Saturday, August 25, 2012
Saturday, August 11, 2012
“I remember being murdered. I died . . . a terrifying, violent death. I shall never forget it."
Imagine the love of your many lives has reincarnated with you, but so has your killer. Emily flips a switch to see bloody bandages on his hands and a face raw with pain. Jason’s mask is off. Cold, gut fear grips her as black holes in a skull where his eyes once were burn into Emily’s brain the image of her own broken, dying body slipping off jagged rocks into water. She feels herself watching from high on a cliff, as the waves below swallow the hem of a bloody dress. At high tide, she is washed out to sea. Never to see her lover's eyes again? I’m going to die again. Only this time, Jason is going to kill me himself.
Friday, August 10, 2012
Here is the new back cover copy:
WILL THEY BE RIPPED APART AGAIN?
Imagine the people who inhabit your world are back from a past life in Oregon to resolve unfinished business. Imagine your nemesis has reincarnated with you. Newspaper co-owner Emily Mason-Wohl does not realize the short story she has written is true. Her disturbing first graf reads, "I remember being murdered. I died in 1865, a terrifying, violent death. I shall never forget it." Thirty-four-year-old Emily has written about Brenda, who was murdered by her husband's lover. Chapter two picks up the present day story, set in 1978, and this time the action is played out against a Florida background. Water's Edge is under seige by a psuedo-religious cult, which is decimating the tax base--and worse, much much worse. However, the plot is almost secondary to the relationships between Emily and Alessio, the one true love of her many lives; also Emily and City Prosecutor Marta Miller, formerly a beloved aunt, now her closest friend. They work together to destroy the cult. Their passion for justice equals Emily’s passion for Alessio, and propels the plot, as together they help to destroy the cult. The inner lives of the characters, their psychological growth (and periods of regression) attainment of insights, and Emily's realizations of truth about who they all were before, compel the reader to keep turning pages, to a surprise climax and a satisfying ending.
Sunday, July 29, 2012
LOVE OF MY LIVES, a first novel, by lin cochran
I REMEMBER BEING MURDERED. I died in 1865, a terrifying violent death. I shall never forget it.
Chapter One is a first-person short story written by Emily Mason-Wohl, the protaganist, a 34-year-old editorial writer and co-owner of the Water's Edge Daily News. She writes about a past life where she lived and died in Chetco, Oregon, a town now known as Brookings, Oregon.
Chapter Two begins the present day story, set in 1978-79, in an imaginary town on the Sun Coast of Florida, that has been invaded by a psuedo-religious cult, headed up by a television evangelist, which is buying up many of the buildings in the city of Water's Edge, decimating the tax base. A large hotel is being used by the cult as headquarters, but a farm north of Water's Edge masquerades an assisted living facility for church members. In reality the farm is a cover for the hideous practice of training children to be sold as sex slaves in foreign countries. However, the plot is almost background to the second-level story, which is the relationships between Emily and Armand, a music critic for another newspaper, and Emily and Marta, the City Prosecutor for Water's Edge. This is where the real action takes place. The inner lives of the characters, their psychological growth (and periods of regression) attainment of insights, and Emily's realizations of truth about who they all were before. It is contemporary, psychological fiction, filled with romance, sex, and enough suspense to keep the reader turning pages.
APPEARING ON AMAZON SOON.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
The purpose of this blog is to help myself get to the spiritual roots of my problems with food. If it helps someone else along the way, fine.
When I still had one hundred pounds to lose, I thought if I could just stick to a diet everything else in my whole entire life would be okay. The weight would come off and all my problems would be solved.
After my son ended his life on March 4, 2008, I found out life isn't about dieting. It is not about losing weight. Numbers on a scale do not mean a thing, except for the meaning we assign to them. Percentages of body fat have nothing to do with who we are or what we are trying to accomplish.
No, the true challenge of carrying around too much fat is not visible on a scale. For some of us, the true challenge of obesity is spiritual. I've learned that sticking to a diet does not make everything alright. But neither does not sticking to a diet. Eating correctly isn't the answer but neither is eating wrongly. Since Tony died I have been mostly eating wrongly. I've gained a lot of weight back. I had already gained but now I've gained more. I'll tell you how much later. I am not living the life Tony wanted for me. I am hurting myself as well as my two remaining sons and other loved ones.
