bargain a better deal | What Do Rock Stars Need To Hear Today

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bargain a better deal 

The danger is never in overpaying for things you really want;
It’s in giving your time, attention and emotional labor, where no agreement was ever made.

—

“Hell, it’s everywhere, isn’t it?!”
I have no idea if I have actually said this out loud, but I’ve thought it.

Because the bad news is that once you have transformed one area of your life, stripped down all layers of socially conditioned paint and veneer
– but not before testing it for lead!
Because you know very well the majority dates from before the 70s when they took this toxic ingredient out-
– the lead-reference serving not just as an instruction to refurbish your vintage furniture, but also a metaphor of the most toxic ingredients being taken out of social conditioning in the 70s-
– just saying!-
And you repair all the damaged wood, and pamper it with oil or wax and new coloring, and you’re just so proud when that whole area of your life is finally shining as a one of a kind original!

When?
Oh no….fuck…..
Yes, Rock Star.
A whole different area of your life falling apart.

With that little corner piece shining bold and bright, it is suddenly painfully obvious how bland, old, out-of-use and dangerously unattended to other parts of your life are.

Absolute relics, and from a life you cannot remember ever agreeing to.

Once you redo one area of your life, you will find all other areas are like brown, mid- 20th century furniture with lead paint and BROKEN LOCKS (this was again a metaphor), dusting away in your basement or shed.
Meaning taking up space in the margins of your life, where other people dumped them, or you took them on board without questioning.

And now they’re…..there.

Want to know who put them there?
Throw out those beliefs on who you owe whatever, or on what was right and wrong in 1953, and find out.

The ones who object to you throwing it out;
They, put them there.

~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

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It’s All You, Rock Star | Share Your Work 2025 08 11

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Last weekend, a visit to a museum I had been looking forward to, fell through.
Train traffic to the area had been cancelled due to maintenance.

The reason I wanted to visit was because they currently have an exhibition on Erotica, which is a topic that has fascinated me even before it was age appropriate.

Credit to my parents, because although they were never part of the Flower Power movement, which did the heavy lifting of cracking open suffocating moral standards that dated back to the dark ages;
They were modern and up to date in their beliefs. 

I did not, nor do, consider our family anywhere near the sexual frontier of liberation, but there was absolutely a fair amount of space to develop myself.
And my love for erotica, in some shape or form, was an integral part of that.

So when the visit to the expo fell through, I was disappointed.
But I decided to go ahead and create something for myself.

In one day, I came up with a homemade vintage erotica exposition.

I visited a thrift store, as well as a vintage store on wheels.
Supplemented it with treasures from my own collection, and created a vintage slide show with a collage mishmash from everything I had seen that day.

Including a room where you could watch Ryan Gosling movies, if you didn’t want to go into the exhibition.

The whole thing was such an amazing experience.
Because in order to have a good time;
You have to bring your own.

Your own enthusiasm, your open heart, your own experience and your courage to try something new.
And then?
Oh, the whole world can match you.

And if something falls through, you find something else.
Or go watch Ryan Gosling dvds, and be completely fulfilled as well.

~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

links to My Vintage Erotica Art Show:
blog or Instagram

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retry from alignment | What Do Rock Stars Need To Hear Today

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retry from alignment

None of us are alike.
We come with different appetites, and are built to carry different things.

The ones you’re built to survive, are the ones that are on your real path.
—

It’s the Lion’s Gate Portal today, the 8th day of the 8th month. And I no longer remember what it stands for, but it was positive, and it was powerful because the 8 is the number of power.

So if you were born on the 8th or on the 17th or 26th (which add up to 8) then you are marked for great power.
You’re able to handle it, to carry its weight.
And should feel right at home today, the 8th of August.
But the portal is for all of us, and let’s just call it an alignment portal.

Because the word Manifestation (portal) implies you’re building something from scratch, stomping it out of the ground with your own willpower.
The exact thing we don’t want to do.

‘Cause if it’s aligned then it’s already there.
You just need to get back to the Self naturally equipped to carry it.

But there is a catch;
The levels to which this society has managed to derail and misdirect everybody from their natural let’s call it “power grid” into a Sunday school version of being a good little capitalist consumer languishing away in the prison of a job you do not like-
is unprecedented.

We are uprooted not from location, but from our power.
We no longer have access to it.

And so like caged animals we start overeating, showing repetitive behavior, we think in loops and our thoughts go from the vastness of the planes to the confinement of our cages.
Slowly, we die.

