I have not been back to visit in some years. It is a non-accident / non-coincidence that I am posting an updated hello.
I just made this post to a Voice Hearing forum to help others. Thought it would fit for a revival of this thread.
I remind everyone that my first post in this thread was written a quarter century ago during my startling phase.
This post was just written yesterday and directed to other voice hearers who have a very long way to get where I have made it to.
It occurred to me given the past responses to this thread some here might enjoy the read.
Just bear in mind it was not tailored to address you here personally. It was addressed to other voice hearers in need of insight and help.
I am 52 years old. I had my startling phase in my early 20's. I have x5 (counting me) distinct voices in my perception. They all have names and personality. They are all my friends. We are one big happy family. It was not easy, but it can be done. The science of Psychology calls them "coping mechanisms". What you call them is far less important than achieving functionality. There have been other voices besides them over the years, but they are not regulars, nor do I regard them as intruders..
The moral of this post is that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and you do not have to kill yourself to find it.
I have had visions, outside my head visual hallucinations, and I even have a paranormal ability. None of which are a big deal to me anymore. I was diagnosed 15 years ago with Chronic Paranoid Schizophrenia. I kept it secret for 10 years prior to diagnosis. I was afraid to share my condition with anyone. I learned to deal with it on my own by trial and error. Had I sought professional help they would have given me the pills, or the shots. Taking the anti-psychotic drugs will eventually cause permanent damage to the frontal lobe of the brain resulting in the gradual shut down of high brain functions. As it was I was Baker Acted to a psych ward many times during those ten years, but I always kept my mouth shut. I just wanted my freedom. I have never been a danger to others. Of course they don't know that and treat you like you are.. I finally met a nice lady who became my therapist. I was 35 years old by then. She got me into a diagnosis program. It was 5 days a week; 8 hours a day; and most important it was voluntary. It was at a VA government hospital. Mind you I had advanced well into the second stage on my own by that time. They tried very hard to get me to take the chemical lobotomy. I vehemently refused. By that time I knew enough of the truth to know better. The diagnosis caused me a severe psychic crush, but sent me on a path of book learning that eventually got me to the third stage. The important takeaway from that is to learn to be you're own psychologist. It is invaluable to learn the jargon the professionals use to diagnose you. You must learn to understand the terms they use to describe you're symptoms. You must learn their language. You will gain a great deal of helpful insight into you're own psychology in the bargain. Educating yourself above and out of their diagnosis through both book learning and personal experience is the way out of the mental cage.
I think the worst part of my condition has been having to spend my entire life alone. Relationships are near impossible to enter into because you can't explain it to a normal. If you try they run away from you fast. I finally did have a 3 month relationship last year, but that was only made possible because the person I had it with had known me for many years and knew the details of my psychology. My voices all cooperated in the relationship. It was wonderful. Unfortunately both of us knew going into it that it would only be a short relationship. It was a very unique situation we both found ourselves in living together and we both needed each other. I was the reluctant one, but I could feel her pain and my voices all agreed to it. We spent 3 very happy months together. Having you're first real relationship at the age of 52 is a ball buster. I was prepared for her to leave, but I was not prepared for the gaping hole it left in my heart. The depression was overwhelming. Were it not for my voices I would have probably died. They saved my life..
My method of learning to live with the voices would be viewed as unorthodox to say the least. It is unfortunate that I will not be willing to discuss them in a public forum. Mainstream psychiatry is ignorant. They would prefer to give us a chemical lobotomy with neoroleptics rather than allow us access to what could make us well. They have no interest in allowing us to become functional voice hearers. In any case what worked for me might not be appropriate for most people. It would not be responsible for me to divulge my personal treatment practices publicly.
Just as important is the work started by Dr. Marius Romme. I would have never made it to where I am without the Hearing Voices Network in Europe. We did not have it in the United States when I needed it. Finding the network guided me on my path to the third stage.
(1) startling, (2) organization, and (3) stabilization phases,
My experience prefers using the terms ...
