Wednesday, December 26, 2007

Christmas 2007

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We shared a most delightful and memorable Christmas, a day of Love and bright, sparkling, warm memories.:) This Christmas was special, a jewel of a moment set in gold.:) We carry its breath-taking moments into the future as a foundation for greater and expanded Love.:) Even on this imperfect little planet, it was a moment of joy to the world.:)
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Tuesday, December 25, 2007

God Everywhere and the Illusion of "Place"

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In the ultimate analysis, only changes in Mind can create healing; and Love/compassion is a major-- Number 9 on the Francis scale-- alteration of Mind towards the positive!:)

Philosophically, I am in full agreement that darkness has no substantial existence, but is the absence of Something that does-- the Light. These are dramatic as well as "primordial" metaphors," and have served the masters, including Jesus, quite well. "God is Light," said the mystic John, and there is no darkness at all within Him." (1 Jn. 1:5)

Honestly, I do not feel well enough to invite and honor a guest....

Your Love for Shela [pseudonym] has been a high percentage of "God" (Love) in your life for many years. I encourage you to probe deeply into the situation, think about it profoundly, and discuss it several times in detail (with both Shela and others) before simply dropping it. Our God is Love, and, as mystics, we do not ever easily dismiss or deactivate any Love-relationships in our lives. For they are what save us, make us and keep us in enlightenment. Mystics are faithful, loyal, reliable, and dependable Lovers, and make the most excellent friends, because we treasure, value, and even worship Love. To abandon a Love of many years might betray the very matrix and foundation of our philosophy, and could very easily become self-centered or even antiagapic. So, try to walk very carefully here, my friend. For the lower nature has surrounded you with a field of land-mines, and they can "explode," damaging Mind and even Soul, at any time. For fidelity, not abandonment, is the Way of Love, the Way of the true mystic.

Your note refers several times to what "I" want, so you need honestly to examine your heart. For the mystic leaves behind any attempt to live for the desires of the self; instead, she seeks always to serve Love, even at great personal cost, or much personal inconvenience.

Your service of Love having been severely challenged by attempts to love your mother or brother cannot, with good reason or valid Love, be used to explain, or mask, a betrayal of yet another Love-- the greatest in this life. Reference is, of course, to Shela.

All the jewel-like beauties of the Upanishads, and other great and lovely classics of the Enlightenment Tradition, are as nothing-- just words-- if we betray Love, or refuse to follow Love, for selfish reasons. Right now, it is sensed that you are on a rocky and perilous path, in which betrayal of the core or essence of the Way is not out of the question.

So, walk very carefully, my friend. Recall all the sweet Love with which Shela supported your donkey... Know that the enlightened always return Love for Love, and never "run from" an uncomfortable situation.

Arguably, no one on earth has found a "perfect" environment; but this is irrelevant to the Way, whose goal is the "perfect" mental or interior environment. As Dr. Frankl pointed out, exterior environments, even if they are as hideous as concentration camps, become the very "food" that supports enlightenment. And no mere mayic or outer environment can prevent full illumination. Neither can maya in any way decelerate spiritual awareness. Indeed, mystics have proved, over and again, that the most Light emerges in the darkest places.

And, if you are in an environment not conducive to quiet, remind yourself, "Thou art that." It is here, not to prevent your growth, but to stimulate it through the utter demolition of all personal desires.

Thus, your personal desire to live out in the woods might be the first casualty of the Light.

For how much of the quiet, the woods, and the cabin, are mere extensions of fantasy? And by definition, fantasy can be the opposite of truth.

The ancient venerable writers of these great classics were usually dwellers in the forests, it is true. But, back then, the poverty was so immense that they had no other alternatives. Could they but have been provided with a house, obtained honorably by non-greed, they would not have objected. You have idealized the forest or woods to contain more, or better, visions of God than an urban environment.

But this is all artificial, and hence, untrue. For the Lord of Love indwells fully every human mind. And She lives in Mind only-- not in temples, churches, or forests. In seeking a greater realization in the forest, you are subtly abandoning the very principle of the interior Being of Brahman, and replacing it with an erroneous perspective-- that Brahman is "more present" or "easier to find" in the forest than in your own mind. This argument is subtle, and sounds correct, but it actually is at least a piece of the denial of the ubiquity and omnipresence of Mind. It is subtly being misled down the path of maya. And it is sensed that it is leading you into notions of a "real exterior" world-- firmly denied by the Upanishads.

