I did and still do it myself, me, me, me, me!

From own experience: I did all that myself, and sometimes still get lost until I remember myself, become aware of chaising to satisfy ME, ME,ME,ME,ME,ME. One day I will make myself a T-shirt with only that word on it spread all over...me,me,me,me IT IS AL ABOUT ME!

It is all about me, me, me, me

Nothing outside of Self can fullfil. We are all complete in Nature.

The moment we start looking outside of self for fullfilment is the moment we get lost, unhappy, unbalanced, dissatisfied. What do we do? We start searching even harder. More going out, more alcohol, more drugs, more sex, more shopping because surely in the next moment that which I am looking for will be found.

This is an everlasting search, with no happy ending ever. On this search many people get hurt. Children are born in the expectation that they will bring the parents happiness. Well when you are still full of wants and needs yourself, children are hard work, a curse, a block which stands in the way, of getting what the me, me, me wants.

The moment the me, the wants, the mind needs are dropped a child becomes a blessing. All your well being found inside yourself is mirrored back through the innocent eyes of the child. Bringing up a child is the most worthy job in this earthly living.

Still so many do not experience this as such. Instead they keep chaising dragons, fairy tales, to satisfy that endless need of me, me, me. I want this, I am entitled to do this and that, I need that, give me this, like me please, find me important pleace, give me money so I can go and buy that dress that will make me feel special, makes me look good, so that I will look attractive to the others.........blablablabla

Is it not the strangest thing that people are chaising dreams, wants, needs in search of happiness, being worthy, being someone of importance, being noticed, in the need to exist? All people need to do is stop chaising that which the me, me, me wants.

The moment you stop chaising your own wants but instead feel towards others well being is the moment well being wells up from within you. The Circle is created.

Seekers Of The Truth (BOOK)

Chapter One

What is Happening To Humanity?


They dwelled in a cave in a remote area where no people inhabited they lived in solitude though in solitude people would find them and go to see them and become cured of their illnesses because they knew they had lost their purity and beings such as these had become rare within the human population the ordinary people therefore could not be masters over their own bodies as once was possible in previous incarnations and the destinies that those bodies had created, for before the destiny of the body took man, and no more was man living the destiny of the soul, for when man would live by the destiny of the soul during this epic time human bodies lived to be great ages and they did not die as we understand death today in this dark age of ego dominance, the bodies would change into beings of light that would phase in and out of physical bodies they were universal beings because they knew the whole cosmos as themselves.

These two beings had an inner circle of disciples, this inner circle were chosen by divine Will, because they who dwelled in the cave were advanced souls were so advanced they had reached a very high level of evolution which meant by the divine law of universal cause and effect that great things would naturally happen around them, this evolution that they had achieved made that others would be encapsulated by the energy fields that were around these two souls even just living near to them, peoples state of reason would go up a notch, they knew how humanity could be raised to great heights of evolution and remembered how it was before this dark age came due to planetary alinement's, souls as advanced as these two have soul memory as-well as ordinary human memory, they were two of a group of souls who stayed awake during this dark period of planetary alinement's so that when the time was right they could make cracks in the dark ignorant phase world that humanity has created out of ego living.

Therefore the natural law was that ordinary people would first be inspired by them because deep within their psyches they recognised how it can be due to forgotten memories held within the deeper realms of all man's psyches and written into the DNA code, then by way of this natural law of the energy emanated from those two greatly advanced souls they would follow there example and by the greater law of compassion not understood by ordinary humans who have not reached this level of human evolution, that compassion fixed yet another law and that law was that all humans have the right to have the opportunity to evolve to a higher order of being already set down in genetic composition of the soul and the physical being, therefore this law caused that these two great souls could not do anything further than to serve those who came in need both mentally physically and in soul sense of evolution.

These great disciples were taught the inner truth without language only by a special form of telepathic communication, this telepathic form of communication still works today but today it is not seen to come from others this communication is thought to come from individual bodies of each person it enters, this telepathy was the language of the heart centre, anyone who sat around these two souls would find enlightenment in a very short time, eventually the disciples ventured to the land of Britannia that land became covered with enlightened ones for the Land had become so saturated by that energy that these souls had emanating from them that all people who were born there in that land had no other way to go other than enlightenment, indeed there was no other way to go that made any sense in the light of this great energy field emanating from the conglomerate of all these evolved souls together, much like the virus of today called ego and personality which power has over taken the energies of the great ones and now infects that land mentioned and the rest of the world.

Because at that time in other parts of the world it was still mostly full of people who were lost completely to the truth or who were lost and looking to regain that evolved state of being, this great Land of enlightened ones, called Britannia could not maintain this energy level permanently to the enormity of people who were living in the darkness from the other corners of the world, in the other lands alien to Britannia at this time people who had been struggling for survival for a very long time those who had gained fear of death and therefore lost faith of the inner way by losing this they had lost god status and the ability to turn rocks into bread, which came about after the last great disaster where the whole continent of Atlantis sank beneath the sea, they did not now the way that these great Great Souls had lived in the land of Britannia they were peculiar and alien to the masses outside of that country, for if they knew the inner way of truth they would have never worry about death and survival and become the lower beings they have now become, like the great souls that inherited this Land for these souls were so evolved that what would happen around them would be called by ordinary man great miracles, these great Great Souls could produce bread from stone because their hearts were pure, they had the power to stop avalanches with one wave of the hand, they could walk on water, travel the cosmos they could call up rain from the heavens for these Great Souls of the land called Britannia had power over nature, they new the Earth as their mother and a living goddess, also they showed what was possible for humans to evolve to by example that was unassuming yet comprehensible by all others.

