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 15 Apr 2003 @ 09:38, by jewel. Personal Development
On one of my lists, someone mentions a book called 'The Guru Papers' by Lary Kramer... and I did a little research on it, as I was very taken by the ideas supposedly presented in the book: "...apparently he writes about the dangers of the 'all is "One" idea' as being a good excuse for a kind of communistic fascism. where one's individuality is taboo, or one's made to confrom or feel guilty and so on.
.. of course for many ideologies the "One" is "God" to whom one must conform, and we, one of the "Many" are somehow "less-than" this idealized "One" ....doesn't this idea--whther the "One" is "God" or some Buddhist-like principle disEMPOWER one's uniqueness?" I couldn't agree more! Funny thing, that in my own 'Mastery' group, I was taught how to go deeper and deeper into my OWN 'truth'... and from there, all I found was molten lava, revolt, pure lust, love, and the crazy Mystery of 'life'... and that all the constructs, were in effect lies... and all the stories... were stories to bring us closer to the fact.... that no one knows, and I don't know. The paradox, is that I am a 'Knower' and I do indeed Know that I Know... something... something deep, and therein is the twist....
So I decided to do some research about these 'Guru Papers' and I found they were written by Joel Kramer and Diana Alstad. Here's a review:"This book delivers what it promises in the preface and introduction, describing the many settings and situations in which overt and covert authoritarianism can intrude into social, political, and religious beliefs and interfere with normal personality development. Part I examines destructive relationships between one person and others, the guru-disciple dynamic broadly applied not only to political and religious leaders but also to parents, close friends, and lovers. Part II explores subtle, indirect forces in values and beliefs both personal and global concealed in what people assume and take for granted, most of the time unknowingly." This is so apparent to me in the recent political atomosphere, and how the typical the 'new age' answer to it, is not working! Because they are both coming from the idea of 'think this', 'pray this' or 'believe this'. Things cannot be seen so fixed. In my searching, I also came across other reads which look very interesting on this subject:
*'400 Years Of Imaginary Friends: A Journey Into The World Of Adepts, Masters, Ascended Masters, And Their Messengers' -- !! Need I say more!
*Psychic Dictatorship in America about the fascist roots of the I AM organizations....
*this site has a good run down on the whole ascended master's history, from a very different perspective than most Californian new-agers would want to swallow!
I think there IS spirituality amongst us... but it is so important to weed away the mental constructs, the whirling whirlds that we 'belong' to, buy into, and participate in. Of course they made it all up--- we make everything up!! And I do think there are spirits, energies in land and in the Mysteries, that we can experience, even imagine as personas. But this is just our interpretations of something that is probably beyond anything that we would call human. But what I agree with, as stated in this site which is aimed to help those who have been abused -- "whether within a cult, political regime, or family".... when we begin to detox the ideas of patriarchy, and the ideas of blind conformity --- I sense this thread, these matrixes of thought, that pervade throughout thought systems of individuals, institutions, belief structures, and governing bodies... that these threads themselves are the illusions that keep us separate from a whole, cooperative experience of life. Within each place where 'two or more' are gathered, I agree that we can link in and find the shared 'One'... but never ever ever ... ever again in my box... at the expense of individuality and freedom to discover!!
(This same this site lists books like 1984 and other novels which "feature champions of free will who must battle outrageous abuse of authority, whether within society at large, a cult, or a family.") More >
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 3 Apr 2003 @ 14:30, by quidnovi. Personal Development
Confucius and you are both dreams, and I who say you are dreams am a dream myself.
This is a paradox. Tomorrow a wise man may explain it; that tomorrow will not be for ten thousand generations.
----Chuang Tse: II
Current-borne, wave-flung, tugged hugely by the whole might of ocean, the jellyfish drifts in the tidal abyss. The light shines through it, and the dark enters it. . . . | More >
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 19 Mar 2003 @ 20:16, by raypows. Personal Development
Last night I had the honor to be a guest speaker at a monthly series called Look Who's Talking sponsored by the Healing Arts Council of Ojai.
When asked what I wanted to speak about, I paused a few moments and then replied Simple Brilliance. Now I wasn't all that clear on what that meant or what form the presentaton would take. The concept of Simple Brilliance, though certainly not new, came to me entotal as a definition, preface and about 20 chapter titles. It was so rich in content and interpretation that I have been sitting with it for almost two years.