See http://linonlife.googlepages.com/linonlife then hit your Back Button and come back here.
(This blog is not going to be about Tony's death. Suffice it to say that for a moment he took his eyes off the Light and the Darkness swallowed him. Now I'm trying to prevent the Darkness from swallowing me. I will write about Tony when I am able. Later, I will share his journal pages in the hope of helping someone else. If you have lost a loved one to suicide, go to http://www.forum.forsuicidesurvivors.com/.)
Meanwhile, life isn't about dieting. Don't make it about food.
First, let me make it clear that I am not a nutritionist. I have no medical degrees of any kind. I have, however worked with the principles of transformative consciousness in my own life for more than 30 years. And for several years I wrote a weight-control column called "Countdown" for a newspaper in Florida, the now defunct Clearwater Sun. Even then, consciousness fascinated me. Pioneers of consciousness are discovering that every cell in our bodies hold or consist of consciousness. Mind resides within each cell.
Fat cells have consciousness. They have minds of their own! They want to live and thrive! They want to have life and to hell with what we want! How do I get my fat cells to cooperate?
Though 10,000 diet plans reside in the collective American consciousness, we are fatter than ever. It is human nature. According to the apostle Paul, we do the things we don't want to do and don't do the things we do want to do. We blame these shortcomings on a weak will, or the subconscious mind. But the truth is, our fat cells are working against us.
For the sake of full disclosure, in 2003 I rewrote my first book, Beyond Dieting. It was first published by A.R.E Press, Virginia Beach, VA, 25 years ago in 1983. It was based on the work of Edgar Cayce and my respect grows daily for the work Edgar Cayce did, as other organizations such as The Institute of Noetic Sciences sponsor programs which confirm how far ahead of his time Cayce was. And in the 25 years since Beyond Dieting was first published, all manner of other sciences have also confirmed the validity of the information that came through Edgar Cayce while he was in a trance state, reading for people who had asked for his help. Much of the information I want to share in this blog comes from that book, which is probably no longer available. So I am not selling books. I am reworking and sharing information that helped me before and I pray will help me again so that I don't eat my way into oblivion because of my son's suicide.
So, back to the fat cells that are working against us. These cells may have been born out of thoughts formed by gluttony. We'll talk more about gluttony later. For now, consider this: A person will eat what his consciousness allows. In some parts of the world people eat dogs, cats, and roadkill. Some perfectly civilized people eat cows, while others worship them. What we eat depends on how we feel about it. My fat cells feel just fine about eating ice cream by the gallon. But at least a couple of brain cells know better, or I'd weigh 400 pounds.
If Life isn't about dieting and food, what is it about?
I'll have to get back to you on that.
Seriously, up until six months ago, when Tony killed himself, I thought I knew what life was about. I thought it was about "being about the Father's business." Granted, the "Father's business" takes many shapes and forms. How do I know I am about my Father's business? My soul expresses joy.
Well, I was right. Today, for about two seconds, I felt joy. A tiny flash of joy and hope crossed my mind. Why? Because today I took the first step back to the life Tony wanted me to live - this blog is part of it. If what I write helps someone, I am about my Father's business. When the food I eat nourishes my body and satisfies my soul as it did today, I am about the Father's business. When my actions are in sync with my desires, I am about the Father's business. And joy is the tip off.
Am I still in pain over losing Tony? Of course. That will probably never end. But as I said in one of my other books, Spiritual Secrets of Learning to Love, A.R.E. Press, 1994 (out of print), pain and joy are two halves of the same whole.
Today I meditated for the first time in a long while. I have been meditating off and on for 36 years. Meditation affects how we perceive and experience life. Mental perception and soul experience work together to form our feelings about our surroundings, our circumstances and the lives we are living. This is why some poor people do not know they are poor, and some rich people do not know they are rich. The same can be said about fat people and thin people. Distorted body images prevent us from seeing the truth about ourselves. Meditation helps clean out the subconscious mind, where we store patterns, addictions, habits, memories and ego. The subconscious mind is where the battle between spirit and flesh is fought. The subconscious mind does not want to relinquish its authority, and it does not surrender without a fight. However, even though the subconscious mind does not always have our best interests at heart, it can learn new responses through meditation.