It is only the lower nature that argues that it is "easier" to find God in a forest or quiet area. People are somewhat noisy, but, in the view of oneness, that noise is also to be embraced as the song of God. It is challenging to live a mystical life among people. But it is clearly the will of Love that we live among people, for only among them can Love have its expression. From this view, it is actually selfish to seek a "perfectly quiet and distant" location to seek for Her Who is everywhere.

And the Goddess lives most powerfully of all as Love, for She is Love.
So, she has lived a million times more powerfully through and in Cindy than in a thousand forests. I know that the views presented here are a little different from your own, as you are so enamoured of the cabin and forest. But please carefully consider them. For I sense that your belief in "exterior" environments is blocking your fullest awakening.
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Sunday, December 23, 2007

What Year is Coming Up?

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Do you know what year is coming up?
If you said, "Two thousand eight," you're dead wrong!
For any number containing the word "thousand" is a quantity, not a year. If you have "one thousand nine hundred seventy-five" pennies, you have almost twenty dollars. But "one thousand nine hundred seventy-five"
is not a year; it is an amount or quantity. The year is read correctly "nineteen seventy-five."
The same is consistently true of "2008." If you have "two thousand eight" cars on a lot, this tells how many cars that you have; it says nothing about the make or year in which the cars were produced. The only correct or literate way to read the date or year 2008 is "twenty-oh-eight."
Play this game with friends. It is astonishing just how many will get it wrong! Ask, "What year is the year just coming up?" An amazing number of people will illiterately answer, "Two thousand eight."
But the only correct answer, known to all literate people, is "twenty-oh-eight."
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Saturday, December 22, 2007

e-Card Warning

Thanks to Tom Gustin.
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Watch For Holiday E-Card Spam, Symantec Warns



Some malware authors have even gone so far as to include the phrases "no worm, no virus" in the e-card's text, as if such an assurance made the message safe.

By Thomas Claburn
InformationWeek

December 4, 2007 04:20 PM

'Tis the season to be wary. Sadly, malware authors are quick to seize on current events to cloak their social engineering attacks -- which typically involve tricking people into clicking on a malicious link or visiting a malicious Web page -- in an aura of legitimacy.

So it is that the holiday season brings a surge in holiday-oriented scams. As security company Cyveillance noted on Monday, phishing attacks jumped by 300% on Thanksgiving Day, compared with the number of attacks seen the previous week.
Another security company, Message Labs, said following Thanksgiving that it was seeing holiday-themed spam coming across its infrastructure at a rate of about 300,000 an hour.

Symantec security researcher Jitender Sarda documented one such attack on Tuesday that uses e-cards.

"These e-cards are purportedly sent from a legitimate source and try to lure the victim to click on the link to view the e-cards, which have underlying tricks to try and infect the computer," said Sarda in a blog post. "With the Xmas bells starting to ring, here is the first incidence where Xmas e-cards have started doing the rounds."
While these e-cards may appear to come from a familiar brand name, the "From:" field is forged. And the spammer responsible, perhaps aware that e-cards have acquired an air of disrepute, has even gone so far as to include the phrase "(no worm, no virus)" in the e-card's text, as if such an assurance made the message safe.
In fact, the link provided attempts to download a file named "sos385.tmp," which is itself a downloader that connects to the Internet and attempts to download other malicious files.

Friday, December 21, 2007

America the Beautiful and America the Terrible

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I grew up in America the Beautiful, a country that was part idealization.

But it was a system that respected international law and order. It was a massive, mighty, many say "blessed," country that would never, under any conditions, stoop to invading a third-world country whose "soldiers" are often twelve-year-olds. And it would never have engaged in this nightmare of mass-murder of women and children for the evils of oil and greed.

I love America. But I do not always love or embrace her behavior under the tyranny of ignorant and greedy men. I do not respond with "shock and awe" to the slaughter and massacre of hundreds of thousands of innocent women, children, and men in a single day. This is the evil twin of America the Beautiful; her name is America the Terrible.

In America the Terrible, it is a place where elections were fixed and dishonest. In both twenty hundred in Florida, and in twenty-oh-four in Ohio, hundreds of thousands of valid votes were disenfranchised-- mostly votes of native Americans, African Americans, Asian Americans, and Latino Americans. Huge boxes of their valid votes were simply thrown away.

