Book Of Kassandra (or, Loh! She doth fleximitise me)

For millennia, humankind have looked on enviously at their agility saturated apey cousins. The way they can touch their grippy toes without bending their knees or making that obligatory groan even though you’re in your twenties. We could only dream.

But Loh! There existeth a woman so graceful and heavenly that she hath uploadeth free yoga on YouTube.

This gift of a soul is Kassandra. Her pulpit? ‘Yoga with Kassandra’. Her diocese? YouTube.

I do hope my lack of any kind of knowledge of the admin and management structures of the church aren’t coming through…

Whatever your mood (foul most likely), Kassandra has got you covered!

Want to lie on the floor with a blanket and pillows but it’s exercise? Want to break your toes whilst repeating affirmations? Want to do so much downward facing dog ass in the air that your neighbours get you done for indecent exposure? Yoga with Kassandra.

Testify! Maybe three years ago I was just another leper of biblical fame. Sure, I was thin, tanned, youthful and downright sexy as fuck but inside I carried a festering knowing. I was stiff as a board.

Any unlucky sailor on shore leave who ran into me at the docks spent his next god knows how long at sea feeling very much cheated. I could barely get on all fours and forget about “arch your back babe” – it wasn’t happening.

This was surely the work of the devil! A bangable but boring bending boy?! A fuckable fella frightened of fracturing?

But then, like a burning bush of maybe a wet basket, Kassandra called to me.

I bean warrior twoing and posing like a giant child. I catted. I cowed.

And behold! I am now a moderately mobile man!

And so I spread the good news to you. Kassandra has uploaded! Go and check her out, it’s awesome fun and genuinely soooo good for you in every way.

I’m in no way affiliated with ‘Yoga with Kassandra’ nor am I advertising her for my own gain. The above has been purely my own ideas and experiences.

Fair Weather Spinster

I’m a lot to deal with and seriously not an obvious choice for a husband. There I said it.

It’s so true though. If you’ve read any of my other posts you’ll be getting a picture of just how potentially batshit I am.

Now, sometimes this “batshitness” I referenced can masquerade as quirky and that can be cute I suppose but what I can’t hide is the fact that I’m pretty annoying. I get on my own nerves regularly and find myself saying aloud “Oh for fuck sake, what is actually wrong with you?!” whilst late and looking for my car keys YET AGAIN.

Why oh why don’t you just put them on the hook? Oh yeah because that would be a sensible place you freaking moron. Oh right yeah good one; of course they’re in your bed, why wouldn’t you put them there?!

Anyway. This was all fine because my older sister was massively single and had no perceivable romantic dalliance on her horizon in the slightest. Thank goodness! We could be spinsters together; both sharing the burden of those horrendous “Got a boyfriend yet?” questions or, as a neighbour put it, “Got any add ons?”.

Well the bitch has sold me down the river big time by meeting and falling head over heels in love with him. Like he’s all that with his lovely personality and open mindedness. Waltzing into our lives with his great manners and his witty stories. Pfft. What a loser.

Jealous? Am I jealous?! Christ no.

I’m livid.

Now it is I who has to bare the whole entire brunt of the shame of being a singleton and fast approaching 30.

It really does seem to bother some people and way more than it does me! I really can’t be doing with online dating or apps or (heaven forbid) putting myself out there more.

Unless a guy is literally going to land on my doorstep then I just don’t think I can be dealing with all the drama of it. I barely reply to messages from my friends and family so bugger me if I’m going to remember to check my “Bumble” or “Hinge” every five minutes.

So I’m asking you, reader, to organise a man to arrive on my doorstep please and or organise the return to singlehood for my fair weather spinster sister.

Step One . I Am Powerless

This blog post contains information regarding drug use, addiction, working with deities and may well be triggering or infuriating for some!

I’ve always felt that there was a greater power in this world. Some kind of sentient presence that was listening and responding in its own way; often not in ways we’d expect or even notice but there all the same.

Being raised as a “casual Christian”, this presence was, to me, God. Yahweh, Elohim, Adonai etc. I only learnt of the names of God through practising the lesser banishing ritual of the pentagram!

I felt a something between myself and God but it wasn’t anything particularly tangible or able to be verbalised coherently. It was more of a hoping within myself that he might exist.

And so, to be able to adhere to the first step towards sobriety that states: “We admitted we errr powerless over our addiction,” and to be able to surrender completely to God needed some consideration.

I was more than happy to admit my powerlessness. “I admit that my life becomes unmanageable when I try to control it. The true meaning of powerlessness.”. But I couldn’t see myself loving this slightly esoteric life alongside a Christian god.

My understanding of divinity drifts like tectonic plates grinding and rubbing and sliding over and under and against and apart. Always in a state of flux. However, one concept, one tiny small spark has always smouldered away inside me. There IS a God of some sort and I sense “it” as a motherly energy.

I won’t now go on about my encounters or “signs” experienced but ultimately know that for many reasons I was led to calling this energy Isis.

