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 19 Apr 2003 @ 01:45, by unity1. Peace
well my dear and loving friends....here is my interpretaion of what peace means to me
peace is standing strong in my truth
peace is spending my hard earned dollar in supporting ethical and environmentally sustainablity consumering
Peace is for me...finding out who owns what so that i am not indirectly supporting war or toxic chemicals with my hard earned $
peace is no longer indulging anyone in their support for what is unsustainable and un ethical bussniess practises or consuming
Peace is trusting that the common demoninator within all of us, ...our hearts will overcome ignorance...
peace is not indulging ignorance....we have a 2000yr old history to draw past experiences on ...so now there is no excuse for ignorance....
peace is being true to myself...in that way i can serve others authentically
peace is not driving to the dairy in my car...if i had one :)
peace is standing up for justice for everybody not just the few...in fact peace to me now means taking the blindfold off goddess justice so she can truly see
peace means standing strong and standing firm within integrity and compassion
peace means no longer indulging others in their victimhood
peace means to me self love......when i can love myself authentically then i will experience authentic love
peace means exposing lies and deciet when i come across it
peace means turning my back on corruption lies and decit knowing full well that they exist and turning my attention to those things that are ethical, life supporting and life nurtering...
peace means loving my friends as myself
peace means sharing knowledge and ideas of alternatives to the status quo
well thats a start.... More >
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17 Apr 2003 @ 02:50, by waalstraat. Ideas, Creativity
Post-Modern-Modernist Soliloquy...
Soliloquy: a dramatic monologue that gives the illusion of being a series of unspoken reflections...
Is this a Post Modern or Modernist rap?
Oh Gosh I am so Confused...
More >
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 16 Apr 2003 @ 23:13, by raypows. Visual Arts, Graphics
You may know that I have a fascination with gourdcraft and their history. I have been gourdcrafting for a few years now. Check it out.
Recently I was honored to be featured on HGTV (Home Garden Network) as part of the Carol Duvall Show. Here is a synopsis and...
Last year the American Gourd Society did a print feature in their national newsletter. I am grateful for that communities enthusiasm and support.
Here is a reprint of the article they did on my work..
CEREMONIAL GOURD RATTLES
Inspired by research of ancient cultures throughout Europe and the Americas, these ceremonial gourd rattles are hand drawn, carved and woodburned with pottery images dating from 5000 - 1500 BC. It is my hope that I have captured the beauty and detail of the original.
The rattles are custom crafted from organically grown canteen gourds, approximately 5-6 inches in diameter. The handles are fitted from branches of poplar, oak, rose, redwood or yucca. The feathers, some of which are color dyed, are pheasant and peacock. The leather is dyed cowhide. Inside, a combination of elements: rice, corn, beans, river stone, even crystal is used to give each rattle its' unique voice. I also include sage, sweetgrass and other elements to enhance the gourd. The average height of each rattle is 15 inches.
Each Ceremonial Gourd Rattle is made to personal specifications. In this way you can choose the patterns, image and color combination that you desire. Using the information from your birth date, we also fill the gourd with a precise number of ingredients to enhance your experience.
There are many styles and explorations in my approach to art, writing, music and sound, yet the core is always my experience of what I call Spirit or Source in my life. Nature has always been an inspiration to me and a great teacher. Thus, all of my artistic endeavors express the relationship I have with Her.
I am located in Ojai, California. It is just south of Santa Barbara and inland from Ventura. I live 5 miles back in a secluded canyon with the Los Padres National Forest as my backyard. I live with my beautiful partner Letecia, who is the person that initially taught me to make gourd rattles and who has been filling in my knowledge base about Old European culture; the thematic designs on the rattles. We have a life dedicated to self-sustaining practices, which encompasses permaculture (we grow our own food, use well water, will soon have solar energy), and activism.