This day;
Drop the bars you’re holding up yourself.
Walk away from the terror of small mindedness.
Burn the learned concept of what is good, and attune to the wisdom of your inner flame.

The truth of who you really are will set you free.

.
~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

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The 369-10 Method | How I quit my online addiction without getting rid of my smartphone

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Foundational post for the 369-10 method.
For the other episodes of the Paperbag Files, follow me on Instagram SLBeenackers.

—

Now definitely WITH the understanding that this thing needs testing,
and has not been submitted to any kind of pressure,
I do feel celebratory because the laboratory version of my new offline lifestyle, WORKS.

I’ve been diligently searching for a way to purge my online addiction and have been reporting my progress in this series since May 2025.

The name Paperbag Files is inspired by the paperbag cover of the dvd of the movie Fight Club.
A movie which made a brave attempt to beat us out of excessive media consumption in 1999.
Without understanding we would one day kill for that turn of the century calm of an offline world without pesky digital devices with whom we have amalgamated to cyborg levels.
We are not just using devices, we no longer know who we are without them.

And so the quest began, and the good news definitely is:
I am healed.
Done.
And like that other 1999 movie The Matrix that predicted we would one day live inside a digital world, I can see the glitches coming and the rough bleak reality seeping through.
And loving it not because of its beauty, but because it is real.

Just like the rebels in the Matrix have to feed themselves with awful food and dress their real-life bodies still marked by digital sockets, in dull greyish green clothing;
Things are not pretty here.
And boy, does the future look bleak.
Intensely lonely.

I hope to find other offline rebels.
But for now this will do.

I am not (yet?) able to identify the underlying mindset shift, that flipped me from trying to go offline (and largely failing), to thriving.

But what I can do, is to tell you how I have made it actionable.

I call the method:
369-10

I turn off my phone for 3 hours;
From 6PM to 9PM.
And again at 10PM for the night.
(leaving phone in the hall)

That’s it.

So although I try to find as many hours during the day as I can, to turn my phone off, the core and non-negotiable ones are:
From 6 to 9.
And after 10PM

“You decide your own level of involvement!” Tyler Durden

.
~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

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Rock Star Take On RESPECT | The New Rock Star Channel (new video)

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new video on YouTube:
click here to see it
-> https://youtu.be/ziYQoFlhBjo

Rock Star Take On RESPECT
| The New Rock Star Channel 

—

The New Rock Star Channel is back!
With a new format:
– 10 minute video
– no preparation

This week, the eleventh video.
A Rock Star Take On RESPECT

—
Or watch the foundational video first, from 24th Oct 2024:
https://youtu.be/AQCIWDhaK4E
2 Rock Star Things That Took Me 25 Years To Find Out
OR All videos with the playlist of this series: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLNB-coaKIJpD5pxPVdrsGG37nvPCaXZIU
The New Rock Star Channel
—

In this video;

1. We’re back! 00:00
With another episode of a Rock Star Take On.
And this time the topic is RESPECT.
We rebooted this series a few weeks ago.
Changes that were made are:
– Vids are now 10 minutes.
– And I go in without preparation.
The unprepared part can never prevent that I think about the topic in advance.

But luckily those insights had their own way of disappearing and by now I have no way to reach them anymore.
So unprepared indeed!

2. Respect “versus” Disrespect 01:11
Except that it’s almost impossible to separate the two!
They’re like Siamese twins.

3. Show, don’t tell 03:03
The key is to show respect, not naming or claiming it.
Which makes respect very actionable:
“How can I show respect?”
Even when you may question aspects of someone.

“How can I respect the people around me?”
And:
“How can I respect the work I have to do?”

4. All responsibilities are created equal 05:48
And no one is more valuable, or worth of more respect than the other.
Even streaming Netflix can be done in a valuable way.

5. What’s Next 09:27
Because we’re covering so many hefty subjects, we’re gonna need a breather every now and then 😅
So as a comic relief, I will make another one about sexuality.
Something that for many of us, is lighthearted!

Plan on making that a recurring theme for this series, just to wash out all the seriousness and start afresh.

Therefor, the next stop is Rock Star Take On
SEXUALITY!

It will go out on this blog.
So subscribe!

.
~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

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—
Playlist of this series: The New Rock Star Channel

 

stop messing with purpose | What Do Rock Stars Need To Hear Today

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stop messing with purpose

Beneath the doubt, the fear, the constant checking;
Behind the yearning for validation, recognition, someone to lean on or even just to lean with!

