In this world, overflowing with lies...
Posted: Wed Feb 16, 2011 12:52 pm
Even the most open-minded, yet diligent, and critical truth seeker can and will be deceived at least occasionally.
With that said, I would like to introduce myself.
I am a child of God, as we all are, in my late 30's and I have used the online moniker Skekzyz (pronounced Skek' zees) for more than a decade now. I live in Montana, am single and childless. I have no problem with being "alone," and as near as I can tell have never experienced "loneliness." I prefer heavy metal music to most other types. I have rarely wanted to follow others or do as they do or act as they act to the point of actually abhorring being a part of the perceived majority or "in" crowd. I have never had an overwhelming drive to acquire money, although I did have the ideation of wanting to "make a million dollars by the time I was 30" while I was still in high school. I consider myself a jack of some trades, master of none, and would like to have/find the opportunity to go back to school, but pushing 40, it does not seem all that likely. I am, however, relatively well educated, and continue to try to learn all that I can on subjects and generalities that interest me, but find that I, more often than not, struggle with the limitations that this mortal form imparts. I do know that seeking truth and helping others are very high on my priority list, these days.
A brief synopsis of how I came to be here today:
I was raised catholic, my mother insisted that we go to church every Sunday, and I attended 1st grade at the school that was associated with that church, my teacher was a nun. My father could not afford to pay the tuition for another year, so I went back to public school for 2nd grade, but we still went to church every sunday. Until, at some point when I was about 10 years old, the church told my parents that my younger brother and I would not be allowed to progress beyond holy communion in whatever ritual came next in the catholic church if they could not tithe 10% or whatever it was. At this point we basically stopped going except for easter and christmas, it really didn't bother me, in fact I was pretty happy about it, I didn't like church and hated the smell of the incense. I attribute my loathing for most perfumes and artificial smells to that and the Camay soap my mother would "wash my mouth out" with when I would cuss, which I learned from my father mostly. She also tried Tobasco sauce, I love hot food, go figure...
After attending public school for 6 years, I had been influenced by a varied assortment of secular people and activities. Along with the influence of my father keeping hard alcohol in the house, and my mother using it in Hot Lemon Toddies for my cough when I was sick, to my grandfather letting me have sips of his beer when he would visit, and the fact that my mother smoked, I was introduced to inebriating chemicals very early in life.
During 7th grade, I read George Orwell's "1984" (the year was 1984) and I was into Van Halen and Motley Crue and I was smoking cigarettes daily, at school, during lunch hour, but because of the "rich kids" at that school, when the year was over, it was decided that I should return to the catholic school that I attended as a 1st grader, in order to avoid fights, and bullying that was almost as frequent as my daily smoking. It is my perception that all throughout my life, whenever I found myself with groups of "peers", be it school or work or jail, where it was basically not my choice to be there, and there existed other immature males in the group, that I was usually the target of ridicule and the one to single out to be "picked on." I still do not fully understand why even to this day that, put in that type of situation with other males, I tend to be the recipient of abuse from the more immature of the lot. Don't get me wrong, I have some ideas why, I just don't fully understand it.
8th grade was marked with less abuse in that environment, but it was not absent. Tobacco was of course totally forbidden there and I stopped smoking during school with a few exceptions, and was even "busted" with "roll your owns" at one point. At least the punishment for that was to transcribe a part of the "Holy Bible" instead of a previous similar repetative writing punishment that I recieved from a teacher in public school for allegedly calling one of the girls in class the "C" word, which at the time I didn't even know, I had to ask my dad what it meant, and of course he told me. Nearing the time of graduation, I had the longest hair of any boy in my class and the principal (looking back on it, she would have fit the look of a "butch" woman at least to some extent) wanted me to cut my hair for the graduation ceremony. My mom tried to defend me with, "but Jesus had long hair." To no avail. This was my first glaring encounter with outright hypocrisy.
