Happiness and Blame

are like oil and water...which do you want to swim in? recent stories and notes from El Salvador and The Matrix

my friend, Izzy Renzo, at La Rava Studios, San Salvador—he wanted to create a space here for people to come express their creativity—a place for artists, filmmakers, writers and performers

It is easy to write about things I am working on myself. I am starting to think another good name for this blog would be: Notes from the Dojo of the Matrix.

Note:

Happiness is not the goal.

If I am happy in the Dojo all the time, I am not going to learn anything. And I realize as I say that, I feel “Happiness” needs to be defined. What does it mean anyway?

I can tell you that right now, I feel Happy.

For me, this means I am surprisingly well rested.

Now, let me add another incoming state that is arriving at this moment and mixing right in with Happiness.

And that is Humor.

Note:

The environment I need for a good night’s sleep is still a mystery to me

Who knew that I needed to be in a nice hotel, over a busy street, across from a mall that plays dance music until 10pm, with cell phone towers all around me, to get the best night of sleep I have had in years?

What was I thinking when I mitigated my whole house in Colorado for EMFs? Turned off my wifi at night and got a remote power switch to turn off the “dirty electricity” surrounding my bed.

And that 2K EMF mitigating bed canopy I bought that looked like mosquito netting and made me feel claustrophobic?

Nope, I didn’t need any of it.

I just needed to come to El Salvador and hole up in this hotel room in the happening area of the city on the sixth floor above a busy street, which has, for two nights in a row, been incredibly conducive to sleep.

But that is subjective too as my EMF Mitochondriach friends swear by watching the sunrise to help one sleep and I have been so busy sleeping that I missed seeing the sun rise two mornings in a row. I could have seen it, but I was too tired. I woke up both mornings at 4am and 5am, and fell back asleep until 8am.

I never, never sleep until 8am.

Even as I child, despite the hour I went to bed, I was always up by 7am at the latest.

All this is to say that God likes to tease me in the Dojo and I am not beyond noticing.

Note:

What I think I want and what I really want do not always agree

My recent visit to The Garden of Eden, in El Salvador, which were the two towns of Ataco and Juayua, was a lot like the bible story. I, like Eve, found I was not happy in the midst of peaceful tranquility, food made for me twice a day, and plants that grew abundantly in volcanic soil.

Yes, Juayua is this pretty

I needed more.

Who knew what I needed was The City?

But here I am for a few days, sleeping well.

Now, as of two days ago, I have my permanent residency, along with a one way ticket to the US to visit my parents, attend a breathwork workshop in Canada, and after that???? I still don’t know.

Note:

Lots of things affect me and my sleep and I am not always going to know what they are

I am sure there will be nights of disturbed sleep and what I realize now is that I am not always going to know why that is.

I am sensitive to tons of stuff. The phase of the moon, the collective energy field of the people around me and the world in general, the past events that took place in a physical location, and probably energy lines of the planet as well. God knows what else. And God does know. I certainly don’t. Maybe recently it was my first use of blackout curtains in this hotel along with an incredibly comfortable bed and a very, very quiet AC unit that pets my face with cool air as I snuggle under the comforter that was just what I needed. And one thing I know for sure. I find sleeping under comforters comforting. Even in the sweltering heat of what locals refer to with a sweat-inducing eye roll as “The Beach”. The Beach is beautiful and it is hot. And when it comes to my sleep, a room with an almost silent AC unit and a nice comforter is better than just a sheet no matter where I am.

So, back to Happiness. It is a state, isn’t it? And sometimes, an elusive one at that.

I have spent a week being fairly unhappy in Nirvana and wondering about why.

Repeat of prior Note:

What I think I want and what I really want do not always agree

My mind thought my situation was great for me.

There I was in my second beautiful hotel (after leaving a haven I did enjoy in Ataco), with a Garden for goodness sake, a fountain, and two meals a day I didn’t have to make. I had found Nirvana, the perfect place to work on my book.

