The Coach Station. I Walk Amongst You
Sitting here at the coach station, headphones on listening to some dreamy dance trance. I’m in observer mode again. The world is slower and everything is of interest. Everything that my eyes drink… A young Muslim girl in a matching citrus green coat to her mother’s stares at me, like one cat to another that knows there is something unusual swirling in my head. She shifts uneasily, disconnects and mutters to her mother then only occasionally does her eyes look up. The black youth a few seats to their right looks bored and too also stares at me but his eyes dart away when my stare meets his.

30 minutes to go before the bus ships out to Norwich and hang with my dad, and also Christmas dinner with my ex-girlfriend on Christmas day. I have to confess I’m not a fan of Christmas. I know I could get excited if I chose to be, but I chose not. Still, there is plenty to feed my eyes and nourish my mind of thought. The normal people… humans. I long since realized that I’m outside of all that. The girl is staring at me again but this time it’s me that looks away. The volume of the music dips and I hear the sound of another text coming through on my iPhone.  As I pull the phone out of my pocket the music stops altogether as a phone call comes in. It’s my brother, Ian. He meets my words with the same level of festive enthusiasm.

We chat for a while and he rings off. I remember the text and glance down to see it’s the ex-girlfriend. She’s rattling around her house doing stuff for Christmas and my arrival for lunch tomorrow. In my case it’s one foot in front of the other and I’ll be there. She’s was no cat at all, Catholic, I sensed that Christmas was like the highlight on the calendar, just like some desperate retail store banking on a good Christmas period to sustain them through to the next.

The Morning Mission
My mind flicks back to the journey into work earlier this afternoon through all the disruption of last night’s severe storms. Trains were out left right and centre. I had got to East Croydon about 15 minutes later than I’d like to have done. The only train leaving that station was 8 minutes after I was due to be at work so that’s no good. I overheard one of the rail staff saying that getting to Mitcham Junction by Tram would give the greatest chance to get to London. Once I digested what that meant I scampered off. Charged towards the tram plan with a plan formulating, so much so that a family had to part holding hands as they sauntered towards me and in my way but in last panic separating like the red sea as my movements told them I wouldn't yield. Soon I was on the Tram to Wimbledon, though I’d get off at Mitcham. I sat and answered a text from the ex. Her reply was a finger in the ribs and I had to flick that mess from my mind. I was something about that I should have got moving earlier as she’d warned me about the rail problems 3 hours before. What the hell use was that to me? Was this meant to help her feel better as a "kind of told you so" smug-ness? Definitely not a cat. For a cat, focusing on solutions rather than telling everyone I'm so great is more productive. Their actions will do the talking.

On arrival at Mitcham Junction I skip across the lines to the rail platform but next the train won’t be there for over 20 minutes. I go in to pursuit mode now. Like an android alien bounty hunter mission that will not be denied. I prod the iPhone to the Rail app and see what it says about getting to London from here. It tells me that there should be a train in less than 10 minutes but services are disrupted due to the weather. Rail travel is fucked, so forget that. What do we have next, what is working? Trams and Underground!

Plan 3 is locked in place. Get to the nearest tube station. Wimbledon is one but that’s the district line which meant too  many changes to get to where I need to be. Morden station will do it. Would mean a tram to Morden Road then a run from there to Morden Underground on the Northern Line. Sorted… let’s get it done. 6 minutes I’m on the tram, and less than 20 later arriving at Morden Road. An oriental dude runs up the steps to the street level and I’m right behind him. Despite these heavy Timberland boots, thick waterproof trousers, heavy backpack stuffed with clothes he’s actually holding me up. On the street now, I switch to "get there" mode and start to run. No, I will not stop its, ¾ of a mile away and I will not stop until I get there.

