Well, they can be if not treated. And how does one treat a Brain Fart? By reducing cranial pressure.

It is not done by the usual method of letting Methane Gas out the “ole Bung Hole.” The kind of Fart you try to slide out quietly because you’re at a rather fashionable dinner party, but to no avail, this one leaves with enough force to blow right past the sphincter muscle to then rattle ones cheeks and exit with a pulsating beat that would make a Belly Dancer proud. And to make matters worse there’s a guy at my table who can’t let any opportunity like this pass and says “Good going Jack that was a real Ripper, one you can be proud of.” Then this guy proceeds to double over and lets out a Belly laugh that’s very infectious which gets the rest of party laughing with many tears rolling down their laughing cheeks and some are now pointing at me and holding their noses. Well I might say this is certainly one way for members of the dinner party to reduce their Brain Fart pressure in a very healthy way because laughter is always good for whatever ails a person.

But now to my more serious side. I want to write about what a Brain Fart is. It’s a kind of unrelenting self imposed pressure that builds as we refuse to recognize that our thoughts are a big part of the problem. Brain Farts in order to not harm our Grey Matter, must be defused by changing the way we react to our daily quota of problems. It’s about learning new habits that don’t raise your blood pressure, or make you feel like a sad sack, or wearing a brow that is furrowed all the time. It’s about being willing to step out of your comfort zone and into the land of “maybe things can be better, it’s up to me”

So when did the pressure get so intense in my head that I had to do something even if it was wrong. I think that happened about the time I entered the early years of my 40ties ( probably a cousin to the midlife crazies). The first thing that came to mind as a possible cure was exercise and it wasn’t long before my Type A personality took over and each day I found myself running a little farther until I was running in a half Marathon and before it was even over I was dreaming of spending my days wherever there was another marathon that would give me the Endorphin High that felt really good, but it was very short lived. So my Brain Fart Pressure Gauge kept climbing ever higher. The idea that maybe a touch of alcohol might do the trick as it’s always available and there were millions of my species that were practicing with it everyday. But for me drugs or alcohol as a solution just didn’t ring true. My thought was that they just masked a Brain Fart and a Hang Over was always a reminder that I was probably on the wrong path.

Unrelieved Pressure had been building in me for most of my life as I tried to please all the people I came in contact with. Wanting to own all the land that joined our V6 ranch and the cattle to stock it. To work 100 hour weeks, year after year with no side effects, add in a number of Panic Attacks. Put them all together and I finally realized that burning the candle at both ends wasn’t going to work much longer.

I think there are as many self help books out there as their are cook books and I don’t cook. Thus, over the course of the next several years I acquired mostly hand me down self help books from friends that had found knowledge and enlightenment from their printed words. I now have a stack that comes about up to my waist. What I found, was that from each author I got a smidgeon of hope for a possible new me that would be much more “user friendly”.

I followed books with some trips to the psychiatric world. I spent some time with a few psychologists, then tried T.M.(transcendental meditation), acupuncture, some Yoga and found a couple of the less than traditional churches that were most helpful. About the only industry out there I didn’t try was the Fortune Teller, Fortune cookie world.

But for me, what turned out to be the most, result effective and affordable cost wise, was when I discovered Support Group Network that was taught by Dr. Robert Simmons. The initial meeting got right to the point. Pick some people around you that you don’t know, no spouses allowed, and this would form my new found group of friends. My group started out with 13 members all wanting to relieve Brain Fart Pressure in their Craniums. I’m going to skip over the finer points. Basically it is a safe haven to discuss anything and everything except Criminal activity without being judged, only given help by the others in the group and only if you wanted it. Our group of 13 needed a name to rally around somebody said E.G.B.OK. Which is pronounced egg bock = everything is going to be okay and after 5 years of meeting every Monday night at different members houses the last 5 of us each had done his or her work. We looked at each other and felt satisfied and content with our new and very different persons, I know I did. We never met again. That 5 year chapter in my life gave me the knowledge and confidence to know that I was a real E.G.B.OK.

What happened to the other 8 members? I think for each that departed along the way they either got what they wanted or this format was not for them as our numbers diminished a little each year.

Boy did I have a lot of skeletons in my closet. But as I took each one out over those 5 years and exposed it to the light of day and started giving the “Old heave ho” to each one, my Brain Fart Pressure would go down a little and It sure felt good. It wasn’t easy as most left unwillingly, bucking and kicking and swearing to return. So one will reappear now and then. But I recognize them rather quickly and tell them that their not welcome in my mind anymore. I seldom feel the need to change myself or the world anymore. I’m satisfied with just a little tweaking to hopefully stay relevant with the times. That does it for me folks. It makes all that reconstructing time very worthwhile. So to all of you out their in blog land suffering from Brain Fart Fever, relief is just a choice away for there are better drummers to march to.

See Ya,

Jack