Note:

In the more rural areas of El Salvador, a meeting is an idea of something that may or may not occur. If I want it to occur, I have to check in, probably more than once.

Sure, there were no hiking trails and my one attempt to find one led to a conversation about it being “Polluted.” The girl who worked in the hotel had offered to take me there the next day, and after we picked a time, I put it on my calendar. Every time I did something like that during the week, I found the people I thought I had scheduled something with didn’t see things the same way. They were consistent though. They simply didn’t follow through.

A friend told me later that is how people are here. In the US, or the city of San Salvador, a meeting is a meeting. But it seems that in the more rural areas, a meeting is an idea of something that may or may not occur. If you want it to occur, you have to check in, probably more than once. I didn’t know that though, and after being stood up three times, I decided rural living was not for me.

This time, after our meeting time of 1pm passed and the clock approached 2:30, I saw her in the kitchen. She was the only employee and I was the only guest, so it was strange it was hard to find one another at the allotted time. I wondered a bit if God, through people, was toying with me.

“Weren’t we going hiking?” I asked, poorly probably, in Spanish.

She replied quickly in a lot of fast Spanish and I went to get my phone and Google translate.

She typed some words until I understood she was telling me: “I called my friends in town and they said the river is polluted. But we can go anyway if you want. It doesn’t matter to me.”

Since I had agreed to pay her for this little excursion, I assume this meant she was still happy to make some extra money and it was at my own risk. She didn’t mention why she didn’t show up at 1 pm to tell me.

Note:

Things are not always going to go the way I expect. Adjust as needed. It helps to visit trees when things feel odd.

“No, that’s ok,” I said. I needed exercise badly and a trip with this young woman who didn’t follow through very well, to a polluted area by a river didn’t feel safe or pleasant. I often feel like a puppy in need of a walk. I told the puppy in me that we were going to have to make due, and went to a short trail below the hotel where I walked my puppy back and forth a few times. It wasn’t a hike, and it was the best I could do. Plus, there was a beautiful sacred tree called a Ceiba we visited after crawling through some coffee plants and a ditch. I thought it was worth it. The tree was stunning, filled with a deep, peaceful, powerful, feminine energy. There definitely was not any “polluted” feeling there.

In the end, I spent a week in a hotel with a beautiful garden working on my book, doing some yoga on the grass, getting a lot less walking in nature than I like, and realizing that small town living, even in a place that likely could survive any potential government-induced challenges, was not for me.

The bed had a pretty, but a very, very thin blanket. I asked for a comforter and got more of the same thin blankets. So, I piled up three and slept rather fitfully in my sweater, vest and socks.

And, there were two cell phone towers staring at me every day and breaking up the beautiful view, plus a wifi router on the other side of my bedroom wall,

But now here I am, in the city, surrounded by similar things and sleeping like a baby. Of course, I do have the comforter and AC.

Note:

My emotional state in regards to the Matrix is often humorous and not what I expect

So God knows more than me when it comes to what it takes to make me happy.

God and I are still exploring that together.

All this led to another attempt to hike, this time with my dear friend and driver, Juan.

It was a failed attempt, which was not his fault.

My perception was that we would visit a place in the city I might like to live, a club Juan thought I might like to join (and since it had no deep history, ancient trees, ecstatic dance, breathwork, or edgy yoga classes woven throughout the day, I decided it wasn’t for me).

Then we headed to the hike he wanted to show me.

It took a little time for me to realize the three hours of hiking was going to consist of mostly driving. Then the road to get there got too rough for my taste, and possibly for Juan’s car. So I asked him to turn around and Juan asked me to define what “Hiking” means in English.

“It is walking in nature, Juan. You know, on a trail.”

“A nice trail,” I added. As certainly all hiking trails are not nice, but those are the not the ones I want to be led to.

Juan confirmed my suspicions after living here for two years.

El Salvador is not Colorado and hiking is something that involves a day trip to a volcano and is not something I can squeeze in on the surrounding mountains in the city.

