Where Is Your Soul Mate?

What if you were a Romeo waiting for your Juliet, a Guinevere waiting for your Lancelot, to show up in this life?

What if a past life ended tragically, in a death perhaps, untimely separation or unfortunate distance, leaving emotions and experiences unfinished or unexpressed.

How tragic.

What if we’ve returned to complete what was started last time with an unhappy parting?

What if, what if?

Are we going to blow it by settling for someone we’ve asked to be our partner too soon?

What if?

How do we know?

We don’t, except that we can go with the flow, by trusting that our interests are being taken care of.

Not so if we’re trying to force things.

What if there is a priority of the thoughts and influences in our lives depending the intensity and the degree to which each is important.

I’ve always thought that the recent talk of the Law of Attraction is only relevant as far as other influences which are in our mental make-up at the time are more important.

For example, are there aspects of our Destiny or our Karma that might override any forcing we set up as our expectation of the Law of Attraction.

And choices.

We’re free to make choices all the time.

That’s free will.

But how do we know whether our choices are, in the long run, in our best interests?

How do we know without a crystal ball?

Seeing into the future.

Are our chances of winning the lottery diminished by aspects to the contrary in our Karma or our Destiny or simply in our need to win the lottery over other considerations.

Are we always simply in the queue?

It’s a mix, like a cake.

Priorities are surely determined more by their importance on a spiritual level than our own sense of importance.

Much of which we may not understand.

It’s not either/or.

Trust.

In the Tao it’s known as “wu wei”, not forcing things.

For the past 30 years I’ve lived by not forcing things.

I had no choice.

Read about it in my book ‘Man Steps Off Planet’ HERE.

Take care.

Neil Walter Smith

Further reading: ‘Tao: The Watercourse Way’ by Alan Watts.

Illustration by ‘facundodiaz’ at Deviantart.com.

Why Not Forcing Things Works.

How this paper boat behaves is a good example of the principle of ‘not forcing things’ in our everyday lives.

If we know the direction of the current then we can have a pretty good idea where the paper boat will end up.

Without any force.

Could it be why some people are successful in life?

The Universe shows us all the time.

Going with the flow, rolling with the punches, cutting with the grain, swimming with the tide, sailing with the wind.

The Japanese marshal arts of Judo and Aikido are based on this principle.

It’s demonstrated in the action of water which does not force things but finds its way through and around every obstacle.

Same with life and we often miss it.

It’s a Taoist idea expressed in the term ‘wu wei’ meaning ‘not forcing things’.

Our society tends to take an opposite view, to force things to go our way.

And we can always be encouraged in our world to use money to get what we want.

That’s okay if its not forcing things.

I’m suggesting that it’s in our own interests to go with the flow, not to force things.

What if we have other choices.

What if we’re trying to control to our benefit something that is not in the end in our best interests.

That’s where ‘not forcing things’ can better work in our favour.

Because often we simply don’t really know what is in our best interests.

Often it’s best to leave it to our Destiny, our Karma, the Universe.

Life itself can be full of examples if only we’d give it a chance.

Sometimes we can be too busy trying to control our lives when we shouldn’t be trying to force things.

Better, maybe, to go with the flow.

For the past 30 years I’ve lived by not forcing things.

I had no choice.

I was bankrupt.

I chose to go with the flow to survive.

I was not prepared to be a victim.

And it worked.

Right now I’m writing my seventh book based on how I view my experiences.

Read more in my book ‘Man Steps Off Planet’.

It’s about how not forcing things led to incredible adventures and a life far beyond one of loss and poverty.

That would be missing the point.

We might call it serendipity.

Maybe it will change your life like it changed mine.

I was once an advertising copywriter and my book was a product of survival after losing everything.

Buy the book and improve your life like I did.

Best wishes.

Neil

>Doctor and wife banished from Regency England for knowing too much book. Click here.

>Visit my author page here.

>Further reading: ‘Tao: The Watercourse Way’ by Alan Watts.