At some point during the summer between that graduation and high school, I tried marijuana, having basically rejected alcohol, disliking the taste and the vomiting that a shot of stolen vodka had induced, mostly from the taste. Hideous stuff that vodka, I must say. The marijuana I smoked tasted pretty bad too, but I also didn't feel anything from it. Looking back on this, it was probably just leaf and the kids that I smoked it with didn't have that much at the time. But for some reason, I wanted to try it again. I'm not sure exactly when "Just say, NO!" became a complete and total joke to me, but if anything it created a forbidden fruit syndrome. I understood that it was a plant and that it was supposed to get you "high." But I also "understood" that other forbidden drugs where man-made chemicals and really were more dangerous for you. During freshman year, I smoked it whenever anyone had it, I loved the way it made me feel, nothing like the numb lips and sick stomach of alcohol. But I had been told that marijuana was also supposed to make you hallucinate, well to me that meant see things that were not there. This, marijuana, did not do, not for me. So I started asking around, and people told me "mushrooms" (but they had to be the right kind) and "acid" or LSD. This I searched in vain for, but soon after getting my drivers license, I met a friend who wanted to drink beer and after conceding that I could not find mushrooms or acid in this town, and had struck out even on the weed front that day, that we would have his, "old enough," friend and neighbor buy us beer with my allowance/gas/lunch money that I never spent on lunch. And that is when the demon of alcohol really did take ahold of me. Then one day, this friend who had basically become our beer dealer, said he had mushrooms. I went frickin' nuts, I didnt have but the 3 dollars for the 12-pack that we were planning on getting. (yes cheep beer was $3 for 12 cans then can you believe that?) I begged him to front it to me, I had searched and searched for something that would do to my vision what pot had done for my mind. I got so insistant that he eventually took me into the room he had them in in his trailer and made me shut my eyes and open my mouth, well I was a little hesitant but I figured, what the hell, I want to try this and there's a pretty good chance he will just pop one into my mouth and we could go get the beer. He shoved a handful of them into my mouth and I started chewing after the surpise wore off, then I was ready to go get the beer, they both said, "No, no way get yer ass back home, you have about 15 minutes before you start trippin' balls, man." Well I had rented "To Kill a Mockingbird" so I could do a book report on it and figured that would be something to do and stay away from my parents so they wouldn't notice. I had to watch the movie again to get the book report done but I still hadn't seen that much in the way of "visions" it was mostly colors and wavyness and such. And it certainly wasn't something that I wanted to go and do the next day or the next weekend like I did with beer and weed. But I still wanted to see things, and I had heard that LSD was the real vision maker, little dancing cartoons and such, and it was supposed to "open your mind." Well I eventually found acid and I liked it but it lasted too long and the visions were a little better than the mushrooms but basically the same "trip" and only once did I ever come close to a bad one on it but was still cognizant enough to realize that it was just the drug. Well, and that walking outside in the dark without a flashlight was bound to make me a little paranoid about what might "get me."
So in the interest of making this long story a little shorter I'll jump ahead to a period in my life that was continuingly clouded in alcohol use and abuse, and of course the relatively benign use of cannabis. Almost every time I found myself in trouble with the law was a direct result of the alcohol, but even though I saw that, and did quit for almost two years, I continued to drink, even after doing the "the thing I could never do," I continued to drink. Even today I am not 100% dry. But after writing this, I hope that I can keep my mind on the hate that I have for demon alcohol when the thought of wanting a beer enters my mind. But good things have come from my use of this drug, demon alcohol, the strife that it has caused in my life has brought me time and time again to searching for God, not religion, which I abandoned long ago if I ever even sought it. So I started reading the bible, to center myself and to try to attain any form of peace, with myself and with the world around me. But having abandoned religion and it's pointless rituals, I read with a very skeptical mind, gleening only what really rung true to me in it's pages. What I found was most of the bible was as much hog wash as "Just say, NO!" Except for a few words attributed to Jesus, the bible was basically useless to me. I knew there had to be more, but I was content for the time being to focus on the main points that He tried to teach. Love God. Love others. Then shortly after being under the thumb of the state for doing "the thing I could never do," a friend of my mom's who knew that her and I were spiritual, gave us The Urantia Book. So having gotten all that I could from the so called "inerrant word of God," I started reading. I have never read most of the structural parts I and II, mostly because I find them very hard to understand and basically
pointless in my current situation. The History of Urantia is interesting, but again basically pointless, or so I thought when I started reading it. I just now picked it up and find that I have a book mark at Paper 77 The Midway Creatures, hmmm... But part IV The Life and Teachings of Jesus is what really caught my attention. Previous to finding The Urantia Book I had obtained and read a book Titled "God Calling" and now upon finding this information about the 11:11 time promts, makes me wonder if that is some of the first modern day communications from Micheal, as it fits almost exactly in line with what I find here. I have not as of yet hunted that book down and compared anything, but will probably find the time to look into it, someday. So here I am, vaguely remembering the start of the fiction story I once began to write with no goal or structure in mind and only got so far as to mention the street light going out as the main character passed beneath it on the side walk in Phoenix, Arizona, becuase it happened to me so often then, I expect, that I'll see that happen again some time soon and now I'll know what to do...