Because they had complete knowledge of the self, this meant knowing self as complete as this gave to them the knowing of the greater universal truths such has very rarely been known in past episodes of human existence, though other races had also hit on these truths who were not of human origin also called aliens even going back to the time of the Atlateans did they not compare to the way this Land was at this time.

These Great Souls would communicate at holy places where the energy of the Earth given through great rock formations built by the divine souls who were in touch with the language of the Mother Earth and knew the great energy centres of the The Mother Earth was just such that man and Earth could communicate it was a time when man new the Earth as a living entity and a living being, and the Earth Mother knew man likewise a time when man and Earth had respect for each other due to this communication, it was the communication of the heart also called soul, Love, god, Divinity that exist the same both in man and in the Earth, therefore the Mother Earth would whisper and man would hear and serve the Mother Earth, in the same way man would whisper from his heart and the Mother Earth would hear man and the Mother Earth would serve man's every needs for this reason she was given the name “Mother” because she was so close to the human heart and provided from her breast (The Land) food for all transient beings.

Today the Mother Earth and man are still subconsciously in touch but man does not hear the whispers of the Earth in a conscious way, yet the Earth still hears the whispers of man and those whispers that come from man's heart are heard, proof of this can be seen when the media were hitting on climate warning and there was a lot of revenue collected from the working people of those lands by making fuel more expensive yet though the true motives for this were hidden human hearts were tricked into believing that they were responsible for the Earth warming up in a big way humanity acted as a whole by generating in their hearts subconsciously the need for the Earth to cool down, though it was not put into intellectual words but written by the language of the heart on a big scale and given to man via media and the children of men who are closer to their hearts cried out and the Earth could hear their cries, men's hearts became humbled due to this humbling they perceived the language of heart more intimately and subconsciously communicated their needs to the Mother.

The Mother heard and she gave what they ask for the weather became wetter in the summer periods and colder in the winter periods, causing problems for the politicians of the time who manipulated the working class people with this artificial fear, of climate warming to compensate this change the mother made.

Those same politician changed the phrase from climate warming to climate change, the heart of humanity does not know what to do with this deceit, the Earth therefore stays still because climate change has always been with us so it is as it is and has always been that is why life is so diverse because of climate change, but any man who uses truth to ill serve his lust for power will pay the ultimate penalty in times to come, what is taken now will be given back later.

I AM THE GREATEST.

Who can defeat me? is there anyone who can defeat me out there, is it possible, for 'you' cannot touch me, for I am the untouchable, there is no one who can move me, I am like Samson and delila, like David and Goliath, for I have a secret, yet this secret makes that I am even much greater than Samson, hear this my word and know that this is the word of truth.

I cannot be defeated because my strength lie's in not my hair but having been defeated, who can defeat that which has been defeated? Who can defeat the greatest warrior, the greatest warrior is not he who can defeat his enemy the greatest of all warriors is he who can defeat the 'SELF'

Freedom! Escaping the prison of the mind

FREEDOM!

ESCAPING THE PRISON OF THE MIND
BY
Ozay Rinpoche


Dedicated to Kaye

TO THE MEMORY of my courageous, unique, and beloved wife, Kaye, who was taken from us by that vile disease of mankind, cancer.
As I walks through the forest of life in search of peace, love, and happiness, I
came to a clearing where sunlight filtered through the shade and all wondrous things grew. In the midst of the clearing I spotted a flower of many colors and of beauty untold. I was drawn to its splendor and grace; I was humbled in its presence.
My instinct was to pluck the flower so that I could call it mine.
“But how could I so lowly as I am. Own such a treasure?” my inner voice said. And so I let it be, bathed in the warmth of the sun, and simply stood by its beauty without moving from its side.
I closed my eyes in sleep. How lucky was I to have stumbled upon such a precious gift! How could I deserve this, after all the bad things I had done? How could I be worthy?
Sixteen years passed, and one day I opened my eyes and the flower was no more. It had perished.
Again and again, I closed my eyes, twice in heart-felt grief, and once in understanding. The first time I saw death, and all that goes with it; the second, I saw union with the great Mother Earth, and the feeling of loss, and the holding on; and the third, I saw rebirth, and a new life, and a new beginning. For what dies is born again; the caterpillar becomes the beautiful butterfly. Where once stood that single beauty now stood seven others. It was then that I was given understanding.
Until the time our souls meet in the next life (love is now and for eternity), rest
peace , my sweet love, and be renewed.