Stop Forcing Things

Who was it that said, “Show me someone who has made mistakes and I’ll show you a person who’s lived.”

Something like that.

And that’s me.

And that’s what I want to talk about.

Living and learning.

This is not only a school, it’s a life.

Once it’s gone then it’s too late.

So please, live and learn before it’s too late.

Stop forcing things.

People say, what about “squeaking hinges”?

What about making noise to get heard?

Forcing things.

And I reply, “choose without forcing it”.

Could that be why the long-held spiritual notion of a rejection of wealth, something I lost when I went bankrupt, bobs up in religious ideas over history.

Because with money we force things.

Without it we can’t.

And therein lies a great spiritual Truth.

Without the benefit of wealth we are unable to force life to go the way we would like.

Then we’re open to our Destiny to take us where we might want to go.

Going with the flow rather than with our will.

Maybe we need to save the use of our will for other purposes.

Like healing of ourselves, and others.

You might be asking, but what about this, what about that, for example, what about the Law of Attraction?

There are many influences contributing to our choices, our actions, our lives.

There might be our Destiny, our Karma, the Law of Attraction, the intensity of our thoughts, past life memory, the influence of the issues in our lives, our habits, even our television watching habits and the emotional involvement in what we watch.

What if we were a Romeo waiting for our Juliet, a Guinevere waiting for our Lancelot, to turn up in this life?

Are we going to blow it by settling for someone we’ve forced to be our partner too soon?

What if?

There is surely a priority of the thoughts and influences in our lives depending the intensity and the degree to which each is important.

I’ve always thought that the recent talk of the Law of Attraction is only relevant so far as other influences which are in our mental make-up at the time are more important.

For example, are there aspects of our Destiny or our Karma that might override any forcing we set up as our expectation of the Law of Attraction.

And choices.

We’re free to make choices all the time.

That’s free will.

Are our chances of winning the lottery diminished by aspects to the contrary in our Karma or our Destiny or simply in our need to win the lottery over other considerations.

Are we always simply in the queue?

It’s a mix, like a cake.

Priorities are determined more by their importance on a spiritual level than our own sense of importance.

Much of which we may not understand.

It’s not either/or.

In the Tao it’s known as “wu wei”, not forcing things.

For the past 30 years I’ve lived by not forcing things.

I had no choice.

I was bankrupt.

I chose to go with the flow.

I was not prepared to be a victim.

And it worked.

Read more in my book ‘Man Steps Off Planet’.

It’s about how not forcing things led to incredible adventures and a life far beyond one of loss and poverty.

That would be missing the point.

Maybe it will change your life like it changed mine.

I was once an advertising copywriter and my book was a product of survival after losing everything.

Buy the book and improve your life like I did.

Best wishes.

Neil

Visit my author page here.

Further reading: ‘Tao: The Watercourse Way’ by Alan Watts.

My 10 Point Plan To Survive From 0.

Are you caught in a struggle to survive? Is your back to the wall? Would you like to know about my 10 Point Plan that worked for me? I’ve don’t it and I want to show you how to survive too with no money and no hope to ever get above it all.

You’re going to have to impose strict measures and stick to them.

But if it works, hey, it’s worth it in the end.

It needs self discipline but only as long as it takes to get back on top.

Isn’t that what you want?

Erica Jong wrote in her book ‘Fear of Fifty’, “Only at the bottom can you decide when to live or die.”

You’re going to decide to “live”, right?

I’ve outlined how I did it in my true romantic mystery adventure ‘Back to the Wall’. It’s an essential part of my story.

Okay, then this is how you can do it.

1. Let go. Take a step back and let’s see everything, your whole life, in a new light. There’s a spiritual principle of “letting go” in the Tao (an ancient Chinese spiritual philosophy) which was my number one secret and which had almost magical consequences.

2. Self discipline. One of the first things I did, and the first thing you should do, is to start a daily policy of “nothing over $2” (my figure was $2, you choose your own). This includes supermarket items. In other words, you need to stop spending money except for essentials.