(1) startling, (2) adjustment, and (3) normalization phases
It is the "STARTLING" Phase that is dangerous for all of us. It is in that phase that we are most susceptible to suicide, or self-harm. It took me several years to move past it into the second phase. It took me well over a decade after that to get to the third phase. Once I got to the second phase I was out of danger from suicide, but required extensive learning to grow in understanding. That entailed a great deal of book reading as well as my own personal unorthodox experimental treatment. Once you get to the third phase you can pretty well go at whatever pace is comfortable for you to improve. It is a life long learning process, but it can be very rewarding. I am proof of that. You're biggest problem will be isolation and stigma from the normals. My family was horrible to me which made it all the more difficult. Most people do not want to understand their own psychology, so trying to get them to understand you're psychology is probably not going to happen. They will likely pressure you into taking the chemical lobotomy for them to be comfortable around you. In other words you wind up taking medication to help them instead of yourself. I cannot stress enough how very important living in a stress free environment around people willing to understand you will be for you.. If you can't find that kind of environment you will have to deal with isolation and internet forums and chat boxes for any kind of social contact. It sucks, but that is the way it is.
Emerging Perspectives From the Hearing Voices Movement: Implications for Research and Practice
http://schizophreniabulletin.oxfordjourn.../S285.full
I will say this. Writing out my experiences in journal form, or as stories has helped me a great deal over the years. I am over the relationship loss and am putting myself back together now. Not the doctors, nor even my therapist were of much help during my difficult time.
A True Story --- 1:00am 6/22/2015
The dolphin and I returned from the other side sometime after midnight in the early morning hours Sunday 6/21//2015 relieving a very desperate Narrator. I have never vacated my perception of self for anywhere near the length of time I have experienced in this episode. In the vast majority of instances that it has occurred it would last seconds, or minutes. There have been times it has lasted for hours and in a few very rare instances perhaps a day, or so at most. This episode it seems has persisted for weeks. As I write this entry I hear a voice clearly interjecting “The nature of time is that it merely exists within the perception of remembered experiences which in turn cause and effect the realization of an eventuality”. Hearing that I remember a subject I became familiarized with many years ago that I found helpful in explaining other past experiences I have had that would leave me feeling the way I do at this moment. I immediately accessed the topic of kundalini to review the subject online at the Berkeley University library.
“In a ``true awakening'' the force of kundalini eclipses the ego altogether and the individual is almost certain to feel disoriented for some time. There will almost certainly be periods of pronounced psychological discomfort and social alienation.”
- - -The Path of Siddha Mahayoga
There is certainly no doubt I have been experiencing severe disorientation and my psychological discomfort and social alienation had become heightened to the extreme. When Narrator told the Psychologist at the VA he was “befuddled” it was an understatement of our condition, but I will say with dead-on certainty that being confused and befuddled is a far better state of mind than being lost in the despair that had consumed me the morning that Tammy departed. The important thing is that I can identify as myself again even if the name Tom is even more alien to me today than it was when I was first joined with the dolphin decades ago. That I can say “I don’t have a name; I just am” and mean it is the best indication that I am getting back to my old self. My ego is no longer eclipsed by Narrator, but joined with it much the same as I have always perceived myself in relation to the others. I am thankful to Hermes for his prescient prescription. He gave me Narrator and it was Narrator’s desperate effort at writing that provided the homing beacon necessary to call me back from the refuge of oblivion to effect the realization of this next writing.
The depression that propelled me into taking the desperate measure of seeking an end to my despair from deep within the Cosmos has subsided. When I told the dolphin to take me to the Cosmos the morning Tammy left I was dead-set on a do-or-die course of action. I now realize I was experiencing a severe case of suicidal ideation and I lacked the insight to see it. I had determined to find the answer (insight) I needed at any cost and failure to find that answer was not an option. I had become vulnerable to the willingness to risk my life in the endeavor and I came very close to losing it. When I finally returned home and looked at myself in the mirror I saw the face of death. I was bedridden for a week recovering from the physical and mental exhaustion. My recovery is ongoing, but the crisis is past. Sorting through my experiences in writing will help to clarify the eventuality. Narrator has left me with a great deal of sorting to do as I wade through the compilation of disjointed and disorganized writing he has left me which includes my encounter with the Over-Voice and the Lightning Riders.