You know why it is you’re here.

—

Today I walked the streets of a rebuilt Roman neighborhood.

I got lost in their alleys, I ate at their inn, I discovered their city villa, centered around the small enclosed courtyard of stone.

I missed the penis sign which had made me wonder years ago, if it was supposed to depict a brothel.
A rebuilt brothel which we had not entered because it had been under construction, but now that I was there, seven years later, I forgot to go into the building and check.
I did not remember.

But I also climbed the wide white stairs of the palace, a wooden throne at its center which the visitors could not sit on.
But it was clear this palace and the large square surrounded by walls, belonged to the ruler of the village.
The palace and its stairs a stage, more than a functional way to enter a home.

And I stood there, in front of an imaginary crowd who had gathered to see their new ruler and I said:
“I shall be your first female senator, and I am your ruler! You will all bow to me!”
And this was after I had already lingered at a high terrace balconies overlooking a hill, saying:
“I could order the troops from here.”
And in my mind I could already hear a horn.

It were playful thoughts and probably inspired by role players who were at the site. I could see roman soldiers left, right and center.
But still the moments lingered in my mind.
They were fiction, yes, but fiction that resonated.

And I realized that whatever it is we do believe we are here to do, it deserves to be lived like that.

We need to find our point of focus, of power, of truth.
To live it, to speak it, to wear it.

Until we can hear the sound of the horn.

.
~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

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Choosing Art | Share Your Work 2025 07 28

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A very long time ago, I became single. I was excited about the choice but also expected it would end up biting me in the ass. I expected a price to be paid.

And I was right;
Just not the price I anticipated.

Because couples can share burdens, decrease risks and pool resources.
One example is how medical treatment often requires someone to drive you and also to be the first line of emotional support as well as the first caregiver.
If you are single you seriously need to rethink your strategy here, since every medical visit means you have to rely on your social network, which can strain friendships and family bonds.

Being alone at gatherings or the existential idea of aging without next of kin, which were the abstract ideas I associated with being single, are not the first thing you should worry about.
It’s the day to day availability of someone who can step in and help you, either practically or just the soothing effect of having someone around.
My partner and me dropped on the couch every evening, with tea, cookies and cats. I have no memory of anything earth shattering or important happening there, yet it was so nourishing.

My old life dropping away took almost two decades.
And now I can truly say I am alone.
All the soft-landing support networks have become either less available, or there is a more narrowed down understanding of what we share.

So I am now the single I set out to be all those years ago.
Including the price I pay for that.
Yet I do not regret any of it.
The choice to label myself as solitary, like a tiger, was life changing and liberating.
And this year, when the edges of consequence have become razor sharp, has been the most creative by far.

When I was still with my partner I had no creativity to speak of.
Something was missing but it wasn’t the new love life as a single, that would prove to change my world;
It was creating.

The biggest thrill of being single is to have art at the center of your life.

Art is The One.


~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

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offer where it can happen | What Do Rock Stars Need To Hear Today

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offer where it can happen

Most of us do not create physical art, but immaterial.
And we call it a service or a business, because that makes it more trustworthy.

But we know it’s art.

The art of offering a space where others feel alive.
—
I just had the unexpected pleasure of visiting one of the top trucker🚚🚛 rest stops of the Netherlands:
Frans op den Bult

And coming from someone who knows absolutely nothing about trucks, but who has definitely visited quite her share of restaurants, I can say I have never encountered anything like it.

And that renaming it to:
The Frans op den Bult EXPERIENCE
would hold up.
Because I was mesmerized.

Yet technically, it was simply a restaurant, which had been accommodated to truckers.
While also doing an outstanding job of feeding hungry tourists and for a price they will not be getting anywhere else within the borders of this country.

Which has begged the question;
What is it that makes them SO alluring I treat them with theme park reverence?! 🎢🏰🎡

Now I’m not going to cover the setup for truckers but just to give you an idea:
-high drive through arches made of steel poles, and welcoming banners in their characteristic blue with white lettering
-safe parking for 160 trucks
-sanitary facilities incl showers
-best tables of the house reserved for truckers

And yes, I think what makes them so appealing is because they needed a system that served truckers.
But that the trick is it’s working like a charm for all visitors.