Fine Feline
Once there I get through the barriers and head down the stairs. Each step is small and it takes many yards down before I click in the rhythm and fly down.  I’d scoped the platform signs before reaching the bottom so when I got there just swung to the right and to the Northbound Northern Line. Not brilliant as the next train was via Bank and I needed Waterloo. I’d have to change at Kennington. As looked down from the sign I saw a slim smartly dressed lady older than me standing without a smile. She wasn’t smiling and yet as an aristocratic cat she was captivating. Beautiful even, as everything seemed so well put together. Her eyes focus hawk like but wider. Thoughts! I was moved to tell her that she had such elegance but didn’t manage to break out from myself. I continued to take long sips at her features. Her eyes, more green than blue but not green. The more I drank the more I felt I knew about her. Yes, she was definitely older than I by a significant amount but that meant nothing at all. Her hair was cut, styled and coloured a dark red/purple tinge matching a somewhat angular face perfectly. Her lipstick a real rose red.

I started to drift away, thinking of my own existing me and ex scrawny alley cat and what I could perhaps mean to a cat so complete. Ridiculous!!!

Soon it was time to get off at Kennington and she stayed. Once I stepped off my mind went back to android pursuit mode. I was thankful I was underground as I wouldn’t be comfortable write now with any more energy sapping texts. I’m in the hunt and have no need for petty distractions. The rest of the plan was to simple travel one stop to Waterloo and get off and run over the Bridge there. I would get shit hot over with that, as I was wearing insulated waterproof trousers and most of the clothes I’d needed for the next few day in Norfolk. I set a gear and pace that I could sustain and trotted over. 

Steaming
By the time I got to the office I was damp to the point that I was virtually steaming like racehorse in winter after the finishing line when peeled off my clothes I didn’t need there.

I pulled out the iPhone and texted the ex to say that I’d made it but not quitting as some had in the office. I’d instead done whatever it took. Yes, I was late by 20 minutes but I made it. There was only me and one other guy there as the other guy took the weather and rail disruption as a reason not to try.

The reply was again felt like another finger jab in the ribs wishing me to admit that I, after all that, in the end was still LATE!

An hour later I discovered that the meaning of that last text perhaps wasn’t quite what I thought, as she’d sent another that enquired if I’d arrived yet. Obviously some confusion…

I closed my eyes cat-like and could see the face, hair, eyes and lips of the lady on the underground, a much more enchanting vision. We Cat's are cool.

Success. Can You Handle It?

I once heard a phrase that since has changed my perception of life, especially when it comes to when shit happens. More recently I have come to understand this phrase even more deeply and it truly holds one of the keys to life as we live it. Hopefully through the following ramblings I can help you understand this very important concept. Here goes...

First thing you want to know though is what was that phrase I was referring to in the previous paragraph? Well it is simply this, and you can exchange the G word with one of your own beliefs or substitute in with the word "Life"!

Here it is:

    "God never gives you ANYTHING you cannot handle!"

I'm sure you've heard that before haven't you? Well when I first heard it I simply interpreted it fairly usefully that if you are given a tough time then it means you have the strength and guts to get through it. With what I now know about how things work is that this is a somewhat negative view. It is true of course you can handle it but it's in the context of looking down and not necessarily looking up. When looking up (positive view of your world) it means that you will receive the desired things you can handle. To illustrate what I'm getting at here's a story that was relayed to me recently by an old friend I'll call Mac. Mac is a very successful family man and has a young tearaway of a son that sound very much like me at that age (and even now)... anyway here's the story he told me as best as I can remember it:

Are you Ready?
That story perfectly sums up our lives. When you are ready to handle your desires you'll receive them. Think about it. Why would life give you 2 scoops if you couldn't yet handle 1?

I know I have in the past thought "Gosh, life is so unfair. So and so just walks in and the world bends over and they gets all the good things". Well more likely this "so and so" was more in a position to receive and handle the things he received. That's kind of how it goes and you can link this to anything in life you care to apply it. There is no victims out there we all get what we ask for and are ready to receive. Success! Can you handle it yet?

