Dave The Penguin

by Nick Sambrook

  He had no understanding of words like zeitgeist, macro-organism, or collective consciousness, or even how to construct a programme on how it all should evolve into an integrated self-aware form.

  No, all that would have been far too much for Dave to cope with, yet the underlying nature and ideas required were surprisingly very simple.

  It was just all common sense stuff really, things which Dave was very good at, things that just needed bravery and faith to come into play for himself, and everyone.

  So in response to Dave’s question - on what difference could he make to it all….

  The answer was, surprisingly, quite a lot,

  and on a scale he couldn’t possibly imagine!

  3 Self-Help Dave

  Dave was a penguin on the edge.

  His wife had told him he looked stressed and worried. She was concerned about how tired and weary he was after the storm had passed, and all he had been through.

  With all the issues with his patch having to be retaken and keeping off rivals it had taken its toll on him. She had said it had all made him irritable and a bit short with her too, but he was fairly sure he was still the same height as he had always been.

  His friends had told him he that he really needed to ‘Chill out’, and then sniggered. “Mate,” they said “you need to stay cool” and then fell about laughing. But he didn’t think it was very bloody funny.

  He had tried to explain to his wife what had happened, and what he had done, but he didn’t have the words, and she either wasn’t interested or didn’t understand.

  Somehow though she seemed to believe him, and know, but she still wasn’t impressed or willing to acknowledge or talk about it for some reason. She seemed to know what he had done, and what he was, and what had happened, but in a different way. However, she was more interested in day to day things, getting on with things.

  It is very odd, thought Dave, but he let it go.

  A few days later he was still no better, so she had told him to go off and think about things, take a bit of time to find himself, and she took over the job of looking after the egg while he went off…. Far off.

  So now he stood on his own way out on the glacier and shuffled a little closer to the edge, and peered over the ice cliff where a large section of it had broken off in the recent storm. Where he was now standing had all originally sloped gently down to the sea, but now all that was left was a cliff, a steep drop and the sea at the bottom, and no way of getting to it safely without a long walk around.

  You just had to accept it, these environmental things, treat them as ‘part of life’, and work around them. Move on, and come to terms with the change. Being this close to the edge, and one step away or one icefall from certain death, certainly put things into perspective though; made things clearer as to what was important, and what was not.

  It brought into sharp focus what life really meant, what it was all about, and why he thought the way he did.

  Dave wasn’t complaining though - unlike the ice beneath his feet, which was now making ominous groaning and creaking sounds. Which was odd, as he didn’t think that his light frame would make any difference.

  Dave had just come to look at the view and to explore, not to fish this time. He had brought his new tape player and headphones that his wife had given him for his birthday, to give him something to listen to, to keep him busy while she had been away.

  He was currently listening to Heaven Can Wait by Meatloaf. He liked that song, it was as if the lyrics were written for him, but then you could say that about most songs he thought, and it would probably apply to most penguins, and they probably all felt the same way too.

  He liked listening and thinking and watching far away things.

  When the tape finished he looked through his bag for some other tapes he had found washed up on the beach that morning. One caught his eye - it read…

  ‘Meditation for Self Help – Extreme (under the counter version)’

  Dave didn’t think he needed any help, he felt fine, relaxed and very calm. He looked at the back of the tape; it read ..

  ‘If you are on the edge – you can use this tape to learn to access all the levels of your mind, and unleash the powers within you for greater understanding, a better more relaxed calmer you, and a better happier world’.

  He thought it was odd that a tape knew where he was, what he was doing, and what he had to do. But then life was full of surprises, and with Dave, things seemed to arrive at the right time, and be there when they had to, and say what they needed to say.

  He was sure his wife said the same about him.

  Dave was a bit sceptical about these sort of self-help spiritual things; he only believed in what he could see, touch, and hear or smell. He was the sort of penguin that liked to call a spade a spade, if he had one, which of course he didn’t.

  Just in the same way that he wasn’t having a mid-life crisis, because if he was he would admit it, obviously.

  He had tried to use a meditation tape that he had borrowed from a friend about a year ago, but it hadn’t worked very well. He remembered the start of it telling him to close his eyes and relax, let his mind wander, and then suddenly it shouted at him rudely

  “…FIVE!! – NOW WIDE AWAKE - FEELING FINE….” which startled him badly.

  He had a whole hour of his life missing somewhere, a sore throat, he was dribbling from his beak, and there were suddenly lots of other penguins looking at him and laughing as the tape clicked off.

  This time it would be different, he was on his own now, and he looked around carefully.