Why? Because they did not want the government to be led by men who trashed personal rights and civil liberties. They were rejecting a government that practiced regular torture and mass-murder. They turned away from a government that spied on its own citizens, and took away civil rights and freedoms. In short, they insisted on a simple democracy, which the U.S. claimed to be exporting, while in reality, it was suppressing here at home.

The rulers of America the Terrible were the pygmy-puppets of corporate America. They stood by the greedy and destructive corporations while they ruined the environment, and defended their absolute greed even as they poisoned innocent citizens. And when opportunities arose to help people-- whether senior citizens, children, students, or the common person-- the leaders stood squarely opposed to programs that could assist. This was done not once, but over and over again. America the Terrible believed in war-- even in starting it, and in the defense of pollution; and "anything for a buck" was its guiding philosophy.

In America the Terrible, an unqualified man could, with the aid of his father, "buy" the highest position in the land, and end up in the White House even if the citizens did not want him there. He could buy his way to power by becoming a weak puppet of vast wealth, again, mostly corporate. He could then reverse laws that the wisest people had developed for decades. He could not only start a nightmarish war, but could threaten the beginning of another-- this time, nuclear. By simply ignoring the poor and supporting the rich, he could come dangerously close to eliminating the middle class-- the traditional strength of America the Beautiful. In sum, everything that could go wrong in America the Beautiful did go wrong in America the Terrible.
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Tuesday, December 18, 2007

"Small" Blessings

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The longer that we remain on this tiny planet, the more we realize that the "small things" are really the great things, and that "small, ordinary" blessings are from the Heart of Love at the Center.:) So, we send a thousand million "small blessings," which add up to healing, joy, friendship, and, most of all, Love.
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The Body in Spirituality

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The body exists within the mind, not the other way 'round.:) The body is only a psychohologram, an aspect of maya. It is a part of spirituality, and is to be acknowledged in a healthy way, but mystics do not focus much on body-consciousness, which we more often regard as a distraction from the spiritual Way. But it is an ego-distraction that, like a pesky fly, keeps coming back, again and again.:)

The chakras (pronounced "chuck-ruhs") can give valuable feedback, especially when we concentrate on the so-called "energy-bodies." But these fields of force are also a part of the mayic world, and so, are not the equivalent of the Christspirit, God, or Reality (cosmic Mind).

The body has its own karmic pattern within the overall pattern of the illusionworld (dreamworld). Sometimes, it challenges a certain aspect of mind to grow. But every biological dysfunction need not have deep symbolic meaning. Some states or conditions are meant to challenge our detachment, our faith in Love, or other factors. Thus, a person with foot-problems need not assume that she is "walking down a wrong spiritual path," and a person who temporarily loses her voice need not assume that she is "speaking incorrectly."

Still, the body is an incredibly complex "school" within the general school of earthlife. It is to be loved and respected, like a best friend, and is our "training-instrument" in this life. But heavy bodily emphasis just leads a person into greater selfconsciousness of, and perhaps slavery to, the world of illusion. Only in purest Mind, not in body, can we ever find true and lasting liberation.
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In-sight

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When the interior eye of the mind is opened by Spirit, the enlightened learn from everything and everyone all around them. All are students, all teachers.:)
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Maintenance of Friendship

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Yesterday evening's visit from you was a great and very thoughtful "Christmas gift.":) We got to share-- early-- some of that famous "Christmas spirit." This is, of course, the spirit of Love, generosity, giving, thoughtfulness, kindness, other-centeredness, and other delightful related positivities.

It stuns and somewhat surprises me just how easily even the best of friends can "lose each other" in the busy-ness of everyday life. Emails stop, phone-calls become rare, and visits scarce. Friendship is a living thing. It must be "fed" by fairly regular communications, or else, it can "die on the vine," evaporate, simply vanish. And this can just naturally happen, without anyone's doing anything, even without anyone's wanting it.

You have to do a little fun "work" to keep a friendship going, but it can disappear without any work at all. In fact, it "starves" when neglected.:(

I surely do not want this to happen to our very precious and light-filled, Love-filled friendship. For it is fun, energizing, positive, and life-enhancing. It makes our lives richer and more fun.