I know all this. Meditation cuts through the subconscious clutter to the soul mind. We can teach the soul mind and the physical mind to cooperate with each other. When they gang up, so to speak, on the critters that live in the dark, dank dungeons of the subconscious, the subconscious has to surrender. Majority rules. (Now, please don't get hung up on which level of mind is named what. Different disciplines assign different names to the levels of mind.) But what I know and what I do are two different things.
I need to review. There are four levels of Mind:
1) Physical Mind - the one you are reading this with.
2) Subconscious Mind - the one nagging you to go eat a cookie.
3) Soul Mind - the one that lives on after we are dead and gone from this planet, and it will help you now to resist that cookie if you ask. This is where free will lives.
4) The fourth level of Mind is known by many names: Spiritual Mind, superconscious collection of all knowledge, the collective unconscious, the mind of God, the Divide, the Door, the Way, the I AM. This level of Mind does not give a rip whether or not you eat the cookie. It isn't about cookies. This goes waaay beyond cookies. It is about Oneness with Love (a/k/a the Father's business).
More on the Soul Mind
Please pay attention. This is important because this is where we make choices about what to eat. The soul mind, being the seat of free will, chooses not only the foods we eat, but whether those choices are guided by Spirit or the latest food fad. The soul mind is selective. It can choose between good and evil. It can move toward or away from its Creator. It can opt for life or death. It can choose to sleep. It dreams. It can choose to die. It can be banished. It can banish itself. It can even be blotted out forever. The soul mind does not maintain its individuality eternally unless it chooses to. My physical mind is not running the show. The soul mind is in charge. It very well could be running amok, or even asleep.
What about Spirit, spirit, and soul?
I need to say this, even though it is difficult to understand. It underlies many of our behaviours. Your soul's mind and mine are animated by spirit, and this spirit too is known by many confusing names: Universal Soul, Soul-of-the-Soul, Oversoul, Infinite Energy, the Collective Soul, the First Cause. Spirit and soul are different. In the same way an apple's seed is distinct from its peel, spirit is distinct from soul. And Spirit with a big S is different from spirit with a little s. First, there is spirit that impels all life non selectively. That spirit does not distinguish between a mosquito, a tree, and a mugger holding a knife. That spirit is the life force that flows through all things without judging whether they are good or bad. However, Spirit with a big S has been transformed by the work of Christ. We call this Spirit holy. The Holy Spirit knows us individually and lives inside us as The Comforter through the work of Jesus (John 14:16,26). The best possible outcome is for the soul mind to decide to seek guidance from the Holy Spirit. Surely the Holy Spirit holds power over my screaming fat cells. As I said, all this goes waaaay beyond cookies.
For those of us for whom food and our reactions to food have created serious physical, mental and spiritual problems, choosing the right foods symbolizes our efforts to live better lives, to be healthier people, to fulfill our purposes for being here. Dieting is not the answer. Some of our problems revolve around health; others focus more on social issues and our inability to relate to and care about other people. But all of us have souls. Some souls express joy or distress; others don't seem to care. I hope to help those in distress and in so doing to help myself. I must find the truth about why thoughts about food plague me night and day. The refusal to choose life over death carries cosmic implications. Why is my soul mind choosing death? Why is my soul mind allowing the garbage in the subconscious mind to dominate so many of my decisions? What are the metaphysics of obesity?
Why did I regain all this weight? Was it just bad choices?
When I still had one hundred pounds to lose, I thought if I could just stick to a diet everything else in my whole entire life would be okay. The weight would come off and all my problems would be solved.
After my son ended his life on March 4, 2008, I found out life isn't about dieting. It is not about losing weight. Numbers on a scale do not mean a thing, except for the meaning we assign to them. Percentages of body fat have nothing to do with who we are or what we are trying to accomplish.