I was curious to find out what would happen as I began to elaborate on it with a small group of twelve people. The evening, which I shared with Carol wade, a nutritional counselor and herbalist, was very expansive. The 20 minutes I was alotted turned into 45, with stories spilling out of me, and an in depth look at the concepts presented in the preface.
I've performed, facilitated and spoken quite a few times over the years and I always approach these events extemporaneously with a great deal of improvisation using only the basic content outline.
I began with an invocation on my cedar flute which tuned and stilled the room.What happened next was that I was moved to read the preface and then go back and repeat each sentence and then speak on that. I felt the energy in the room begin to conspire together and a unity being formed with the group mind. The often present critical voice in my head was still and I felt as if I was authentically embodying the words I was speaking. What a gift I was given to be invited to speak about life, love, relationship, cosmology, creativity and the compassionate heart.
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Here's the preface of Simple Brilliance that I read:
There's a state of remembering that brings us back to the full self-expression and conscious passion we were as a child. Those very activities and resources that magnetized our attention, and later our intention. With little effort, hours were spent as minutes, and days as hours, as we remained enraptured with this/these creations of life.
Maybe it was something externally present already, like something in nature, or a technology or a person; or maybe it was something we enjoyed birthing from our internal wellspring into the world, such as art, or music or words.
Creation IS, and always it has been coursing through our veins wanting expression. Simple Brilliance is a conscious re-memberance of who we are as integrated, inter-related, passionate and vital Beings.
Through the freedom born from discipline, we can rediscover and embody the very essence of ourselves, revealing and sharing without ill confidence, our own unique genetic stamp. For some, this will be easy, for others, extremely difficult, even painful.
We all have our own hinderances to joy and exuberance. Some may need to focus on releasing emotional material from their past, others will need to learn how to still their mind and others may need to create some type of spiritual cosmology that expands their viewpoint of themselves in relation to nature and the universe. Attending to a way that is inclusive rather than exclusive.
There is no "one way" to freedom and there are many ways that we prevent ourselves from fully living our original vision of life. We must first learn to cultivate trust in Life itself and then in ourselves and finally with others.
Cultivating Simple Brilliance renders us available to that which is joyous and unforeseen. More >
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 15 Feb 2003 @ 06:32, by justinnow. Personal Development
breatharians
- i believe people who practice LOL raise their frequency levels and become less materialisticÂ… donÂ’t you agree?
- as an aspiring breatharian you can during the "transition period" survive without eating conventional foods. learn how to absorb energies from SUN and AIR with better efficiency.
strengthen your energy field
- one way of strengthening your aura and boosting up energy level is a visualization exercises combined with:
a) cold shower – by taking that regularly it will strengthen your energy bubble which surrounds and protects your body against negative energies by converting them in to a positive ones, which you can absorb thereafter and use them to expand your energy body;
b) listen to uplifting sounds and chant mantras, by that you will adjust and/or harmonize your body frequencies to a surrounding ones. More >
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 29 Nov 2002 @ 18:12, by adexlf. Personal Development
In such a turbulant noisy and high stressed place such as the streets that we rest on, it is so easy to become the victim of every little jitter and flutter and every word uttered, our senses grow so weary to every little event within event within event and our mind begins to take note of every little change. We, being the beings behind the scenes, thus become the victim to every thing that is floating by in our imagination, but we somewhere have lost the ability to veiw the reality as an illusion like a movie, when you watch a movie, you can pretend that the people are as present as you are your self, but you know they are composed by millions of individual frames that animate them and bring them to life, well this is almost no different than anything happening outside yourself, everyone and everything, as real as they are, are an illusion, and are composed of nothing greater than the atmosphere. If you can understand this, then you can understand the importance of training your mind properly so as not to be decieved by that it percieves, all the noise in the world is nothing more than millions of children playing and fumbling with their building blocks, and all of the words floating in your ears, are nothing more than secret messages you send to yourself to decode. We are eternaly engaged in an internal game with ourselves, and wisdom and wits are the tools we use to win, but the truth is, we will never lose. More >
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23 Nov 2002 @ 10:48, by sharie. Personal Development
What is evil?
Lies are evil.