  Dave was more of a doing sort of penguin, and when he wasn’t doing things he liked to contemplate stuff if he had any spare time, work things out, rather than just meditating or tuning in to whatever was going on ‘out there’. However at the moment he was so stressed he was willing to give anything a go.

  He started the tape, and the calming relaxing music started to flow into his ears through the headphones, together with a deep mellow echoed voice telling him to find a good quiet place to relax and to lie down somewhere where he would be alone and uninterrupted.

  Dave looked at the cliff edge, the ice falling into the sea, and stopped the tape and looked around. ‘mmmm, Tricky’ he thought.

  Half an hour later Dave settled himself back against the rocky slope just up from the beach in the most comfortable part of the penguin colony.

  There were several young penguins looking at him curiously, and also at the Do Not Disturb sign that he now had around his neck. He was also sporting a heavily scratched pair of sunglasses that he had found on the beach. This was to prevent him from seeing distractions.

  He didn’t have a pillow, as suggested, so he led back on the comfortable rocks and took a deep breath and started the tape again.

  The music started and the narrator began in his polished voice; “I want you to imagine…” he said “…that you are on a beach, with the waves in the background, and the gentle sea breeze flowing over your body…”

  This guy is good thought Dave. The voice then went on to explain what was going to happen and why, what benefits he would get, how it would help him, and how he would feel, and what he would be capable of at the end, and how much better his life would be.

  The man was confident that Dave, at the end, would feel even more relaxed than before he started, which was good.

  It all sounded good to Dave. He made a quick check around by opening one eye and gave a glare to the sniggering young penguins, who, following the look, decided to leave him alone.

  He closed his eyes and settled down to dutifully follow the instructions.

  He was then told not to drive a car, or operate any machines – which sounded very prudent to Dave.

  The narrator went on to explain how he would be better off financially, healthier, happier, confident, smarter, more attractive, and get all the things he wanted.

  Dave was fairly happy with what he had, and how he was already, he already had all these
things, but he was an open minded penguin, and always open to possibilities, even the possibility of improving perfection.

  As instructed, he continued to imagine himself in the same place that he was already, listening to the sounds that he was already hearing; the sea, the whales, the wind and the seagulls - so far it was all pretty simple.

  Now, Dave had a very good imagination; he could easily create anything in his mind, as long as it wasn’t too big for the space. Like say an elephant, he had made that mistake once, Oh damn, he thought, there it was now, large, grey, awkward, and filling all the room in his mind again.

  Concentrate he reminded himself. His mind was wandering off again, and he snapped it back to the voice on the tape.

  Dave was then told to say and repeat some statements to himself, ‘mantas’ they were called, like hypnotic rays of hope – or something like that - he repeated the words…..

  “Every day, in every way, things are going to be the same as yesterday and the same as the day before that” Dave said to himself, which was what he thought he was supposed to say.

  Dave liked that. He liked things the same, and yesterday had been good, which meant tomorrow would be good too. ‘No changes’, that was all very ‘reassuring’, he wiggled his rear end to settle himself down more comfortably in-between the boulders, and then safely relaxed.

  He was then told to breathe deeply, in, and out, in and out, several times. Which he did. It made him feel a bit giddy, a bit like brain freeze, when you had eaten too much snow, or eaten the wrong sort of fish, so he slowed the breaths down a bit, and that helped somewhat.

  He could never work out why he didn’t get brain freeze when the temperature dropped to -50c, but eat even a small bit of snow and whoosh there it went again, that numbing pain in the head, unable to think and cursing yourself for being so stupid, again.

  Concentrate, he shook his head and listened carefully, trying to not get distracted.

  Dave was then asked to count down slowly from ten to one, breathing deeply and slowly each time. This made Dave very tense for a moment, for obvious reasons, until the narrator started counting down for him, and he was able to let out a sigh of relief.

  He was then told to imagine himself breathing though his skin, his pores, and imagining that he was his own breath. That though was a little tricky for Dave; he couldn’t imagine how the air was going to make it all the way from his lungs though all those thick layers of rippling muscles. But he gave it a go.

  He then had to try and ‘see’ his breath; imagine and visualise his breath, which was easy, especially as it was already -30c.

  Breathing seemed to be a big part of the tape, important, in-out, in-out, in-out stuff, which was fine until the narrator forgot to mention that he could breathe out at one point, and he nearly died.

  He found himself gasping for air, and opened one eye to make sure nobody had seen him, but oddly he was quite alone now. In fact everyone seemed to be keeping a good long safe respectful distance away from him now.

  He closed his eyes again, safe in the knowledge that he could relax again in peace. The narrator informed him that any distractions or noises from outside wouldn’t disturb him, in fact they would help him relax. Dave doubted this as it seemed like a contradiction, but he decided to wait and see.