I knew right away that I wanted to focus some attention on making gourd rattles and because I have a distaste for co-opting others traditions, I looked towards my own lineage (Polish and Ukrainian) and discovered a wealth of information on the culture, as expressed in their artwork, and Spiritual traditions. The patterns I use, come from all parts of Old Europe dating from 5000 -1500 B.C. and some older. These are pre-patriarchal cultures whose beliefs centered around the Goddess, meaning a focus on seasonal cycles, moon cycles, birth/death/regeneration cycles, life passages etc. (See my website www.goddessrattles.com for the sources of my information, particularly Marija Gimbutas.) Women were much more empowered to participate in leadership roles and as the author Riane Eisler states, they were cultures that were based on partnership rather than dominance models. So the ancient pottery designs I use on my rattles represent the symbolic language that reflects the values of the Neolithic cultures of Europe. Because this is my personal lineage, I feel particularly drawn to these images. Therefore, these rattles serve several functions, personal tools for ceremony, fine art and an educational resource about Old Europe.
I was first attracted to canteen gourds because of the simplicity of their form, which lent themselves perfectly to the mandala type pottery patterns that I am working with. As I have begun to sprout and grow my own gourd patch, I am gaining a deeper appreciation of the Spirit of the plant as well. The rattles I am making cannot only be perceived as three dimensional art, but personal ceremonial or ritual tools as well. The patterns themselves are teachers and through delving deeper into their lineage, those of us with European genealogy, can come to know a more complete picture of our Old European his/herstory.
I give special thanks to Letecia Layson for sharing her knowledge of gourd crafting and wisdom of the Goddess culture. Her support is and has been invaluable. I also owe a great debt to Marija Gimbutas for her breakthrough research and generosity in sharing her discoveries and conclusions." Other than the fact that Letecia introduced me to gourd craft, there are many factors that keep me exploring this medium; the variant textures and colors of each gourd, the longevity of gourds themselves (there have been Egyptian gourd vases found upwards to 10,000 years old, in perfect condition), the wonderful smell during the wood burning process and now the relationship I have with the plants themselves as the new seedlings begin to grow.
The challenge now is to share the work as much as possible and have that aspect be a creative outlet as well. It's been exciting to see the international interest in this subject and my craft. My gourds have found homes in Canada, Germany and West Africa thus far. Letecia and I would like to have gallery showings and have them be classes about Old European Goddess culture. She is a scholar, researcher and facilitator for events and conferences on this subject matter.
Raymond's love of music and lyric writing began in his early teens. At age, fifteen he had begun his recording endeavors leading to the culmination of several releases on his own independent label, Paradise Boutique Records. He completed his studies in voice and composition at California State University at Northridge. His love of world culture and music inspired him to create two global compilations for K-Tel Records and to include a myriad of ethnic instruments in his own compositions. He has developed a unique musical style with Native American Flute, voice, world percussion and technology. Raymond has produced many artists and composed for film, video, and television.
Throughout the years, his endeavors have included a staff journalist position for Better World and Meditation magazine, business/life coach and consultant for entertainment companies such as A&M and Sonic Images, self-improvement workshop facilitator, and multimedia producer. He is also a gifted healer, studying and practicing modalities from the East, indigenous American culture, sound healing, bio-energetics, and spiritual counseling. His breakthrough approach in this field has led to interviews with GQ and Maxim magazines, as well as television, radio and Internet based media. More >
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 16 Apr 2003 @ 21:11, by jewel. Neighborhood
Somerset Man wakes up in old home"A man has been escorted home by police after waking up in a house he had lived in years before." But wouldn't it be nice if we could go back to our old homes, and find the comfort, capture the essence of a place of safety? We are always trying to find safety in a world that isn't safe today, but was it ever safe yesterday? To find a benevolent Mother who makes us hot chocolate, and we have all the time in the world to dream of creating better tomorrows?....
(And, it's not at the expense of another's home being blown away?) More >
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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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15 Apr 2003 @ 04:07, by newdawn. Housing, Building, Architecture
does anyone out there in cyber~land have ideas and sites I can visit in regards to building an affordable energy efficient house suitable for a cool, dry climate in the southern hemisphere? More >
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 14 Apr 2003 @ 18:31, by spectragon. Ideas, Creativity
When I was a small boy growing up in a very rural area, I spent most of my free time deep in the wilderness, eagerly absorbing all nature had to show me. One summer day I spied a huge hornet's nest in a tree. I had never seen one half it's size before. As I stood in awe, I noticed large black hornets with white tails entering and leaving the nest. At that moment I decided I would return to that spot in the fall after the cold weather had killed all the hornets.