Skekzyz
With that said, I would like to introduce myself.
I am a child of God, as we all are, in my late 30's and I have used the online moniker Skekzyz (pronounced Skek' zees) for more than a decade now. I live in Montana, am single and childless. I have no problem with being "alone," and as near as I can tell have never experienced "loneliness." I prefer heavy metal music to most other types. I have rarely wanted to follow others or do as they do or act as they act to the point of actually abhorring being a part of the perceived majority or "in" crowd. I have never had an overwhelming drive to acquire money, although I did have the ideation of wanting to "make a million dollars by the time I was 30" while I was still in high school. I consider myself a jack of some trades, master of none, and would like to have/find the opportunity to go back to school, but pushing 40, it does not seem all that likely. I am, however, relatively well educated, and continue to try to learn all that I can on subjects and generalities that interest me, but find that I, more often than not, struggle with the limitations that this mortal form imparts. I do know that seeking truth and helping others are very high on my priority list, these days.
A brief synopsis of how I came to be here today:
I was raised catholic, my mother insisted that we go to church every Sunday, and I attended 1st grade at the school that was associated with that church, my teacher was a nun. My father could not afford to pay the tuition for another year, so I went back to public school for 2nd grade, but we still went to church every sunday. Until, at some point when I was about 10 years old, the church told my parents that my younger brother and I would not be allowed to progress beyond holy communion in whatever ritual came next in the catholic church if they could not tithe 10% or whatever it was. At this point we basically stopped going except for easter and christmas, it really didn't bother me, in fact I was pretty happy about it, I didn't like church and hated the smell of the incense. I attribute my loathing for most perfumes and artificial smells to that and the Camay soap my mother would "wash my mouth out" with when I would cuss, which I learned from my father mostly. She also tried Tobasco sauce, I love hot food, go figure...
After attending public school for 6 years, I had been influenced by a varied assortment of secular people and activities. Along with the influence of my father keeping hard alcohol in the house, and my mother using it in Hot Lemon Toddies for my cough when I was sick, to my grandfather letting me have sips of his beer when he would visit, and the fact that my mother smoked, I was introduced to inebriating chemicals very early in life.
During 7th grade, I read George Orwell's "1984" (the year was 1984) and I was into Van Halen and Motley Crue and I was smoking cigarettes daily, at school, during lunch hour, but because of the "rich kids" at that school, when the year was over, it was decided that I should return to the catholic school that I attended as a 1st grader, in order to avoid fights, and bullying that was almost as frequent as my daily smoking. It is my perception that all throughout my life, whenever I found myself with groups of "peers", be it school or work or jail, where it was basically not my choice to be there, and there existed other immature males in the group, that I was usually the target of ridicule and the one to single out to be "picked on." I still do not fully understand why even to this day that, put in that type of situation with other males, I tend to be the recipient of abuse from the more immature of the lot. Don't get me wrong, I have some ideas why, I just don't fully understand it.
8th grade was marked with less abuse in that environment, but it was not absent. Tobacco was of course totally forbidden there and I stopped smoking during school with a few exceptions, and was even "busted" with "roll your owns" at one point. At least the punishment for that was to transcribe a part of the "Holy Bible" instead of a previous similar repetative writing punishment that I recieved from a teacher in public school for allegedly calling one of the girls in class the "C" word, which at the time I didn't even know, I had to ask my dad what it meant, and of course he told me. Nearing the time of graduation, I had the longest hair of any boy in my class and the principal (looking back on it, she would have fit the look of a "butch" woman at least to some extent) wanted me to cut my hair for the graduation ceremony. My mom tried to defend me with, "but Jesus had long hair." To no avail. This was my first glaring encounter with outright hypocrisy.
