Thoughts to action, action to habit, habit to fate...

We have two characteristics in common with every other living being in this world; we survive, and we pass on our genes. And while practically every other living organism is out there just trying to get these two things down, and adapting as fast and efficiently as if they're existence depended on it, cause well... it does; we have it SO GOOD, we get to sit around and ask: What is the point? Why are we here? What is my purpose? This is the equivalent of a very wealthy person having the problem of choosing to eat the Creme Brulee or skipping dessert, when there are masses starving to death. But alas, to the Victor goes the spoils, we got smart, we got social, and here we are. I'm here to tell you that you CONSCIOUSLY CHOOSING an answer will prove very empowering, and a key to genuine happiness; the kind that pays dividends in the form of peace and joy when the world seems to have little of either. 

They tell us that things happen for a reason, what they forget to tell us and that we GET TO CHOOSE what that reason is! Any one with a true testimony of their faith, religion, or personal believes will tell you that we are ALL converts, whether we are born into it, or run across it in our lives, there comes a time, or many, where you choose to believe one thing or another. Through my short existence, I've followed different branches of Christianity, from born again to Latter Day Saint (That's Mormons for all you non-Utahns ;) I've studied different religions and met close friends from different faiths, from Islam and Judaism, to Sikh and Buddhist  They've all taught me very valuable lessons that have shaped me to be the  person I am today, and here's where I'm getting at: All these lessons shaped me, only when I put them into practice. Only when I chose to take action on the principles did a pattern began to emerge. Only then did I find the strength and joy of freedom. Anthony Robbins has been a role model which I've studied and admired for a long time. One of the most powerful principles I learned from him is that your life is yours to live, you are responsible to choose, to take action and to deal and learn from the consequences. Although he has very strongly held believes, he only teaches that we should implement these teachings for sake of our own experience and understanding. If something is not for you, leave it. (ps: on a side note, this is how I became vegetarian, after 10 days of juicing is hard to argue with the way you feel, which is amazing!) "Faith without action is dead" is a phrase often heard in the LDS church, but widely misunderstood outside of it. Faith is Power, and true faith always precedes action. I believe we are souls with bodies, not the other way around. I believe that if our existence were to be an ethereal one, where we contemplated on the wonders of the universe, and lived in constant tender and positive emotions, there be no reason for us to be here. We are here experience this reality, pain and all, and we cannot do that hiding behind fear. Forget social conditioning, forget disempowering biological tendencies. You are not a sheep, and you are no longer a cave man or hunter in the plains of Africa! Use your frontal lobe, choose how you wanna live vis. how you wanna experience your life, and do it! Will there be pain? HELL YEA! (hahahahhahaha....I laugh so I wont cry :P ) but SO WHAT? Whats the alternative? Not learning to walk, talk, use the toilet? We had to learn all these things at one point even though it was easier, in terms of energy expenditure and momentary pain perceived, to stay where we were previously. It didn't stop us then and it shouldn't stop us now. 

When you choose your path, choose to push through the uncomfortable; it was ALL uncomfortable once. We experience this life not by just comfortably being in it but by pushing the limits, by having authentic experiences. Now pay attention kids cause this part is important: you have authentic experiences by BEING your authentic self. Live in the moment, allow yourself the live the life you know you deserve, the life you know you want. Take off the masks of ego, even if you have to fly across the country where you're not tied by the preconceived notions of those that surround you. Let loose, do something new, something out of character. LET GO! Be vulnerable  Be YOU!!! FULLY, AUTHENTICALLY, UNMISTAKABLY, INTIMATELY YOU! It's one of the most blissful activities you can engage in! Forget the future, let go of the past and be here! Be in the moment and live through it. Talk to the hot girl/guy, be the loudest voice in the room, wear something crazy, say something crazy! Serenede a stranger with a cheese love song from "Top Gun", try public speaking, leave the country, make the effort to meet people you would normally never approach  How will you know what you like if you never try it? How will you know what you love if you don't push past the uncomfortable start of things? Jump in the pool and splash around for a while, it will stop being cold and start feeling warm after a while...but you have to jump in and splash, a toe or foot just wont do! 

