What If?
In a recent interview, I found myself talking about the idea that if we give a thing our attention then it becomes real. In so many words, I was saying that we create our own reality through mental focus. You can, in fact, more or less prove this to yourself any time that you wish. Simply, think of something – something as bizarre as you wish – and give it your focus. For example, decide that today you will see a mouse dance. Keep on giving this thought your focus and attention throughout the day – keep looking for that dancing mouse. I guarantee that you will at some point during the day see a dancing mouse even if it is just a Disney cartoon on TV. If you experiment
Read More »In Search of A Barber
I must confess that I have never much liked having my hair cut. I just think that firstly, its a real waste of valuable time and secondly, I hate people fiddling with my ears. Really, fiddle with my ears and I get quite ratty. However, today I had to go and try to have fixed the mess the last cutter made two weeks ago. You see, here in Brno, getting a decent haircut is like asking for a miracle. In fact, why beat around the bush (!), it is a miracle. Prague was different. There you could find a decent haircut no problem and come out looking very dapper. I even found a barbers shop that did a wet shave, provided a glass of whiskey and allowed you to smoke
Read More »Rewriting History
They say that the winner gets to write history and of course, there is truth in that. History is always a subjective assessment and there are always several points of view just as when several people observe an event and yet recollect it differently. Another aspect of history is that we often make the mistake of judging by today’s standards forgetting that the historical culture might possibly be not just different but totally alien to us in our time. None the less, history is important we just need to remember that it is imperfect. In the past, history came mainly from school, books and TV. The message was fairly consistent and led us to believe in a certain take on history. These days, with internet and social media, we are
Read More »A Journey to the End of the world
I remember one day deciding with a friend that we would explore the very edge of our world. We jumped on our bicycles and set off resolutely in that general direction. After about 15-minutes, we had already entered an entirely new world about which we knew only rumor. Here, there were supposed to be roaming gangs that if they caught you, would carry you off to their secret lairs in the ‘blackgang’. We felt, well, very brave to have gone so far and to be in someone else’s territory. Parking our bikes by the side of the street, we entered some gardens discovering a veritable paradise of willow trees and grass surrounding a small private pond. It was magical and it was someone else’s secret garden as we had hauled
Read More »The Meaning of Christmas – A short Story
The scene was a familiar one. The street was filled with people hustling and bustling and jostling with each other from time to time. Their breaths hung in the freezing air like little trails of smoke. The street was lit in the darkness of the winter’s late afternoon by the colored christmas lights hanging from each lamp and in the shop windows. With just a few days left until the holiday, these were the last minuters – those who were ever increasingly desperate to grab their last few bargains and presents. Phillip watched in silence. The scene had a surreal quality about it. The anxious faces of people who in some instances, could ill afford the presents and gifts they were trying to purchase. He watched with increasing understanding of
Read More »An Old Man in Scotland
Here is another true and strange tale of the paranormal. I will post a new strange true story each day so don’t miss them.This will be last until next Wednesday as its a long weekend public holiday here…. We were touring the west coast of Scotland for a day or two. We had set out from Glasgow that morning and fully intended to go back there that night but the day had been fun with lots to see and do and so by the time we entered Inverary it was already quite late. In fact, we had already visited Inverary jail that morning before motoring a bit further up the coastline so the idea of staying the night there seemed a good one and would give us more time to
Read More »Just A Game?
Another short story taken from my book – My Haunted Life. If there is one game that most certainly is not a game it is the Ouija board and I have avoided that board like the plague most of my life. However, one night, in my late teens, my friend and I went to visit an ex-teacher of his. Well actually, we went on the pretext of visiting her but actually, it was her daughter we really went to see but that really is as they say another story. It was quite late by the time we arrived. We had already been for a beer at the pub and then had the idea to visit as we drove home. Their house was a huge home in a well to do
Read More »The Devil Rode Out
When I was a teenager, I was experiencing all kinds of strange things that really scared the hell out of me. I have documented a lot of that in my book – Inner Journeys: Explorations of the Soul including the poltergeist-type activity and the visitations by some ghostly presence. It’s all in that book! However, I remained really interested in magic and the so called ‘occult’ at the time devouring many books on the subject. In the midst of the activity and the interest, I watched a film on TV one christmas that both enflamed my interest but also scared me very deeply. Looking back on the movie now the effects are pretty poor by comparison to modern movies but back then – wow! More important though was that in
Read More »CBA
Periodically I seem to fall into some sort of depression. Actually, I am not sure if it is depression or something else. I become lethargic and I simply lose interest in everything. I mean, things seem like a good idea but then I simply cannot be bothered to do it. I sit wasting days on end essentially doing nothing at all except aimless web surfing or TV watching. I don’t want to go out or do anything and nothing seems to make me feel complete. Is that depression? Usually, it lasts a few days and then I am fine again – the usual busy old me. Anyway, as you may have guessed. I am currently in this mood or frame of mind. I can’t be bothered to do anything at
Read More »Reality Really is Weird
I am reading a book about the nature of reality. It has an interesting way of working its theme as it has you conduct experiments. This last two days, I was doing one of the experiments where you simply look everywhere and expect to see something. In my instance, I decided on a pink car. Don’t ask me why. It just seemed like something fairly rare…. I actually finished reading the instructions on my Kindle riding a bus to pick up my car from service on Friday. I decided, pink car and looked up. As my eyes refocused on the view through the back window of the bus I noticed another bus. It was white but…. it had huge pink stripes on it. I thought to myself “OK, thats not
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