Note:

I am still figuring out what makes me happy (and it’s ok that God and I are still exploring that together)

So maybe I do need to join a fancy Club?

Juan had taken me to his the day before. It did have big trees. He showed me the tables where the government people like to eat, the Olympic sized swimming pool, the sauna, tennis and squash courts.

Juan is a member of the most expensive club here, I believe.

And I do have expensive taste.

And they did seem to have a few dance classes.

Juan said he liked the new club he just showed me and I told him I liked his better.

Juan rolled his eyes.

He helped me purchase tickets for a circus performance here which happened to correspond with the day I successfully was approved for my permanent residency (after only two years, which many people, told me was never going to happen…God and I gave them a wink).

thank you Vanessa and Estudio Vortex—I arrived here less than two years ago and now have my permanent residency—more than one person told me that was impossible—but not for Vanessa who stayed on top of things including legal changes that made this possible

The circus was great. One of the best things I have seen in a long time.

I went home for a surprisingly good nights sleep.

Now here I am, writing at the last minute, lacking exercise, but rested. I am next to a rooftop pool with tables around it where I have decided it feels inappropriate to come in my tan-through bikini.

They added tables a few days later, here at The Suites Las Palmas, in San Benito, San Salvador and I was sitting near this spot writing at one of them.

Business and wealthy looking locals sit around me and it feels akin to a coffee shop, which is what I like for writing and why I am not in my room.

There is jazz music playing in French, which Juan would like as he speaks it and often waxes nostalgically about the time he spent at the French School here and also smoking a cigarette in a cafe on the Champs-Élysées in Paris.

He told me about using his father’s credit card to take an unexpected and unplanned trip to Europe as a young man. His father tracked him down. By then Juan had romped his way through a few countries and was happily staying in Switzerland with a friend, probably hung over, but Juan didn’t elaborate on that sort of thing.

He felt his dad should have been more strict with him.

Note:

Keep exploring Blame and Perspective when it comes to My Life—Zoom out a bit to feel less of “B” and more of “P” (I do like math and should go to chess club this Thursday even though I think almost everyone is better than me)

Which got me thinking about my own personal stories, which I had been busy sharing with Juan, as we had lots of time in the car together when he rescued me from Juayua followed by our trip to the ancestral home town of his maternal grandmother, called Comasagua on the way to our attempted hiking adventure.

Friends had mentioned Comasagua as a fun day trip on a motorcycle (which exceeds my sense of fun) and I had wondered what the hard-to-get-to little mountain town was like. Now I knew. It was small, cute, and undiscovered by tourists. Also, trucks and cars tended to block the narrow roads, which Juan found particularly annoying. “They aren’t allowed to do that, Terra! But they do it anyway.” (The road was completely blocked by a small truck and a group of men unloading cement blocks from the back into a smaller vehicle).

“But Juan, what else can they do?” I wondered, as I didn’t like it either and couldn’t see a solution.

“They can park a block away and carry the blocks! But they don’t,” he fumed.

I could see both sides of the predicament.

We had plenty of time stuck behind cars or cruising through the mountains which gave Juan time to put the Socratic method I think he learned at the French School, to use…on me. I believe Juan finds this both interesting and entertaining.

He brought up someone I had referred to from my past.

“You hate so-and-so don’t you Terra?”

Now, Juan and I do have a language difference and some words, Juan uses a lot more readily than me. “Hate” is one of those words.

“No, Juan, I don’t hate XXX. I see XXX as a learning opportunity. Everything is a learning opportunity, Juan.”

And as I sat back in my seat, I started to wonder a bit about the resentment that may still be hiding in the cracks of my body and energy field. Maybe there was still some resentment in there that Juan had astutely picked up on?