At some point during the summer between that graduation and high school, I tried marijuana, having basically rejected alcohol, disliking the taste and the vomiting that a shot of stolen vodka had induced, mostly from the taste. Hideous stuff that vodka, I must say. The marijuana I smoked tasted pretty bad too, but I also didn't feel anything from it. Looking back on this, it was probably just leaf and the kids that I smoked it with didn't have that much at the time. But for some reason, I wanted to try it again. I'm not sure exactly when "Just say, NO!" became a complete and total joke to me, but if anything it created a forbidden fruit syndrome. I understood that it was a plant and that it was supposed to get you "high." But I also "understood" that other forbidden drugs where man-made chemicals and really were more dangerous for you. During freshman year, I smoked it whenever anyone had it, I loved the way it made me feel, nothing like the numb lips and sick stomach of alcohol. But I had been told that marijuana was also supposed to make you hallucinate, well to me that meant see things that were not there. This, marijuana, did not do, not for me. So I started asking around, and people told me "mushrooms" (but they had to be the right kind) and "acid" or LSD. This I searched in vain for, but soon after getting my drivers license, I met a friend who wanted to drink beer and after conceding that I could not find mushrooms or acid in this town, and had struck out even on the weed front that day, that we would have his, "old enough," friend and neighbor buy us beer with my allowance/gas/lunch money that I never spent on lunch. And that is when the demon of alcohol really did take ahold of me. Then one day, this friend who had basically become our beer dealer, said he had mushrooms. I went frickin' nuts, I didnt have but the 3 dollars for the 12-pack that we were planning on getting. (yes cheep beer was $3 for 12 cans then can you believe that?) I begged him to front it to me, I had searched and searched for something that would do to my vision what pot had done for my mind. I got so insistant that he eventually took me into the room he had them in in his trailer and made me shut my eyes and open my mouth, well I was a little hesitant but I figured, what the hell, I want to try this and there's a pretty good chance he will just pop one into my mouth and we could go get the beer. He shoved a handful of them into my mouth and I started chewing after the surpise wore off, then I was ready to go get the beer, they both said, "No, no way get yer ass back home, you have about 15 minutes before you start trippin' balls, man." Well I had rented "To Kill a Mockingbird" so I could do a book report on it and figured that would be something to do and stay away from my parents so they wouldn't notice. I had to watch the movie again to get the book report done but I still hadn't seen that much in the way of "visions" it was mostly colors and wavyness and such. And it certainly wasn't something that I wanted to go and do the next day or the next weekend like I did with beer and weed. But I still wanted to see things, and I had heard that LSD was the real vision maker, little dancing cartoons and such, and it was supposed to "open your mind." Well I eventually found acid and I liked it but it lasted too long and the visions were a little better than the mushrooms but basically the same "trip" and only once did I ever come close to a bad one on it but was still cognizant enough to realize that it was just the drug. Well, and that walking outside in the dark without a flashlight was bound to make me a little paranoid about what might "get me."
So in the interest of making this long story a little shorter I'll jump ahead to a period in my life that was continuingly clouded in alcohol use and abuse, and of course the relatively benign use of cannabis. Almost every time I found myself in trouble with the law was a direct result of the alcohol, but even though I saw that, and did quit for almost two years, I continued to drink, even after doing the "the thing I could never do," I continued to drink. Even today I am not 100% dry. But after writing this, I hope that I can keep my mind on the hate that I have for demon alcohol when the thought of wanting a beer enters my mind. But good things have come from my use of this drug, demon alcohol, the strife that it has caused in my life has brought me time and time again to searching for God, not religion, which I abandoned long ago if I ever even sought it. So I started reading the bible, to center myself and to try to attain any form of peace, with myself and with the world around me. But having abandoned religion and it's pointless rituals, I read with a very skeptical mind, gleening only what really rung true to me in it's pages. What I found was most of the bible was as much hog wash as "Just say, NO!" Except for a few words attributed to Jesus, the bible was basically useless to me. I knew there had to be more, but I was content for the time being to focus on the main points that He tried to teach. Love God. Love others. Then shortly after being under the thumb of the state for doing "the thing I could never do," a friend of my mom's who knew that her and I were spiritual, gave us The Urantia Book. So having gotten all that I could from the so called "inerrant word of God," I started reading. I have never read most of the structural parts I and II, mostly because I find them very hard to understand and basically
pointless in my current situation. The History of Urantia is interesting, but again basically pointless, or so I thought when I started reading it. I just now picked it up and find that I have a book mark at Paper 77 The Midway Creatures, hmmm... But part IV The Life and Teachings of Jesus is what really caught my attention. Previous to finding The Urantia Book I had obtained and read a book Titled "God Calling" and now upon finding this information about the 11:11 time promts, makes me wonder if that is some of the first modern day communications from Micheal, as it fits almost exactly in line with what I find here. I have not as of yet hunted that book down and compared anything, but will probably find the time to look into it, someday. So here I am, vaguely remembering the start of the fiction story I once began to write with no goal or structure in mind and only got so far as to mention the street light going out as the main character passed beneath it on the side walk in Phoenix, Arizona, becuase it happened to me so often then, I expect, that I'll see that happen again some time soon and now I'll know what to do...
Skekzyz
Well for one who always seems to take "the long road" to understanding and enlightenment, I should have a fair amount of growth by the end of this mortal engagement. 
I know that my own children are being prompted.