A Lack Of Time...

My biggest issue in my spiritual life at this point is that I seem to lack the time to actually DO anything more than that which can be done "in and around" other aspects of my life. IE, praying in my head when I'm doing other things like doing dishes or cleaning, or communing with spirits that happen to "show up" in one way or another throughout my day, but not actively making a decision to speak to anything in particular.

I'm noticing a serious issue here, more than frustration. I have reason to believe that the nightmares I experienced the other night were because "something" got through the shields I usually keep up around the house and my mental "space." This has let me know that I NEED to get back to my regular spiritual activities - starting with moving my supplies from the plastic bin they're in, into their new home in a wooden chest we found in the garage in the midst of all the cleaning. I'm going to do that this week. I've promised myself, and them, and I will NOT fail again.

I'm going to find a chunk of time - most likely about 3 hours on Saturday morning - to do something spiritual, just to "refind" my feet, as far as that's concerned. I'm still incredibly happy, which brings me to my next point.

Two weeks into it now, and my positivity only continues to get better. I've had a few moments that I was down, and I was able to turn it back around very quickly. Today, even, I had another fantastic example of positivity in motion.

I went to bed about midnight last night, which is normal (or even early) for me. And I got up this morning at seven - again, normal for me. And I'm usually fine. However, I spent about 4 hours driving yesterday, and I didn't take into account how exhausting that would be, as well as this being my first day back to school after Spring Break, and therefore my brain apparently needed more time to sleep.

I did my normal morning routine, but rather than leaving insanely early for class, I decided to nap on the couch for an hour or so to try and wake myself up. I wound up actually sleeping through the alarm I'd set on my phone and sleeping nearly 2 hours rather than one. Good news - I'm awake and happy. Bad news, I was leaving WAY late to get a good parking place.

I heard that nagging voice in the back of my head saying that I was gonna have to park way in the back because I'd been lazy, and how could I do that.... - and as I've become quite adept at doing, I shut it down and replaced it with happiness and the knowledge that I was going to get an absolutely fantastic parking place.

I got to school, drove down the first row, and there was an empty spot way at the back... But I passed it up. See, the fantastic parking place I knew I was going to get was better than that. I drove up that row, turned and went up the next row - and there it was. 3 spots from the building I needed to go in, there was a spot sitting empty. So I happily parked, pulled out my Anthropology book, and did some studying before class.

Once again, my positivity has given me a fantastic and amazing parking place, just because I knew it would be there. :)

So, in review, overall, I'm doing really well. I'm going to find time to do things in a more organized manner when it comes to my spirituality, and I'm going to continue with my positivity - as it makes every day honestly fantastic!!

Welcome to Spring Break!

Also known as "another monday, another post". :D

My positivity has continued to pay off over the last week, both in actual money and in just... mental piece of mind. I'm happy, I'm healthy, and each day continues to be as as amazing if not more amazing than the last.

We had an incredibly powerful thunderstorm last night. The thunder woke me from a sound sleep, and I'd thought that a bomb had gone off in my dream and that had woken me up. Then, as I was trying to sleep again, the room lit up with some lightning and the thunder slammed the entire room and made the walls rattle. So that was just kind of awesome. I let myself slip into a mostly asleep "fanfiction dream," that involved random elements from World of Warcraft mixed with Doctor Who, which made something interesting that I don't really remember now.

As far as the base topic of this blog, I don't have much to report. I've settled into a calm spirituality now. I experience things on a daily basis, don't overthink them, and just generally go about what I need to, feeling spiritual when I need to.

Sometimes, though, the urge is incredibly strong, and I feel the need to "do something." I've been feeling that recently with regards to visiting a natural history museum. Oddly enough, it isn't the tar pits that are calling to me this time, it's the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. I haven't been in over a year, and they've made a lot of changes... And something in there now is calling to me. I need to go see what it is.

Beyond that, I don't know that I have much to add this week. I feel the need to get a bumper sticker for my jeep, but I'm not quite sure what to get. It doesn't help that searching "wolf" on cafepress' bumper stickers comes up mostly with Twilight references. >.< Ugh.

Anyway, we're on spring break this week, so there might be more posts. I have a couple of projects I want to take the time to get done this week, too. So here's hoping I have time for all I want to do! :D

It's still Monday!

For another hour, anyway. I'm not late yet!

However, this won't be a long post. For the simple reason that holding my arms in position to type is really painful right now. We had a garage sale this weekend, and I managed to get through the whole thing without badly hurting myself. Until I took the "leftovers" to Goodwill. No one was available to help me unload, and I wanted desperately to be done. I could've waited. I didn't. I grabbed a bin and unloaded the back of my car myself.

When I got down to a box of full sets of plates padded with clothes, I lifted it easily.. But lowering it into the bin was another matter. I wrenched my shoulder something awful. Getting back into the car was excruciating. Over the next few hours, with a hot shower, arnica rub, and a lot of ibuprophen, I managed to calm it down. But I still couldn't type more than a few words without growling in pain.

It's been easier, if stiff, today, but taking notes in Human Development tonight killed me. Need to stop typing soon.

I AM going to be posting some pictures very soon - pictures of the mammoth ivory I mentioned in a previous post, as well as pictures of the INCREDIBLE present I got this week.

An old and amazing friend and packmate of mine who has gone by many names over the years sent me a dire wolf metatarsel bone. The energy of this bone is incredible... I shake every time I hold it. I want to get it a respectful display box, and do some actual communing with it. With my school schedule, I haven't had the chance, yet.