Kaye

October 4, 1953 – October 27, 1998
Contents

Preface


Childhood Memories
Boxing
Out to Sea
Back Home
In the Army
Absent without Leave
Giving Up
Learning to Meditate
Dreams
The Material World
Out of Prison


Epilogue
Appendix A Meditation
Appendix B
Dream Interpretation
Preface

What I offer you in this book is freedom. Most people unknowingly live their lives in a prison. I will take you on a guided tour of the realms of imprisonment. If your enthusiasm is strong enough, you will be able to realize this freedom for yourself, and taste the joy that is available to those who are willing to do the work.
Ask yourself how often you wake up in the morning feeling excited about something---the next pay packet, the next party, the next vehicle, the next romantic partner---only to discover that things never quite work out the way you expect?
The one certainty is that you will continue to believe that satisfaction exists somewhere in the future. With repeated disappointments, your motivation and energy may fail. Even the will to live can be lost.
There is a better alternative.
The disciples often asked Jesus about the kingdom of heaven.
Once Jesus called a child into their midst and told them that to enter the kingdom of heaven, they must “become as little children” (Matthew 18:3).
When we become as children, all things in life take on new meaning, and we see through the eye of a child. Everything is fresh, and with this freshness enthusiasm returns. A whole new energy—cycle begins.
Freedom is about awakening from the great sleep. By sleep I mean the state of being captivated by the mechanical, unobserved mind—the unfocused mind, the mind that is like a boat without a rudder, driven by the wind. Even as you read these words, your mind may already be drifting off in different directions.
I would like to help you to know yourself, and become a self-realized or enlightened human being—if not fully, then at least on an intellectual level. A purely intellectual understanding can at least be the start of authentic development toward self-realization.
This book tells the story of my life. I do this not to promote myself, but to give you a tangible example of what self-realization means. Though superficially about me, at a deeper level the book is about you, since you are the one who must discover the truth for yourself.
As for my credentials, these were earned while I was serving a prison sentence, first part of the sentence in Cardiff prison in Wales, and then the remaining part in Dartmoor prison in England. Through diligent work, I became enlightened.
Enlightenment means rising above the ego with its ideas and theories whose root is so often the desire to look good to others. This is a form of self-deceit, and the result of the workings of the lower nature. To feel peace—the great peace—you have to ;earn to read the book of self. It is in that book that all the answers may be found. One has to learn to know the ego, and finally to conquer the ego.
The ego is the one who fights, who derives satisfaction from positions of power, and who revels in feelings of self-importance. You must learn to destroy this ego. Step back from the mind, and observe its workings. By so doing, you create the conditions necessary for the development of the higher mind—the mind that witnesses the working of the lower, or thinking mind.
This thinking mind is not really your own. Rather, as you go through life, you identify with traits coming from outside of yourself. A trait may be something as simple as a gesture, and expression, or a point of view. You pick these up from your parents, from friends you admire, even from people you have. You then incorporate these traits into yourself, and mistakenly identify with them. After a while, you think of these external characteristics as “I” or “me.”
Having built such a prison, you must then protect it. This is the origin of the ego. The ego is the one who guards the fortress built from false identities. Whenever the edifice comes under attack, the ego will use whatever means available to defend it.
Rigidly-defended people may say: “ Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.” In reality, everyone is entitled to know the truth, and there is only one truth. The person you think you are is a pretender.
Do you ever find yourself lost in the sleep of the mind, and drawn away from the task at hand? Are you aware of those moments? If you can become aware, you will begin work of reaching true light and true peace. But this goal can be reached only through constant work on the self.
Keep watching your mind. Learn to know yourself. As you make the effort to learn, you will begin to know more and more, until eventually you will know the great peace and light. Then you will be among the seers, prophets, and sages of all ages. Apparent burdens take on new forms, and life becomes joyful and blissful.
You are free.
This freedom has always been there, but fear of the unknown can make you hold on all the more tightly. If you have the courage to let go, you will see that life can be so much better, both for yourself and for the people who are connected to you in life.

