Condoms Are cheaper Than Child Support

Condoms Are Cheaper

Than Child Support

&

Other Obvious Truths We Overlook

When Creating our Reality

Written by Christy Gaynell

Illustrations by Javyn M Booth

Edited By Stacey-Jocelyne Lewis

Published by Thompson Publishing

Copyright 2012 Christy Gaynell

Smashwords Edition

Smashwords Edition, Licensing Notes

Names and Identifying characteristics of people in the book have been changed to protect the privacy of the individuals

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of the author or publisher. Printed in the United States of America. For information address Thompson Publishing, 7 Regina Blvd. Beverly Hills, Fl 34465.

Table of Contents

Part 1

Obvious Truths About Life

Chapter 1. Healing Happens at the Hurt

Chapter 2. No One Can Make You Happy if you’re not

Chapter 3. Condoms are Cheaper Than Child Support

Chapter 4. The Golden Rule

Chapter 5. Figure Out Why You’re Hungry before You Eat

Chapter 6. You Have Power, Use It

Part 2

Obvious Truths About Relationships

Chapter 7. You Attract What You Are, So Be Yourself

Chapter 8. If You Want To Know How He Feels About You, Ask Him…Then Listen

Chapter 9. If She’s Asking For Chocolate, Don’t Give Her Peanut Butter

Chapter 10. If You Want to Spend More Time With Him, Don’t Buy Him a Play-Station

Chapter 11. Don’t Ask Questions You Don’t Want The Answer To

Chapter 12. Happily Ever After Doesn’t Just Happen

Part 3

Obvious Truths About Parenting

Chapter 13. If the Child is Quiet, Leave the Cornflakes on the Floor

Chapter 14. If I Can’t Sleep Nobody Can (Be More Selfish)

Chapter 15. Do Not Make Idle Threats

Chapter 16. If You Lock the Dog in the Room, Your Whole House Will Stink

Chapter 17. If You’re Going to Lie, Lie About Your Future

Chapter 18. Use Your Words

Part 4

Obvious Truths About Work

Chapter 19. We Love What We Serve

Chapter 20. Follow Your Inspiration, Not Your Education

Chapter 21. Mirror, Mirror

Chapter 22. If You’re Doing Something You Don’t Enjoy, STOP

Chapter 23. Focus on the Object of Your Desire

Chapter 24. The Three Words to Not Use, and the Two We Should

Chapter 25. Live Your Story

Part 1

Obvious Truths About Life

"Life is an opportunity, benefit from it.

Life is beauty, admire it.

Life is a dream, realize it.

Life is a challenge, meet it.

Life is a duty, complete it.

Life is a game, play it.

Life is a promise, fulfill it.

Life is sorrow, overcome it.

Life is a song, sing it.

Life is a struggle, accept it.

Life is a tragedy, confront it.

Life is an adventure, dare it.

Life is luck, make it.

Life is too precious, do not destroy it.

Life is life, fight for it."

― Mother Teresa

Chapter 1

Healing Happens at the Hurt

As an alternate title for this chapter I considered using "You can't heal your heart by massaging your vagina." I still think that it may have been more appropriate. I find that with external injuries like cuts, and sprains, we go to the source to treat the injury with pain cream, and a bandage, protecting, and supporting the wound while it heals. Though for some reason, we do not follow the same logic when it comes to internal injuries like a hurting heart, a fractured mind, or a broken spirit.

We invest our hearts in relationships where they end up getting mistreated, or broken; and then we try to heal them by getting drunk or high and having sex at random. The problem with this particular solution is that it serves only to compound the problem. Instead of healing our heart, we end up scarring our soul. Sure, for the moment it feels better because we have numbed the pain and diverted our attention away from its source. But the only way to truly heal is to focus our attention on the area that has been damaged.

When my children were little and they sustained injuries of a physical nature, they would bring their wound to me, and display it with the request that I make them feel better. I would assess the extent of the damage and come up with an appropriate remedy to take the pain away. In some cases, all they required was a little attention, in which case I could simply kiss the affected area and instantly they would feel better.

Mind you, it never helped to kiss any area other than the affected area. I know because I tried. My child would come to me with a scratch on his knee and say, Mommy, kiss it. I would kiss his elbow. That's not where it hurts, he would say to me. Mommy you have to kiss my knee. I would then kiss his finger but still he would not feel better. We could play this game for as long as it took me to kiss the injury, and the moment I did, he was convinced that the pain had subsided.

For deeper cuts, scrapes, or wounds, other things were required. Band-Aids were needed if there was blood, Neosporin for pain, alcohol or hydrogen peroxide to stave off infection, and for a major sprain or broken foot, an air boot or cast, and crutches were necessary to support the injury while it healed. In each case, it had to be applied directly to the wound because that is where the pain stems from, and where the healing takes place.

