was asleep, I was safe, and I was comfortable. However, all of this changed at the age of 18 for me. I graduated high school and moved to a larger city where I met my now, ex-husband. In retrospect I now understand that he was the morning person chronotype. But, for seventeen years I was railed at because I couldn’t get up early and hold an 8 am to 5 pm job. He constantly berated me and called me lazy even though I could wake up and work 12 pm to 12 am and essentially put in more hours than he did. Because I couldn’t wake when he did he felt I lacked ambition and motivation and wasn’t pulling my weight for our financial well-being. I want to note here that it was me, all on my own, who bought our first house, it was me who paid off his truck early, it was me who worked a full-time job, a side job, and did public speaking twice a week. All of this was simply because I couldn’t wake up early and he could.

I thought perhaps once I left him that I would finally be able to sleep without fear of being berated or criticized. But, after seventeen years a neural circuit had definitely formed. As I write this I’m struggling with the idea of going to bed (I left him 7 years ago and I’m still struggling with fear). I’ve been in therapy and doing neural integration for 5 years now and I’ve healed so much more than I ever thought I could. And now I’m finally to a place where I can focus on my sleep.

As my mind has pondered going to bed I’ve noticed a pattern with myself. I always feel this last minute “push” of sorts to work and not allow myself to get drowsy when it comes time for bed. So tonight I’ve decided to sit with the feeling rather and ask it questions rather than get up and go on a cleaning spree or “crank out” content. This is content I guess, but it’s also a journal entry, a therapeutic release that I hope will help me…go to bed and fall asleep.

As I’ve focused on this feeling of doing trying to push myself when it gets bedtime I’ve been able to hone in on the specific motivation behind the feeling and that is the motivation to feel…resolve. I need to feel I’ve resolved problems before I allow myself to get totally still. I find myself thinking, “there’s at least one more thing I need to do or think through before I call it a day.” Yet I lie in bed and try to solve problems until I at some incoherent point switch off. But, even then I feel like I’m too aware. Like I’m not totally asleep. I’m still somewhat alert.

My goal is to work on this need to be alert. This need to find resolve. Maybe this is what you need to?

All I know is that I’m not alone. I know that 6 hours or less is NOT enough for my body and mind. I am so ready to recondition myself. I am ready for a sleep revolution.

What about you?

Yours in the dreamscape,

Cozett

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In The Silence

In the quietness of the dark

In the quietness of my room

In the quiet of my pain

I transmute my tragedies

Would that God would build me an ark

Would to God I was back in the womb

God, would you please release this cosmic brain

And I will transmute my tragedies from there

Oh, shining light who knows no chasm

My feeble legs are given to spasm

I kick and I roll and cannot sleep

Head throbbing, bladder thumping, I rise twice an hour

Wrapped in a weighted heating pad and hanging on to hope

This is me writing trying to cope

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I Have To Move Forward

I’m lying in bed in my dimly lit room from the light of my Himalayan salt lamp.  It’s dark and quiet in my apartment.  I can hear the low hum of my ceiling fan.  Tamber is curled into my chest and arm.  I feel the soft vibrations of her purr.  I’m alone with my cat. No one can see me.  This is a mental snapshot I’m taking because I want to remember the peace and the visual.  The sounds and the feelings.  I need many more moments like this.

I love the obscurity of this picture.   It represents more than just this moment.  It represents where I am at in my life at this point.

Everything is so obscure right now.  I don’t know what the future holds and I kind of feel in the dark.  I’m about to make some major changes and while I don’t quite know what they will look like….I can say this:

Just like in this dark obscure picture where you can make out the soft form of my sweet cat and just like you can feel the peace and calm energy of this post (hopefully) there is something taking shape.

Something soft and comforting after a lifetime of hardness, and fear, and anxiety and disappointment.  I can’t fully see it.  But, I can feel it.  I sense it taking shape.  Some kinder and gentler time on the horizon (I hope).

I hear the low hum of its build and I feel the soft purr of it coming alive.  I await eagerly but patiently.  Please God.. please let 2023 be my year.  The year that I move forward in every imaginable way in every arena I wish to find myself.  The year that I have my very own song of freedom and never look back.

I promise to go forth with full throated and robust courage.  I promise that once opportunity finds my preparation that I will leap with every fiber of my being even if I don’t know where I will land.  I swear I will.