A friendship, no matter how strong or how long, can perish through simple neglect. Everyone is in greatest and immediate danger of becoming simply "too busy" to do "maintenance" on a friendship. This delightful friendship-maintenance includes fairly regular communications (emails, phone-calls, snailmails, cards) as well as visits when possible. It might also include, as in the Christmas Holy-day, small gifts as appropriate.

Let us simply think of each other. Let us do this often, and with Love in our hearts. And let us show that we truly love and care for each other. Friendship is the most beautiful gift that we can ever give each other. Construction of friendships is one of the reasons for living on earth. (It is a most common form of Lovexpression.) Investing in friendship is investing in the "ggold" of real spirituality. So, friendship-maintenance is real worship.

Creating, and maintaining, good friendships is one of the very few things that we can do on earth that will affect eternity. For the best friendships can last for millions or billions of years!:) So, friendship is the center-piece of Love, and one of the most important things in our lives. For long after these tiny lives have disappeared, friendship will stand by our side to support us and make us stronger and wiser.

It is rather startling, for example, how easily, and how quickly, the good habit of regular emails can simply die. It appears that even our email communications could follow this troubling path to non-existence.
Again, this letter is written so that this "vaporization" (through forgetting or busy-ness) does not occur in our case.

For we love you and think and speak of you quite often, with both Love and joy in our hearts. And the Season of Love and Light is the perfect time to express these sentiments,together with these caveats. And Love is always, like friendship, Its twin, a two-way communication. So, we look forward, with delight and pleasure, to your response to this email, so that, together, we can "get our friendship back on track.":)
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Sunday, December 16, 2007

Deborah Shank Needs Your Help

Seven years ago, a semi-trailer plowed into the driver's side of Deborah Shank's minivan. The 52-year-old Missouri Wal-Mart employee and devoted mother of three suffered permanent brain damage. Today she lives in a nursing home for round-the clock care, unable to walk, feed or dress herself.

As the Wall Street Journal reported on November 20, it's a tragic story - but it gets worse:

"Wal-Mart started out as one of the good guys in this story, paying almost $470,000 of Shank's initial medical bills. But three years after Shank's husband sued and settled with the semi driver's employer, the retail giant changed hats. It demanded every penny back, plus interest and legal fees -- more, in fact, than the $417,477 the settlement had placed in a special trust fund specifically for Shank's future health care expenses."

Wal-Mart sued a permanently brain-damaged woman out of her medical care funds. Thanks to her former employer - the world's largest retailer - Deborah's family is sinking deeper into debt and Deborah will be completely dependent on Medicaid and Social Security for a lifetime of medical care.

Wal-Mart Watch is collecting funds to help Deborah Shank's family with her medical bills.

Will you make a donation?

Wal-Mart's actions are horribly unethical and morally bankrupt, but the company says it's legal - and it's right about that.

As the Wall Street Journal explains:

The reason is a clause in Wal-Mart's health plan that Mrs. Shank didn't notice when she started stocking shelves at a nearby store eight years ago. Like most company health plans, Wal-Mart's reserves the right to recoup the medical expenses it paid for someone's treatment if the person also collects damages in an injury suit.

In cases like the Shanks', where injuries and medical costs are catastrophic, accident victims sometimes can be left with little or none of the money they fight for in court. Company health plans are increasingly adopting language such as Wal-Mart's, which dictates that it is to be paid first out of any settlement, regardless of what remains for the injured person. Moreover, the victim is responsible for all legal costs in pursuing the suit.

Last year the U.S. District Court sided with Wal-Mart over the Shank family - making its ruling just six days before Deborah Shank's 18-year-old son, Jeremy, was killed while serving in Iraq.

The decision has forced Deborah's family to take drastic measures.

Earlier this year, her husband divorced her because of advice from a health care administrator, who said that she would qualify for more public assistance as a single woman.

The Shanks aren't gold-diggers. They are an honest, hard-working American family trying to deal with a catastrophic event, and now they're doing it with an empty wallet - thanks to Wal-Mart.

Please do your part to help the Shank family by making a donation now:
http://action.walmartwatch.com/deborahshank

This holiday season, Wal-Mart rolled out a new slogan: "Save money. Live better."

But who lives better with Wal-Mart's low prices? Clearly, it isn't Wal-Mart employees like Deborah Shank.