No, the true challenge of carrying around too much fat is not visible on a scale. For some of us, the true challenge of obesity is spiritual. I've learned that sticking to a diet does not make everything alright. But neither does not sticking to a diet. Eating correctly isn't the answer but neither is eating wrongly. Since Tony died I have been mostly eating wrongly. I've gained a lot of weight back. I had already gained but now I've gained more. I'll tell you how much later. I am not living the life Tony wanted for me. I am hurting myself as well as my two remaining sons and other loved ones.
See http://linonlife.googlepages.com/linonlife then hit your Back Button and come back here.
(This blog is not going to be about Tony's death. Suffice it to say that for a moment he took his eyes off the Light and the Darkness swallowed him. Now I'm trying to prevent the Darkness from swallowing me. I will write about Tony when I am able. Later, I will share his journal pages in the hope of helping someone else. If you have lost a loved one to suicide, go to http://www.forum.forsuicidesurvivors.com/.)
Meanwhile, life isn't about dieting. Don't make it about food.
First, let me make it clear that I am not a nutritionist. I have no medical degrees of any kind. I have, however worked with the principles of transformative consciousness in my own life for more than 30 years. And for several years I wrote a weight-control column called "Countdown" for a newspaper in Florida, the now defunct Clearwater Sun. Even then, consciousness fascinated me. Pioneers of consciousness are discovering that every cell in our bodies hold or consist of consciousness. Mind resides within each cell.
Fat cells have consciousness. They have minds of their own! They want to live and thrive! They want to have life and to hell with what we want! How do I get my fat cells to cooperate?
Though 10,000 diet plans reside in the collective American consciousness, we are fatter than ever. It is human nature. According to the apostle Paul, we do the things we don't want to do and don't do the things we do want to do. We blame these shortcomings on a weak will, or the subconscious mind. But the truth is, our fat cells are working against us.
For the sake of full disclosure, in 2003 I rewrote my first book, Beyond Dieting. It was first published by A.R.E Press, Virginia Beach, VA, 25 years ago in 1983. It was based on the work of Edgar Cayce and my respect grows daily for the work Edgar Cayce did, as other organizations such as The Institute of Noetic Sciences sponsor programs which confirm how far ahead of his time Cayce was. And in the 25 years since Beyond Dieting was first published, all manner of other sciences have also confirmed the validity of the information that came through Edgar Cayce while he was in a trance state, reading for people who had asked for his help. Much of the information I want to share in this blog comes from that book, which is probably no longer available. So I am not selling books. I am reworking and sharing information that helped me before and I pray will help me again so that I don't eat my way into oblivion because of my son's suicide.
So, back to the fat cells that are working against us. These cells may have been born out of thoughts formed by gluttony. We'll talk more about gluttony later. For now, consider this: A person will eat what his consciousness allows. In some parts of the world people eat dogs, cats, and roadkill. Some perfectly civilized people eat cows, while others worship them. What we eat depends on how we feel about it. My fat cells feel just fine about eating ice cream by the gallon. But at least a couple of brain cells know better, or I'd weigh 400 pounds.
If Life isn't about dieting and food, what is it about?
I'll have to get back to you on that.
Seriously, up until six months ago, when Tony killed himself, I thought I knew what life was about. I thought it was about "being about the Father's business." Granted, the "Father's business" takes many shapes and forms. How do I know I am about my Father's business? My soul expresses joy.
Well, I was right. Today, for about two seconds, I felt joy. A tiny flash of joy and hope crossed my mind. Why? Because today I took the first step back to the life Tony wanted me to live - this blog is part of it. If what I write helps someone, I am about my Father's business. When the food I eat nourishes my body and satisfies my soul as it did today, I am about the Father's business. When my actions are in sync with my desires, I am about the Father's business. And joy is the tip off.
Am I still in pain over losing Tony? Of course. That will probably never end. But as I said in one of my other books, Spiritual Secrets of Learning to Love, A.R.E. Press, 1994 (out of print), pain and joy are two halves of the same whole.