Childhood memories

Nothing in my early childhood suggested I would end up in prison. There was, though, one curious incident tat the time of my birth.
On the day I was born, some student nurses were so impressed with what a handsome baby I was they took me away for the day. Nobody knows where they took me. My mother and father were worried, of course, until the nurses returned. Though I do say so myself, I’m still good-looking today!
When I reached eighteen month’s, my mother and father decided to take my older brother and sister and myself to live in the country where we would have a back garden to play in. A war-time friend of my father’s helped him find a house in a mining valley called Garndiffaith, which is just outside Pontypool, Wales.
After we moved in, my mother and father discovered the house was not what they had expected. It turned out to be a derelict miner’s cottage in a bad state of disrepair. There was no hot water, no partitions between the bedrooms, and the toilet was outside. My mother’s and father’s first job was to shovel all the accumulated rubble out of the house.
Dad got a job, but six weeks after we moved in had a heart attack and passed away, may his soul rest in peace. Though I never got to know him, I feel as if he has always been close to me, especially during my times of need. I love him with all my heart.
I was close, too, to my big sister, Margerate, who would eventually pass away at the young age of fifty-one. She went to bed one day and never woke up. When she died, it brought back a memory of a conversation I had with her when we were young.
We sat in the little room with the coal fire burning. It was cold outside, and nearing time to go to bed. Margerate mentioned that every night she went to bed, she would recite a prayer to protect herself in the event she died in her sleep.
This aroused my curiosity. Being so young, I did not know one could die in one’s sleep. It scared me to think of such a thing happening, and not having any say in the matter.
Since Margerate’s death, that incident has often come to mind, and I have frequently wondered if she had some premonition of it, or whether she may have lived before and experienced the same thing in a previous life. My big regret is that I never told her how much I loved and admired her—my “big sis.”
I mention these deaths for two reasons: first, out of respect for these beloved members of our family, and second, because these painful life-experiences can make us into better people. Too many of us do not give enough consideration to death and all that death implies.
Despite the fact that our house in the Garndiffaith (or “Garn,” as the locals call it) was small, to me it was home and felt very comfortable. We would huddle around the coal fire and moan at anyone who took up the heat by standing immediately in front of the fire. In winter times especially, I would notice the front door had a wide gap underneath it. Through this gap snow would blow under the door and into the front room.
As I neared the age of three, my mother became concerned that I had not yet spoken a single word. She took me to the doctor, who examined me, found me healthy, and told her I would learn to speak in my own time. This put my mother’s mind at rest.
My first encounters with the spirit realm took place in that house in the Garn. Our house was undoubtedly haunted. I would lie in bed with my brother at the top end and me at bottom. Then I would hear noises such as banging and footsteps. Being the child I was, I would pretend they were birds and animals.
Quite often, I would wake in the morning to find one of my socks had gone missing. My mother gave me a hard time about this. She could not afford to keep replacing socks or other items of clothing, she told me.
Her scolding made me careful to put the socks where I thought they would not go missing. I believed at first it was mice who were taking them, but soon realized that mice would be unable to crawl under my pillow and remove socks without my knowing about it.
My mother did not believe that socks were disappearing from under my pillow. In the end I am sure she did know, but would not say so. One of her philosophies was that if you did not believe in something it would go away, whereas if you believed it then you made it real.
Once, as I was lying in bed, I heard what sounded like wind coming up the stairs and making a strange howling sound. I reacted by trying to imitate the sound myself. In hindsight, it is obvious that such a sound could not have occurred naturally in that part of the house. The stairs were completely isolated from any doors or windows. If I ever lay on my back to go to sleep, I would feel as if I were being carried up and out of the house in a vortex of wind. This frightened the living daylights out of me, and I would sleep on my side to avoid the experience. Even today, I will always lie on my side rather than on my back.
As I got older, I took to sleeping under the blankets, since I was so frightened of the dark and of the supposed “ghost” my mother would threaten us with in order to make us get to bed promptly. But we had a ghost for real.
Once, I heard my name called out several times. Even after inspecting all possible sources for the voice, I could not find out who was responsible. Since my mother was downstairs on her own, I went to ask her if she was the one who had called me. As expected, the answer was no. It had not even sounded like her. The voice was that of a man, and in any case, I would have recognized my mother’s voice.
I told her about this incident, but she put it down to my imagination. It was real, however—as real as my mother.
Later in life, my mother told me her own story of an incident in Garn. She was lying in bed one night when a misty figure appeared. After a while the figure became more solid. My mother recognized it as my father. He did not say anything to her, but was as real as I am. She told me that, although he had said nothing, she felt as if he wanted to check to see that she was alright.
I had a feeling that not only was I alive now, but that I had always been alive. However, it seemed important to me to confirm this belief with my mother. I was certain she was going to tell me what I already knew, but she said: “No. you only have one life to live, and one day you will die, and that will be the end of it.”
Her answer left me depressed. Prior to that, I had a calm about me, because I was sure of my eternal existence. In one fell swoop it was taken away.
The impression that conversation made on me stayed with me for some time. After all, she was my mother, and at that age I thought my mother knew everything. Such is the innocence of the your child.
Shortly after this, I remembered a technique I had learned in a previous lifetime. I would ask a question and allow the answer to arise within me. I could not possibly have known this technique from any source other than a previous life, since at that time I had so little experience of this life.
When I remembered this technique, the great burden of death was lifted from me, and my previous calm returned.
One day I asked myself the question: What is the purpose of my life? What am I here for?
The answer came to me as if from the back of my head. I did not feel that it came from the everyday “I,” but rather from a place deep within me. I was here to be a teacher, and to learn all the things that were new since the last appearance of my soul on earth.
Another time, I asked myself the question: Who am I? And what is this “I”?
It came to me that I could not possibly “be” the name my mother had given me, since this was just a name. So who was I? I am just this, this life. I am here, and I simply am.
As the years went by, I forgot these events, and lost that inner peace, until eventually it returned during my stay in prison. But that was still a long way in the future.
It was now time for me to go to school. Here I would inadvertently get into trouble.

