Archive for the ‘Spirituality’ Category

I think anyone will agree that we are as polarized as any of us can recall in our lifetimes.  Polarization is not particularly helpful when going through profound times of transition and transformation.  After all, sayings like “United we stand…divided we fall” are founded, at some level, in Truth. At the same time, it might also be said that polarization is a direct by-product of transition itself.

So how do we deal with this seeming paradox?

I think its by recognizing that whenever change occurs, a natural state of tension and resistance is created as the parts of an organism, organization or society reorganizes and realigns itself.  As difficult as it may be to live through a realignment, it’s a necessary stage of growth.  Perhaps, the best way to transit a realignment (not to mention survive one!) is not by trying to hold on to the tail ends…thereby finding oneself whipped and flailed about in a constant frenzy…but to draw one’s energy into the center where the most stable condition possible exists.

So where’s the center?

It’s, literally, inside of you.

When remedies that previously worked and laws that once created order now seem, at best ineffective and at worst harmful, it is smart to retreat within and find solid ground amid the shifting external sands of reorganization.

This doesn’t mean you “drop out” in 60’s-hippie-type-fashion, but rather ask your own questions and find your own answers from a place within yourself.  It is futile during times of profound change to look outside yourself and seek solutions amid chaos. The best you can hope for in so doing is to be drawn into someone else’s perception of events, analysis and action.  The danger therein is that perception is time constrained. It is based upon one’s limited view at a finite point in time.

The principles that one needs to successfully traverse change are unchanging and beyond time. Since everything in the world you or anyone else can perceive is subject to change and time bound, your answers cannot possibly be found there.

If not without then within.

If you trust yourself to be able to source inner guidance and allow others the same opportunity without having to polarize their findings or your own, a core of stability can be created that will transcend and transform all that is in transition external to our true inner selves.

The paradox of unwanted but necessary polarization is thereby resolved.

As is all conflict.

Wouldn’t that be sweet.

I’m not someone who has ever had a position on the inherent value of the United Nations or it’s effectiveness. I know there are proponents on either side of the issue.  I’ve just never given it much consideration. 

Until this week.

This week, three world leaders stood before that organization.  Two would have been laughable in their ignorance, bigotry and hatred had their very presence at the United Nations not dignified them beyond either merit or reason. 

Hugo Chavez and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are carbon copies of historical predecessors who sought to dominate and subjugate the very people they claimed to represent and care for.  Such men have one goal. It is the annihilation of the Jewish people and the destruction of freedom everywhere. They would see their goals accomplished through repression, deceit, torture and murder.

The United Nations welcomed these two men and gave them a platform. Some delegates even shamelessly laughed and applauded as Chavez, once again, debased an American President.  A former American President.  It seems he actually likes our current one.  A disturbing fact that should give us all pause.

The third man to speak was Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.  Holding the United Nations feet to the fire of its Charter, he questioned the morality and absence of shame in providing these other two a stage from which to spew their hatred.  He spoke of historical fact, not fiction.  As if any rational or feeling person might need it, he came with proof in hand.  He held up a mirror for those listening who were brave enough to look upon their own reflection.

Then, having spoken truth to power, he went on to speak of all that has been and will be accomplished by civil and humane societies everywhere that look to better the world for the highest good of all concerned. 

I began by saying that I am not someone who has ever had a position on the inherent value of the United Nations or it’s effectiveness.

I do now.

It is an institution with vast potential that has completely failed to achieve its mission.  It is a mockery of what it was envisioned to be. It is rendered impotent by nature of its cowardice.  It is irrelevant.

As an American, I am proud that our delegation left the room when Ahmadinejad spoke.

As a Jew I am proud of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s forthrightness.  I have not always been a fan… but he “had me at hello” on this one. 

As a member of humankind, I hope we, the people of the world, continue to awaken to the choices we face at this critical time of transition and transformation.

The Chavezes and Ahmadinejads of the world or the Netanyahus?

The choice, and the voice, belongs to each of us.

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size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>It seems getting to God is a team sport.