  He was told that he could manifest anything he wanted, be anything he wanted, he just had to think positively, train his mind, to focus on what he desired, and his mind would ask it of the universal mind and then anything was achievable.

  This is great, Dave thought, because he had always wanted to fly, it was his dream, his passion, and first on his bucket list.

  Well actually he wanted everyone to fly, he wasn’t a selfish penguin, he wanted everyone to be happy, and what was the point of flying if you didn’t have anyone else to share it with.

  He was then asked to imagine a balloon on the top of his head, like a bubble that he should inflate with all his worries and troubles and stress. With every breath out he should fill the balloon, then let it go, and it would fly away.

  Dave tried hard, but he couldn’t imagine it inflating at all, the balloon just stayed limp and flopped over to one side. Dave wondered what this meant, but he put it down to the fact that he must already be stress free.

  He was then instructed to tense and relax different parts of his body, starting from the top of his head moving down to his feet, which, he was told, would take away the tension and allow the muscles and tendons to relax.

  He was successful with his head and feet parts, but identifying the other described body parts in-between was somewhat tricky, everything was a little ‘vague’ down there, and it was quite hard identifying which muscles were where, if at all – but he did the best he could.

  Tense, relax, tense, relax. It seemed to be working, but frankly, it was absolutely exhausting.

  There were then lots of other instructions and suggestions, with clicking of fingers, with lots of ‘you wills’ and ‘shalls’ and ‘going tos’, followed by various other set commands. Which of course he followed to the letter, as suggested.

  Dave was then asked to imagine himself on top of a very tall crystal skyscraper, this skyscraper was his mind, and he was going to explore it.

  He knew what a skyscraper was, but this was a real shock to Dave.

  Dave had always thought of his mind as more of a small bungalow, or beach hut, with just a TV, some magazines, a comfy sofa, and a fish freezer in it. Oh and the large hole in one of the walls where he frequently had to chase the elephant out.

  This was impressive, a giant building. Dave liked having a big mind; tall, see-through, up in the clouds, higher than the annoying seagulls with stupid names, and high above everyone else. This was amazing, and he suddenly felt very important.

  He was told that the tower held all the levels of his mind, and he could travel to anywhere within it, and to places outside of the tower, and to other towers.

  He was now at the Beta level of his mind, the fully conscious wide awake top levels, and he would be descending down through Alpha, though Theta, and then into Delta. He could make the tower higher later on, up to Gamma levels and beyond, if he so desired. Which all sounded ‘cool’.

  He would be gently guided down through each of the levels exploring various areas, virtual-scapes, and imaginative constructs. He would be learning habits, techniques, developing tools at different levels of the mind to help him, and would learn how to see into the collective spiritual mindscape, and influence things, and that he was in control and could return to being awake at any time.

  Really Cool thought Dave again, but he didn’t really understand what it all meant.

  He was then told to imagine some lift doors in front of him, on the roof of the skyscraper, which opened onto a lift shaft that went down to every level of his mind - all the way down through this very tall skyscraper - this skyscraper that was his mind, this very tall skyscraper here that he was standing on. Mmmmm he thought, things seemed to be repeated a lot, perhaps the tape was also suitable for people who were slightly deaf or forgetful.

  The doors opened; he was told to walk through them, and to turn around and face the open doors, which he obediently did.

  Now Dave was a literal sort of guy, he had a very vivid and precise imagination, and he did what he was told. He was always willing to be open to suggestions, and do what he was asked to do, and his imagination was likewise.

  However in this particular instance the narrator had neglected to tell Dave to imagine the lift itself, which most people would have taken for granted, but not Dave.

  Dave plummeted………..

  The sudden shock made Dave physically jump, and he accidently pressed the fast forward button on the tape player under his wing. Down, down, down, the mind shaft he went, like, well, a falling brick really, accompanied by a high pitched whizzing squeaky voice sound in his ears from the tape as it rifled through the lessons and levels.

  Dozens of levels that he would have spent
weeks practising getting to, entering, and exploring, flashed past in seconds.

  Dave wasn’t worried though, he thought it was all part of the course, and he looked on with interest, as it all went by, at speed. Images of open doorways full of interesting things strobing past him like rapidly presented flashcards, colours changing as he went.

  He was quite calm and he could feel his breathing and mind slow in frequency as he fell. This was all very interesting stuff.

  He was now past the Beta levels and past the Alpha levels and onto the Theta levels.

  It was surprising what you could see and take in in just a flash or instant vision, like a photo flashed into the brain of each open doorway as it went past straight into his mind. Whistling past, each doorway giving a brief woofing sound in the air as it flashed past.