In the rhythm of daily life, the terms “AM” and “PM” glide by unnoticed, simple guardians of our schedules and routines. Yet, beneath their familiar veneer lies a fascinating labyrinth of history and misconception, waiting to be uncovered. Recently, a spark of curiosity ignited by a viral social media post has led many to question what they thought they knew about these age-old time markers. What do these terms really stand for, and how did they come to dominate our clocks?

Misconceptions and Revelations

The terms “AM” and “PM” are so ingrained in our daily lives that few of us stop to consider their true origins or meanings. Yet, misconceptions abound, with some of the most popular yet incorrect beliefs being that “AM” stands for “After Midnight” and “PM” means “Past Midday.” These interpretations, while intuitive, do not align with historical facts​.​

In reality, “AM” and “PM” derive from Latin terms used in ancient timekeeping. “AM” stands for “Ante Meridiem,” meaning “before midday,” and “PM” translates as “Post Meridiem,” or “after midday.” This system divides the 24-hour day into two 12-hour segments, crucial for distinguishing between morning and afternoon times in a clear and organized manner​.

Social media, especially platforms like TikTok, have played a significant role in spotlighting these misconceptions. For instance, a TikTok video questioning the meanings of AM and PM went viral, illustrating the widespread curiosity and varying degrees of misunderstanding about these commonplace terms​.

Despite their clarity, the use of AM and PM can sometimes lead to confusion, particularly around the transitions of noon and midnight. The terms themselves do not logically apply to these moments—midnight isn’t after midday, nor is noon before it. Thus, to avoid ambiguity, it’s recommended to refer to these times simply as “12 noon” and “12 midnight” instead of using 12 AM or 12 PM, which can lead to misinterpretations​.

Social Media Spotlight

The exploration of AM and PM found a new audience on TikTok, where a post by Amaya Clarke unexpectedly vaulted these timekeeping abbreviations into viral fame. The simple question, “What do AM and PM mean?” resonated with millions, sparking a flood of replies and shares as users expressed their astonishment and humor upon learning the actual meanings of these everyday terms​.

Amaya’s video, highlighted with a playful tone and genuine curiosity, captivated a diverse audience, illustrating the power of social media to educate while entertaining. The responses varied widely, with some users playfully admitting their previous misunderstandings, such as assuming AM stood for “After Midnight” or PM as “Past Midday,” underscoring the common misconceptions surrounding these terms​.

This instance on TikTok not only brought to light the widespread lack of awareness about the Latin origins of ante meridiem (AM) and post meridiem (PM) but also underscored the platform’s role in disseminating knowledge and sparking dialogue across a global audience. The interaction highlights a fascinating aspect of digital culture: social media’s ability to transform mundane topics into engaging discussions that reach across different cultures and time zones​.

Practical Guidance and Timekeeping Anomalies

Navigating the nuances of the 12-hour clock, particularly around the ambiguous times of 12 AM and 12 PM, requires clear communication and a good grasp of timekeeping principles. The confusions surrounding “midnight” and “noon” can lead to practical issues in scheduling and planning. Here are some strategies to minimize misunderstandings:

1. Use Clear Designations: Instead of referring to 12 AM or 12 PM, it’s advisable to use “midnight” and “noon.” This avoids the ambiguity since neither 12 AM nor 12 PM clearly belongs to the periods before or after midday.
2. Adopt the 24-Hour Clock: For clarity, especially in professional and international contexts, using the 24-hour clock (or military time) eliminates confusion. Midnight is represented as 00:00, and noon as 12:00, making it clear which part of the day is being referred to​.
3. Double-Check and Confirm Times: When scheduling appointments or meetings, especially with participants across different time zones, confirm the intended times explicitly. This helps ensure everyone is on the same page and reduces the risk of missed or misaligned commitments​.
4. Educational Efforts: Ongoing education on the proper use of AM and PM and the benefits of the 24-hour clock can help mitigate common confusions. Many digital tools and devices default to the 24-hour format, supporting this transition and helping users adapt to a more precise method of timekeeping.
5. Practical Tools and Digital Assistance: Utilizing digital calendars and scheduling tools that support the 24-hour format can help avoid ambiguity. These tools often offer the option to display times in both 12-hour and 24-hour formats, allowing users to choose the one that best suits their needs and reduces errors in time interpretation.

Beyond AM and PM: A Journey Through Timekeeping

The journey of timekeeping stretches back thousands of years, marking a profound evolution from ancient civilizations to modern technologies. Initially, humans relied on natural phenomena like the position of the sun to measure time. Sundials, which use the sun’s shadow to indicate time, were among the earliest devices, with evidence of their use in ancient Egypt as far back as 1500 BCE. These early methods provided a rudimentary means of dividing the day but were limited to daylight hours​.