Sincerely,
David Nassar
Wal-Mart Watch

Help horses reach finish line -- support stronger laws today

Your support is critical to helping end the export of American horses to Mexico and Canada for slaughter and foreign consumption.

In 2007, state laws in Illinois and Texas shuttered the last remaining horse slaughter plants in the United States. But the perpetrators of this grisly industry continue to ship American horses to Mexico and Canada, where the creatures endure long-distance transport and harsh killing methods.

Help us stop the export of America’s majestic horses once and for all.

Please make a special year-end gift to the Humane Society Legislative Fund today.
We've made great strides toward protecting these American icons from ending up on European dinner plates. HSLF has worked to pass state and federal laws to protect America’s horses, and also to defeat lawmakers who were proponents of horse slaughter.

But America’s horses still face the chopping block, and we can’t save them without your help. Please donate today to help us push for federal legislation to outlaw the export of American horses for slaughter.

We will also put your donation to work to pass other animal protection bills, such as: prohibiting dogfighting nationwide and criminalizing attendance at a dogfight; stopping the imports of sport-hunted polar bear trophies; allowing the establishment of trusts to provide lifelong care for pets; halting the imports of dogs from foreign “puppy mills” where they are treated like production machines; and much more!


And with 2008 shaping up to be a critical election year all across America, your support will help HSLF accomplish other important goals like: continuing to get humane candidates elected to office; publishing an online Congressional scorecard, with real-time humane-legislation scores for your federal lawmakers; and continuing to grow HSLF's popular "Party Animals" program for grassroots advocates.

I know we can continue to directly impact the lives of animals by changing laws in our state legislatures and on Capitol Hill. I hope you'll join us by showing your commitment to the HSLF with your special year-end gift today.

On behalf of our staff and many dedicated animal advocates nationwide, I wish you a holiday season filled with joy and compassion. Thank you for all that you do to help animals every day.
Sincerely,

Mike Markarian
President
Humane Society Legislative Fund


Camel No. 9 or Cancer No. 9?

This week we won a victory in our fight against Camel No. 9! R.J.Reynolds announced that they're temporarily suspending all print advertising -- including magazine ads. While they claim that this was a business decision, we find it hard to believe that it has nothing to do with the outrage and protests from people like you.

Since last spring, we've fought R.J. Reynold's marketing of Camel No. 9.
In July, you flooded the offices of Vogue with more than 8,000 e-mails asking the magazine to stop accepting Camel No. 9 ads. Later in August, you sent more than 4,000 thank you e-mails to Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA) for taking this issue up in Congress.
Now we have a new web site to help you fight this deadly product. Visit www.CancerNo9.com today!

Don't let RJR fool you, Richard. We still need to keep up the fight. They may have stopped magazine advertising for the moment, but Camel No. 9 is still actively marketed towards young women and girls through direct mail, web sites and events. There's also nothing from stopping R.J. Reynolds from advertising in magazines in the future.

The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids listened to advocates from across the country, and designed a web site that allows YOU to stand up for young women and girls in YOUR community. CancerNo9.com features:

A petition asking editors of women's magazines to stop running ALL cigarette ads

Fact sheets about women, smoking and health

Media coverage of Camel No. 9

Image gallery of Camel No. 9 magazine ads, postcard promotions and novelty items

Message board to share ideas

Resources page

Thank you for standing up for women and young girls! We hope that you'll visit www.CancerNo9.com and use its resources as R.J. Reynolds continues to lure young women and girls into a lifetime of disease and addiction.


Sincerely,

Carter Headrick
Director, Grassroots
Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids

P.S. Don't forget to tell your friends and family about www.CancerNo9.com.

Saturday, December 08, 2007

Friendship

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There is no better use of time on this planet than to offer assistance to a friend.:)

Christmas Words

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Our poor, ravaged little tiny planet needs all the words of Love and healing possible, as it has always been torn asunder by fools, fakes, and simply misguided people. Let us use Christmas as the Season to multiply positive words of joy, Love, and healing.:)

Christmasthoughts

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The very old Soul never meets a true "stranger," but encounters those who have been, and are still, beloved, from the vast and immense past.