When I prayed and reflected and surrendered my control over the addiction I am so powerless against to Isis, knowing that all will be right if I surrender to her will; a red kite flew above me. I recommend you research the association between Isis and a red kite to fully appreciate this.

The universe is listening to you and is ready and willing to respond so long as you are ready and willing to experience that.

I’m so incredibly grateful to the deities I understand in my life. Isis has smiled upon my willingness to choose a better and brighter life and when things are challenging, I remember that she is in charge of my addiction now. I cannot be trusted to take control for I am powerless.

Step two requires me to cement my absolute knowing of the divine and this is something that I already know will prove to be seismic.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference, living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; taking this world as it is and not as I would have it; trusting that You will make all things right if I surrender to Your will.

Accidental Astral Projection and Does My Spirit Guide Have Great Banter?

It’s another one of those posts.

I’d like to point out that, seeing as I did confess to an addictive personality, that at the time of writing this I am sober as a judge. Minus like two glasses of wine but believe me; that’s not the issue.

For the last year, the notion of a spirit guide has both captivated and cramped my mind. I can’t begin to tell you how frustrating it is to read things that say, “Your spirit guide is trying to communicate with you too..,” as if it’s this endless tragic love story of two ships passing in the night.

I’d try so many different ways to really connect to this, as I imagined it, incredible energy that would send sensations all over my body. I expected my eyes would bulge, my throat would constrict and I was fully up for the possibility of wetting myself. I’d likely see kaleidoscopic mandalas and hear ethereal whispering.

Well, as so many other people will say, “spirit is very subtle,”. It’s never going to be this siren that goes off. It’s a silent exhalation of breath amongst a storm with a name like Brian or Phil.

In the back of my mind, I told myself that if I were to be feeding the old addiction monster; my spirit guide would never be able to communicate in the ways I want. I bound myself tighter and tighter in this belief to the point where I probably made it so.

The second then that I declared myself no longer doing horrible things, I fully expected a full body manifesting angel to be before me with cake and a card to celebrate me. Nope.

What I did experience instead were “buzzings”. These weird sensations similar to what a circuit might feel when it suddenly shorts. A fizz of sensation in my entire body.

I now believe this to be my energy trying to sit comfortably around me and struggling as my whole system tried to shift back to working like a “normal” person. It couldn’t attune to my inner discomfort perhaps and instead shot out of me? I don’t know.

Because of these buzzings, I popped out of my body A LOT. Feeling exhausted as I was no longer running on the bad stuff, I spent a lot of time lounging on my bed. My whole body would be being pushed and pulled energetically. Rushes and waves and spins and bursts of sensation.

Before I knew it, I’d be floating up and out and down on to my bedroom floor. Blind but fully aware. I felt the carpet of my bedroom beneath my hands. I could lift myself up off of the floor and, after some initial challenge, speak and hear myself speaking out loud.

I remembered this audiobook I listened to and how the author describes demanding “Clarity now,” aloud to trigger improved astral senses. I did this and then panicked about what I might see so plunged back in to my physical body.

Another time, I did the same and managed to see somewhat. I also flew above a forest and encountered two rather unscrupulous chaps. On all occasions though, ultimately my own fear would snap me back.

I want to stress that, for me, astral projection feels just as real as being in your normal life. There was no difference bar I couldn’t see. Like me being blind (yet conscious of the fact I’d just floated out of my body like a leaf) in my day to day life. It’s not the same as a lucid dream at all.

So that was cool as fuck.

Now the spirit guide. So, I’m super relaxed and not thinking about how relaxed I was. I was that relaxed that I wasn’t even conscious of how relaxed I was. You get what I’m saying? It’s that knowing and feeling of relaxation rather than that repeated statement of thought, “Ahhh, I can relax for a bit now. How lovely,”.

In this state, I decided to attune to spirits by simply listening out for them!

An incredible pressure surrounded me and I saw a slight blue flash. Then the pictures came.

I’ll respect the identify of my spirit guide for now but I know that he was a pretty witty spirit! The sudden responses that came like thoughts to me were honestly proper banter. It was beyond what I would expect a spirit to be like and it was way funnier than I could ever hope to be.

The overall feeling though was joyful and uplifting. It felt very much like this was an important being to know and be speaking to.

And so, I encourage you to keep trying if you haven’t yet met your own. Absolutely don’t think that I or anyone else is an expert on YOUR spirit skills and YOUR spirit guide. You’re the fountain of allI knowledge about your own spirituality – you’ll know what to do always.

12 Steps

At this stage with all my many ones of readers, I feel it appropriate to fully lay my cards (tarot of course) upon the table.

I am a recovering addict.

For years and years I’ve been unable to spend any length of time without sating my immensely powerful addiction. However, I’m approaching things differently this time and at time of writing this, I haven’t indulged my parasitic pangs of wanting for 8 days. Yes, it’s early still.

My uncle was an addict and he muddled and withered and oozed out of this world at the age of 53 in 2022. I vowed to see this as a wake up call and change my ways so as to avoid the same fate but that didn’t last longer than a few hours.