The doors of my first school seemed huge to me. One day, I rushed through them too hastily. As I let the doors slam behind me, I heard a loud scream.
I turned to see a girl holding up her hand. Her little finger hung to one side, attached to the hand only by a sliver of skin. I stood and stared, utterly speechless. A dinner lady came and hurried the girl off.
Shortly after this, I was summoned to the Head Mistress’s office and questioned about the incident. I explained exactly what I had done: I had slammed the door, and then I saw the little girl with the finger hanging off.
The Head Mistress did not seem to believe me. I could not understand why. Until that time I had believed it was normal to speak the truth, and therefore adults would always believe me.
She let me off with a caution, but for some time after this I was puzzled by her behavior. The memory of our conversation darkened my mood whenever I thought about it.
In the early days at school I had only one friend, and spent most of my time on my own. Our class began to congregate around one particular child, John Meacham. He had an uncanny ability to inspire the other children to think of themselves as heroes.
In those days, the second world was still constantly being discussed on television, and war with its accompanying killing and violence became focus of their heroism. All our schoolyard play focused on war. It is not surprising that our generation would eventually develop a reputation for gang warfare.
One young lad had the most curly hair you could ever imagine. Because he looked so different, the group of young world war two soldiers made this young lad’s life a misery. I was tempted to befriend him, until I figured out that if I did so, I too would become their victim. After this, I thought it wise to keep myself to myself.
One day the gang began to pick on me anyway. Their target was often chosen randomly, and tended to be whichever child was on his own. My turn arrived. I was terrified as John Meacham approached me with his platoon of child-soldiers.
We spoke a few words that I do not remember. I was determined not to show my fear. At that point, I literally had my back against the wall. Then the fight started. It was me against the entire gang.
They began lashing out. I flailed back with no real aim as to where the punches would land. Suddenly, the fight was over, and John Meacham was clutching his nose, blood gushing from it. He must have caught one of the flurry of punches.
Without intending it, I now had a gang of my own. I was the hero who had stood up to the villain and come off the victor. From that time through to secondary school, life in the schoolyard was one never-ending battle for supremacy.
It was now several years since my father died. My mother was ready to get on with her life. She remarried, and had another two children—my younger brother and sister.
The marriage turned out to be a disaster. Her new husband was a womanizer, and he abused my older brother and sister. My brother still suffers from the after-effects of that abuse to this day.
We were still living in the Garn, and one morning I came downstairs to see urine and excreta all over the place, and my mother with two black eyes. All mother said was: “I hope next time I see him, he’s sitting in a wheel chair.”
After a few years of separation, the next time she saw him was in child support court. He was indeed in a wheel chair. This left him unable to work and earn money, and my mother was in an even worse situation then before. Instead of three children to raise on her own, she now had five.
Those were difficult days for my mother. What compounded her difficulties was the fact that she was a Greek-Cypriot immigrant who had never had the opportunity to learn to read and write. At the time she was in school in Cyprus, the war was raging, and she had to leave school early to help build the roads needed for the war effort. Incredibly, she would only have been about eight years old at the time. She was though, a very strong lady, and by today’s standards she did the impossible.
Margerate was fourteen by now. Since our mother found it difficult to make ends meet, Margerate had to leave school and take a job to help support the family.
She was just getting to the time in her life when she wanted some fun and excitement, and I suppose the prospect of helping my mother raise us must have depressed her. After a couple of years, she ran away from home.
Margerate went to London, where so many teenage runaways find themselves. We heard nothing from her for two years. I missed her terribly, but would never say so.
My mother got the police involved, and eventually they found Margerate and told my mother she was safe and well. However, since she was now legally an adult, the police would not give us her address, and Margerate herself did not want our mother to know where she was.
By this time, my mother had decided it was time for us to move. Almost anything seemed better than our run-down miner’s house, and she moved us to a new housing project called Trevethin. There we had to start at a new school, Snatchwood.
Snatchwood was built next to a quarry face with was fenced off to prevent the children gaining access to it. The quarry did not bother me at first, but one day I had a vision of the whole thing collapsing, and burying all the children in the schoolyard under rocks. The vision made me so afraid I gave the entire area w wide berth.
About two weeks after my vision, there was a disaster at a place called Aberfan. A slag heap collapsed due to heavy rain, and over one hundred children were killed by falling slag.
Shortly after the disaster, all the slag heaps in Wales were levelled off, and our quarry face was covered with protective wire meshing. This relieved my fears.
I had another problem to deal with in my early days at my new school. Some of the children wanted to find out what I was all about. In any gathering of children or adults, often there emerges a need to test the new boy on the block to see if he is a threat, to push him down out of competition’s way, and ultimately either to give him respect or to walk all over him.
There is, too, a primeval and unconscious instinct to find out who is the best fighter. Perhaps this is related to the desire for the group to have a leader, and for the leader to have as many followers as possible. The more followers you have, the more respect you get.
This urge to dominate can be found in most social groups, but it manifests in more sophisticated forms as we get older. Among adults, it crystallizes into such things as being the competitive businessman, or boasting of intelligence in subtle ways, or thinking oneself better then other people at some activity (“I have this, and this is special, and that makes me better”).
The reality is that as God’s creation we are all special, but this genuine “special-ness” is something not based on being better then other people. It is like the dog saying to the cat, “I am special because I am a dog and you are a cat.” This is where the enemy of mankind, the ego, is born. Without the ego, we would look at our fellow human beings and all forms of life on earth and be able to see them as our brothers and sisters.
Things being what they were, it was arranged I was going to have to fight to prove myself. We would all meet after school and settle the matter. There was no dispute, no fallout, nothing. It was just coldly accepted that it had to be done.
The boy I was to fight was named Pete Murphy.