Yes, let us ignore and reject the coldness and cynicism that mark the materialists and the Jehovah's Witnesses during this blessed, warm, sparkling Season of Love and Light. This is the time to enjoy the universe through the soft, gentle, Love-filled eyes of idealism. Let us try to see each other not as we appear, but as we are-- parts of the sweet, joyful, Love-overflowing Mind.:)

Abortion and Spiritual Freedom

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The Bible does not use the word "abortion"-- not a single time. If the Bible was intended as a life-guiding set of regulations, it leaves this important decision to the individual adult conscience.

When people are spiritual children, they must have every possible event listed, together with its "correct response." But, as people approach adulthood, they allow Love to move into their hearts and lives, and to guide their God-given conscience. Also, spiritual adults do not try to control other adults.

It is wrong, then, for ministers, priests, and pastors -- most of whom are
male -- to try to force women to conform to their notions of what is "right" and "wrong." Women, like men, must grow to be able to hear the voice of Goddess deep in their hearts.

God-- or Goddess-- is Love. People of Love view it as a sad and very regrettable tragedy when an abortion must occur. But we do not live, have never lived, in a simple world: Very few events are totally "black" or totally "white." There are many shades of "gray" in all human behaviors.

The so-called "pro-life" people are misnamed; this title implies that those who differ are "anti-life." But actually, anti-abortion" is also inaccurate, as it implies that others are "pro-abortion."

Probably no one is literally "pro-abortion." No one celebrates abortion, delighting in its occurrence. Abortion is a tragic nightmare that rips lives to pieces, creating great sadness and loss for everyone. So, I agree that the most accurate title for these people is "pro-choice."

For their enemies are truly "anti-choice." This is an anti-freedom stance that rips away a woman's freedom as an adult to choose. It places all grown, mature, wise women in the position of little girls, who must be "told" how to live. And who tells them? Not God or Holy Spirit, but men-- males who are so arrogant and full of themselves that they dare to invade a woman's most private and personal areas of life, thumping their Bibles.

Abortion, then, is really about a different issue entirely-- freedom of adult women to guide and form their own lives. Sometimes, abortion is even necessary for the survival of the mother.

Nature itself "aborts" millions through miscarriages. A fundamental question, very often ignored, is tied in with this issue, and that is the nature of biological life. Biological life is energized when a nonphysical Soul enters a physical body. Souls who cannot enter a body due to abortion are not destroyed or killed; they simply find a different, alternative, biological body. If it is their karma to enter our material world, they come here through (in) that body instead.

Freedom-- including life's most intimate ones-- is the gift of God (Love). No one has the right to take away this freedom, although the history of the orthodox church is largely a sad and terrible one of this invalid attempt. Jesus said, "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." (Jn. 8:32( The core-truth of the cosmos is God (Love) Itself, which said through Jesus, "I am... the truth."

No one should ever take away this gift of divine freedom. It is more precious than even political freedom, for which so many have given up their lives and fortunes.
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Friday, December 07, 2007

Love

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What makes people "decent" is the Presence of a Lovemind or Love-nature deep within the (unconscious) mind. So, it is Love that is the root of decent behavior, decency being the flower of Love. Could a hypothetically loveless being-- totally without Love -- behave decently?

I do not think so. For one important consideration, she would lack the motivation, provided by Love.

This, of course, defines "Love" in its broadest and most universal definition, as intrinsic compassion, producing empathy, for the self and for all others. I should clarify that, when referring to "Love" in a conversation such as ours, I mean the Love that is universal, unconditional, and consistent. This is the cosmic Love that is God itself, a very special and widely vast Love that swallows, and includes, many subsystems within it, including decency, kindness, goodness, empathy, sympathy, tolerance, and dozens of other factors.

Deep within the Mind-- at a level so deep that it is collective (shared)-- there exists the Lovemind. This is the "mind of God." Unifying with It is a powerful healing (wholing) experience, and the reason that we were created (emanated) as "separate" Souls.

You may choose, of course, to define "Love" differently, and that is, of course, your right. But if so, then, we are on very different "pages," my friend. For if "Love" is defined as a lesser reality, then it is not the Love that is ultimate, supreme Reality ("truth" or God). And, to be honest, I have little to no interest in discussing this "lesser Love."

The Love to which we refer is the very highest expression of mind and heart. It is very vast and immense, and includes many lesser subsystems.

This is the glory of the human condition; indeed, it is the glory of the cosmos!