I began to think about the missed opportunities for my uncle and the fact that he was never able to find the fraction of him that wanted to get help. He never really admitted he had a problem.

I, though, did find a large fraction of me that did want out of that monotony. I also found the 12 steps thanks to google. It was a good day.

And so I am on step one.

What Do You Say When Someone Shows You Their Sex Dungeon?

One of life’s unanswerable questions and yet one that I came face to face with only a few weeks ago. Disclaimer: this story includes references to drugs, sex and a certain someone with a messiah complex.

As a gay guy with a pulse (although if I were without one probably wouldn’t stop some guys), I’m no stranger to perverts. I jest yet there do seem to be a lot of them around.

Since I started trying to live my life more in line with my “soul” or whatever you may want to call it, I’ve inadvertently given up sex. No intentional and perhaps I’m just allowing my ego to defend myself here by blaming my clear lack of sex appeal on my spiritual awakening. Hmm.

So anyway, I’m unsexy now. I used to be what one might call a complete fuckbunny. I’d literally hop from one guy to the other feeling all cute and valued because someone wanted to bone me. Sad where I used to find my worth but true.

So now I am a bit of a shocking prude. Shagging used to be my favourite topic of conversation but now I feel uncomfortable hearing about my friends bloody anus (genuine anecdote I was blessed with) or how the spare room renovation at my friend with the messiah complex’s house is evolving in to a rather unusual use of space.

Arriving at my friend- who-thinks-he’s-Jesus’ house, the atmosphere was a little tense. See, if you hadn’t gathered already, I find him to be the absolute source for spiritual narcissism. In fact, at one point he was claiming to be some kind of archangel and apologised to me (genuinely true) for the fact that the feathers in my garden were due to him malting.

I question his mental health and his alleged heavy drug usage.

So it’s awkward as fuck. He then breaks the ice by showing me the aforementioned spare room (a lovely room which he used to refer to as my room as I would stay there -drunk- often). Well, he called it a sex dungeon and I pretty much had an automatic OBE there and then.

Peering round the door, I was presented with a rather empty (and surprisingly light and airy) space with a pommel horse positioned perfectly in the centre. A selection of pencil sketched nudes hung proudly on the walls and what appeared to be a leash was neatly placed in the far corner.

The pommel horse threw me, I won’t lie.

The only thing I could think of to say was “Did you get this on Amazon?”

Spiritsplaining (verb. To explain someone else’s spiritual experiences to them)

Spiritual narcissism. Wow is it rife! Take an I’ll-advised detour across the many spiritual videos on YouTube and you’ll soon see what I mean.

Living in line with your spirit means trying to allow the ego to die. Now, this is really no easy feat and believe me – I’m 70% ego, 28% caffeine and 2 % spirit. But I learnt the hard way not to take everything someone with a good camera and awesome eyebrows says as gospel.

When I (I really feel like a twat saying this) began experiencing things which signalled the start of my spiritual awakening (yep. Test), I had no idea what these experiences meant. I was seeing wobbly and sparkly air, hearing bizarre ringing, feeling like a jelly in my own body and pretty much tripping balls. YouTube gurus explained these things in so many different ways and yet not one of them said to simply experience these sensations and not immediately try to explain them. That’s the best advise I have ever received “allow yourself to experience without questioning”.

Disastrously, I sought the wisdom of some random person claiming to be some kind of divine messenger whilst I was reaching out to my spirit guides. Quick side note – I’m still not certain about what I think about the idea of spirit guides. I had had a couple of experiences during meditation where I felt that I’d encountered “something”. Initially it was a sudden and random blazing white light that called itself Amy. I shared this with the aforementioned divine douchebag and he told me “Nope.” And so I believed him and that was that. No more Amy.

Next, I literally saw (in my imagination) and heard (with my real ears) a woman who called herself Amina. She was elderly and had great banter. She wanted to sit down and was telling me to move over on my bed so she could sit with me. Now, did she give me any actionable advice? No. Did she make me feel very happy in that moment? Absolutely.

Again, I told another divine dickhead about her and they told me that in fact her name was Mina and she a black woman from West Africa who (according to the person who was spiritsplaining) was owned as a slave by a family member of mine many many years ago. The divine dickhead came up with this whole story and, at the time, it was convincing. I was new and it was possible I was wrong.

This led to me trying to connect to the new Amina – Mina. I never could though. She didn’t feel like a spirit I could connect with. I didn’t feel that she was my guide.

The outcome of all this is that I’m now even further away from meeting my spirit guides than j ever was. The influence of other people’s ideas of what my spirit guide should be like have created enormous defensive walls around the true identity of them. Now, do I even think they are a genuine thing? These people who speak so clearly and receive messages and even see their own guides; are they just mentally ill or telling lies?

The search continues!

Whatever happens along your journey, it is your journey. Anything you hear, read or are just told by someone else is potentially bullshit and spiritsplaining driven by ego. If it feels helpful and true to your own experience then consider it. Otherwise, thank them and chuck that chunk of nonsense out of your head for good.