The holiest day on the Jewish calendar, Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) is about to occur. I am re-reading a book I first read 30 years ago titled “A Course in Miracles.”  size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>These two facts, from a formal, organized religious perspective are seemingly irreconcilable. size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>..mainly because the book is about God, Christ and the Holy Spirit and Yom Kippur is …well, you get the picture.

size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>Irreconcilable. I’m sure that’s what most would say.

But I think the messages of Yom Kippur and “A Course in Miracles” are exactly the same.

size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>The holiday and the book are about Atonement.

size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>As a Jew, I’ve always felt the gravity and opportunity of Yom Kippur… yet I don’t think I ever really understood Atonement until reading the book.
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Atonement is the undoing of what you thought occurred in your past.  Well, at least the undoing of whatever occurred to you or by you that was not loving.  It’s more than forgiveness, because to forgive there must have occurred something that needed to be forgiven…and whatever occurs that is not of Love never really occurs at all since only Love is real.  size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>

Everything else is illusion.

size=”3″ face=”Courier New”>Hard to comprehend, right?

But really, if we’ve been created in the image and likeness of God….and God is Love…ever expanding outward energy with Its only intention being to give All to All for eternity and infinity…then how can we be anything other than That from which we came and which continues to sustain us? And if we are That, then We Too Are Love and everything that is not Love…is not real.

The Atonement is setting aside, putting down, walking away from all that is illusion and turning toward That Which Is Real. Turning toward Love. Turning toward Creator.

Having turned, we then surrender to Who We Really Are and commit to Being Love..to understanding Oneness…to gifting to every other human being the same Love and Grace we have received as a result of Atonement.

It’s an interesting discussion I’d like to have with a Rabbi and a Priest…in the same room at the same time. 

I think the outcome would be One(1)ness.

Final Score: 
Separate religions O
Spirituality       1

If the White House thought it had a problem with Glenn Beck, conservative talk radio and the “organized smear campaign” against Van Jones….they better hold onto their hats as they are not likely going to be able to hold onto their jobs.

This morning, on both Glenn Beck’s radio show and, simultaneously on FOX cable TV, they ran an undercover video with audio exposing WHO ACORN IS and WHAT ACORN DOES. A portion of that video is being excerpted on the web, as I write, at Big Government.

ACORN “professionals” assist, advise and conspire to commit fraud with an undercover man and woman posing as a future Congressional candidate and a teenage prostitute who allegedly want to purchase a house in a respectable neighborhood to run a brothel.  Proceeds from the brothel will go into the campaign coffers of the man when he runs for Congress. 

The man and woman are undercover and with hidden camera and wired with a mic.

The ACORN employees are shameless criminals.

If ever there were a straw to break the Public’s back it will be this one.

ACORN employees:

    -Advise the couple how to evade filing federal taxes;
    -Proceed in misrepresenting the girl’s “job” by using the code designation for an unrelated occupation in order to qualify for federal loan monies to purchase the house;
    -Tell the teenage girl she should be proud of her prostitution;
    -Suggests the couple not discuss the 13 year-old-girls from El Salvador who are illegal and prostitutes working within the brothel or not get them social security cards because they’re not old enough to get social security.
    -Suggests the prostitute claim the 13-year-old-illegals as dependents.

ACORN is:

    -The organization from which President Obama emerged. 
    -Where President Obama learned how to community organize.
    -Having it’s employees arrested across this country, as recently as this week, for fraudulent voter registration. 
    -Along with SEIU, had the voting laws changed in Nevada in order to give Barack Obama an advantage over Hilary Clinton in the Primary that likely cost her the nomination.

Out of every bad comes a good.

This is a moment to STAND UP FOR WHAT IS RIGHT.
This is a moment to STAND FOR TRUTH.
This is a moment to say NO MORE CORRUPTION.
This is a moment to say NO MORE DECEPTION.
This is a moment to say I AM NOT AFRAID.
This is a moment to say I KNOW WHO I AM.
This is a moment to say I KNOW WHERE I WANT TO GO.

This is Your moment. Your choice. Your reality.

The road is forked just around this bend.  One way will take you home and the other will take you to a dark and twisted place. You have the Inner Guidance to know which way to go.  All you have to do is listen from within, trust in that voice, and stand with certainty for what you know to be True.

The rest will done for you.
Not by the Federal government, ACORN or Van Jones.
But by the Only Power There Is.