Face in the Direction You Want to Head In

Today I had a travelcard for Zone 5 for this week so today instead of catching the bus to Thornton Heath I ended up jogging to to East Croydon. I have to confess that I wasn't in the ideal mood to run. My muscles felt tired and my knees felt like a worn out gate hinge, but that only made me more determind to at not deny my self from doing what I knew I was capable of doing. To make it easy on myself I simply started jogging. Nothing tremendous at first but the key ingredient was I didn't look into the distance, I merely kept my eyes down on the road knowing that I was heading in the right direction. This way I wouldn't get overwhelmed by how far I still had to go I just had to make sure I was facing in the right direction and kept moving. If would see soon enough if I had to swerve to avoid anything or anyone in my way so it made the jog much easier. In fact without the mental energy used up on thinking about the distance I was able to speed up a bit, and then a bit more until I was galloping pretty quickly. Soon enough I was only 100 metres from the station and could look up and really sprint for the line. 

That experience got me thinking. We often heard that famous phrase or quotation, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”. I don’t think there is one person on earth that could disagree with that statement. BUT…! But what? The but is that you need to know where you want to go. Everyone is putting one foot in front of the other right now. Even if you are feel you aren't, you are! You may however be taking steps forward and then turning around to face where you've just came from and taking your next steps in back in that direction, or simply just taking steps with no idea. You know what I mean don’t you? Yes, you do… I know that about you because, if you’re anything at all like me, then you've done this before and if you’re anything like me more than once!

It’s taken me many years to understand the concept of defining what it is that I want or simply the direction I want to go in. Very often I would in effect say I don’t care where I'm going as long as I don’t go back there! The effect was I went back “there” because the “there” dominated my thoughts even though said I no to whatever that was. Then other times I would think I want to be over there and it seemed easily possible and sooner or later and as natural as rain, I was over there, right where I wanted to be. I was on a roll. Then for some reason I would lose direction and veer off the track and into the wilderness again. I would wander around the wilderness, eventually get seriously fed up again and see where the target out of there and then get my life back on track again.

Well if any of you can relate to this then that’s fine. I don’t think it’s totally bad to have done this in fact I now can view it as an advantage. A bit like people that didn't pass there driving test first time (I actually passed first time both my Motorcycle and car driving tests, but until recently would never admit to being particular brilliant at either) it could be said that they are at an advantage as they will respect what it takes to drive a car, plus they have had more teaching. Those that passed first time could get a bit cocky or complacent.

The key to solving anything is, of course first and foremost, awareness. If you have no idea there is a problem to solve then you could be in trouble. One day if you may wake up to find that you are really far from where you want to be and maybe no idea where you would like to be. It can happen so easily too. Especially if you lose focus in any area in of your life and a reason why balance is the key... home, physical, spiritual, social, business/career etc. 

One of the things that you can do however is to get really deep down and maybe a little childish and ridiculous with it. What I mean by that is get a writing pad and a pencil or pen and pretend you're a kid again. Pretend you're going to create the ultimate Christmas list of all the things you would like to have or have happen. Go for it get ridiculous or outrageous. If you think it's too much what I would suggest is "GO DO IT ANYWAY!" What do you have to lose? Whenever I feel lost or of track give myself a physical shake and grab a pen and make like NIKE and just do it. You wanna know the cool thing about it too, is that I ALWAYS feel better after I've done this. Always!

I triggers new ideas gets the juices flowing again like a dog that's picked up the trail - which isn't too far from the truth, I'm off again.

I'll end here, but I urge you to give it a go. I dare you to start writing and see how cool it feels afterwards.

I broke up with my girlfriend of some 18 months a couple of weekends ago. To say she took  it hard would be a huge understatement. I guess it would have come as a bolt out of the blue for her as she was looking to gallop off into the sunset with  me. To be fair we did get along amazingly well. You could say we were the perfect couple so why did it have to end?

Now in answering that question I’m  obviously going to ruffle more than a few feathers. I have visions of the hernia the postman is going to have struggling down the garden to my letter box to deliver the hundreds of ice-cream cartons of female human poo!!! I will probably appear very self-centred. I know this because I will be talking mainly about me and what I felt and not really about her. In all fairness though how can I be so presumptuous to speak for her anyway?