Unfortunately, in the medication age, we are not taught that our bodies heal themselves; that the drugs and medications doctors prescribe for us are useful, only in masking the symptoms while our bodies do the work. We are not taught to wait patiently for the healing process to complete itself or what to do to increase the speed of recovery. We are especially not taught how to heal emotional wounds.

So when my son got older; and his hurts were of an emotional nature and no longer a physical one, he did not know how to show me the wound and ask me to heal it. In fact, he did not even believe I could. He found himself so overwhelmed with emotional pain that he decided to alleviate it himself by replacing it with physical pain.

When he was in middle school and the girl he liked, or rather the girl he had prayed for, broke up with him, he was so overwrought that he started cutting himself. He very gently and repeatedly slid a butter knife over his arm until his brain recognized that there was a more pressing issue to deal with than his breakup and redirected its focus.

In his case, he stopped short of drawing blood, which indicated to me that his fear of doing himself more harm was greater then the emotional pain he was feeling. Additionally, the fact that he let me see his wound accidentally was indicative of his awareness that causing physical pain was only a temporary fix. He inherently knew he needed a lasting solution, and subconsciously, he hoped that I would see his pain and make it better.

I am so grateful that I was able to recognize what was going on and help him work through his heartbreak by means of compassionate conversations, and understanding. I wish that I could offer similar assistance to all of the people suffering. I know there are so many children, and young adults out there who have loving parents with busy schedules, and little awareness of what signs to look for; that is assuming the person in question displays any signs at all.

Pain, whether it is physical or emotional, is your body’s way of telling you something is wrong. It is like an alarm clock, waking you up to what is going on inside of you. The more you ignore your body’s natural alarm, the more insistent it will get. If you want to quiet the pain and make it go away permanently, you have to feel it. You have to acknowledge the pain and its purpose while resolving to not add to the injury. In many cases, this alone is enough to make the pain go away. However, there are times when a little more effort is required, as I will discuss later.

They say time heals all wounds, but the truth is time only heals the wounds that are properly set and supported. No amount of time will heal a broken limb if you don’t first push it back in place, and then tightly bandage or cast it. With emotional pain the same is true, and sometimes the waiting process feels unbearable.

Many people find emotional pain more intolerable than physical pain and would do just about anything to keep from experiencing it fully. So instead of waiting it out or actively working to heal it, we increase the number of injuries we have. Like my son, we supply our brain with any means of diversion we can think of. In his case, it was physical pain. In other cases we may divert our pain with sex, overeating, drinking alcohol, or using drugs, which impair the body.

Overeating, and drinking alcohol affect the body through weight gain and decreases in organ functionality, though they do tend to temporarily calm the mind. As long as you are using them drugs create the illusion that everything is fine, but when they start wearing off, the sensation of pain is so greatly magnified, you feel compelled to immediately return to the bliss of being high. Certain substances have been known to fracture the mind, in some cases permanently, and they can be very addictive.

Sex is different in that it affects the soul. A lot of people think sex is a purely physical act; when they can’t see any physical manifestation of the harm that comes from sex they think they are not causing any harm. This could not be farther from the truth. In fact the harm you do is far greater, because sex is not just a physical act, but also a spiritual one. And every time you have sex that is not in line with your spirit, you cause a little damage to your spirit and create a small scar on your soul.

You cannot see this occur anymore than you can see the existence of your spirit or your soul. However, it is reflected in your eyes if you look deep enough, in your behavior, and in your rapidly shifting perceptions on life, love, and happiness.

A broken spirit causes everything in life to hold less and less meaning until nothing seems to have any meaning at all. Sex becomes just an act to take the edge off, a means of scratching an itch, or getting a fix. It is no longer the bonding experience it was designed to be. The connection becomes blocked, and it fails to serve the purpose of uniting two spiritual beings together to form one soul.

All of these acts slow down the healing process. They pull the healing energy away from the original wound, in order to repair all of the new injuries being created by this destructive behavior. If this goes on too long, the end result is at least one open wound that never heals properly. Over time you forget the original source, or cause of the pain, making it much harder to completely heal.

We become so damaged that we begin to no longer even see healing as an option. We succumb to our addictions in whatever form they take until they no longer do the trick. Then we search for something stronger until there’s nothing more to find. We do all of this because no one told us that the key to our recovery is in our very own mind. The solution to every problem, the secret to healing every hurt, lives inside of our mind and beats inside of our heart.

Sadly, when it's the heart that needs the healing, we want the beating to stop. We don't even care if that means the breathing will stop.

It is imperative in healing the heart to focus our attention on the sources of our emotional pain, and treat our aching heart with the same level of care, and attention we would give to broken bones or torn ligaments. We must guard our heart, and shift it out of harm’s way; protect and nurture it taking care to massage, pamper, and fill it with the love it feels it is missing; then our heart can heal properly without the hole, and without the loss of our precious soul.