As civilizations advanced, the need for more precise timekeeping led to significant innovations. Mechanical clocks, first appearing in Europe during the 14th century, marked a pivotal shift. These clocks, driven by weights and regulated by a verge-and-foliot escapement, were initially installed in towers of Italian cities. Despite their improvements over sundials, they were not very accurate due to the variable force and friction affecting their mechanisms​.

The introduction of the pendulum clock by Christiaan Huygens in 1656 revolutionized accuracy in mechanical clocks, achieving an error of less than one minute per day. This was a drastic improvement from earlier mechanical clocks, which could be off by several minutes a day. The refinement of clock mechanics continued with developments like the balance wheel and the spring assembly, allowing for the creation of portable watches​.

The 20th century saw another significant advancement with the introduction of quartz watches. Quartz crystals, due to their piezoelectric properties, vibrate at a consistent frequency when voltage is applied, providing a highly accurate and stable base for timekeeping. This development pushed forward the popularity of digital watches and devices, integrating precise timekeeping into everyday electronics like cellphones and computers​.

Today, atomic clocks represent the pinnacle of precision, utilizing the microwave signals emitted by electrons in atoms as they change energy levels. Atomic clocks are so precise that they will be off by less than a second over millions of years, making them indispensable in fields like GPS technology and international timekeeping standards​.

As we look to the future, the integration of new technologies such as optical clocks, which use light frequencies to measure time, promise even greater accuracy and may redefine how we understand and measure the second yet again​.

This rich history of timekeeping not only highlights human ingenuity but also underscores our persistent quest to measure and understand time with ever-greater accuracy.

Time’s Tapestry: Reflecting on Our Temporal Journey

As we trace the lineage of timekeeping from the rudimentary shadow clocks of ancient civilizations to the sophisticated atomic clocks of today, we gain not only a deeper understanding of our technological advancements but also of the human desire to capture and manage the intangible essence of time. The journey from sundials to atomic and optical clocks is not just about technological innovation; it’s about the ever-evolving relationship we have with time itself.

Our exploration of timekeeping reveals a narrative woven with threads of necessity, ingenuity, and aspiration. The progression from observing celestial bodies to harnessing the regular vibrations of quartz, and ultimately to counting the precise oscillations of atoms, shows a trajectory marked by increasing precision and reliability. This pursuit is driven by our need to bring order to our lives, to navigate the world and the cosmos, and to sync up with one another in an interconnected global village.

The future of timekeeping promises even more remarkable advancements. With potential developments in quantum timekeeping and further enhancements in optical clock technology, our grasp on time will continue to tighten, allowing for even more precise synchronization of global activities and navigation systems. These improvements will undoubtedly open new frontiers in science, exploration, and daily life.

“Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.” ~Attributed to Benjamin Franklin

“Well-armed” doesn’t necessarily need to mean militantly locked and loaded. It can just as easily be a higher consciousness metaphor for knowledge. Indeed, a well-armed lamb is a knowledgeable lamb. As Doctor Who said, “You want weapons. Go to a library. Books are the best weapons in the world.”

A well-armed lamb can eventually transform into a lion. In a world of blind obedience to authority, it takes a particular flavor of courage (mostly the courage to question authority) to wake up the blindly obedient (sheep) to the extent of their ignorance, and to poke holes in the unhealthy, unsustainable and violent power constructs (sick society) built by entrenched authority.

The blindly obedient are the lambs. The entrenched authority are the wolves. And the uncommonly courageous are the lions.

As stated in the movie Robin Hood, “Rise and rise again, until lambs become lions.”

MAGA is MAFA:

“Beware of the good and the just! They like to crucify those who invent their own virtue for themselves.” ~Nietzsche

Making America Great Again is Making America Free Again. The only thing that is truly anti-American is anti-freedom. Lambs and wolves are afraid of freedom for different reasons.

Lambs are afraid to lose their comfort, security and safety, and thus cling to it at the expense of freedom. Wolves are afraid to lose their power and are intent upon keeping everyone divided and afraid so that they can maintain their overreaching power. The lion breaks the vicious cycle with small and large acts of courage by checking the entrenched (and thus corruptible) power of wolves.

But how does a lamb transform fear into courage and thus become the brave lion who is capable of keeping wolves in check? The lamb must first put itself in check by questioning why it believes what it believes about the way the world works.

The lamb must ask itself: Are my beliefs merely culturally conditioned by a sick society? Have I been brainwashed into believing a certain way by a religion or political party? Do I just blindly obey out of fear of losing my comfort, safety and security? And, most importantly of all, once I realize I’ve been mistaken, will I cease being mistaken or will I cease being honest?

It’s a tricky tightrope between fear and courage, and the menacing maw of the abyss is ever-present beneath it. The way toward freedom is not for the faint of heart. Which is probably why there are so few lions among men.

A lamb that can manage to question its fear-based lifestyle –which is built upon blind obedience, addiction to comfort, and reliance on wolves to keep them “safe”– is a lamb that has the potential to become, at least, a well-armed lamb, if not a courageous lion.

