During the first forty years of my life I was sleepwalking.

I listened to what other people told me about life and how I was supposed to conduct myself as I stumbled along in my journey from birth to death.

I was told to follow the rules because only by following the rules and working real hard would I be able to achieve this illusive thing called “success.”

So I bought into the idea that I was a separate entity from all other people and things and went about the business of hard work and being better so that I would be successful.

I got the college education, the job, the wife, the children, the house, the right car, the material possessions, the life-style, the alcohol, the drugs, the affairs, the divorce, the depression, and the guilt. While all this “life” was happening I always had this nagging feeling that there was something about life I didn’t know, the knowing of which could change my life in a more meaningful empowering way.

Then, in the late 1980’s a friend called me and said I should turn on my television and listen to the guy on the Oregon Public Broadcasting channel. Well, I turned on the television to this fellow named Deepak Chopra and he was doing a PBS fundraiser. He was talking to a small audience about a book of his called “The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success.” I was fascinated by what he had to say and I went out the next day, bought the book, and read it cover to cover (it’s not a very big book). Then I read it again and then I read it again. It just made a lot of sense and gave me another way of looking at life.

The inside cover says, “Based on natural laws which govern all of creation, this book shatters the myth that success is the result of hard work, exacting plans, or driving ambition.”

Wow! Shatters the myth that “success” is the result of “hard work, exacting plans, or driving ambition.” Could it be that the very thing that people had been telling me to do my whole life was a myth? I had to explore this new way of looking at life in order to find out.

Deepak Chopra and his book introduced me to the concept of spirituality and by doing so it got me to start working on my ego. What I found was that the more I was able to suppress my ego, the clearer life became to me. I started seeing the parts of life’s puzzle start to come together. I started reading more of Deepak’s books, which led me to other spiritual mentors including Wayne Dyer, Gary Zukov, Marianne Williamson, and many, many more.

I started incorporating their ideas and philosophies into my life and my business and I saw very positive changes taking place in the way I related to the people and experiences of my life. I was really pleased with the direction my life had taken and I thought that this was it. This idea of being in balance with the three-part (mind, body and spirit) being that we all are really made sense in the day-to-day living of my life. As I started waking up to the spirit part of my mind, body, spirit beingness, I saw that the separation I believed in was only an illusion. I found that oneness lights the way to wholeness.

Then, in 1995, I read an article in the newspaper about a man in Ashland, Oregon who had written a book about what he called “Conversations with God.” His name is Neale Donald Walsch and, of course, I bought the book that day and started reading it that night. I was totally intrigued by what the book was saying and then on page 20, I read the following words that have transformed my life. The God character said, “The deepest secret is that life is not a process of discovery, but a process of creation. You are not discovering yourself, but creating yourself anew. Seek, therefore, not to find out Who You Are, seek to determine Who You Want to Be.”

Wow! This was my missing knowledge. This was what I didn’t know, the knowing of which could change my life forever. And now I knew. No more excuses because along with this knowledge came the idea that whatever you create, you are solely responsible for. You can’t keep blaming other people for your creations. So I thought, “Well, if I am creating my life as I go along then why not create my life ‘consciously,’ as I desire it to be, rather than continually wondering what life was going to throw at me next and how I was going to react to it.” No more reacting. I was going to be a consciously creating machine.

So that’s what I did. I started consciously creating my life. I began a new chapter in the journal of the Richard D. Blackstone story and it has taken my life in a whole new direction. A direction that I consciously chose and continue to choose every day, every second, and every moment of now. And I love the way the universe works. I love the way the universe sends me the life I am choosing. It fascinates me that I always receive my creations in a much fuller, magnificent form than what I may have visualized by any expectations about what my creation should look like. You get to open yourself to the wonder of life. You get to be more child-like and start to understand what “true freedom” means. You realize that “love” is at the core of our being and we are here to experience love in all of its different perspectives.

As I look back on my life as a sleepwalker I bless each and every moment. All of them. Each trial and tribulation has allowed me to grow and has given me some gift that I can use in my present moment of now. I was being groomed all those years, just as you are being groomed right now. I finally discovered the passion that seemed to elude me my whole life. I always envied those people who lived life with a passion. Now I have a passion. I can tell you in all honesty, it is a lot more fun to live life with passion than to be lost in sea of confusion and fear. I have tried both and I vote for passion.

This passion has led me to the writing of “Nuts & Bolts Spirituality.” As I sat down to write the book the words and ideas seemed to flow to the paper effortlessly. It was a labor of love and it was written by me for you to read and it was co-created by you for me to read. You see, we teach what we desire to learn. What you give to another, you give to yourself, and what you give to yourself, you give to another. I believe that we are at a critical juncture in the evolvement of the human species. It is exciting to be part of the change during these tremulous times. If we are going to come out of this and survive as a species we will see a new, more wondrous way of experiencing life on earth. The belief that we are separate will no longer be a workable system to carry the world society forward.

A new belief system based on the idea that we are all one will be the opening to a new era of harmonious existence. We will still have to ‘chop wood and carry water’ but our entire perspective will change as we drop the struggle and live effortlessly in awareness, gratitude and love.

I have chosen the path of the messenger. You have received the message. How you use the message is entirely your choice. Whatever choice you make it will be the correct one for you. Just re-member, you are a spirit child of God and you playing small doesn’t serve you, or the world.

Namaste’

Richard D. Blackstone