Going Back in Time.
I’m a firm believer that if you want to get to an idea of a problem then you have go back to the beginning. As an example I read an article about breaking up only today (what timing, I’m getting it from all sides). In this article it explained basically why we feel so rotten when we get dumped and they put it down to our origins as tribal being. Basically being accepted and living within the tribe was good, getting rejected and kick out the tribe to fend for yourself, bad. Reason for that is that few people had what it took to survive in the wild, totally alone so rejection basically meant death.

Sounds Reasonable
Whether we still feel like dying I’m not sure. I know the last time I got the phone call to say “It’s not working, it’s not you it’s me…” I was like “cool, get well soon, good thing you caught me before I went for my run”. I was of the mind that obviously she had gone through a lot of pain and had managed to find a solution which would for her lead to less pain i.e. to break up and sort herself out. So I really wished her all the best.

Just good friends
I guess the challenge in today’s society is the perceived perfect stereo-typical model. The happy couple together forever etc. There is that jelly mould that society wants us all to be formed by. You see it every day. Posters, TV adverts and friends and family even sitcoms and movies. Everyone is on the hunt for “The ONE”! The truth is there has never ever been just the ONE. There are hundreds or possibly thousands of the ONEs out there. To be honest this is the biggest secret to conspiracy theory proportions.

The Big Secret
There are laws of nature and we all subconsciously know it that are as definitive and real as the law of gravity. One such law is the Law of Attraction. It works in whatever way you want to apply it. This law at its heart says that whatever you centre your mind on will expand in your belief and manifest itself to you.

Basically whatever you think about and focus on you’ll get more of. I can see some of you thinking Colin has gone nuts and wo-woo! I can prove it though. Remember I said that it works ever way you want to apply it. In other words it can either work for you or against you. Here’s proof. Have you or any of your friends ever said the famous line “Oh, I can’t get a boy/girlfriend all the good ones are gone” or I can’t get a boy/girlfriend because I’m too…(old/young/fat/skinny/poor/rich/busy/stupid/clever etc..etc)? I bet you have and what happens at that point the mind focuses on the “Can’t” and reinforces it with the reason at the end of the sentence. That becomes the focus and that becomes the reality. We also know people that are the complete opposite. Who either say nothing at all about what they can’t do or appear to say what they want and they just get it. Guys (or girls) are literally falling over themselves to be with them. Why? It’s the law of attraction of course. Whatever you centre your mind on expands into your reality. 

Now the fun thing is that the law works with everything, not just relationships.

Enough about me let’s talk about you….what do you think of me?!
No, I’m not quite that vain. I’m also not a demon either. I’m just someone feeling his way in world. The challenge is I am thinking a lot wider. I’m thinking, what is the bottom, bottom line according to me, because at the end of the day regardless what happens and who you decide to end up with you have to be at peace with YOU. You are the most important person you’re ever likely to know. There is only one YOU! Not only that, but there has to be the understanding that only you can control you. Yes, it is true you can attract things to you. But they will only be attracted by what you do or think. What you think and believe sows the seed, but in today’s society we can very often we sow the seed of “lack”. In other words we concentrate the fact that we are starving for love, for a man, for a woman for money. That lack is the seed not the thing we want. I am lonely, I am unhappy. You left me and made me sad. When you were in my life you made me happy. 

Did they really or did you chose to feel that way by yourself? 

At the end of the day most of the emotions that we initially believe were caused by someone else were in fact allowed by ourselves. We actually choose to be happy, or sad in the most part. I know in the past when I felt “Oh crap, my life sucks” and then waking up the next day and everything has appeared to change to “wow, I feel I can kick the shit out of this problem, I’m a warrior”. I was still in the same situation both times, nothing had changed and yet the next day I allowed myself to feel dynamic as opposed to the day before to feel like crap and my life sucked. I chose… it was my choice!

All this doesn’t exactly help with her broken heart of course, but hopefully something here will say it’s all for the best and we are not merely passengers. We do have control over our life experiences. Not saying it will be easy to do but like anywhere we want to get to we have to first work out which direction we want to go and then do whatever we can to move ourselves there.

If anyone has any opinions on this subject or even experiences to share please do. There are people that need to hear your words. Thank you