Live first hand, experience life on your terms! Don't be a spectator of your own life, be the star and lead! Learn to love yourself and to value your opinion above anyone else, its the only one that truly matters anyways. So go out and use your head, think through things and once you choose, take action! Live your choices, your faith, your beliefs, let them guide you as you experience the moment, trust your intuition and you abilities. Seek improvement and not perfection, when you inevitably stumble or fall, get up, keep moving, it only shows you're doing something new, you are growing. Never let others ridicule or fear of their ridicule stop you, its their own insecurities being projected anyways.

So, to wrap this up. Choose your purpose, choose to experience life on your terms, and go out and do it. I sincerely hope and pray to see YOU, the real YOU one day; atop a podium or restaurant table professing yourself and your truth. I hope to see your light shine, in a quite smile or in a roaring laugh at next weekends party. I'm thankful and grateful for our differences, and for that universal string which ties us all together too. Love you all. :)

Skin Deep...

Disclamer: All perception is projection. NOTHING is personal. I'm talking to myself more than I'm talking to you (whoever is reading this)

Imagine for a second, if you would please, that you are a "hot girl". Imagine that from the time you're 16 (probably earlier, but for sake of argument lets agree on 16) you've been hit on daily, consistently, by dudes everywhere: The mall, the restaurant, at school, in the street, at work, by your sibling friends at home...everywhere! Now You are talking THOUSANDS of references in your life by the time you hit 21, where you were validated for what you look like, period! What kind of a person would that create? Would you develop a personality if you didn't have to? Doubt it. We do the best we can with what we have. We all do. I have to believe that, cause I believe in humanity, but hey...maybe I'm just a optimist. Now, to the more important things:  What can we gain from these "hot girls"? Practice for one. You wanna learn to hold frame, try going a few rounds against one of these. Now I'm not talking a punching match, or a inter exchange of crude unknown vulgarities, I'm talking wit. Can you word fence with the best of them without loosing control? Cause I'm telling you, the hot girls may seem quiet until you get to that point where they wanna test you, then they're fucking Joe Rogan making a heckler cry.(Go look at some of his shit if you haven't, its hilarious) You're also fighting against millennia of hard wiring in your brain, telling you to bow down to the being in front of you. She has too much value, and its good to numb some of that shit down.  Second: Pretty girls can be a TON of fun under the right circumstances. They're very socially adept and know how to handle social pressure. These are the girls you bring to Vegas, or to large parties, they know how to hold their own, they don't need your babysitting. Third: Sex. Enough said. Fourth: They're are great teachers at letting you know that Walt Disney was a FUCKING LIAR! Life is NOT a fairy tail, and people are not the archetypes he told us they were. I'm no prince, and she ain't no princes, and chances are the only thing being dropped and left behind at midnight is some underwear. Is that bad? NO! Life is amazing, wonderful and miraculous as it is, we don't have to make it into something that is not...Hot girls wanna take our money? Don't let them. "They're not very nice and don't validate me" Why do you need some girl to validate you? At the end of the day, we win. We get better with age, and our value is centered around our character not our looks, they peak physically at 23-27...that sucks, and its something they don't like to talk about. But go ahead honey  keep drinking like a fish and smoking like a chimney .. what's that? you don't even need to work out cause of genetics? Good for you, I'll see you 5 years and 25 lbs later... I used to be bitter, now I understand. Beauty is SO fucking common, and whoever doesn't agree with that go take a 5 min walk down any major street in LA, its ridiculous. Truth is, we're the ones who condition them to act the way they do, then we resent them for it. We wish them to be be cold to other guys, and warm and fuzzy with us, and they do have different faces (or emotional states if you will) for different people. I'd rather see the freaky sex goddess side, but I know that is a price that few attain, but hey: "Victori Spolia" If any "Hot Girls" are reading this, here's my advice: Read a book, travel, live a healthy lifestyle: eat healthy  exercise, cut down or out alcohol and drugs, BE COOL: don't be over jealous, grow emotionally and spiritually (Not necessarily to mean religious) be your own person and have your own life, goals and ambitions. Be a fucking sex freak in the bedroom! guys LOVE that, regardless of what society or anyone else tells you. You are not gonna stay high value forever (I mean social value, obviously not as a human being) and although you might be able to get validation through sex long after you've peaked, you are not gonna be able to get "that guy" for very long, the window is small and once is shut, no amount of surgery opens it back up. I might come off as rude, misogynistic, or plain just crazy, but I promise I'm just trying to help the world out, cause there seems to be too much confusion, misunderstanding and just plain ignorance. *That's it, I'm done!        