Deception is evil.
Murder is evil.
Exploitation is evil.
Theft is evil.
(restoring rightful ownership is not theft)
Investing in weapons is evil.
(profiting from the slaughter of our brothers and sisters is evil)
Look deep into your heart to see if you have lied, or deceived, murdered (in your heart or in your mind), exploited others for your own benefit, exploited the earth without regard for her well-being, stolen that which does not belong to you...
Are any of us innocent?
The global crisis is a reflection of our own hearts and minds.
Clean up our own hearts and then we shall have the world we desire.
Our Father Who Art in Heaven
Sacred and Holy is Your Name
Your Kingdom comes
Your Will is done
on earth is it is in heaven (earth becomes a heavenly realm)
Give to us this day
the fulfillment of our needs
as they may be
and forgive us our debts
to the same degree as we
forgive those indebted to us
and lead us free
to live in peace
for Your Kingdom is the Kingdom
of glory and power for ever
Amen
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6 Nov 2002 @ 11:57, by sharie. Personal Development
What in your life makes you feel sad?
What sadness have you been carrying around a long time?
A couple months ago, I woke up from an intense dream that stuck with me for weeks and weeks.
It just wouldn't go away.
I got the feeling that maybe there was something I was supposed to understand from it, and so I tuned myself into the feeling of the dream to see what it was trying to say to me.
It dealt with a period of my life almost 25 years ago that had always been a mystery to me. I was never able to make sense of events that had occurred.
As I *felt* and embraced what this dream was communicating to me, I was struck by a shocking insight.
That time in my life had been immediately following a serious car accident that I was in. I was the passenger, and knocked unconscious on impact. The two cars were both totaled.
I was taken to the hospital for an x-ray, and then told I had a concussion. I didn't know what that meant at the time, but as I look back on the accident and how mangled the metal was, and that I'd hit my head on impact, I realize the injury that the soft tissue of my brain must've sustained. I realized I was brain damaged by the accident. It wasn't permanent but it was about six months before I began to feel like myself again.
Meanwhile the upheaval in my life was catastrophic and heartbreaking.
And it was *always* a mystery to me the turn of events that occurred... until I had this dream that made me look closely at when it all started.
There wasn't anyone to care for me or help me, or even explain to me what was going on.
I was just brain damaged and hadn't a clue. I didn't even understand that I was brain damaged.
It is such a relief to finally understand that pivotal moment of my life, and to understand why my life took such a drastically course than the one I'd been on.
It had always been the saddest part of my life, and now to understand it was all because of a car accident... I feel myself changing mentally... and emotionally.
All because of a dream.
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3 Nov 2002 @ 15:01, by scotty. Personal Development
"Too dull to think, people might read: too tired to read, they might look at the moving pictures: unable to visit the picture theatre they might turn on the radio: in any case, they might avoid the call to action: surrogate lovers, surrogate heroes and heroines, surrogate wealth filled their debilitated and impoverished lives and carried the perfume of unreality into their dwellings. And as the machine itself became, as it were, more active and human, reproducing the organic properties of eye and ear, the human beings who employed the machine as a mode of escape have tended to become more passive and mechanical. Unsure of their own voices, unable to hold a tune, they carry a phonograph or a radio set with them even on a picnic: afraid to be alone with their own thoughts, afraid to confront the blankness and inertia of their own minds, they turn on the radio and eat and talk and sleep to the accompaniment of a continuous stimulus from the outside world: now a band, now a bit of propaganda, now a piece of public gossip called news."
Technics and Civilization pp 315-316
( [link] )
Lewis Mumford
Quotations
(1895-1990)
U.S. Social Philosopher
Every new baby is a blind desperate vote for survival: people who find themselves unable to register an effective political protest against extermination do so by a biological act.
The chief function of the city is to convert power into form, energy into culture, dead matter into the living symbols of art, biological reproduction into social creativity.
We have created an industrial order geared to automatism, where feeble-mindedness, native or acquired, is necessary for docile productivity in the factory; and where a pervasive neurosis is the final gift of the meaningless life that issues forth at the other end.
The vast material displacements the machine has made in our physical environment are perhaps in the long run less important than its spiritual contributions to our culture.