    

This past Thursday I wrote a column that was unusual for me because it had political subject matter.  I try to avoid that arena here.  Breaking policy, I wrote it because, as is always the case, truth is “the highest good for all concerned” and that’s my mission statement.  So, I go where it takes me.  On Thursday it took me to the White House.

It’s Sunday morning and the trip was worth it.  Van Jones has resigned.

Glenn Beck is a Public Servant, in the purest sense of the word, for has done the nation a service.  He shone a bright and unwavering light, the Light of Truth I dare to say, upon a shadowy man whose intentions have been deliberately masked and obscured by those in positions of power in order to advance a very anti-American agenda.

The resignation of Van Jones as Special Adviser to the President is a victory for full and fair disclosure… a legal and ethical concept lost on this Administration.  He is but the latest in a long list of appointees and nominees by this President who have personal and professional histories of corruption, pay-for-play tactics, cronyism and supporting policies and foreign governments that would see an end to freedom as we know it.

This is a cloaked and shadowy Administration but I still believe in Hope and Change.  They are what Barack Obama promised us and they are exactly what he is delivering….albeit not quite the way he and his wife intended.

There is always a silver lining… and I see this one shining brightly through.

We can remain HOPEful that there are brave and impassioned men and women, such as Glenn Beck and those who are making his personal mission possible, to shine that Light of Truth when and where it’s needed.

We can CHANGE the face of politics by removing the mask of deceit and cloak of subterfuge and demanding accountability, full disclosure and truthfulness of those who claim to aspire to serve the public good.

Van Jones’ resignation is not the end.  It is the beginning of a sea CHANGE moving this nation and, ultimately, free people everywhere, to higher ground where HOPE is the order of the day and the air is cleaner… not of CO2 content but of fear.

Yes, “HOPE and CHANGE.” 

Turns out it really is more than a bumper sticker after all.

This is not a political blog. I have always advocated “the highest good for all concerned” as my mission statement and I go the extra mile to find just that within everything I write.  Sometimes, however, important choices need to be made at crossroads, and I believe we as a People have arrived at one.

I have listened to Glenn Beck on and off for the past three years.  I found him entertaining and intellectually curious, a combination I enjoyed. I thought his tag line “the fusion between entertainment and enlightenment” was aptly put.  I sometimes questioned how far out on a limb he was walking… and where the fine line ended between his entertaining persona and his intellectual curiosity; however, I none-the-less felt that overall he provided a “cut above” in talk radio. 

He seemed not so much partisan as he did genuine.

To be up front, I was a life-long Democrat (now Independent) who voted for John McCain.  I did so not with a happy heart but because I had an intuitive feeling that there was too much unknown, untested and, frankly, disturbing about Barack Obama and the people with whom he surrounded himself.  I listened, as Glenn Beck started down the road of alleging more than discomfort with the President but rather alleging mal-intent.  As Beck’s allegations grew and intensified, along with his substantiated fact finding, my concerns grew and intensified as well.

I believe today is a turning point.  Like Glenn Beck, I too now pray for the country.

Beck has played on air this morning audio from April 2008 of Van Jones, Special Adviser to the President on Green Jobs.  It is the straw that will break that camel’s back.  Van Jones speaks, unabashedly, of undeniably Marxist intentions.  He sets forth, unmasked, what he (and I now believe many surrounding President Obama) intend for this country.  It is not what I intend and I know with certainty it is not what most people intend whovalue freedom, privacy and personal responsibility.

The President is a smart man.  He knows who surrounds him.  He is either in agreement with their intentions, or, he is not certain enough of what he believes in and strong enough to stand for it. 

Either way, the crossroad is here, now, for you and me.

Each citizen must decide for himself and herself what their basic values are and then stand for them. Be ready to stand for them in every way at every opportunity.  Be ready to voice your stand.  Be ready to be demeaned for it, marginalized for it and rejected for it.  And be certain that no voice other than your own has any more certainty or power.  Get your strength from within.  Fear nothing and no one.  Know that you are looking at and listening to an illusion wherever fear and urgency are the clarion calls. 

I take no political side on this. I take the side of inner guidance and personal responsibility. I take the side of full disclosure and good intention. I take the side of opposing all who would impose their view upon me while attempting to dishonor my own. 