After school was over for the day, we met on the top of the hill we all had to climb on our way home. Just a bit further on was a wooded area with a clearing in which the fights were always held. All the children who were under no pressure from their parents to get home straight after school would stop to see the fight.
The fight began with a flurry of punched. I do not remember who threw the first punch, but we fought, and we fought, and we fought. It went on and on, until we were at a standstill on the ground with neither of us willing to give and inch to the other.
After what must have been an hour interlocked in battle, we were totally exhausted, but still not willing to give in. Our audience had dwindled to one curious little boy wearing glasses, shorts, and a school cap. After a while, even he disappeared.
The boy returned with his parents, who broke up the fight. From that day on, Pete Murphy and I became the closest of friends. Our friendship has lasted to this day.
Pete and I had a lot of adventures together, and became like brothers. We would play pranks, and were always dreaming up new schemes to get money to buy our favourite treats—custard cream cookies and sponge cakes.
When we were not doing this, we would be out bird – nesting. We each had a bird egg collection, and it was our pride and joy. The idea came from an uncle of Pete’s, who had a birds’ egg collection, and who arranged his eggs in an artistic display. Each egg had a story to go with it describing the adventure by which that particular egg had been collected.
Many a time we would find ourselves in all sorts of predicaments because of our enthusiasm for this hobby. We were only about seven years old when we started. At that time, nobody cared about such things as wildlife protection, and we did not know any better.
On one occasion, we decided we wanted to add a raven’s egg to our collections. The ravens nested on a high quarry face that must have been at least seventy feet from top to bottom. All we had to do to get to them was to clamber across a rock face—with the twenty-foot drop below us.
Pete never showed any sense of danger, but when I looked at that quarry face it put the fear of God into me. I would never show this fear to anyone, of course, as I believed I had an image to maintain, and I was not going to let anyone see my fear.
We decided Pete would climb across the rock face first, I watched carefully where he put his hands and feet, so that I could copy his every movement when my turn came.
At one point he got into trouble. I looked at his predicament and hoped he would decide he could not do it, so that we could call the whole thing off. To my dismay, Pete somehow found a way across to the relative safety of a ledge on the far side of the difficult path. The raven’s nest was just a little further on.
After Pete go to the ledge, he stopped and called out to me: “Come on! I’ll watch you across.” Perhaps he sensed my dear, or perhaps he just knew it was a difficult climb. Neither of us would ever admit to any weakness.
My heart went to my mouth. I thought to myself: “I’ll do it. If he can do it, then so can I.” This was my rationalizing to overcome my fear. I had been sure Pete would turn back. Now he was calling for me. I had no choice. It was do or die.
I began to climb across the rock face, and got past the first part without much difficulty. Then I got to the area I knew was going to be a problem. A certain point would support the weight of only one leg, since one’s full weight would cause the toehold to collapse. The other leg had to be stretched out at a seventy-degree angle. The only hand grips were small cracks in the rock face that allowed one or two inches of the fingers to be inserted.
Suddenly I froze with fear. Every muscle was rigid. Thoughts of falling from the rock face flooded my mind. I said to myself: “This is it. I’m going to die.” With that, I froze even more rigidly.
Then I become aware of another though-process in my mind. This was a more logical way of thinking that told me that the more afraid I became, the less chance I had of making it to safety. The best thing I could do would simply be to stay where I was, and hope that someone would call the fire department to come to my rescue.
I relaxed momentarily. But then I encountered another problem. Due to all this continual exertion, my hands and legs were beginning to give me tremendous pain.
Something had to be done soon. If the fire department was going to come, Pete would have to be the one to alert them. Since he would have had to pass by me to do so, this was now impossible. It was all up to me.
The thought of just staying there out of fear was so strong, and so easy to give into. In the end, I concluded that if I did not do something soon, I was going to fall to my death.
I looked at what I had to do. Pete was encouraging me, telling me where to place each foot and hand in turn. I did not like the idea of holding on with only one had, but knew I had to momentarily do so in order to make progress. It was my only chance.
When I reached the ledge, my heart was pounding so hard I could hear it thudding. The next few steps were easier. I got to where Pete was, and at last felt safe. I took a deep breath, still trembling from what I had been through.
We decided to continue on to the raven’s nest. Pete went first. When he came back, he said there were no eggs in the nest anyway. So we sat on the ledge and chatted for a while.
Then I realized that to get home, we would have to make the dangerous crossing once more.