These words are not intended as medical advice or as a substitute for a physician’s instructions. However, my favorite methods for treating emotional pain, are crying, laughing, and Inner Smile Meditation.

According to The Meditation Bible, Inner Smile Meditation promotes awareness of your internal body and organs, prevents illness, and promotes healing. The practice basically encourages you to smile into every gland and organ in your body, including the heart, and offer thanks for the work it does or use your smile to soften any tension found internally.

Talking to your body also helps to reduce pain release stress and assist in the healing process. Asking the aching or inflamed areas what is wrong or what it wants is extremely beneficial; if you listen closely, it will tell you exactly what you need for optimal health. Acknowledge the cause of any blocks or problems, and declare your intentions to make it right; often this helps relieve pain almost immediately. For God fearing people, prayer works wonders as well.

I think the most important thing to remember is the heart is an organ that is also a muscle, which can be pulled, torn, injured, or broken. When this happens, it requires time and patience to heal just like any other muscle. You need to baby it, not abuse it, and acknowledge it, not deny it. The more time and attention you give your heart, the healthier, and better equipped it will be to handle the next opportunity it is given to love.

Action Plan: For Healing the Heart, Spirit, and Mind

Laugh, and cry, out loud, and with abandon, as often as you can. Laugh until you cry, and cry until you laugh. Not only is it a cathartic release, but it may also help in the prevention of cancer.

Go for walks in nature, and observe its magnificence. Seeing the perfection in nature helps us to see the perfection in ourselves.

Read inspired writings. Sometimes when we can’t hear spirit, or feel inspired, we can benefit from reading the work of someone who could.

Write a journal chronicling how you feel, and why you feel that way. You will recognize the lasting benefits of this when you go back years later, and read what you wrote, only to realize it is a less enlightened version of your current perspective.

Talk. Put the pain into words, and push the words out of your mouth, and into the ears of anyone who will listen without bias, or judgment. If you don’t know such a person, then see a therapist or call a help hotline if you can’t afford professional help. By all means, find a way to express what you feel. The more ways you can find to push the hurt out, the less damage it will do to you inside.

Last but not least, do one meaningful thing for yourself every week. It could be a hot bath or a spa day, as long as in doing so, you are declaring to yourself that you are worthy.

Chapter 2

No One Can Make You Happy If You’re Not

Happiness for me was sitting on the front porch of a basement apartment in Bequia, St. Vincent & the Grenadines. The apartment overlooked the ocean and the man with whom I was in love was sitting near enough to touch. In that instant, I felt this sensational joy, and I immediately recognized it. I smiled to myself knowingly, and in the very next moment, I judged it. How can I be so happy when my children aren't here with me?

I examined my happiness, after which I questioned my judgment until finally I accepted it. There was no getting around the truth; I was genuinely, indubitably happy. My heart was filled with joy, my mind was free of fear, and in that moment there was nowhere else I would have preferred to be.

Those periods of unequivocal bliss made it well worth the hell I went through to get there. The night before I was supposed to leave for my trip, I had a huge fight with my stepfather, who had only just learned of my plans to return to the islands and decided that he didn't want me to go. In an attempt to stop me, he told me I was not permitted to stay at the hotel he owned.

I felt hurt. I had just spent the entire season prior living in the hotel and working to help build up the business out of a desire to see my parents succeed with their health intact. And now I was being forbidden to stay there.

It was distressing, but it was not the first time I had found myself on a flight to a foreign country with no idea where I would stay upon arrival. I had very little money and a great deal of faith, which I must say, served me very well.

When I arrived in St. Vincent, I asked a taxi driver if he knew of a reasonable place for rent by the night. Fortunately for me, he had an uncle with space available. He drove me to the house, and I was able to negotiate a price within my budget to rent for the night. I needed to regroup and figure out what I was going to do about housing for the rest of the month. That night I tossed and turned until all of the stress was released into the bed. I awoke hopeful and positive it would all work out for the best.

Still it took a lot of deep breaths, and a few short prayers, to help me build up enough courage to call the person I was flying there to meet, and tell him what was going on. He told me not to worry; he would work something out. Suddenly I felt a wave of relief wash over me.

Soon after I hung up with him, my mother called to tell me she had arranged a room for me, if I needed it. I was grateful for her assistance, but I was much more delighted by the fact that the man I was going to meet was taking care of it.

In all of my stress, worry, and fear, I missed the first ferry and ended up spend the day joyously exploring the island of St Vincent before catching the evening boat to Bequia.

I walked off the ship to see him standing there waiting for me, and I knew everything was going to be fine. What I could not have anticipated, though, was just how well he would care for me. Being in his presence and in his arms allowed me