I am hopeful that Glenn Beck has made his voice so public and so widespread, that to harm or silence him would be it’s own affirmation about the lengths to which those now in power will go to try and force their view of reality upon others.

This is a potentially glorious moment in our societal evolution.  I have no doubt that just as a lit room obliterates darkness, so too will the light of truth obliterate those who are motivated by power and the desire to oppress the spirit of man.

We are at the crossroad and it is the night before the dawn.

Stand for what you believe in and hold high the light of truth.  

Five months ago I wrote an entry titled “Christ Consciousness” that daily continues to receive more hits that any other blog I’ve written since.  So I asked myself why?

I think I know the answer.

It all rests on the difference between reality and illusion….between religion and spirituality.

Most of what we are concerned with, what our minds are preoccupied with on a daily basis, is…quite literally…a distraction from the only thing in life that truly matters: being in a constant state of co-creating with love.   While this may sound unrealistic given the practicalities of life, and somewhat philosophical as well, to the contrary, nothing could be more realistic or practical.

The opposite of reality is illusion.  How many of us know, by way of first-hand experience, that what we’ve been taught, told and sold will satisfy us and make us happy is simply an empty promise.  How many of us “acquire” and “achieve” accomplishments, degrees and “stuff” only to realize that none of it makes a meaningful difference in how joyful or satisfying our lives are?   That’s because the world of achieving, acquiring and materialism is a world created not by the One Mind capable of creating a Universe and more….but rather by only one aspect of that Mind….and a misapplied aspect at that….called the human ego.   Everything ego makes is temporary.  You know it and I know it.  If it’s temporary, then it will come and it will go. And if it can go, then where does that leave us other than in a perpetual state of anticipating and fearing abandonment and lack?

T o the contrary, what is real, and neither illusory nor temporary, is that which Creator is…which is All There Is.  Creator is eternal creativity, ever-expanding outward by way of Its Unified Thought, in a field of loving awareness of Self.  What we have forgotten, or denied, is that we are part of that Unified Thought thus making us co-creators in loving awareness of self.  If Who You Are is eternal, ever-expanding, unified and lovingly aware then you must be something much more than either your body or your ego since both are limited and finite.   Which is why identifying with our bodies or trying to “gain” self love through achievement or acquisition is so unsatisfying and must, ultimately, fail.

What has been forgotten can be remembered.  What has been denied has occurred because when we deny something in another it’s because we are not aware of it in ourselves. The way to heal our own sense of unworthiness, our own alienation from the state of wholeness that is our birthright, is to see others as whole, healed, and worthy in themselves.  By so doing, you return them to the Only Mind There Is and to the Reality where peace and joy reside. 

What you see in others is what is in you.  Therefore, the blessing you have given them becomes yours.

Which is why I think the previous entry “Christ Consciousness” is getting so much attention… for it strikes a deep knowing within each of us.

                                       The way home is lovingly with and through one another. 

This year marks our arrival at a crossroad.  We are exactly 40 years out from Woodstock and Woodstock was exactly 40 years out from The Great Depresssion.  “So what’s the crossroad?” you ask.  If you give me a moment or two I’ll explain; but first, let’s take a look at what’s happening right now that’s causing public outcries, Republican and Democrat stone-throwing, and so much general discontent.

Most of us are aware that there’s something like a war being waged between what I’ll call, for lack of more accurate terms, Conservatives and Liberals.  While these have come to be completely meaningless terms, using them will make identifying the combatants easier.

The instant battle in this war seems to be over health care reform…although this is just the latest in a series of public objections to what appears to some as increasingly and, increasingly unacceptable, government ineptitude and intervention into the private sector.  The important words in the previous sentence are the words “to some”…because how many and who they are seems to be over what the battle is currently being waged.

Conservatives say the battle is inextricably tied to the intention of the Founding Fathers, the Constitution, and even survival of the Republic. They are united in their opposition and claim their numbers are increasing daily.  Liberals say the battle is tied to compassion for those who have been marginalized by both prior Administrations and private sector greed, and, ultimately, is inextricably tied to our financial solvency and overall economic survival going forward. They, too, are united in their opposition and believe their adherents are the majority, and have been for some time, albeit a less vocal one.