3. Spending rule. This is one of those times we need to be prepared to make sacrifices we wouldn’t normally even think about. I’m talking about the small things we take for granted. I’ve outlined them in my book: no takeaways, no eating out, no daily papers, no impulse purchases, no new clothes or accessories, no movie visits. I even sold my car so, if you can manage it, then do it. And start paying off your credit card(s) as soon as you can.

4. Convert to cash. I was amazed at how much stuff I could convert to cash. Hold a garage sale. Sell books to a used bookshop. What can you sell on eBay? What can be recycled?

5. What’s your passion? The line from the song in the movie ‘Flash Dance’ says it all: “Take your passion, make it happen”. Believe that it’s waiting there for you to make the first move. So make the move, then see what happens. If a door opens, walk through it, if it doesn’t open, make another move or try another passion.

6. Go with the flow. It’s another Taoist principle and it’s how I moved on in my new life. Keep in mind that many famous people had to wait for their first lives to fail, then start a second (successful) life. When we go with the flow and stop forcing things, I’m convinced we are met by an energy, if you like, an invisible magic carpet that carries us on in a way we can only trust and go with it.

7. What you think is what you get. When we become emotionally involved in anything, be it our own problems or the world’s negativity, our thoughts create more of the same. When we pay attention to what we are thinking then we are going to change our own reality.

8. Aim to live off the grid. This might take a while, even cost money, but if you start working to it now like growing your own food, you can expand your plan a bit at a time as you save.

9. Sell the home, move to the country and rent cheap.

10. Sell the car. It’s a major financial burden.

My book tells how I did it, in minute detail, starting from nothing, bankrupt, homeless, penniless, jobless and friendless. Adjust to suit your own circumstances.

I know this all seems a little harsh but it’s the only way to escape struggle street.

Now read the book and see how it worked for me.

Copy and paste into your own life.