*In Ben Afflecks voice in "Boiler Room"

I know enough, to know I know nothing...

"...On the planet Earth, man yhad always assumed that he was more intelligent than dophins becaue he had acheived so much - the wheel, New York, wars and so on - whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man - for the precisely the same reasons" -Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy 

I believe we are the dominating species in the planet for two main reason: a. We are the most intelligent and b. We are social creatures. Being social animals, and more specifically, social learners, gives us the ability to take huge amounts of information in very short periods of time, because we do not have to learn everything first hand. Most of us know that high altitude falls will likely injure us not because we've taken leaps from seconds story windows (although I'm sure some of you out there have) but because we've been taught this by others, whose opinion on this particular matter we trust. This type of learning begins very early in our childhood and we are very adapt at it. We take very subtle ques from others in our environment  and our brains cement in the lesson via emotional response in the form of drama or trauma. You learn not to put dirt in your mouth, because when you tried it your friend gave you a look of disgust. You felt a sting of shame or embarrassing you put the dirt down, and learned not to do it again. We learn to trust others opinions of the world because it allows us to avoid mistakes already made by others, its brilliant, and extremely efficient, but its a double edge sword that serves us only up to a point. Because of our canning ability to learn from others, we are tribal in nature, and we learn to respect and fear the opinions of the tribe. If you look at it from this point of view it makes sense of our deep need to be accepted and liked, to conform to the status quo. Rewind not that long in human history, and you realize what it meant to be ostracized by your peers. Banishment meant almost certain death. In a jungle or desert full of  predators, poisonous animals and plants, you're chances were not very good. Instances which put you in place of high social pressure, such as public speaking, approaching a potential partner, or any other high social value individual (think rock star or Football captain in High School) trigger the fight, flight or freeze response, because you FEEL like its a life and death situation, because not that long ago IT WAS! Offend the Alpha of the group and banishment might be preferably to a head bashing. Get rejected by the opposite sex and you might ruin the chances with all the other possible partners, step out of bounds of the comfort of the group, and you might not be very welcome anymore. "No one is a prophet in their own land" (parraphrased from John 4:44), my mother used to tell me those words a lot when I was a kid, I've ponder on these words considerably since then, and tribal mentality help me understand them better. Progress means change, and greats leaps of progress mean lots of change. Well, the thing is people are uncomfortable with social change, the group like to remain in stasis, because why change unless we have to? We are creatures of efficiency if nothing else, and we are programmed to preserve as much energy as possible. One must have either a very good argument, or lots of social value (preferably both) to be able to bring about change in the tribe, and my guess is, seldom did anyone ever get it in the first try, hence they tried again not "in their own land". Once you discover these concepts, you come to two conclusions: a. You've been, for all intent and purposes, domesticated through constant reinforcement, and b. Once you are aware of it, you can use it as a tool to help you direct your life in the direction you want it to go. You're no longer subjected to the cage your life had become, but instead becomes the means of your escape, you way into freedom. The how and they why, are already known to you. If you ponder on it, your subconscious will start to give you the answer, but until you know to ask the question, you're ignorant to your ignorance. ;)

Actually...its an Elephant

"

Its awesome how we can look at the same facts and come to different conclusions, perception truly is projection! I realize that being aware of this fact does not make us immune to it, but it does allow us to step in the right direction by maintaining awareness and being vigilant of our preset filters. What I do know is that absolute statements are rarely, and I mean RARELY, true. To quote the great Obi Wan: "Only the Sith deal in absolutes" Have a wonderful Monday and keep your minds open, remember "We still do not know one thousandth of one percent of what nature has revealed to us" :D Also, big shout out and thanks to my sister Cynthia Loaiza Shipp and Kory Charles Shipp for their hospitality over the New Years and for keeping me on my toes on my own Belief Systems, you guys really keep my mind open in the most empowering sense of the word! ;) #appetentandardent

"

Same Clothe, Different Garment...