Unable to create a meaningful life for itself, the personality takes its own revenge: from the lower depths comes a regressive form of spontaneity: raw animality forms a counterpoise to the meaningless stimuli and the vicarious life to which the ordinary man is conditioned. Getting spiritual nourishment from this chaos of events, sensations, and devious interpretations is the equivalent of trying to pick through a garbage pile for food.
The settlement of America had its origins in the unsettlement of Europe. America came into existence when the European was already so distant from the ancient ideas and ways of his birthplace that the whole span of the Atlantic did not widen the gulf.
Today, the degradation of the inner life is symbolized by the fact that the only place sacred from interruption is the private toilet.
Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century.
Sport in the sense of a mass-spectacle, with death to add to the underlying excitement, comes into existence when a population has been drilled and regimented and depressed to such an extent that it needs at least a vicarious participation in difficult feats of strength or skill or heroism in order to sustain its waning life-sense.
However far modern science and technics have fallen short of their inherent possibilities, they have taught mankind at least one lesson: Nothing is impossible.
By his very success in inventing labor-saving devices, modern man has manufactured an abyss of boredom that only the privileged classes in earlier civilizations have ever fathomed.
War is the supreme drama of a completely mechanized society.
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3 Nov 2002 @ 02:19, by tomsawyer. Personal Development
HELPFULNESS IS PEACE FULL-GROWN.
UNHELPFULNESS IS WAR AS A SEEDLING.
War is an opportunistic disease that can only exist in the absence of specific healthy activities between ordinary citizens over prolonged periods of time. The very utterance that war is thinkable is always a telltale symptom of a cataclysmic decline in self-evident helpfulness between members of the mainstream in private. Imaginary helplessness and selective unawareness is raw unhelpfulness times-two.
War is sometimes an impolite result of one's awareness that one's plight is not only known but meticulously maintained by the party most easily positioned to render the substance of mercy. And sometimes it is an impolite result of the belief that getting away with being impolite is an exhillerating proof that one is cooler than other kids. The survivors and refugees are left to discuss which motivation caused it while they pry apart the stuff that holds down the remains of the people they spent a lifetime seeking for company.
By the time war ceases to be an obviously gross mismatch with one's sense of life's purposefulness, civil and domestic unhelpfulness has definitely grown common, acceptable, and deep. More >
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 22 Oct 2002 @ 01:37, by ming. Personal Development
Look at the World Game Institute's What the World Wants chart. It shows the costs of globally eliminating certain major problems that are facing humanity, seen in relation to the global military spending. It suggests that one-third of the $780 billion spent every year on the military could ultimately: Eliminate Starvation and Malnourishment, Provide Health Care & AIDS Control, Provide Shelter for everyone in the world, Provide Clean Safe Water, Eliminate Illiteracy, Provide Clean Safe Energy through Efficiency and Renewables, Retire the Developing Nations' Debts, Stabilize Population, Prevent Soil Erosion, Stop Deforestation, Stop Ozone Depletion, Prevent Acid Rain, Prevent Global Warming, Remove Landmines, Provide Refugee Relief, Eliminate Nuclear Weapons, and Build Democracy. There are detailed plans and budgets as well.
A key breast cancer test can no longer be done in British Columbia, Canada, because a U.S. company, Myriad Genetics, holds a patent on the two genes tested. Myriad wants $3500 for each test, more than 3 times what it previously cost. Gene patents are evil.
My 3 year old daughter got an e-mail today from Broderbund Software advertising a program for preparing her last will and testament. The subject of the message was "Hurry Nadia! Only a FEW DAYS LEFT!" Excuse me?! I'm glad she can't read, or I would have to explain that to her. Mass marketing is stupid. Not to mention, frequently offensive, as it mostly hits the wrong people with stuff they don't want and didn't ask for.
Max and Alana came by today. They met each other online in NCN and really connected. She was in Minnesota, and he flew over from New Zealand to meet her, and they've found a special magic together and are very much in love and are going to get married. They've been driving around the states a bit, and will go together to New Zealand in a couple of days, to live a new life. It is always wonderful to meet people not only that I've only known virtually before, but who really have clicked with each other. And knowing that I had just a little bit to do with that. That alone makes it worth just about any amount of abuse from the few people who're angry that I didn't provide them what they were looking for.
"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be." --Douglas Adams More >
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