The Elementals gently, but with deliberate force delivered me to a dimension of the cosmos I have never experienced. The only sensation of travel was a momentary aftereffect that occurred just previous to my grasping to comprehend what was happening to me. I could describe the journey as instantaneous, but for anyone who has ever experienced a black out, or feinted it was like coming to consciousness which is completely different than just waking up from a sleep. I was forced to go through a similar reorientation in order to establish the mental equilibrium necessary to cope with an experience that was quite alien in nature. They took me to the “Wild’s” where I found myself free of the abyss I have come to know as earthly reality. It was not until later in consultation with my own voices and through them the medium of writing that I was able to face the full recollection of the experience.
I found myself adrift in what I imagined to be the empty vacuum of space. For a moment I thought that I was somehow freed from the limitations of known physics, but quickly realized that the phenomena was merely the “physics of self-experience” adapting to a new perception . I was somehow existing in a dimension that dwarfed my former perception of the physical universe. I recall thinking what was happening could only be what I have long imagined the Cosmos might be like if one could traverse the barrier. I had the distinct perception of being able to both observe and remain in contact with my former reality from a place that existed separate from it. I was existing in two places at the same time which seemed impossible to me until I realized I was existing everywhere all at once unbound by the laws of spatial physics. None of the six interrogatives entered my mind at the time. I was outside the bounds of the laws of physics, or any other self-limiting form of science, or technology save one. The Science of Mental Alchemy.
My conscious mind was tethered to an ethereal form that became separated by what I can only think to describe as an almost imperceptible shift in consciousness, or out of body experience if you prefer. I slowly drifted away from my corporal body towards one of the Rider’s who was offering to assist me in mounting the lightning. Not even Hermes recognized who and what this Rider was exactly, but he was able to discern to my consciousness that this entity was of a positive nature which negated any fear taking hold of me and inclined my alters to take a wait and see attitude of observation and non-interference. The connection to my alters remained intact allowing me an assurance of support as I began interacting with this Rider, but unbeknownst to any of us at that time the dolphin had quietly disappeared.
I felt like a welcomed visitor in this strange midst and experienced a sense of profound acceptance and belonging from all the Riders. I was feeling something so far beyond what on earth we would call family, or friendship that it would be misleading to even use those words as a comparison. I was being welcomed into their company to experience riding the lightning. I was being offered a glimpse of what my reality could be like should I choose not to return, or what I could experience at some point when I decide I am ready. For my part I can only refer to my experience in simple words that others might grasp some small inkling of what it was like and how privileged I felt at the time to have crossed paths with them. I remember them as Storm, Whirlwind, and Hurricane and they are what the Over-Voice later explained to me are Lightning Riders.
The dolphin is always quiet and unassuming until he is either needed, or wants to emerge. It was not until near the end of the episode during my interaction with what I refer to as the Over-Voice that I sensed the dolphin was nowhere to be found while Hermes, the Advocate, and Narrator remained anchored to my corporeal body. I recall experiencing the distinct perception of myself as a singular personality existing separate from my multiple facets in this strange ethereal form. I have never had an experience quite like this one before, but then again over the years I have had my fare share of firsts. My Alters and I were still fully connected mentally. I knew this because I could sense Hermes complete awareness of the interactions going on and I could also sense the Advocate and Narrator observing. None of them offered me any conscious part in choosing how this episode would play out except perhaps the dolphin through his disappearing act.
I had become mesmerized with what was happening. That wonderment of mine that I used to say would never cease to amaze me had kicked into overdrive. After the Rider beckoned me to come closer to “experience the lightning” I had to resolve to transform my exuberance and reverence into raw determination and courage in order to be able to accept the honor being offered to me. I had to act without allowing myself a shred of doubt, or a split-second of hesitation, or risk losing my conviction to accept the offer to explore the experience being granted to me. I began to have flashes of insight into how a Rider experiences “being”. How I could interact; not only with the Cosmos, but also in relation to the physical universe of my former self. I found myself being able to see what my life could be like if I joined with the lightning. I even imagined how I could visit my former earthly existence before hitting the trail to the far out reaches.