My muscles still ached from the first crossing. I needed time to recover before I was ready to go through he same thing again. I was not looking forward to it.
The time came, and we decided to go back. Again, I carefully watched Pet’s movements. Though he had some difficulty, he got across the quarry face relatively easily.
As he was climbing back, I wondered how he managed to make it look so easy. Perhaps he is not smart enough to realize how dangerous it is, I thought. Then I wondered if it could be because he was shorter than me. But that could not be the answer, since being smaller, he had to jump proportionately further. Yet he seemed to do it effortlessly.
My mind churned out excuses as to why Pete had no problem, while for me it was incredibly difficult. Finally, I came to the conclusion that the problem was I was thinking about the whole thing too much, while Pete was not. Even before we decided to start this expedition, I was the one to say: “Hang on. Let’s plan how we’re going to do this climb. Look at the rock face. We will do this, and then we will do that with the other foot,” and so on.
Pete had just wanted to get on with it without any thoughts or plan of attack, relying solely on instinct. My mind, on the other hand, was thinking of all the possibilities, and all the different angles. All my energy went into formulating ideas.
A light went on. I realized it was my thinking mind that was stopping me. It was my mind that had stirred up all my fear! Thought alone prevented me from traversing the rock face without problems.
That mind could so easily have cost me my life!
When I came to this conclusion, I made a resolution to focus totally on the rock face, and not think about the possibility of falling, nor of how high off the ground we were.
It came to my turn to go back across.
I could see the look on Pete’s face. It was as if he knew I was going to have a problem. He would shout our advice as to where to put my feet. I knew I did not want to feel that fear again, so I blocked all thoughts from my mind, except thoughts as to how to cross the rock face. My concentration was focused solely on my hands and feet, and on where I was going to put them next.
Before I knew it, what I had deemed to be a threat to my life was over and done with.
This little escapade taught me a truth in life at an early age. The mind can be useful, but it can also be debilitating when used in the wrong way.
Pete and I went on to have many more such adventures. We were always up to some mischief or another.
Once we took on the task of going door-to-door to collect money for a Royal Air Force charity. Each of us had a tray of little pins in the shape of R.A.F. wings to give out in exchange for donations.
We decided this would be a good way to make a bit of cash for ourselves, so we could buy our favourite custard creams and sponge cake.
First, we went round all the houses in our own neighbourhood. Even after doing this, we still found we had too many wings left. Our thinking was that the more we sold, the more money we would have for ourselves.
Then we came up with the idea that collecting in a wealthier neighbourhood would result in larger donations. Our theory turned out to be correct
We covered many miles, but our feet did not seem to mind, and we would stop every once in a while to empty out the collection box to see how much we had collected. This was easy to do. Simply turning the box upside down and inserting an ice pop stick in the slot allowed the coins to roll out.
With each success, we became all the more enthusiastic. Even when it began to rain, we carried on, despite the fact we were both now tired and exhausted, and the weather was becoming increasingly cold and windy.
After trudging through the rain for a couple of hours, we went back to Pete’s place, and emptied out the collection box.
When we counted it, we had collected over twenty pounds, a huge sum of money. We decided to remove three pound each as our “commission” for the collecting work. In the following days the temptation to remove even more became too strong, and we made a total of three withdrawals, removing altogether fifteen pounds and leaving only five.
The day came for us to take the collection box back to school. I was not looking forward to it. In a vain attempt to avoid the inevitable, I decided to become ill, and gave the collection box and my empty tray to Pete to take back to school.
I was sure he would be in the deep end, and when it was time for me to go back to school, I would be in trouble too.
The next day, I saw Pete and waited for him to tell me what the teachers had said, and what trouble he was in. He did not mention the subject. I thought he had forgotten, or else that he just did not want to mention it for some reason.
Eventually, I had to go back to school, since it had become impossible for me to take any more time off. All my excuses had run out.
In the hallway, I saw the teacher who was in charge of the collection, and pretended not to notice him. This charade continued for several days. I came to the conclusion they had not yet counted the money.
Then, one morning, we were in school assembly, and they said that next day would have an announcement to make about the R.A.F. collection. The morning the announcement was due, I made a lot of trips to the washroom! Here I was, and this was going to be it.
I stood in morning assembly ready for the worst. Only a week before, the headmaster had my brother up on the stage to sane him because he was in trouble for fighting. I was sure that this week it was going to be my turn.
The headmaster started to read out the names of the pupils who had collected money. With each set of names, he would state how much money they had collected. The amounts ranged from ten shillings to about three pounds. This sounded good, I thought. But then how could it be explained that we had sold a full tray of pins, and not handed over more then five pounds? Even if you received a penny for each pin, you would still have more then five pounds.
As the headmaster reached Pete’s and my name, I felt a sense of foreboding. My legs began to shake. My mind raced to prepare an excuse. Perhaps we could say we lost the pins, or that some big bullies came and took almost all the money, leaving us with only five pounds.
The headmaster said: ”And now I want the whole school to give a round applause for the team that has collected the most.”
It was us!
I was so pleased. If only they had known the truth!
The incident made me aware how temptation can be stronger than common sense. I did not want to put myself in that position ever again—or so I thought at the time. As you will see, one sometimes forgets life’s lessons.
When we got to secondary school, we began to play truant. This became a regular habit, especially at times when we had academic subjects such as English or geography. I never skipped classes that involved using my artistic skills or making things though.
We would either go to someone’s house or, if the weather was warm, climb the trees opposite the school and taunt the children who were still in the schoolyard.
Once, someone who owned a ball-bearing repeater air rifle decided to shoot at the children in the schoolyard. This was extreme, even by our standards, and the school called the police to come and keep an eye on the area. Such was the uncontrollability of the teenagers around that part of Wales at the time.