Note:

The Present Moment is helpful to notice, and brings me some peace

Happiness is an emotion and I do feel there is a state beyond it that is possible to experience and live in more frequently. Eckhart Tolle and Buddha come to mind. The Beauty of the Present Moment. I can feel it now as I type, while in the periphery, I see my now empty coffee cup, shadows and light dancing on the pool, and hear chairs scraping across the floor as they prepare the roof-top breakfast bar for an upcoming event that starts at 12pm.

Note:

Resentment and Blame take me out of the present moment and never serve me…unless I want to feel Self-Righteous…which doesn’t serve me either

But one thing I know for sure. Resentment and blame take me out of The Present Moment and they also remove me from any transitory possibility of Happiness.

As Juan and I shared our stories, I could hear Blame in some of his, and I knew it was easy to see why it might appear to still be woven in some of mine. But was I feeling it?

“Terra, are you still blaming people for events in your life?” I wondered, as I leaned back in my seat.

I am very determined to complete my book without feeding the field of energy that people seem to feed off, where people take sides as either victims or perpetrators of disturbing events in one another’s lives.

“We love to Blame people for things don’t we?” I mused silently to myself.

And how can we not?

Bad things happen. “Bad things happen to Children!” my mind reminded me.

“Bad things happen to Children, Terra. Bad things happened to you when you were a child. And someone did those things…”

And that’s when I realized that, yes, those thoughts were true…and…and…

There was that mushroom journey I took when I saw that as a soul, I came here to go through and silently and energetically demonstrate the way how to get through and come out the other side of such things.

Note:

Continue to remember that all experiences are gifts, and practice opportunities to grow my capacity for love and peace

So, from that point of view, all the experiences were gifts and I have been and never am a victim.

When I remembered that, I realized I could free myself from the viewpoint of the dynamic between victims and perpetrators.

It can be hard to feel Freedom.

Simplifying Prior Note:

Blame never serves me

I realized that the first step people, especially children, often take, that I have taken, in an effort to free oneself from no longer seeing oneself as a victim of someone else, is to immediately Blame oneself for the situation.

“Well, Terra, you Chose those experiences as a Soul, so if you don’t like something, you SHOULD have chosen differently. You SHOULD have known better, Terra. You SHOULD have been more wise or mature.”

My younger self used to say things like that a lot, without the part about the soul. My younger self had no soul perspective like that back then, as I was still my younger self and hadn’t met Beverly, my chi gong Grand Master, or taken any hallucinogenic mushrooms. Back then, in childhood, no one came and gave her a talk about how children blame themselves for painful events that happen in life in order to feel a sense of personal control in an environment that is out of their control.

As a child, it wouldn’t have done any good if a wise adult had pointed out my coping mechanism as I wouldn’t have had a better solution for feeling safe back then. I still needed to cope and adults were more in control of my environment than me, but it was easier to blame myself for things. If painful events were my fault, I imagined I could change something about myself which gave me a sense of control. Things felt less scary that way.

And now I am not a child. I am a woman who is interested in personal growth, deepening my connection with the divine, and feeling Happy more often than not.

I also am a woman who gets curious and at times, inappropriately amused by other emotional states like Anger, Frustration, and Misery in The Garden of Eden.

It is not uncommon for me to feel Anger along with Humor about a situation concurrently.

And I realize, Blame doesn’t serve me.

It takes me away from Happiness. It takes me out of the Present Moment and into the past. It pulls me far away from Compassion for Myself and Others.

“Father (the divine energy field that encompasses feminine and masculine energy fields and infinitely more), Father, please forgive them for they know not what they do.”

“And please, forgive me too.”

“Sometimes I still blame myself or other people.”

“Thank you for two nights of unexpectedly deep and restful sleep.”

“Thank you for my attorney and for her help with my permanent residency.”

“Thank you for this little country that lacks hiking trails.”

Note:

Juan asks Socratic questions; be ready

Juan: “Well Terra, then is the Camino you have been talking about in Europe, a hike, Terra?”

Me: “It’s on roads Juan…but it feels like a hike to me…”

And Juan has stumped me once again with his ability to ask questions that make me think.

