As we get older, we tend to contract.

We get tighter in our bodies. Our muscles contract. Our minds contract too.

We tend to hold on to fixed beliefs. And if we’re not careful we reject things that are new. New ways, new ideas. Even new things. Some us shy away from the effort of change.

Contraction is sly. It creeps up on you. You don’t even notice you’ve contracted your thoughts, your body, your world.

Exercise can cause us to contract. How tight are our bodies after exercise? We push and jar our muscles and circulatory systems into stress, so that later they will cope with stress better. But the end result is that our body contracts under that stress.

When something shocking happens, we tend to contract for protection. We can very easily find ourselves espousing values and social policies that are tight, limiting, constrictive. We allow our Governments to take away our freedoms. Some us want to close our borders.

We tighten up.

When you’re under pressure or stress, your breathing becomes tight. Your breaths become short and sharp. This is your body contracting for protection.

As well, as we get older we tend to contract our circle of friends. We surround ourselves with people who reinforce our point of view. We don’t like to be challenged, most of us. This self-perpetuates our closed world view.

What we should be trying to do is expand into this big glorious world.

Instead of getting smaller and more hunched as we grow older, we should be getting taller, and straighter. Instead of shutting down we should be opening out.

The Camino is expansive.

It opens you up to new people, new thought, new ideas, new ways of looking at the world. With that more expansive thought, your physicality changes.

You feel yourself growing taller as you walk. You feel yourself becoming straighter under the weight of that pack, which grows lighter the longer you journey.

Your breathing is deep and rhythmic. The air is clean and pure. It cleanses your chakras. You glow, inside and out. You can see it in the faces of those pilgrims around you. They glow too.

If you feel that you’re suffering the symptoms of contraction, the best medicine to take is a pilgrimage walk on the Camino.

So my book, The Way, My Way,  is now up on Kindle. It’s selling for $5.79. In a few days it will also be up on iBooks, Nook, etc. It’s also available at Smashwords.com

For my PGS mates, I’ll give it to you for free. I only ask two things: it’s for your use only so please respect the Intellectual Property Rights; and secondly, can you please post a review on Kindle, and Goodreads.com – and Smashwords too if you can. That will help get the book to a wider audience.

The free version will be a pdf – same text as the Kindle version, except the photos aren’t in color, and it doesn’t have the cover.

if you want a free copy, please just email me at billpgsblog@gmail.com – and I’ll email it back to you. I’ll keep this offer open for a week.

Here is the Amazon site for the book –

I hope you enjoy it!!

… makes Bill a dull boy.

Hmmmm.

I ran out of gas yesterday. I needed to step away from the blog for 24hrs and just regroup. Re-energize. Rethink things.

It’s springtime here now, and I haven’t been able to walk because of my crook knee. It’s getting me down. Walking always was a great stress reliever. It was always a meditative time. A time for myself, where I couldn’t be contacted, or connect to others. It was a quiet private compartment that I could crawl into for 2 hours or so.

I miss it.

Also, I discovered there were major formatting errors in my book when it went up on Kindle yesterday. I was so excited to see it finally published, then I had to haul it back down again and go back to the formatter. The preview copy he’d sent me was all okay – however when it went through the upload to Kindle, for some unknown reason all the italicised text came up bold. I was very disappointed.

And then to cap it off, my footy team got hammered last night in the preliminary finals. The poor blokes had played their hearts out all season, and were just exhausted. The team they were playing had had a rest week, and they were everywhere on the field. The good thing is the team that beat us will now be in the grand final for the first time in their club’s history, so I’m pleased about that. But it was heartbreaking to see my time so thoroughly mauled.

So when it came time to write a blog, I felt I had nothing to give. I said I felt empty, and that’s exactly how I felt. I’m sorry if I came across whiny – and I thank all of you who sent me kind and caring messages. it was very sweet of you.