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Science Is The Twin Flame Of Spirit

For nearly the entirety of my life I have spent my free time, my play time, contemplating life. How big it is. Why people do what they do. Why people think the way they think. Why people interacted with me the way they did. What does the future hold for the universe as we know it. What impact does the unseen have on the seen.

My childhood and adolescence was quite traumatic. Because of this my mamaw fiercely guarded my play and rest time. She knew that through her love and the therapy that only nature could provide I would have a shot at transitioning into a normal adulthood. Whenever domestic violence or some other drama wasn’t actively occurring she made sure that I was able to have that down time to sleep. Now, lots of sleep is nothing unique about the teenage experience. But for me prolonged sleep was imperative for my mind, emotions and body to recover from the stress of crises.

My senior year in high school brought a lot of change naturally. I was launching into legal adulthood, choosing whether or not I wanted to continue educational pursuits or take a break (I took a break), experiencing milestone events like prom, graduation, getting my first car, applying for jobs, finding my father on my 18th birthday, and of course surviving the overdoses of my mother. My senior year was so intense that I would often lie to my friends and tell them I was grounded just so I could stay home on the weekend to think about life.

As a child I would run barefoot from the house down the sloping front yard and to a pond where the cattle would gather to drink. I would first walk around the entire pond in the gray claylike mud looking for tadpoles. Nothing was more satisfying in those days than feeling the slick smooth clay of the pond to squish between my toes and see my feet disappear slowly into the murky waters as the tadpoles would gather around my ankles. I took those moments in slowly. Thinking about the feeling. The sight. What it meant to the tadpoles. Did they really flee in terror so quickly at my splashes only to return and gather unknowingly around the source of the splash?

The pond was spring fed and the spring was terraced with tiny waterfalls that eventually gave way to the opening of the pond. I would walk up into the spring to it’s very head and at its main waterfall (which hit at about the height of my knees) and pretend to be making medicines with some gnarly fallen limb from the woods. I would take my stick and jab through the top of the fall into the mud below. Think mortar and pestle. I would declare to my imaginary audience that I had just found a cure for whatever ailed them. After passing around my medicine I would go lay inside a circle of trees beside the pond and just look up at the sky for hours. Until I was either called home or found I would lay and look and think.

At the time of this writing I am 43 years old. I have devoted my life thus far to the pursuit of understanding why people think the way think and how the unseen impacts the seen. In thinking about how the unseen impacts the seen it is an inescapable thing at this juncture in history to think in terms of God. The concept of God. The understanding of God affects the thought lives of billions of people and for the atheist or agnostic they are also impacted by the beliefs of other’s beliefs about God. In short there is no escaping God. Even if you don’t believe in God you probably are in relationship with others who do and that absolutely impacts your reality, the justice you are able to receive by a legal system that is influenced by the belief in God, relational ethics and dynamics that are influenced by others belief in God. From sexuality to spirituality all these things are shaped by the concept of God whether it is a personally held concept or not.

Since 2019 I have experienced the hardest years of my adult life. I’m feeling disillusioned and disappointed. But, I’m discovering if it weren’t for my disillusionment I would have no chance at “reillusioning” a theory and philosophy that works for me. If not for disappointment I would have had no shot at being reappointed into a higher perspective. One that helps me finally to feel a level of self-assurance that will translate to my own soul how perfectly capable I am of relying on myself and trusting myself to be able to protect myself.

I am well-studied, well-versed in all of the major world religions and spiritualities. Not as an enthusiast. But, a genuine learner. I have been careful to take a scholarly approach to all things unseen, all things faith related. I’ve always intuitively felt that the intangible held the keys for a humanity who can holistically understand the world and people around them. And through that I, we, could form a sure scaffolding for a reliable hope.