When that cold fall day arrived I returned to the nest and watched patiently until I was convinced that the hornets were gone, at least for the season. I climbed the tree, carefully removed the nest from the branch and brought it home. I placed it on my bed and began peeling back the exterior to reveal what the combs that were stacked like a wedding cake (the nest was upside down so the largest comb was at the bottom and smallest on top). Each comb presented a hexagonal array as the familiar "honey comb pattern" but instead of honey, each cell had a black shiney convex luster to it, almost like a jewel. No sooner did I make this observation than I also noticed movement in each cell, synchronous rotation. First slow then accelerating until the entire array was moving in a hypnotic frenzy. At about that time I realized that I was watching the tails of the hornets that were waking from their hibernation as a result of being it the warm house.
This realization dawned just as the hornets began to leave the combs and exact their revenge on me for having intruded on their turf.
At this juncture you are probably wondering if there is a point to this story. The point is that this particular adventure revealed to me that each of those hornets in the combs, face-down, were totally synchronized with eachother even though they obviously had no physical contact with eachother. As their tails rotated, each one pointed exactly in the same direction at the same instant. Intuitively, I knew at the time that nature possesses a mysterious mechanism that unites all of it's diverse elements in one great pattern that goes largely unseen by most of us most of the time.
More >
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 13 Apr 2003 @ 23:22, by quidnovi. Violence, War
Who are we fooling here?
Nuclear weapons have been scratched off the list a long time ago already.
Chemical weapons? Biological weapons? None, so far, have been used.
Have we found any, yet? Rumors abound. Chances are that we might still find some traces of them---though probably not in any significant amount if we do, and certainly not anything that would amount to the evidence of the "grave and gathering" threat of which it was question before the war started.
But what does it matter now, whether we find some or not?
We now all know that it was all false pretense. The cat is out of the bag. We are there for REGIME CHANGE (and darn proud of it, too.) That's what this has always been about. And Iraq is just the tip of the iceberg.
We have apparently become the self-appointed "liberators" of the Middle East. And while some have found this a cause for celebration and others see there cause to re-evaluate their positions on Iraq, there are those who are expressing some concern over what kind of signal we are sending to the world: More >
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13 Apr 2003 @ 20:32, by craiglang. Extraterrestrials
A few years ago, as several friends and I were talking about going to a rather popular restaurant, one friend quipped "Oh, nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded...". I smiled yesterday afternoon, as I was reminded of this remark during a discussion we had at the most recent Minnesota MUFON meeting.
On the second Saturday of each Minnesota MUFON holds our regular meeting, which is open to the public. During the last half-hour-or-so, of each meeting, we often have an open mike session - discussions where anyone can make comments. I had just given a talk on the topic of ET contact, and so, the general discussion centered around possible open ET contact at some time in the near future. I indicated that I didn't feel that this was likely. I suggested that humanity is not ready for contact, simply because it's single biggest endeavor is war (see the article "The Day the Earth Stood Still: Thoughts on Why They're Here" for some thoughts on this topic).
I indicated that at the present time "We" (meaning humanity) are very much dis-united. Individual humans give their allegiance to smaller units within our overall world civilization - nations, religions, individual leaders, etc. As long as we generally think in terms of "I", or a smaller-scoped "we" [and at times this author is certainly not immune to this thinking, either], then humanity will probably not be a very good neighbor.
As I was referring to "humanity", I casually used the term "We". And that's when the fun began...
As soon as I had made my comment, a person sitting in the back row jumped up and shouted angrily, "Who's this 'We'? Don't count me as part of this 'disunity' you're talking about!" At this point the person sitting in front of him replied that the responder had just proved my point. Like my friend's remark of a few years ago, this was one of those delghtful paradoxes in logic. And it just made me smile...
To me, it is plausible that humanity is not yet ready for membership in what I imagine is a "Galactic Club" out there. This will be the case until there is a deep, underlying shift in the global human consciousness. As a species, and for each human as an individual, there must come this shift in focus from I and small-we, to Global-WE [and just like this author, most of us probably still have alot to learn]. Until that time, very little overt contact will likely take place - and humanity will remain isolated from the rest of those "out there".
