When I was about 12 or 13 years old, we moved into a rental property in Greenwood Springs Mississippi. It was very convenient for us as it was just a mile or two down the road from property Dad had just bought where he planned to build us a house. In the evenings we would go and work on clearing out the house place and such.

My grandfather, Daddy Straw spent a lot of time with me during the time we lived at this place. He would take me hunting and teach me other skills that a boy my age needed for life in the country.

We had lived there a few months before we started noticing strange things happening. One of the first things I remember out of the ordinary was when I gave my mother a magnolia blossom as a gift. Normally these seem to wilt quickly once cut from the tree but for some reason this one just never withered. I set it in a bowl of water on the dining room table and it stayed fresh for over a week. We finally got tired of it and threw it out but it still looked as fresh as the day I cut it from the tree.

The next strange thing happened one evening when we were all sitting around the dining room table after dinner. We heard a noise in the kitchen and we all looked up in time to watch the door knob turn and the kitchen door open. We were expecting it to maybe my Grand daddy straw as he sometimes came in the back door instead of the front.

But to our surprise, the door simply closed on its own and no one was there. Then our attention turned to the other door to the dining room. This door led to the rest of the house. Just as before the door knob turned and the door opened on its own and then closed again as if a person had just walked through the room from one door to the next.

After a while, we got accustomed to sharing the house with our invisible roommate. We knew to look for missing shiny things under a certain board in the closet and to expect small items to move around when no one was looking. We even decided that our dog was not crazy for jumping on and playing with an invisible friend in the yard.

Never did any of us ever feel threatened by the ghost. We felt she was female and began calling her She. Once, my mother was ill and sleeping alone at the house. She said she felt a presence wake her up and as she awoke, she saw a white figure at the foot of the bed gently shaking her to wake up. Once she awoke, the figure was gone but she realized that the pilot light had gone out on the gas heater and the room was slowly filling with gas. The ghost had protected her.

The only scary time I ever experienced was one day after hunting rabbits with my Grand Daddy Straw; I went inside to put up the butcher knife I had used to clean the rabbits.

I tossed the knife onto the counter near the sink and turned to go back outside to get the rabbits. As I turned around, I heard the knife fall on the floor. I did not think anything about it, I just figured I had missed when I tossed it on the counter. I was more careful as I set down the knife by the sink and turned to go back out.

Again as I turned and headed out the door, I heard the knife hit the floor. Still I thought nothing of it as the counter tops were not quite level and I assumed it had slid off after I set it down. So this time I picked up the knife and carefully placed it on the counter top. I put it all the way back against the backstop near the sink. As I lifted my hand away I made sure it was stable and was not going to slide off again.

This time however as I turned to go back outside, the knife flew across the room and landed near the door on the opposite side of the room. This time, I decided to leave the knife on the floor and go back outside. I am not sure why she did not want the knife on the counter, but she made it very clear she did not want it left there.

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Special Stage one Rally Tennessee 2005

In his book, The Power of Now, one of the examples Eckhart Tolle uses of people who naturally live in the moment are people who drive race cars. Being in the moment is how he defines a spiritual process.

Having driven in automobile races and rallies, I understand what he is saying. In order to be competitive and to drive safely, you need to have your mind clearly focused on the task at hand when driving a race car. If you are thinking about what you did last week, or what you plan to do after the race, you will loose time on the track and in the worst case, you will crash the car.

I have also found that driving off road makes me focus on the moment almost as much as racing. While the time pressure is not always there in the off road environment, the need to be clearly alert to my surroundings is. I have to know where my tires are at all times and be keenly aware of the amount of traction available. I can’t do any of that if my mind is distracted or focused elsewhere.

Often as we drive our daily commutes, we do not have this keen focus to the task of driving. We sometimes put driving on mental auto pilot and allow our minds to wander through all sorts of thoughts – some that make us happy and others that bring us grief.

We can however choose to use any time behind the wheel as a deeply spiritual time. By simply focusing on driving the car and paying attention to the surroundings, we can bring our focus in to the eternal now and block out thoughts of past and future.

Often it is easier to bring back attention to driving by taking a different route. For example, instead of taking the interstate, take the old US highway that parallels it. It may take a few minutes longer but just notice the feeling of release that you feel as you look at the scenery and focus on the details of driving the car.

Even a familiar road can bring release if you focus on feeling the contact of the wheels to the pavement through the steering wheel. Listen to the sounds of the engine and the whirr of the gears turning making the car go forward.

I like driving my Jeep because it gives me a great feeling of being in contact with the road. A quieter car does not give me this same feeling of connectedness. I also get this feeling form driving sports cars whose stiff suspension keeps me in touch with the road surface.

It is easy to make driving a spiritual experience. Just focus on the things that are happening right now in the moment. Forget about all the things in the past that you are driving away from. Stop worrying about the potential future that may or may not happen when you get there. Just focus your attention to driving the car right now where you are.

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The leader of the Unity Church I attend simply says, “Begin again.” But I end up getting frustrated with all the beginning again and I don’t feel I benefit from the meditation that way.

I think I have found my answer in a book of Taoist exercises. In Internal Exercises by Stephen Chang, he explains that people who think a lot – I am pretty sure I qualify – can have disastrous results if they force themselves to empty their brains for meditation. He warns that they will experience confusion, illusion and frustration. In worst cases it can lead to schizophrenia. But mostly it leads to a worsening of the stress and tension one is trying to overcome through meditation.

The solution he recommends is a balancing between the brain and solar plexus. He mentions that the symptoms of cerebral brain over use are headache, stiff neck, confusion, forgetfulness and spaciness. He offers a simple exercise to help balance the mind and body.

The Solar Plexus Exercise:

Begin by sitting or standing with both hands placed on your stomach. Face forward and inhale. Feel your stomach expand with you hands.

While exhaling, push in and up with your hands on you stomach. At the same time, turn your shoulders and head slowly to the left as far as possible without straining.

Face back to the front as you inhale releasing your stomach and feeling the air push your hands out.

This time turn to the right as you exhale.

Repeat up to 36 times or as often as the flexibility of your neck and shoulders will allow.

I have found that after only a few days of doing this exercise, my mental clarity has greatly improved. I have not yet tried to meditate. I will give it a few more days before I try again. I was able to complete a mental focus exercise last night that I have been having trouble with however.

For more information on the solar plexus exercise and many other wonderful Taoist exercises see Internal Exercises by Stephan Chang.

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