As I’ve researched the world’s major organized religions I have observed the following:

  1. Each one subscribes to a main, male deity who feels insulted if other gods are adored or seen as powerful or wise. Monotheism. But, how can monotheism be monotheism if the “the” acknowledges that there are other gods? Thou shalt have no other gods before Me, yes? Then it follows that there are in fact other entities, other gods by the admission of the deity who says it’s wrong for any other deity to receive adoration.
  2. Researching as far back into recorded history as is humanly possible we understand the earth’s oldest spirituality is Hinduism. Hinduism is polytheistic but still features male deities as the ultimate gods to whom everyone is an emanation of. Hinduism, however, does at least teach that these male gods have female counterparts, or female energetic expressions that should be equally worshipped since they understand that masculine energy is incomplete without the feminine.
  3. In mythology which served as a religious context for many in the ancient world we see that our collective, those before us, were immersed in a world of legends held to be truth or fact. The stories of Zeus, Calliope, Cupid, Achilles, Aphrodite, Venus are all so fantastical that those of us who cut our teeth in western thought and the allopathic treatment of the intangible almost lack the capacity to believe in the unconsciousness from which they all sprang to be dealt with by the conscious. Demigods? Absolutely real. But, wait that concept is also echoed by Jesus in the NT of the Bible when He boldly declared to the super religious of his day that….”you all are gods.” Incarnated wisdom. Incarnated goodness. Incarnated creators. This is what we think a good God should be. Wise, good, and tirelessly producing.

In the last several years I’ve found the answers to many of my nagging questions about life in quantum physics and the study of metaphysics. As someone who was raised in a southeast Tennessee Christian context I was acutely aware of the history of Christians balking at science. At one time, not too long ago Christians would kill any other human who thought the world was round. The church regarded this teaching as a point of major doctrine and anyone who opposed that thought was deemed a heretic and punished accordingly. I resolved as an adolescent to listen to science no matter what because to me, to walk in this world as a single-faceted human who only has the ability to disseminate ignorant rigidity concerning the intangible is an utter betrayal of the mystery that sent me to this planet. It would be a cosmic travesty and a coward’s journey for me.

As I sat with my observations I endeavored to honestly explore the implications of them. To the best of my ability I’ve tried to allow the observations all the latitude of God. Because if truth is found in God then God isn’t afraid of the truth. How can I discount one and exalt another simply because the one I choose to exalt tells me to do so? If you have only one dollar to your name and it is in your pocket and you are dehydrated are you going to spend that dollar on water or will you throw it in the trash because someone who seems more hydrated than you tells you to do it and do it with joy because joy is a virtue do you throw it away? In the same way I have chosen my wells and I hope you do too.

As I began to finally have a big picture developing I’ve been able to think through what the implications of this big picture mean to me and how I will allow or disallow them to shape my life and relationships and career and philosophy about life in general.

Every single belief we hold has within it an origination, an emanation, an elation and a declination. Concerning God I no longer have to understand origination because that is truly impossible to know. But, emanation is where I pick up the trail and follow out each belief to see what does this belief entail, how has it shaped the world and people around me, what did or will it look like when it reaches its fullest expression, and what will its declination look like, do I already see its declination, if so what does it look like and what are the implications of its decline. If it hasn’t happened yet but I can see it coming what are the implications of its decline for me personally, and what are the implications of its decline for my neighbor.

In short, everything, every deity, every belief, philosophy will at some point collapse back in to itself. It may resurrect or reassert itself again later or it may fall away completely and out of the reach of the annuls of history for someone like you or me to discover or know that it even existed. Oscillation and vibration is everything. Why? Because literally everything tangible and intangible is comprised of electromagnetic energy. My theology, my cat, the bird on my balcony, the poem in my heart that hasn’t been written down or recited for any ears. All oscillating and vibrating. The higher the vibration the healthier is that thing, person, animal, belief. If there is no vibration. No oscillation. Then there is death. There is no escaping that reality. Your body is made up of approximately one trillion cells. Every second your body is undergoing thousands of chemical processes to keep you alive. Thousands. Every second. Completely unaware your body is carrying out its assignment.