Last night I slept 9 hours. I never sleep nine hours. I must have needed it. This morning I got up and instead of immediately hopping onto the internet, I did two hours of yoga and meditation. And out of that meditation. certain things became apparent. I have to change some things, if I’m going to remain productive and relevant this next decade of my life. I have to :

1. Do a minimum of 1hr yoga each morning.
2. Not go on the internet until I’ve done my yoga.
3. Do a minimum of 30 mins on the bike each day, and increase that as my knee improves.
4. Do a fast and reset my body and mind.
5. While raising money for the PGS film, write the book.

After the yoga and meditation this morning, I felt rejuvenated and refreshed. Recharged. The long sleep helped too. And then I got notification that the book was now up on Kindle, and the formatting errors will be automatically rectified in a day or so.

Now I feel great. I am aiming at having the PGS book done by Christmas, I hope. End of January latest. And with the sizzle reel, I am confident the money for the film will be found.

Sorry for the wobble. Thank you for your love.

This will be the first day since I started my walk when I haven't posted a blog.

I just feel I need to regroup. I feel empty.

Sorry.

My footy team got bundled out of the finals tonight, too. The Sydney Swans. That hasn't helped.

Tomorrow I'm changing my life.

Please use this post to talk amongst yourselves…

Well, one thing leads to another.

Ingrid told me in a comment this morning that I should get on with making my PGS film. That I should ask for money.

And then I came upon that wonderful story in the news about the honest homeless man who received donations from a crowdsource funding site. So I checked out that site, called Go Fund Me, and one thing led to another and I set up my own page: PGS – The Film.

So here’s the link – http://www.gofundme.com/4er3jo

Feel free to send the link to anyone you think might be interested.

And we’ll see how we go!

This is off Camino topic, but it’s relevant I think to the spirit of this blog.

Those of you in the US might have already heard this story on the news – it’s made the papers here in Australia, and I thought I’d share it, because the homeless man in question said: God always looks after me. 

Sydney Morning Herald – 

Honesty has – quite literally – paid off for a homeless man in the US who found a backpack containing more than $US40,000 in cash and traveller’s cheques and immediately turned it in to police.

Now, well-wishers who learnt of Glen James’ admirable deed have donated more than $US100,000 ($106,000) to help the 54-year-old get back on his feet.

Mr James, a former courthouse employee who has been homeless since 2005, discovered the abandoned backpack at the South Bay Mall in Boston on Saturday afternoon.

When he unzipped the bag, he found $US2400 in cash, almost $US40,000 in traveller’s cheques, a Chinese passport and other paperwork. Rather than keep the money for himself, Mr James immediately flagged down a police officer and handed the bag over.

His actions earned him praise from the city’s police chief, Edward Davis, who gave Mr James a special citation and thanked him for his “extraordinary show of character and honesty”.

After reading about Mr James’ selfless actions, a Virginia man who had never met Mr James set up an online donation page to reward his honesty.

“Let’s all chip in and help this man change his life,” Ethan Whittington, 27, wrote on the crowdfunding site GoFundMe.

Mr Whittington said he initially hoped to raise $US50,000 for Mr James, but that goal was achieved within a day of the site going live, and money was still pouring in.

Now Mr Whittington is hoping to raise $US250,000 for Mr James in the hope that it can be used to buy him a house.

Mr James, who stays at a homeless shelter in Boston, said he had been offered so much money on the street this week that he had finally been able to open a bank account.When he found the backpack, he said he never considered keeping the cash.“Even if I were desperate for money, I would not have kept even a penny of the money found,” he said in a handwritten statement to the Boston Globe.

“God has always very well looked after me.”

Do you believe in miracles?  Is the story I’m about to tell you a miracle?

I believe it is.

In Australia, our only saint is St. Mary MacKillop.

In the mid to late 1800s, Mary MacKillop established The Sisters of St. Joseph of the Sacred Heart – a congregation of Sisters that worked in the Outback of Australia. Under Mary MacKillop’s supervision, they set up schools, helped the rural poor, established orphanages and homes for the incurably ill, as well as aged care homes. They helped miners and rail workers when they were sick or injured.

The Josephite Sisters, under Mary MacKillop, battled sexual abuse of young children, and when she exposed a parish priest for pedophilia, another priest sought revenge and had her ex-communicated from the church.