Best wishes,

Neil
Author Page

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Crash Landing

I arrived at the Blue Lake like a meteorite crashing to earth. I needed a place to crash. At the time I knew nothing of the significance of the lake, all I knew was that I had landed. Thank god.
I’d been promised a Place in the Sun to settle down and write the book.
What book?
Well, the book about my adventures up until that moment. But what were they talking about, a Place in the Sun? That could mean anything.
First there had been my one-on-one with a channel in New Jersey. The word was that Michael who I was speaking with was being channelled through numerous mediums across the United States at the time. His words had been gathered, cross-checked for consistency and published by one of the channels named Jose Stevens PhD. The books were published as ‘Tao to Earth’ and ‘Earth to Tao’. I had been given free copies of both, they’re now available on Amazon for over $A100 each. I’d never heard of his idea that we are all born with a ‘Chief Negative Feature’, a negative personality trait we need to overcome. I know mine and he was dead right (but no way am I giving it away). It could explain a lot about some people’s negative behaviour because they can’t help it. Michael told me many other personal things. He told me that I had placed myself in a kind of chute or funnel in order to meet many people and have experiences I would not otherwise have had. And I was “going for it, full blast”.
Which, in a few words, explained everything.
Was this an example of my higher self or soul taking a hand in my daily affairs?
So how did I know that this small furnished timber flat built on the side of a hill at Ocean Grove with views to the Barwon Heads was my Place in the Sun? I mean, that could be anywhere, why Ocean Grove and why a stones throw from my tranquil Blue Lake.
Having gone for it “full blast” as predicted, tearing myself away from the cute New Jersey school teacher when my 6 month visa was up, I was on a plane to meet a friend in England to search for places where my ancestors lived. My New Jersey friend had given me $US20 to cover the bus fare to Cheltenham.
Was that enough? I needed 16 pounds and I gave a sigh of relief when got small change in return. Whew. Just enough otherwise I would have been walking all the way to Cheltenham. I had to lie to customs to get into the country. On the plane my nerves were so bad that in trying to impress the attractive woman next to me I spilled my complimentary rum and coke all over me.
I arrived back in Hepburn Springs where I had been living in a friend’s caravan for 5 years before leaving for the United States 6 months earlier.
I was in for a shock.
The caravan had been towed away by my friend’s son and I had nowhere to live.
That weekend I went to the weekly trash and treasure market at the Daylesford restored railway station. It was my lucky day. There were psychic ladies offering “Readings 10 minutes for $10” for charity.
I picked Margaret who sat me down and gave me a reading for over an hour for my $10. She told me about the book I was going to write at my Place in the Sun. Over and over I asked her, how will I find my Place in the Sun? Where is it? Over and over she replied, ask the estate agent. Well of course, I’d ask an estate agent. I needed for more information. Ask the estate agent. Which estate agent? She couldn’t say.
I returned to where I was staying knowing I needed to leave soon and wondering, asking, where is my Place in the Sun? I needed to know the answer fast because, once again, I was homeless and broke. I was desperate.
As I went to sleep that night I was thinking, over and over, where is my Place in the Sun? I fell asleep with that thought on my mind. All night there was a voice in my head saying to me, remember your dream to live in Ocean Grove? I woke up knowing it was in Ocean Grove with the words “what ever happened to your dream to live in Ocean Grove”.
I knew exactly where to go. Next morning I was on the bus out of Daylesford to the train to Melbourne to my daughter’s home in Mentone. I was on my way to my Place in the Sun and nothing could stop me.
Next morning I got myself to Ocean Grove. One by one I called at every estate agent in town. Nothing. The sun was getting low as I came to the last agent who took me to the edge of town. This was my last chance. I was really out on a limb here.
As we drove along Driftwood Street and pulled up at the group of 3 flats on the side of the hill, I knew then that I was there. I moved in within the week. And that message from Margaret about keeping on asking estate agents, well, it was the last rental from the last agent in town that showed me what I was looking for. I was profoundly moved by the whole experience.
My Blue Lake was yet to be discovered, to complete my elusive but perfect place to relax, a place of peace to shrug off that “blast” I was going for, to find myself again and to live my lifelong dream, the author.
I lived there for the next 11 years and took that long to write ‘Back to the Wall: A Spiritual Adventure’. I worked through 4 different computers with 3 different operating systems all given to me by new friends because they (the computers not the friends) were about to die.
Everything was falling into place and I was a new man. Exhausted. A little disoriented. Missing my daughters with whom I had just been reunited after 10 years apart. But incredibly happy. It was a new life and I set to work straight away to write the book.
These are some of the thoughts that were going through my mind at the lake.
Pretty much every day I’d almost slide down the embankment beside my flat, walk across the Lake Road Reserve, across the road and enter the lake territory through an entrance of large old trees which made it almost invisible from the road.
There was an old willow tree with branches weeping into the lake and around the single park bench conveniently placed by the water’s edge. I’d sit there for hours, lost in the calm surface of the water, my mind still reeling from the whirlwind I had just lived through.
Those first days were spent thinking of driving along Fifth Avenue the night before I left the USA and, the next day, standing in a quiet country town with all of that in the past. There was still the memory of my 3 weeks in Cheltenham trying to find the remnants of ancestors who lived 200 years ago in Regency England and of the ancient university town of Oxford. I found nothing, everything was gone except for the churches where they were baptised, married and buried (even the graves have been built over).
Past and present.
Such contrasts.
The water was like a crystal ball showing me my frantic past as well as my future as the writer of this very therapeutic personal story. All of my boyhood dreams were coming true (and then some).
The past was all go and struggle.
The future was finding myself again.
This was a major turning point in my life marking the past clearly away from the future.
It happened at the lake.
It’s as if I had arrived.
Spilling rum and coke, flying around the world, going bankrupt, 5 years in a caravan, my ill fated freelance business, the insane ad world and the corporate madness, my 2 marriages and the dramas that accompanied them. Always fighting for my life, it seemed.
Then, 11 years later, came the call.
“Dad, I’m pregnant.”
It was over and the next adventure had begun.