So, where does this position me? I am a Pisces. I’m a poet. I’m a philosopher. I’m an INFJ. I am a manifestor according to human design. I am naturally and now unapologetically a metaphorical and highly spiritual person. The disillusionment and disappointment over the years have once and finally threatened willingness to believe that if a higher power exists then it exists to protect me and cheer me on as I walk through life. I’ve spent so many days crying. So many days wishing I could gather together the most prominent spiritual leaders of every organized religion and major spirituality and screaming at them, “I DON’T UNDERSTAND!!!! I SEE WHAT YOU ARE SAYING. I KNOW WHY YOU BELIEVE THIS. BUT, I DON’T UNDERSTAND WHY THERE SEEMS TO EXIST ONLY A CHASM BETWEEN BELIEF AND REALITY. BECAUSE ALL TOO OFTEN THE BEHAVIOR OF YOUR ADHERENTS DO NOT MATCH THE BELIEF YOU HOLD. PLEASE PROVE TO ME WITH ALL YOUR WISDOM AND KNOWLEDGE AND BEHAVIOR THAT YOUR WAY IS IN FACT THE BEST OR ONLY WAY. BECAUSE AS I STACK YOUR BELEIF AND YOUR ORIGIN STORIES AND YOUR PHILOSOPHIES AND PRACTICES TO OTHERS, WHO SAY SIMILAR THINGS I DON’T SEE HOW IT’S ANY BETTER OR SO UNIQUE THAT IT INDICATES YOUR BELIEF IS THE MOST ORIGINAL AND OLDEST AND THEREFORE THE MOST CORRECT AND SURE.”

I’ve sat with my unbelief. And I’ve realized that if I sever the part of me that is nourished by mystery and metaphor then I will kill myself. I will kill who I am at my core. So, in light of that I have deduced that my healing will not happen if I become atheist in an effort to cope with my hardship and confusion. My most sure path of healing will not include the world of mystery and metaphor but it will be my unique voice. My wilderness cry in a world that has no interest in deep listening. My voice is truly in a desert. It is dry and desolate here and in order to inhabit it you have to have a special skillset that many do not naturally possess nor are they interested in possessing. It’s quiet. The silence alone has born witness to my thought. And, it has been during my contemplation that I have concluded that spirituality cannot and should not be separated from what we consider reality. The gods have always lived among us. They have all at some point or another lived in us in the form of mysteries. Some people shake their fists at mystery because to them mystery is misery. It is a psychological plague. It removes their control and grip on their own understanding of life and as we have seen with the crusades this causes violence because it activates the bruteness and lower vibrational emotions such as anger, hate, superiority, elitism, etc.

As I meditated earlier today I decided, “I will no longer try to separate myth and mystery from science. When I read stories about how demigods came into existence, or how monks and nuns and mystics have levitated during prolonged periods of meditations, or how a scientist used the power of his mind to heal his own broken bones….I understand that the truth lies in the mystery.” Fact doesn’t have to be separated from fiction. Remember the chasm I mentioned? That chasm is space. Space between the intangible and tangible. Space between belief and practiced reality. Space. Did you know that an atom is 99.999999999% empty space? And, if you removed the empty space from the atoms of all people, the entire human race could fit in the volume of a sugar cube? Empty space where there is no obligation to believe a certain doctrine or dogma, empty space where there is no demand for decision, empty space that is completely and infinitely neutral, empty space like this should be inherent and integrated into belief system in the world whether atheistic, polytheistic, or monotheistic.

I came away from my meditation with this specific thought in my mind, “the mysterium, the mythology, theology cannot and never will be reduced down to simple calculation that is explained away by science. Science is the twin flame of spirit.” Little did I know only an hour or so later as I continued my study about physics that I would come across a quote by Nassim Haramein, a unified physics researcher and scientist. He said, “Physics without philosophy is lost in mathematics. You have to have a fundamental concept to write the math that works. And that is called thought, philosophy.”

Today my footing is more sure not because of hard and fast and provable science but because I am intrinsically rooted in mystery. I am found in metaphor. And I await science to discover me.

Yours in thought,

Cozett

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Silent Retreat Please

As I’m lying here with heavy eyes I find myself longing to escape to some prolonged silent retreat. It’s a soul’s longing. Deep. Not quite guttural but definitely gritty.

At this time I feel like I want to take a solid 90 days in silence. No TV, phone, etc. Just me and the void. I feel like unless I can get into this kind of setting I’m always going to feel void on the inside. Like I have to create a larger more spacious void outside of the smaller void that is within me. It seems a larger and exterior void would be able to absorb the void within me…and essentially rid me of it that I might be truly whole for the first time in my life.

I am so much stronger than I give myself credit for. But, it’s because I’ve been in either 1 of 2 states nearly the entirety of my life thus far. 1. Panic 2. Numbness. Fluctuating between the two. The strain to be in such constant states while fighting with everything you have on the inside to stop feeling the panic and then admonishing myself for being numb. Ugh. Like my soul was acidic.

I just feel this need to detach and reflect and just be quiet. For a very long time.

Love,

Cozett

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