That excommunication was later lifted, and in October 2010, Mary MacKillop was made a saint at a huge ceremony at the Vatican. Jennifer and I were were fortunate to be there in Rome to witness her canonisation.

She’s buried in a church in North Sydney, which is where she lived and worked for many years. It’s called The Mary MacKillop’s Place – and it includes a museum dedicated to her and the Josephite Sisters.

Jennifer’s father, a practicing Catholic and a builder by trade, worked on the church and built its doors.

Jennifer has a brother named Matt. He’s married to a beautiful lady, Megan. Megan has multiple sclerosis, and is badly afflicted. Matt and Megan have always wanted a baby, but didn’t think it was possible – not only because of Megan’s illness, but because she’s 42.

They’d been trying though for many years, without success, and had finally decided that the only possible way for them to have a child was through IVF. But they wanted to give it one last try, so they decided to go to the Mary MacKillop Place, to pray for the child they so desperately wanted.

Megan a couple of years earlier had been given a small portion of Mary MacKillop’s burial shroud by a Josephite Sister. She took that tiny piece of shroud with her when they visited the church.

Matt describes beautifully what happened in the church. They both sat and in their own way they prayed, then Megan got up and went over to Mary MacKillop’s tomb. Matt said that he had no desire to see the tomb, he just wanted to sit in the church by himself.

And as he sat there, two things happened – the sun broke through a cloud and a shaft of sunlight came through a nearby window and literally hit him in the face. At the same time, out of the golden shaft of light, a nun appeared and asked him kindly if he was alright.

Matt said he felt a sudden sense of calm come over him, as though a huge weight had been lifted from him, and he said to the nun: “Yes, I think everything is okay. Thank you.”

Six weeks later, Megan discovered she was pregnant. Two weeks ago the baby was born, premature at 5lb 6oz. Her name is Matilda, but we call her the Miracle Baby.

I get so much work done in the shower.

It’s a very powerful place.

It’s where my PGS really kicks in.

I let the water just wash over me, and I allow thoughts to come. I always used to listen to the news in the shower, but then I realised that my thoughts were being dictated by what was on the radio.

On the one hand, I was using the time productively to find out what was going on in the world – but I was also missing out on that time to just allow my thoughts to wander – to allow my PGS to touch base and talk to me.

There are very few other times in the day when that can happen, because I’m so busy, and often there isn’t time to be still. You need to be still to hear your PGS. And I’m still in the shower.

I find with the movement of the water massaging me, the shower becomes a meditative space. Also the sound of the water. It’s a contemplative place. If you allow it to be.

This morning I had a sudden insight into how to rewrite my PGS sizzle reel. It came out of nowhere, but I knew immediately it was the right way to approach it.

I’d allowed my PGS to speak to me, and I listened.

(Image below from shower scene in Psycho – :D)

I asked my wife Jennifer to give me her take on “asking.”

Here is what she wrote:

Everyday I ask for my highest good.  I ask for the highest good for my family and friends, and I ask for the highest good for my extended family and for every human being on Earth today.

 Why do I do this?  I do this because my intention is to lead a happy, healthy and fulfilled life.  It is as simple as that.

 Why ask? 

Well, I have to get in first thing on waking up and ask for what I really want.  I’m a rogue human being.  I can get frustrated and anxious as my day unfolds. 

I can worry about my children.  I can look in the mirror and see an older me, I can become afraid that world violence is escalating and innocent people are being hurt.  I can get confused and distraught if I’m not careful. 

Now all these rogue states of my mind are pulling me away from what I really want.  They are like old computer programs hidden within my system.  And they can take over. 

Before I know it I’m asking for what I don’t want. 

I’ll say to myself – “I’m stupid,” “I’m getting old,” or “I don’t have enough time.”  I’ll worry and get anxious and I’ll focus on the negative and this focus is as good as asking for the negative to come into my life.

This is why I have to get in first and ask for what I want – and not allow all those negativities to put their order in ahead of me! 

If I don’t ask, then it allows the other darker energies to slip in their requests.