Today I meditated for the first time in a long while. I have been meditating off and on for 36 years. Meditation affects how we perceive and experience life. Mental perception and soul experience work together to form our feelings about our surroundings, our circumstances and the lives we are living. This is why some poor people do not know they are poor, and some rich people do not know they are rich. The same can be said about fat people and thin people. Distorted body images prevent us from seeing the truth about ourselves. Meditation helps clean out the subconscious mind, where we store patterns, addictions, habits, memories and ego. The subconscious mind is where the battle between spirit and flesh is fought. The subconscious mind does not want to relinquish its authority, and it does not surrender without a fight. However, even though the subconscious mind does not always have our best interests at heart, it can learn new responses through meditation.
I know all this. Meditation cuts through the subconscious clutter to the soul mind. We can teach the soul mind and the physical mind to cooperate with each other. When they gang up, so to speak, on the critters that live in the dark, dank dungeons of the subconscious, the subconscious has to surrender. Majority rules. (Now, please don't get hung up on which level of mind is named what. Different disciplines assign different names to the levels of mind.) But what I know and what I do are two different things.
I need to review. There are four levels of Mind:
1) Physical Mind - the one you are reading this with.
2) Subconscious Mind - the one nagging you to go eat a cookie.
3) Soul Mind - the one that lives on after we are dead and gone from this planet, and it will help you now to resist that cookie if you ask. This is where free will lives.
4) The fourth level of Mind is known by many names: Spiritual Mind, superconscious collection of all knowledge, the collective unconscious, the mind of God, the Divide, the Door, the Way, the I AM. This level of Mind does not give a rip whether or not you eat the cookie. It isn't about cookies. This goes waaay beyond cookies. It is about Oneness with Love (a/k/a the Father's business).
More on the Soul Mind
Please pay attention. This is important because this is where we make choices about what to eat. The soul mind, being the seat of free will, chooses not only the foods we eat, but whether those choices are guided by Spirit or the latest food fad. The soul mind is selective. It can choose between good and evil. It can move toward or away from its Creator. It can opt for life or death. It can choose to sleep. It dreams. It can choose to die. It can be banished. It can banish itself. It can even be blotted out forever. The soul mind does not maintain its individuality eternally unless it chooses to. My physical mind is not running the show. The soul mind is in charge. It very well could be running amok, or even asleep.
What about Spirit, spirit, and soul?
I need to say this, even though it is difficult to understand. It underlies many of our behaviours. Your soul's mind and mine are animated by spirit, and this spirit too is known by many confusing names: Universal Soul, Soul-of-the-Soul, Oversoul, Infinite Energy, the Collective Soul, the First Cause. Spirit and soul are different. In the same way an apple's seed is distinct from its peel, spirit is distinct from soul. And Spirit with a big S is different from spirit with a little s. First, there is spirit that impels all life non selectively. That spirit does not distinguish between a mosquito, a tree, and a mugger holding a knife. That spirit is the life force that flows through all things without judging whether they are good or bad. However, Spirit with a big S has been transformed by the work of Christ. We call this Spirit holy. The Holy Spirit knows us individually and lives inside us as The Comforter through the work of Jesus (John 14:16,26). The best possible outcome is for the soul mind to decide to seek guidance from the Holy Spirit. Surely the Holy Spirit holds power over my screaming fat cells. As I said, all this goes waaaay beyond cookies.
For those of us for whom food and our reactions to food have created serious physical, mental and spiritual problems, choosing the right foods symbolizes our efforts to live better lives, to be healthier people, to fulfill our purposes for being here. Dieting is not the answer. Some of our problems revolve around health; others focus more on social issues and our inability to relate to and care about other people. But all of us have souls. Some souls express joy or distress; others don't seem to care. I hope to help those in distress and in so doing to help myself. I must find the truth about why thoughts about food plague me night and day. The refusal to choose life over death carries cosmic implications. Why is my soul mind choosing death? Why is my soul mind allowing the garbage in the subconscious mind to dominate so many of my decisions? What are the metaphysics of obesity?
Why did I regain all this weight? Was it just bad choices?
This day is set before thee carrots and cake. Choose thou.
Cheers!
Lin
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