Lovethoughts

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Enlightenment is not an achievement, but a discovery. It can dawn only now, and now. All things, in vast diversity, are but one Mind. That Mind is Love, and that Love is guidance. It leads higher and higher until the high and low disappear. When all disappears, your true Mind appears, alone and solo; it is all minds. It is bliss, ecstasy, and deep tranquility. This, the gold and jewels of the Way, can go on without end, without limitation.

Saturday, December 01, 2007

Goddesses

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We do indeed have much for which to be grateful. We place good, kind, loyal friends at the top of that list!:) Friends, especially those who last, and who stay in your life, are the "emeralds" of life. In so many ways, the cultivation of friendship is what this life is all about. For it is a very common pattern that Love takes in our lives.:)

We are "surrounded by goddesses." For I have the most delightful female friends in the whole world. Shining jewels, every one!:) I do, of course, have some male friends, but have always preferred female companionship, for I have found women to be deeper, more emotionally complex, more tender and loving, than males generally. They strike one as more artistic and poetic, more open to the matters of the heart.

Also, generally, they are more spiritual. All very, very good things!:)
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Communication

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Even strong, good friendships tend to break up, or break down, and vanish when they are not supported (fed) by regular communications.:(

It is very sad when this happens, for one of the main reasons for life on earth is the skillful, loving cultivation of friendships (expressing a special kind of Love).
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Cultic Counterfeits of Spirituality

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No, my friend, I do not know, or know of, the man whom you mentioned, Himavat Ishaya. But I think that you are very wise to respond to your intuitive feelings about him. Sadly, the metaphysical and "spiritual" communities have always been special havens for lunatics, phonies, fakes, and charlatans. When a person makes a claim to be on a spiritual path -- and especially if she or he claims to be a "teacher"-- one should be able to see at least some of the Spirit working through her, as Love, joy, peace, or egolessness. The latter implies material simplicity and the total absence of greed. Anyone who talks too much about himself, his "famous" or "numerous" students, his money, or his personal spirituality is a phony. Also, anyone who over-charges for seminars, lectures, etc, is also a fake.

These bogus-teachers are rampant throughout the vulnerable "spiritual" community, because spiritual people are more open than most to non-traditional views. And, in some psyches, this fine openmindedness slips over the line, and becomes simple gullibility.
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What Really Matters

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Under the worst conditions, and even on the worst planet (and it can, at times, seem to be earth), you have been tempered by life to a solid, non-wimpish state of courage, Love, strength, wisdom, and active service.


There is a pop-phrase that comes to mind: "That which does not kill me, makes me stronger." Agreed, but I would expand it to: "Even that which kills me will make me stronger." For death is an incredibly empowering experience!:)

The storms of life are so great at highlighting the things that really, truly matter in life. And you know what? There aren't a whole lot of things that truly count. There are Love, friendship, giving, relationship, spirituality, and a few other things. Beyond these, as the great mystic Solomon said, "All is vanity."
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Love and Karma

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It is because we took our lessons seriously that we have found what blessings can be squeezed out of this life.:) You asked, "What were we thinking when we incarnated on earth?"

The Soul level of Mind is always and only thinking of creating karmic balance in the cosmos. To create this perfect equilibrium, we must make mistakes. Happily, however, these mistakes are only processing-errors, built into the system in order to teach us. The ancient Greek word for "sin" was the term used by archers for "missing a target." This was not a voluntary or deliberate act, but an imperfection. So, "sin" was not "evil," but imperfection.

Imperfections and errors create no negative karma, for we simply do not have the processing-capacity to act outside their influences. Only deliberate, voluntary acts create karma. The rest are covered by a wide and wise forgiveness. In fact, early Christians were famous for the phrase, "All our sins are forgiven."

With karma, no one is spying on you or reporting you. Karma is a law, just like gravity. No one has to "enforce gravity" upon you; it is simply a natural law.

We come to earth as often as it takes in order to learn the great lessons of Love, forgiveness, detachment, remorse, recompensation, and regret. As we learn greater Love, we are also able to receive greater Love. This is what Jesus meant when he said, "If you forgive men their trespasses, your Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive them, neither will your Father forgive you." This makes the entire cosmos a kind of mirror, sending back lessons, both easy and (usually) more difficult.

Love is greater than even that massive karma. This means that we can be forgiven for even "sins" for which we cannot forgive ourselves, for the Love-fountain at the Center of the cosmos is infinite.
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