He must have learned that in The French School. By now, I am convinced Juan is much better educated than me.

His father made sure of that, regardless of how much Juan blames him for other things.

And I find it sweet that his father, who pulled himself up by his bootstraps and sounds like a workaholic, made sure Juan made it to gay Paris.

It took me a day to realize that my response to Juan was incorrect.

“No, The Camino is not a hike.”

“It is A Pilgrimage.”

And so what does that mean to me?

I am not sure except I imagine perhaps we are already walking it in our own ways, doing our best to feel happy most of the time, and wondering about things, together.

Blame isn’t serving me. And if I Zoom out far enough, this whole life experience is beautiful.

Note:

It’s either Love or it isn’t. If it isn’t, it isn’t real, so why focus on it and worry about it so much. “Terra, if it’s not love, it isn’t real.”

Even those cell towers that bothered me can be reframed.

I was on a call with my friend, Sandra, and mentioned them (as they were staring me in the face and I was busy pouring toxic frequencies of resentment and dislike right back at them).

But then I was reminded of another mushroom journey, a different one. The one that had me marching around for a week silently proclaiming to myself: “It’s either LOVE or it ISN’T. ANYTHING that isn’t LOVE isn’t REAL.” I had words for the unreal stuff like “Demon shit” and I have calmed down since then. I guess people might call that “INTEGRATION” but that word, like many words, feels inadequate.

I guess I was still integrating that journey a year later when I looked at those cell towers and said, “Well, I guess anything that isn’t love isn’t real anyway, Sandra. So maybe those towers aren’t as real as they may seem.”

And of course, that includes anything that happens to my body. Everything is an experience in A Matrix. The Matrix. The one made for me, so I can learn, so we can learn, who we are… which I believe is a part of God, made of love, in different frequencies…like music.

When I feel Blame, the instrument that is me just needs a little tuning.

And self-responsibility only comes when I can feel compassion and care for who I was, and who I am becoming.

If I am feeling Blame towards myself or anyone else, it is simply “Demon Shit,” and we have all had enough of that now, haven’t we?

Note:

I can write at the last minute and things will be ok

Here are some photos and captions for those of you interested in tidbits of El Salvador and updates on travel adventures here. I do love this country and the people so much and feel incredibly grateful for my time and experiences here.

I noticed these men cleaning the windows of this building from the balcony of my hotel… I imagined robots out there in the future, doing the same thing.

Izzy’s studio and the art supplies he lets people use when they come. Art therapy is what got Izzy painting and I love his heart, his work, and this offering

the eye is painted by an artist who comes there, the sketches and other paintings are by Izzy

Izzy: “You know Terra, I like this painting I made. It’s like people. If we stacked things the way we think they should be, it actually makes it all out of alignment.” Then he showed me a face or two he could see in the painting.

I grabbed a mask to try on and Iggy handed me this bat. Not my usual look, but it does remind me of Blame and how it truly doesn’t serve me.

I went to see “Murphs Life” near Juayua which I had been following and hearing about on X

an organic garden at Murph’s Life

Me, at my favorite restaurant here that is right across the street called Betto. It has a glass elevator and surprises me all the time with the beauty and presentation of the food, the San Francisco-esqe setting up high, and the prices—which are much lower than they would be in the US. I ordered what I thought was Apple Pie and got this. It was amazing and I felt like Snow White who ate an apple that came from the Good Queen.

Juan’s grandmother has made a business loaning money to people. One person pays the interest in toilet paper. I offered some to him when I was moving my stuff into storage and that’s when he explained it was the last thing they need.

$320 a day. I think about that a lot. I saw this, and I saw the nicest private club in the city. I do believe things are changing here and I hope it is a rising tide that lifts all the boats up.

a painting from the beautiful hotel in Juayua, Los Cuatro Olivos, of one of the owner’s daughters. He says the artist is the best in El Salvador. Every time I walked by, the eyes in the painting followed me, like the Mona Lisa.

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