I offer the guess that if our civilization can survive the coming generation or two without destroying itself, we may well accomplish the needed shift in consciousness. And networks such as NCN, and other similar efforts pave the way to this paradigm shift - bringing us into coming Awakening.
In the mean time, while I suspect that there are many members of the "Club" out there, perhaps watching us closely - I would bet that few of them actually visit Earth. As long as we make comments such as "Who's WE? - Don't include ME in that!" - I suspect that the Visitors will probably limit their involvement to observation, abduction and other such covertness. There will be minimal contact with our overcrowded and dangerous world.
And so, maybe, my friend's comment takes on new meaning. Perhaps, indeed, almost nobody goes to Earth because it's too crowded... More >
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13 Apr 2003 @ 04:14, by unity1. Peace
what is peace ?
what are all the people asking for when they march for peace... it didn't stop the US going to war and making a killing in more ways than one literally...so what does peace mean then ?
if life is lived in a similtaneous moment then right now, the amazon is burning, a mother is giving birth to a child in ethopia who will in some future time be one of those starving kids that we are asked to donate money to..the taliban will beat up another woman, Mugabe will kill some white farmer. right now there are milita in indonesia, fighting in the jungle, drug runners fighting with the cops in some far off place.....well i guess by now you get the picture....
while all eyes are on Iraq and the illegal and higly visible lies the UK USA devised as a pretense in invading...while millions scream peace.....I ask what the hell is going on
some people hide behind the cross of god, you know the one they hung that dying murdered brutally tortuerd man on... the one they seem to think is a symbol of life....some people hide behind the justifications of their book of god ...others think their spirituality will somehow sheild them from the horrors of everyday life...yet others will spend till they drop in some kind of massive retail therapy...in any case each and every one will have some kind of monstrous justification for doing the action they have chosen...and sometimes i think i want to throw up .....yeah just puke on the entire world
is this a nightmare i am waking into or what....
it has occured to me that we selectively pick and choose our 'peace' topic.....and in a way that is wise cos living in a similtaneious world ....theres many to choose from ...which one will it be next week........as long as it dosn't distrub my lie to much...i mean hey....
as if the war is not enough ........now there is SARS....Sickening And Repulsive Scam to bring the fear of death or the fear of god or the fear of life to a tv or news outlet near you.......bring on the virus the planet needs a cleanse
UK USA now means United to Kill US All according to a 60 yr old Iraq engineer...is he right....if not with a war then with a virus conjured up in some USA lab or in some other country with some USA ingridents....sooner or later...hell everything you buy has some connection to the US...look at that it spells us....us and them....us against them...us against the world....hmmm how symbolically correct
there is nothing left to do now...the global scale is visible its ingrained and its everywhere....its been growing like a cancer for over 100 years and we cannot stop it although once apon a time i naievly beleived that together we could.....but now i see that it is to entrenched....they have the weapons of Mass Deception and Dectruction at their finger tips, they have the police as their thugs and they have the might of a grand army of willing but stupid marines, soilders trained to kill.......how insane is that....if any one of us should step out of line, well....if any of them should step out of line we would never hear about it....lady justice has been blindfolded....kept in the dark by a race of men for a long time now...if she where to take off her rag she would be shocked at what blind justice has created....who blinded goddess justice orginally ?
I look around me and I see ego centric spirituality, massive consumerism to fill the void that arises within ....that sense of hopeless ness that one wishes to conceal by any means ...drugs sex, crime, violence, videos, shopping, food, ..yes it is a hopeless case...this earth...so just pick a peace cause to scream justice about .hell you might even be able to make some money out of others suffering or the environmental degradation of our planet....worth a go aye...
does this mean that ive given up....nope...it just means that ive woken up and had a good look around..... hell im gonna get a car and drive aimlessly around and use up as much oil as i can whilst similtaneously polluting the atmostphere we all breath...and pretend i live in a different world than this....finally ive gone insane
that world is a world of fear, and all of fear dervitives....love cannot live in that world....although the seeds are there in embryo...nothing will come of them in such a barren landscape....the seeds of love can no longer grow in such a delisiounal world...
my insainty says i must move away turn my back in full consciousness and mover towards another world.. to stop giving my energy to this one...in full consciousness....to deprive it of my oxygen my energy and my life force which it is sapping... More >
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