One of the most liberating epiphanies I've had in the past few years, was accepting the fact that we are all cut from the same clothe. I used to look around and find traits and talents that I deeply wanted in others, but not in my self. I used to see an abyss between what I had and what I longed for. I didn't see things as ongoing but as static, I didn't realize that God's delays aren't God's denials. I saw the results but not the cause, the hidden struggle, pain and time that it took to develop what I wanted was unbeknownst to me. In a big way, we are all the results of a genetic lottery, but despair and sadness to the heart that accepts this as an end all. Benjamin Disraeli said it best when he said: "Man is not the creature of circumstances, circumstances are the creatures of men. We are free agents, and man is more powerful than matter." Perception is projection, and if you see something in someone you admire, it might be the recognition of who your soul wishes you to become. Of all the LDS church taught me, one of the lessons I hold dearest is that we are here to "become"! More than to have or to do, is who you transform yourself into in this life that will have the most impact in your joy, and the effect and imprint you leave on this world. If you're not where you want to be, remember you're not there YET! Find the price and pay it, do not hide behind the fallacy of a limited predetermined constraints. The past does NOT equal the future. I watched this week a kid take some of his first steps and I wondered who we would become if we took on life as a child and his parents do walking. We don't put a time limit, or certain number of tries; we just help them back up so they can take another chance, again, and again, and again until they do it. Be a leader, be a fighter, a poet, philosophizer, entrepreneur, a teacher, an artist, a builder, a creator, an organizer, an example of life worth living, and most importantly be your highest self! Do not let fear of failure or ridicule set you in the path you walk, if others have become it, so can you! Be who you want to be, BE FREE! :) "

Reality...?

"

Your "reality" is so objective, that's an atrocity to refer to it as reality. You perceive the universe through your 5 senses, which are marvelous and none the less limited. If you look at the wave spectrum which we perceive as light and sound, you realize we are only able to sense a very small portion of whats out there. For all intent and purposes, we're both blind and deaf. On top of that we process all this information through a brain whose one of the primary functions is to delete, distort, and change information to fit your reality and believe systems. THEN that same information is put through a large number of predetermined filters which you've picked up somewhere along the way mostly through social conditioning, which means you didn't even really choose to incorporate them. THEN you have genetic predisposition which are hardwired into your brain, such as the tendency to believe negative information vs positive one. So, is this a negative thing? Only if you choose to believe it is. We see reality as we are, not as it is. Perception is projection, and this can be a VERY empowering realization. So question you're disempowering believes. Realize that the reference that maintain them are thin and weak at best. Leave room for being wrong, cause chances are that you are. Take things within context and realize that there are rare absolutes, and more likely answers are to be found somewhere along the spectrum. Remember the Sun only rises exactly in the East twice a year, and even that depends on where on the planet you're standing... ;)

"

It is what it is...

"Having my "open-mind attitude" tested this week... One of my heroines is on a full on campaign to promote ideas that are SO far removed from my reality that it has become hard for me to consolidate my love of her spiritual wisdom with her political ideas...I've often questioned my friends, and people who's opinion I value on wether one part of a persons life can take away from the other: Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King, and Mother Theresa of Calcuta were people who brought immense positive change to the world, but they were people none the less, with defects (some pretty dark ones at that) as we all have them. In the end I've come to the conclusion that you must appreciate what empowering ideas and works one brings to the world, and accept everything else. Working to stay open, accepting, and conscious of my thoughts. #breakingamentalsweat
"

One Sided...

"Girls at a huge disadvantage...the more and more I look, the more evidence I find of this...why are real men so rare now days? I'm gonna go ahead and blame the break down of the family unit, but I can't say that with much certainty... I just don't get it :/ But of this I am sure: My mission is to make sure my daughter(s) know what the price looks like, and to settle for nothing less, and for my son(s) to have all the tools and example to be the real deal... #selfishgene"