I must say it is not often that I experience hallucinations which exhibit perceptions in combination of form, voice, and location outside of my own head. A good analogy to better explain the perception I was experiencing would be to say that my Alters were sitting in the bleachers spectating rather than crowding into the dugout to sit beside me on the players bench. The only issue I found troubling was my inability to sense the dolphin once I had become alerted to his absence, but it would not be long before I would come to understand; and not a moment too soon. Were it not for the dolphin I would not have returned when I did. It was my unwillingness to abandon the dolphin that became the determining factor in my decision not to remain with the lightning. Were it not for the dolphin I very likely would not have returned that night. If I had followed through to ride the lightning the dolphin and I would no longer be able to stay together. The instant I realized that was the moment I experienced the presence of the Over-Voice.
Throughout all these many years since the onset of my startling phase that has on occasion culminated into a chronic state I have been witness and participant to one hell of a spectacle on parade marching through my head. Never mind the countless characters in the books I read growing up. This may be hard to understand for most people, but I offer as food for thought to both the professionals in the field and especially to those afflicted with auditory hallucinations to consider that I am living proof that if you can somehow learn to love and embrace the various facets of personality that haunt you that they can actually love and embrace you back. I am reminded of the lyrics from an old song that “learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all”.
If this life experience I have lived with these many years has not been an “ethereal dawn” then I don’t know what else it could be. There is great deal more that I wanted to add to this writing, but I have run out of time needed to wade through and piece together a proper edit of the material "Narrator" left me. As it is I have not even had time to craft all the paragraphs relating to the details mentioned within this writing; Never mind all the subject matter relating to two other important aspects of the story I have had to leave completely out. I am simply not comfortable with just slopping together a bunch of paragraphs to fill up space. I am out of time because I still have to print this out and get ready for my appointment today with my therapist.
Here is me singing recently. The dog in the picture was my Mom's baby. She passed away a few years ago. His name is "Boy". I give him the same love she did. Having an animal friend helps big time alleviating the pain caused by isolation. Music is therapeutic. I prefer to fiddle with the piano, but since I don't have access to one I have to make do.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07YbXnY9xis
I just made this post to a Voice Hearing forum to help others. Thought it would fit for a revival of this thread.
I remind everyone that my first post in this thread was written a quarter century ago during my startling phase.
This post was just written yesterday and directed to other voice hearers who have a very long way to get where I have made it to.
It occurred to me given the past responses to this thread some here might enjoy the read.
Just bear in mind it was not tailored to address you here personally. It was addressed to other voice hearers in need of insight and help.
I am 52 years old. I had my startling phase in my early 20's. I have x5 (counting me) distinct voices in my perception. They all have names and personality. They are all my friends. We are one big happy family. It was not easy, but it can be done. The science of Psychology calls them "coping mechanisms". What you call them is far less important than achieving functionality. There have been other voices besides them over the years, but they are not regulars, nor do I regard them as intruders..
The moral of this post is that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and you do not have to kill yourself to find it.
I have had visions, outside my head visual hallucinations, and I even have a paranormal ability. None of which are a big deal to me anymore. I was diagnosed 15 years ago with Chronic Paranoid Schizophrenia. I kept it secret for 10 years prior to diagnosis. I was afraid to share my condition with anyone. I learned to deal with it on my own by trial and error. Had I sought professional help they would have given me the pills, or the shots. Taking the anti-psychotic drugs will eventually cause permanent damage to the frontal lobe of the brain resulting in the gradual shut down of high brain functions. As it was I was Baker Acted to a psych ward many times during those ten years, but I always kept my mouth shut. I just wanted my freedom. I have never been a danger to others. Of course they don't know that and treat you like you are.. I finally met a nice lady who became my therapist. I was 35 years old by then. She got me into a diagnosis program. It was 5 days a week; 8 hours a day; and most important it was voluntary. It was at a VA government hospital. Mind you I had advanced well into the second stage on my own by that time. They tried very hard to get me to take the chemical lobotomy. I vehemently refused. By that time I knew enough of the truth to know better. The diagnosis caused me a severe psychic crush, but sent me on a path of book learning that eventually got me to the third stage. The important takeaway from that is to learn to be you're own psychologist. It is invaluable to learn the jargon the professionals use to diagnose you. You must learn to understand the terms they use to describe you're symptoms. You must learn their language. You will gain a great deal of helpful insight into you're own psychology in the bargain. Educating yourself above and out of their diagnosis through both book learning and personal experience is the way out of the mental cage.