So which of them is right?  Oh, sorry.  Wrong question.

So, what is the Truth?

First, to the combatants: both are right and both are wrong.  You see, its the old saying “there are three sides to every story. Yours, mine and the Truth.”

What we do now, about health care reform and everything else that’s on the table or will be, is very much about what the Founding Fathers intended.  It is about the future of the Republic.  It is about compassion and action for those marginalized by institutional biases and greed.  It is about what kind of participant we, the United States…and we, as Co-Creators in the future of humankind…will be in the evolving consciousness of life during this millennium, on this planet, and beyond.

That’s where, combined, both groups have it right. 

The Truth, however, isn’t found within either argument and is bigger than both combined.  The Truth has nothing to do with right or wrong. The Truth isn’t about perception, judgment or separation.  The Truth is about harmony and Oneness.  The truth is found at the crossroad.

So, let’s return to The Great Depression, Woodstock and that crossroad.

Woodstock was emblematic of a vocal, and seemingly brief, generational rejection of the materialism and direction this nation had pursued following The Great Depression.  I say “brief” because many of we Boomers who later got caught up in that very materialism, also lost sigh of the fact that in so doing we became seduced and distracted by it.  Our distraction led to our abdicating responsibility for heading in the very direction we had earlier opposed.  From 1990-2008 life got faster, more materially comfortable, and more technologically dependent. It also got more stressful, more alienated, less meaningful and less joyful.

If The Great Depression was the beginning, and Woodstock the milestone, then we have arrived at the crossroad.

The Truth?

The Constitution was divinely inspired. But so are you.  So are we all.  We’ve just forgotten our purpose. 

Our purpose isn’t to accomplish anything more than remembering that we are not what we make, what we consume, or what we bank.  We are One Being.  All we have is all we need.  We are what we share and give away in joyful knowing that we are of One Mind and One Heart.  Sustenance and Abundance are our birthrights.  We are Co-Creators in the ongoing miracle that is the only Creation that ever occurred or ever will.

No government, no political party, no employer, no spouse is your Source of supply.  One Mind is.  Connect with that Mind; know that it is within You as it is within everyone else.  Be joyful about that knowing and share your gifts and your part in it freely… knowing that the adage “All you have is what you give away” is about trusting in the only Truth there is.

It isn’t True because I say it is, either. 

It just Is.

Or, better said, “I Am That I Am.”

         Whenever there is an occurrence that generates such massive focusing of consciousness as the death of Michael Jackson its a moment filled with opportunity.

         But for whom and for what?

         The very day that news of Jackson’s death broke, I was browsing through Barnes and Noble and came upon a book titled “Frequency” by Penny Peirce. The title caught my attention since as long as I can remember I have been known to say “We are all energy operating at different frequencies.” Since I had just “asked” the Universe for an inspirational message, I opened the book randomly and read the page.

         What I read was remarkable.

         If I can paraphrase, the author posits that since our bodies live in the present so must our minds. When we linger too long in thoughts that are either past or future, we fundamentally leave our bodies without consciousness…or as my friend Marlene likes to say, without the computer that runs it. What’s the result? Its stagnation…non-action…no movement. Think about your computer without an operating system. What can it do? Now think about your body without the benefit of your mind’s attention. It’s like that computer… and it’s not about to do anything either.  So what you get when you leave our body to trip the light fantastic is nothing.  Literally, you get stagnation in your life. Why?  Because since the only thing that exists is the Present, the Now… when your thoughts are any place other than Here and Now you are creating NO-THING-NESS in your Present. Your are creating EMPTINESS in your Life.

         I don’t know if “It takes a village to raise a child” but it definitely takes a mind and body working in both harmony and real Time to create a Life.

         How do your know if your mind and body are in sync?  Frequency. 

         Think about those days when everything just seems to be going right. You’re energetic, things fall into place, you can seemingly do no wrong. Now contrast that with days when your devoid of energy and everything you attempt feels like an uphill battle. Know what the difference is?  When things are going right, your operating at what Peirce calls your “home frequency.”  Its that vibrational rate, default rate if you will, at which your mind and body are set to maximize creativity in its various forms.  But when the opposite is true, and it all seems a futile battle, its because you’ve “left the room”, so to speak, by separating your thoughts from the Present and thereby also left your body without the means to function effectively in the material world.   You become the laptop without the operating system.  Nothing’s going to happen.