Because they created a system that HOLDS you.
A framework, not just literally with those high drive-through gates, but figuratively.
And you feel that.

They see you, welcome you.
But before you are allowed into the restaurant you are cleared and given a pass.

The pass literally means:
“YOU are now allowed to pass.”
You’re crossing a guarded border and entering a different world.

And that?
Is what people pay for.

.
~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

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Rock Star Take On INTERVENTIONS | The New Rock Star Channel (new video)

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new video on YouTube:
click here to see it
-> https://youtu.be/21q_jblnppM

Rock Star Take On INTERVENTIONS
| The New Rock Star Channel 

—

The New Rock Star Channel is back!
With a new format:
– 10 minute video
– no preparation

This week, the tenth video.
A Rock Star Take On INTERVENTIONS

—
Or watch the foundational video first, from 24th Oct 2024:
https://youtu.be/AQCIWDhaK4E
2 Rock Star Things That Took Me 25 Years To Find Out
—

In this video;

1. We’re back! 00:00
With another episode of a Rock Star Take On.
We rebooted this series a few weeks ago.
Changes that were made are:
– Vids are now 10 minutes. -Ish. Ten-minutes-ish!
– And I go in without preparation. Embodied knowledge only!

Invitation to subscribe to this current blog (Catacombe, where you are now).
In particular if I forget to include something in the video, then it will still be included here.

2. Interventions done right 02:17
Not an expert here, but came at it from the inquiry:
“But what would a GOOD intervention, actually look like?!”
+ definition what intervention even is, or what we usually mean when we’re talking about interventions.

3. Do it alone 03:40
Do it with the minimum amount of people, ideally one-on-one.
(make adjustments if needed, in particular for your own safety)
Maybe “official” interveners have a different perspective on this, but to me 1-on-1 is ideal because respect and equality should be leading.
Not overpowering the person you’re intervening on, by six to one or whatever, is a good start.

4. Don’t tie it to your support or presence 05:05
Before the intervention, already make a decision whether you’re going to stay in this person’s life (even if it might be in a small way) or if you are leaving (but with the door open for when they’re clean/sober).
Communicate the decision with clarity, very early in the meeting.
Make clear that this decision is independent from how the person responds to the intervention.

5. Empowerment 07:00
Make it a respectful conversation, honoring the choices someone has made or is making, and coming at it from them being in the director’s chair of their life.
Or you reminding them of the truth of them being in control.

An intervention done right is about respecting yourself (the intervener), respecting the other (the intervened) and speaking in a way that invites them to respect themselves.

Let’s explore this concept a little bit deeper.
The next stop is Rock Star Take On
RESPECT!

It will go out on this blog.
So subscribe!

.
~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

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But no additional or promotional emails are sent – just the blog, sec.

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—
Playlist of this series: The New Rock Star Channel

 

shame, your final reckoning | What Do Rock Stars Need To Hear Today

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shame, your final reckoning

When you’re almost there!

Confronted your most personal fears, rinsed your deepest wounds and even successfully finished your Passive Aggressiveness Combat Training, which we all know almost none of us master;

There it is.
And you can start all over again.

—

Shame and capitalism.

If I was in the business of giving advice to dictators, new gurus or even invading aliens looking for the best hook to implement either their nefarious or virtuous agenda (it works on both);

Or even if I was doing nothing more than writing a blogpost for one reader in 2025 or in a timeline far far away;

I would give all of them the same advice.

Study shame and capitalism, and you will have all you need to understand, infiltrate, and conquer humanity.

And although I would try not to brag, especially in the case of aliens because there is little point in inter-galactic comparison, but I don’t think I would be able to refrain from adding;
“Trust me on this”
“Thank me later”
or even:
“You’re gonna love it”

We will do everything for money.
And we will do everything to not be shamed.

Humanity has built its own mental prison, and one the majority of us are not even aware of.
Yet this framework is not just built, but also attended to and freely maintained by everybody, as we go about unconsciously living its law.

We’ve all been both victims as well as henchmen, accomplices, and to both capitalist repression as well as shaming others even when it is just by parroting values that are based on exclusion.
On not being good enough and not worthy unless.

You think you’re finally making headway with this whole enlightenment thing and there it is…

(Shame:)
“You didn’t think it was gonna be that easy, did you?”

(You:)
“You know, for a second there, yeah.
I kinda did.”*

.
~Suzanne Beenackers
Catacombe
become the Rock Star you were born to be

*free after Kill Bill I

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