I think the worst part of my condition has been having to spend my entire life alone. Relationships are near impossible to enter into because you can't explain it to a normal. If you try they run away from you fast. I finally did have a 3 month relationship last year, but that was only made possible because the person I had it with had known me for many years and knew the details of my psychology. My voices all cooperated in the relationship. It was wonderful. Unfortunately both of us knew going into it that it would only be a short relationship. It was a very unique situation we both found ourselves in living together and we both needed each other. I was the reluctant one, but I could feel her pain and my voices all agreed to it. We spent 3 very happy months together. Having you're first real relationship at the age of 52 is a ball buster. I was prepared for her to leave, but I was not prepared for the gaping hole it left in my heart. The depression was overwhelming. Were it not for my voices I would have probably died. They saved my life..
My method of learning to live with the voices would be viewed as unorthodox to say the least. It is unfortunate that I will not be willing to discuss them in a public forum. Mainstream psychiatry is ignorant. They would prefer to give us a chemical lobotomy with neoroleptics rather than allow us access to what could make us well. They have no interest in allowing us to become functional voice hearers. In any case what worked for me might not be appropriate for most people. It would not be responsible for me to divulge my personal treatment practices publicly.
Just as important is the work started by Dr. Marius Romme. I would have never made it to where I am without the Hearing Voices Network in Europe. We did not have it in the United States when I needed it. Finding the network guided me on my path to the third stage.
(1) startling, (2) organization, and (3) stabilization phases,
My experience prefers using the terms ...
(1) startling, (2) adjustment, and (3) normalization phases
It is the "STARTLING" Phase that is dangerous for all of us. It is in that phase that we are most susceptible to suicide, or self-harm. It took me several years to move past it into the second phase. It took me well over a decade after that to get to the third phase. Once I got to the second phase I was out of danger from suicide, but required extensive learning to grow in understanding. That entailed a great deal of book reading as well as my own personal unorthodox experimental treatment. Once you get to the third phase you can pretty well go at whatever pace is comfortable for you to improve. It is a life long learning process, but it can be very rewarding. I am proof of that. You're biggest problem will be isolation and stigma from the normals. My family was horrible to me which made it all the more difficult. Most people do not want to understand their own psychology, so trying to get them to understand you're psychology is probably not going to happen. They will likely pressure you into taking the chemical lobotomy for them to be comfortable around you. In other words you wind up taking medication to help them instead of yourself. I cannot stress enough how very important living in a stress free environment around people willing to understand you will be for you.. If you can't find that kind of environment you will have to deal with isolation and internet forums and chat boxes for any kind of social contact. It sucks, but that is the way it is.
Emerging Perspectives From the Hearing Voices Movement: Implications for Research and Practice
http://schizophreniabulletin.oxfordjourn.../S285.full
I will say this. Writing out my experiences in journal form, or as stories has helped me a great deal over the years. I am over the relationship loss and am putting myself back together now. Not the doctors, nor even my therapist were of much help during my difficult time.
A True Story --- 1:00am 6/22/2015
The dolphin and I returned from the other side sometime after midnight in the early morning hours Sunday 6/21//2015 relieving a very desperate Narrator. I have never vacated my perception of self for anywhere near the length of time I have experienced in this episode. In the vast majority of instances that it has occurred it would last seconds, or minutes. There have been times it has lasted for hours and in a few very rare instances perhaps a day, or so at most. This episode it seems has persisted for weeks. As I write this entry I hear a voice clearly interjecting “The nature of time is that it merely exists within the perception of remembered experiences which in turn cause and effect the realization of an eventuality”. Hearing that I remember a subject I became familiarized with many years ago that I found helpful in explaining other past experiences I have had that would leave me feeling the way I do at this moment. I immediately accessed the topic of kundalini to review the subject online at the Berkeley University library.