It was while playing in the trees one day that we witnessed a phenomenon I cannot explain even to this day.
On that particularly day there was Pete Murphy, Steven Wells, and myself. We were playing among the trees on the grounds of a graveyard that was overgrown with grass, weeds and bushed. A couple of weeks earlier, Steve Wells’s grandfather had been buried in that same graveyard, not far from where we were playing. Before climbing the trees, we went to see his grave.
When we were up the tree, I noticed something strange emerging from among the brambles. To get a closer look, I came down from the trees. The closer I got, the more mystified and frightened I became.
It looked like a cloud of concentrated steam, about three feet in diameter. It was rising out of the solid earth.
I shouted to Pete and Steve to come and see. They too got down from the trees, and came to have a look. All of a sudden, the three of us bolted like lightning.
The only description I can give you is that it was like a genie who had just come out of a bottle. I have never seen anything like that before or since, and to this day I am mystified as to what it was. It was certainly not my imagination, as all three of us saw that same thing.
When we grew into teenagers, we began to go to discos. One of the best was a t a place called court Bleddyn. All the “talent!” would go there once a week. Since we were young and full of hormones, it was a must.
Court Bleddyn was out in the country some distance away from us. Being young lads in school, we had neither our own transportation, nor the money to pay for a taxi. Sometimes we managed to talk one of the older once into giving us a ride in their vehicle. Even if we were lucky enough to get a ride there, usually we had to make our own way back.
On one such night, Pete and I had been to Court Bleddyn, and we were walking the ten miles back home. Our route took us through mostly unlit roads and pitch-black countryside. A young couple followed behind us.
Because it was so dark, we could no see who they were. We could hear them laughing and giggling, though. Then we heard them having some kind of discussion.
Eventually, we came to a stretch where the road was long and straight, and lit by occasional streetlights. Out of curiosity, we turned to see who this couple was. We could still hear them talking. But when we looked back, there was no one there.
We walked on, then looked back again. The couple sounded as if they were very close. The lit part of the road now stretched back for some distance, much further than our hearing range. We had heard them following us for some time. But, again, there was no one there. It spooked us so much, we ran from the spot as if we were powered by rocket fuel.
Prior to this, we had another mysterious experience on that same stretch of road. We were on a part that was almost pitch black, with high hedges on both sides. It was the hedges that made it so dark. On clear stretched the moonlight made for good visibility.
As we entered a particularly dark patch, we heard what sounded like electrically-generated noise, similar to the sound you hear when you stand near electricity pylons. This noise followed us for some distance.
We realized that sound could not be coming from anything stationary, as it followed us everywhere we travelled. When we got to a part of the road where the hedges were lower, we decided to look behind the hedges to see what this sound was.
We climbed over a gate, and to our surprise could not find anything to explain the noise that had followed us for so many miles. To this day remains another unsolved mystery.
On talking to people about the incident with the couple, we discovered that, some time before, a young couple had been knocked down on that patch of road and killed outright.
I could well believe that, because it was out in the country, the road was narrow, and you needed to have your wits about you. No one in a care would expect to see you there at that time of night. I gathered from this what we must have encountered the spirits of the young couple who had been killed in a n accident.
If nay one is interested in this type of phenomenon, and would like to know where these incidents took place, it is the road from Court Bleddyn to Little Mill, just outside of Pontypool, Wales UK. Try it in the early hours of the morning and see. Be careful, though, because that road is dangerous! Both times I walked it, there were strange phenomena, and I would say the chances are you would experience something too.
Neither Pete nor I were very interested in what school had to offer academically, and Pete even less so then me. Because I was in the “B” stream and he was in the “C” stream, we did not see so much of each other at that time.
When I did see Pete one day, he told me he had started down at Jack Evans’ Boxing Club in Pontynewynydd. I was not interested in boxing, except for Mohammed Ali’s fight. Though he was one of my sport heroes, I thought boxing was not for me personally.
Pete did ask if I wanted to go, but I told him, “No, I’m not interested.” I had started taking judo classes, and thought this was better.
Judo never mustered the respect that boxing did, though, and Pete reminded me of this. Again, he asked me to go with him.
I did not like the idea of being hurt, and I did not want to get up in that ring and have people see me getting beat. There was no way was I going to risk damaging my image as the toughest.
Finally Pete said: “I only go down there to keep fit. That’s all I do it for.” I thought this was a good idea, so I went with him.
It was an impressive set-up. There were punch bags, reflex balls, speed balls, weights, heavy leather balls, and all over the walls were pictures of old boxers of bygone days. They had a ring, of course, and the entire Welsh boxing squad trained in that gym. They also had a few European champions, who to me at that age looked quite scary.
It turned out that I enjoyed the training. For a number of weeks though, I managed to avoid the sparring. There was no way I was going get in that ring. I had watched people sparring, and seen the blood and mucus flying out of the ring. One day I saw someone getting knocked out, and that put me off even more.
My excuses kept me out of the rind for four weeks, but it was inevitable that eventually I would either have to get in the rind, or stop training. Jack Evens was only interested in spending his time and effort on motivated boxers.
So there I was. No more excuses.
As old Ernie Morgan gloved me up, puffing on his Woodbine cigarettes that made my eyes water, I could feel my mouth getting dry, and a sickly feeling in my stomach. Before I got in the rind, I vomited over his shoes.
My heart told me to stop, to call it a day, and not to train any more. The problem was, half a dozen of the lads from school were watching. Their eyes were on me—the one who had worked so hard to maintain a reputation of being the hardest individual around.
This was my day of reckoning. I would be shown up for what I really was
I had no choice but to get in the ring and spar.