Just... thank you for that incredible gift. You truly are amazing. I only wish I could get you something for YOUR birthday that would be nearly as incredible. :( I'm working on art, but as I'm tablet-less, Photoshop-less, and now INJURED... it isn't ready yet. :(

Anyway, I think that's it for now. It's been a very long week for some of my dear packmates, and I howl with all of you, be it in grief, happiness, confusion, or joy.

See you all next week!

The Week In Review

Not a lot has happened in this last week, but I promised to start doing this weekly so here I am.

Something that pointed out in my head how differently I see things than most people happened when I got something amazing in the mail from Lupa. Some mammoth ivory. A beautiful bark piece, as well as some smaller core pieces. Not enough to actually make a guess at the age of the mammoth, but still... something thousands of years old and from a creature that I as a dire wolf am intrinsicly linked to.

When I first held them in my hands, I felt like I was going to explode with the energy connection. It was as if the mammoth that had laid dormant in the ivory for thousands of years, mourning it's lost world, suddenly sparked to life in shock when our energies touched and said, "Oh hey, I remember you! I recognize your species!" I showed off the mammoth ivory excitedly to everyone in my house. My fiance was excited because it was something that was potentially expensive that I now was in possession of, but she's kind of money obsessed right now since she's job hunting and very aware of a low bank account, as am I. Her mom was excited because I was excited, but didn't really understand. My best friend was excited, but more for me than because of what it was - she was excited because of what it meant to me to have the things, but when I offered her a piece she just had a "where would I put it.." reaction. My brother was excited on an energy level - but he's a kitsune otherkin and very energy conscious. I offered him a piece and he took it in awe that I would give a piece away. His reaction was nice, but still not related to the way I reacted, and I don't know what the mammoth had to say to him, if anything.

Other than that, nothing's really drawn anything into sharp relief for me this last week. There've been arguments and fights, as there always are when we in the house get low on money - it's like two neighboring wolf packs when the population of food gets low. We start nudging at each other's edges, snapping and snarling and jockeying for position that might get us some money to be able to do what we need to do first.

I'm in Anthropology class right now as I write this, waiting for the actual class to start while I write this. The only other thing that's on my mind is that I got to school early today, parked and napped in my car a bit before heading up to class. I don't usually dream when I do that - I don't fall into a deep enough sleep to dream, but today I did.

It's already fading, as dreams have a tendency to do, but what I remember is that I'd decided, for whatever reason, not to go to class today, but I didn't want my family to know. I was driving around, looking for somewhere with something cheap to eat since I'm hungry. I kept getting lost in what should've been familiar areas that just weren't familiar. I remember muttering to myself at one point that I'd turned off the car when I parked at school so I wouldn't use up the gas I just paid sixteen dollars for (for a little over 4 gallons... gas prices are crazy), and here I was driving around and using up even more than I would've if I let the car run while I was sitting at school.

At one point I see a sign that reads "six lane freeway entrance ahead," I've always been able to read in dreams. I know that alone is weird. But I remember noting that I would get on the freeway and see where I went. But it was as if I was coming up onto the freeway at it's end, and getting on going the wrong way. I swerved around cars and managed to pull off a J-turn and went back the way I came, angrily muttering that the freeway hadn't gone this way the last time I'd been on it. It was about this time that my alarm went off and I jerked awake. My right hand was asleep, my body was sluggish, it took me a damn long time to get my alarm turned off. And I was actually surprised when I realized I was still in the parking lot. I sat there for a minute and finally managed to get myself out of the car and head in to class. Though since then I've just been thinking and wondering if that dream had any meaning (other than the obvious - go to school). I mean, I never have dreams when I nap in the car. It's uncomfortable, so I don't get into a deep sleep, so I have no idea what was going on this morning that I dreamed.

But yeah, that's this last week for me. See you next week!

A New Year - A New Blog!

I'm going to try this blogging thing again. I seem to have relegated my LJ to the realm of following feeds and accepting them, but not really POSTING there anymore. I do have this blog set up to crosspost, at which point I'll be going over to LJ and changing the userpic and lables, etc on it for most posts.

I've made a lot of changes and gone through quite a lot since I originally created my LiveJournal, and I think it just doesn't quite fit me anymore. However, to change it or leave it, and lose the archive of all the years it DID fit me is something I won't accept. So here we go with Blogger - yay, Google family of companies.

I rather like the simplicity of this design - not that I won't be making my own header eventually.

Now, as for the title of this blog, These Ancient Eyes. It came to me as I was setting up the blog itself - nothing dramatic or amazing.. But I realized how differently I do look at the world because of being an extinct species therian. I see things in a way most people don't, and when I try to explain it - even to other therians - they can't quite... snap in to what I'm saying.

So I really do see things differently because of my perspective - and that's going to be the focus of this blog. A place where I can be myself and express my odd world view, as well as talking about day to day life. I'd LIKE to make this a daily blog, but I'm a little too realistic to do that right away. So for now, I'm going to aim for weekly and see if I can keep up with that.

Of course, as interesting things happen I will keep up posting to Twitter, and my Mobile Blog as well (which also crossposts to LJ, so if you follow me there, you get everything), but this is going to be a fairly regular "thoughts on the world and life in general" blog.

That being said, here's to a new beginning!