“In a ``true awakening'' the force of kundalini eclipses the ego altogether and the individual is almost certain to feel disoriented for some time. There will almost certainly be periods of pronounced psychological discomfort and social alienation.”
- - -The Path of Siddha Mahayoga
There is certainly no doubt I have been experiencing severe disorientation and my psychological discomfort and social alienation had become heightened to the extreme. When Narrator told the Psychologist at the VA he was “befuddled” it was an understatement of our condition, but I will say with dead-on certainty that being confused and befuddled is a far better state of mind than being lost in the despair that had consumed me the morning that Tammy departed. The important thing is that I can identify as myself again even if the name Tom is even more alien to me today than it was when I was first joined with the dolphin decades ago. That I can say “I don’t have a name; I just am” and mean it is the best indication that I am getting back to my old self. My ego is no longer eclipsed by Narrator, but joined with it much the same as I have always perceived myself in relation to the others. I am thankful to Hermes for his prescient prescription. He gave me Narrator and it was Narrator’s desperate effort at writing that provided the homing beacon necessary to call me back from the refuge of oblivion to effect the realization of this next writing.
The depression that propelled me into taking the desperate measure of seeking an end to my despair from deep within the Cosmos has subsided. When I told the dolphin to take me to the Cosmos the morning Tammy left I was dead-set on a do-or-die course of action. I now realize I was experiencing a severe case of suicidal ideation and I lacked the insight to see it. I had determined to find the answer (insight) I needed at any cost and failure to find that answer was not an option. I had become vulnerable to the willingness to risk my life in the endeavor and I came very close to losing it. When I finally returned home and looked at myself in the mirror I saw the face of death. I was bedridden for a week recovering from the physical and mental exhaustion. My recovery is ongoing, but the crisis is past. Sorting through my experiences in writing will help to clarify the eventuality. Narrator has left me with a great deal of sorting to do as I wade through the compilation of disjointed and disorganized writing he has left me which includes my encounter with the Over-Voice and the Lightning Riders.
The Elementals gently, but with deliberate force delivered me to a dimension of the cosmos I have never experienced. The only sensation of travel was a momentary aftereffect that occurred just previous to my grasping to comprehend what was happening to me. I could describe the journey as instantaneous, but for anyone who has ever experienced a black out, or feinted it was like coming to consciousness which is completely different than just waking up from a sleep. I was forced to go through a similar reorientation in order to establish the mental equilibrium necessary to cope with an experience that was quite alien in nature. They took me to the “Wild’s” where I found myself free of the abyss I have come to know as earthly reality. It was not until later in consultation with my own voices and through them the medium of writing that I was able to face the full recollection of the experience.
I found myself adrift in what I imagined to be the empty vacuum of space. For a moment I thought that I was somehow freed from the limitations of known physics, but quickly realized that the phenomena was merely the “physics of self-experience” adapting to a new perception . I was somehow existing in a dimension that dwarfed my former perception of the physical universe. I recall thinking what was happening could only be what I have long imagined the Cosmos might be like if one could traverse the barrier. I had the distinct perception of being able to both observe and remain in contact with my former reality from a place that existed separate from it. I was existing in two places at the same time which seemed impossible to me until I realized I was existing everywhere all at once unbound by the laws of spatial physics. None of the six interrogatives entered my mind at the time. I was outside the bounds of the laws of physics, or any other self-limiting form of science, or technology save one. The Science of Mental Alchemy.
My conscious mind was tethered to an ethereal form that became separated by what I can only think to describe as an almost imperceptible shift in consciousness, or out of body experience if you prefer. I slowly drifted away from my corporal body towards one of the Rider’s who was offering to assist me in mounting the lightning. Not even Hermes recognized who and what this Rider was exactly, but he was able to discern to my consciousness that this entity was of a positive nature which negated any fear taking hold of me and inclined my alters to take a wait and see attitude of observation and non-interference. The connection to my alters remained intact allowing me an assurance of support as I began interacting with this Rider, but unbeknownst to any of us at that time the dolphin had quietly disappeared.