         So what’s all this got to do with Michael Jackson’s death? Or Bernard Madoff’s conviction and sentencing? Or the aftermath of the Iranian election for that matter?

         Well, while these events may be happening in real time, or close to it, are they actually happening in the real time of your own life?  I think not. If you and millions of other people around the globe have their consciousness endlessly “looping” around these distractions… and others like them… then whose minding the store? 

         The store being your body and, hence, your Life?

         I would suggest that if you’re focused on anything other than what needs to be done in your own life this day that you are guaranteeing a drain on your “home frequency” and leaking energy away from what is possible in your Life.

         Michael Jackson died. Rest in peace. Bernie Madoff is sentenced to 150 years. I guess Rest in Peace is appropriate there, too. The Iranian election is over and there’s civil unrest. I wish them freedom. But a blog had to be written and food shopping had to be done and a client needed my input and I had to exercise and meditate and my daughter will be home soon and dinner has to be made and I have target shooting tonight and piano practice.

         As long as my consciousness is operating at my home frequency I can accomplish all of those things and much, much more. Without it, I’m a bump on a log.

         So next time things seem to be slow or uphill, perhaps you’ve left your body unattended to pursue a distraction or two that has no hope of getting you where it is you really want to go in Life. That’s fine… as long as you’re not wondering or complaining about how come you’re not getting what it is you really want out of Life.

    

         A few weeks ago I po sted a blog entry about a “miracle” healing. What continues to surprise me is that the post has continued to get a steady stream of visitors each day since, without any promotion from me. Now that’s somewhat unusual because what normally happens is that posts get a lot of visitors initially when first published and then that traffic dies off but for occasional, usually diminishing, activity. However, not so the “Miracle Healing” entry. This tells me that it’s word-of-mouth, so to speak, that’s generating the continued traffic.

         So what is it about that post that’s generating all the buzz?  Allow me to digress for a moment.

         Those of you who read my blog know I have written about an attempted suicide at age 24. You also may have seen me on YouTube talk about that experience and how it changed my life and formed the basis for the spiritual and philosophical way I live my life today. Perhaps the most frequent point I try and make when public speaking about the attempt is that “people who try to commit suicide don’t really want to die. They’ve just temporarily misplaced hope.” 

         I think the words “misplaced hope” hold the secret to the popularity of the “Miracle Healing” post.

         We continue to live in extraordinarily stressful times and stress takes it’s toll. Usually, on the body. Dis-ease and illness are rampant. Particularly cancer. The numbers of people who have been, and are each day, diagnosed with some form of cancer are escalating at an alarming rate. Yet cancer is just one example. The human body is simply not designed to withstand the pressures… particularly the mental and emotional pressures…that result from the way we live. Nor are we meant to live at this pace. Plus, there are all the environmental pollutants that have been, and continue to be, spewed and dumped into the Earth and It’s atmosphere.   With so much pressure and so much illness, it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that we have the ability to change how we live as well as to heal ourselves in non-traditional ways.

         In other words, it’s easy to misplace hope in the as-yet-unknown.

         Enter my post about the miracle healing.  I think people read it and are moved by the miraculous, non-traditional healing that took place. Sure. It’s a great story and a true one.

         More importantly, however, I think they find in it that elusive thing called “hope” that the seemingly irreversible can, in fact, be reversed. So whether it’s an illness they or someone they know is struggling with, or a relationship gone awry, or a business venture turned liability, or a troubled child….whatever it is… they are reminded, encouraged to renew their faith, that hope is never lost, only misplaced.

         I could not have been part of that healing had I not had faith and hope that I could somehow make a difference. And the patient could not have improved had he not also had, on some level, faith and hope in his own survival. I believe that. And while you may not, what matters is that both he and I did and the result speaks for itself.

         I think we live in a world where people are hungry for hope. It’s the effort to feed that hunger that is driving the ongoing traffic to the “Miracle Healing” post.  I am encouraged by all the interest. I hope those readers who are called there find what it is they have gone in search of.

         Hope.