I felt like a welcomed visitor in this strange midst and experienced a sense of profound acceptance and belonging from all the Riders. I was feeling something so far beyond what on earth we would call family, or friendship that it would be misleading to even use those words as a comparison. I was being welcomed into their company to experience riding the lightning. I was being offered a glimpse of what my reality could be like should I choose not to return, or what I could experience at some point when I decide I am ready. For my part I can only refer to my experience in simple words that others might grasp some small inkling of what it was like and how privileged I felt at the time to have crossed paths with them. I remember them as Storm, Whirlwind, and Hurricane and they are what the Over-Voice later explained to me are Lightning Riders.
The dolphin is always quiet and unassuming until he is either needed, or wants to emerge. It was not until near the end of the episode during my interaction with what I refer to as the Over-Voice that I sensed the dolphin was nowhere to be found while Hermes, the Advocate, and Narrator remained anchored to my corporeal body. I recall experiencing the distinct perception of myself as a singular personality existing separate from my multiple facets in this strange ethereal form. I have never had an experience quite like this one before, but then again over the years I have had my fare share of firsts. My Alters and I were still fully connected mentally. I knew this because I could sense Hermes complete awareness of the interactions going on and I could also sense the Advocate and Narrator observing. None of them offered me any conscious part in choosing how this episode would play out except perhaps the dolphin through his disappearing act.
I had become mesmerized with what was happening. That wonderment of mine that I used to say would never cease to amaze me had kicked into overdrive. After the Rider beckoned me to come closer to “experience the lightning” I had to resolve to transform my exuberance and reverence into raw determination and courage in order to be able to accept the honor being offered to me. I had to act without allowing myself a shred of doubt, or a split-second of hesitation, or risk losing my conviction to accept the offer to explore the experience being granted to me. I began to have flashes of insight into how a Rider experiences “being”. How I could interact; not only with the Cosmos, but also in relation to the physical universe of my former self. I found myself being able to see what my life could be like if I joined with the lightning. I even imagined how I could visit my former earthly existence before hitting the trail to the far out reaches.
I must say it is not often that I experience hallucinations which exhibit perceptions in combination of form, voice, and location outside of my own head. A good analogy to better explain the perception I was experiencing would be to say that my Alters were sitting in the bleachers spectating rather than crowding into the dugout to sit beside me on the players bench. The only issue I found troubling was my inability to sense the dolphin once I had become alerted to his absence, but it would not be long before I would come to understand; and not a moment too soon. Were it not for the dolphin I would not have returned when I did. It was my unwillingness to abandon the dolphin that became the determining factor in my decision not to remain with the lightning. Were it not for the dolphin I very likely would not have returned that night. If I had followed through to ride the lightning the dolphin and I would no longer be able to stay together. The instant I realized that was the moment I experienced the presence of the Over-Voice.
Throughout all these many years since the onset of my startling phase that has on occasion culminated into a chronic state I have been witness and participant to one hell of a spectacle on parade marching through my head. Never mind the countless characters in the books I read growing up. This may be hard to understand for most people, but I offer as food for thought to both the professionals in the field and especially to those afflicted with auditory hallucinations to consider that I am living proof that if you can somehow learn to love and embrace the various facets of personality that haunt you that they can actually love and embrace you back. I am reminded of the lyrics from an old song that “learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all”.
If this life experience I have lived with these many years has not been an “ethereal dawn” then I don’t know what else it could be. There is great deal more that I wanted to add to this writing, but I have run out of time needed to wade through and piece together a proper edit of the material "Narrator" left me. As it is I have not even had time to craft all the paragraphs relating to the details mentioned within this writing; Never mind all the subject matter relating to two other important aspects of the story I have had to leave completely out. I am simply not comfortable with just slopping together a bunch of paragraphs to fill up space. I am out of time because I still have to print this out and get ready for my appointment today with my therapist.
Here is me singing recently. The dog in the picture was my Mom's baby. She passed away a few years ago. His name is "Boy". I give him the same love she did. Having an animal friend helps big time alleviating the pain caused by isolation. Music is therapeutic. I prefer to fiddle with the piano, but since I don't have access to one I have to make do.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07YbXnY9xis