If a lamb can manage to become a well-armed lamb or to transform itself into a courageous lion, then the next step is to show its teeth (knowledge/courage) to the world.

Shove the first amendment down everyone’s throat:

“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.” ~John F. Kennedy

The First Amendment gives every American the right to “petition his government for a redress of grievances.” No matter the seeming “goodness” or “righteousness” of that government.

Freedom begins with individuals being free to express themselves. An individual who chooses to remain blindly obedient and silent to unchecked power is an unfree lamb. An individual who chooses to question the chain of obedience with the knowledge it has gained is a well-armed lamb contesting power. An individual who is willing to put everything on the line to maintain freedom in the face of tyranny is a courageous lion.

The beauty of the first amendment is that it maintains the essence of freedom: free expression. Without it, there can be no liberty. Without it, there can only be tyranny.

Well-armed lambs and courageous lions are able to take advantage of the first amendment as a platform for speaking truth to power.

Whether through peaceful protests (Thoreau’s civil disobedience), or revolutionary speeches (MLK jr./ JFK), or hard-hitting political articles, or even radical eye-opening art; the first amendment is a platform for freedom. It must be protected at all costs.

Free speech should never be controlled by an authority. No matter how popular that authority. Free speech is paramount for freedom to exist at all. As John W. Whitehead said, “If the government can control speech, it can control thought, and, in turn, it can control the minds of the citizenry.”

Lest we become a nation of mindless sheep, free speech must be protected at all costs against the wolves who seek to muzzle lambs. It is protected by well-armed lambs and courageous lions with the mettle and the wherewithal to speak truth to power.

Don’t kowtow to the chain of obedience (but don’t be violent either):

“Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.” ~Henry David Thoreau

Never confuse patriotism with blind obedience. Many a cowardly lamb makes this mistake. And many a cowardly wolf uses it to lord power over lambs.

Sometimes being a true patriot means questioning power. Especially if that power is violent, unjust, and overreaching. As Barbara Ehrenreich said, “Dissent, rebellion, and all-around hell-raising remain the true duty of patriots.”

Don’t allow yourself to be brainwashed into believing that everything the government does is for the good and anyone who opposes the government is an enemy.

The government is made up of people. And people are fallible. Likewise, the state. Likewise, the chain of obedience. As Edward Abbey wisely stated, “Since few men are wise enough to rule themselves, even fewer are wise enough to rule others.”

There must be checks and balances. Fallible individuals checking the power of systems made up of other fallible individuals is the only way to prevent the power within those fallible systems from becoming corrupt. Let alone from corrupting absolutely.

It is vital that whatever we are freeing ourselves for, and whatever freedom we are advocating for, does not violate the nonaggression principle. A truly virtuous system is never directly violent. It is only ever violent in self-defense. The moment a so-called virtuous system becomes directly violent it ceases to be virtuous.

The only moral exception to this fact is when violence is necessary to defend against direct violence –and, even then, only as a last resort. Any attempt to use violence to force others into compliance is a violation of the nonaggression principle and therefor unvirtuous and unfit for either well-armed lambs or courageous lions.

Only cowardly lambs would ever advocate violence as a means toward solving problems. And only cowardly wolves high on power would ever use it to solve problems.

Don’t be a cowardly lamb or a cowardly wolf. Rise above the “need” for safety and security at the expense of freedom and liberty. Become a well-armed lamb contesting all votes and proactively voting with your feet. Better yet, become a courageous lion and dare to become a brave David in the face of the hyperviolent Goliath of the state.

“To find a mountain path all by oneself gives a greater feeling of strength than to take a path that is shown.” ~Karen Horney

Find the nearest mirror. Look deeply into it. There, hidden within that fabulously flawed human being staring back at you, is the greatest teacher you will never know.

Yes. It’s yourself. And yes, you will never really know it.

The famous inscription at the Temple of Delphi, “know thyself,” is ultimately unattainable. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to obtain it. Enlightenment is equally unattainable, but there’s nothing wrong with striving for it. Self-improvement is still healthy regardless of the fact that you will never be perfect. Socrates’ dictum still stands: “The unexamined life is not worth living.”

Examining your own life is always going to begin with your interpretation of it. So it behooves you to align your interpretation of it with reality. Easier said than done. Because examining the self is a tricky proposition. The Self is an elusive mystery. It’s masks all the way down perceiving illusions all the way up.

The trickiest part is that only you can experience these masks and illusions. Nobody else can experience them for you. They are subjective. Your experience of them will always be primary to anyone’s interpretation of them. Not even the best shrink in the world can know them as well as you can.

That’s what makes self-examination, and the self-realization that comes from it, so important. Therapists are, at best, guides. Self-therapy is what a therapist directs you towards anyway. So, you might as well make that attempt to begin with. A therapist is good for keeping you on track and preventing you from getting stuck, but there’s nothing saying you cannot learn strategies to do it yourself.

There’s nothing saying you cannot be your own greatest teacher. The autodidact inside you is calling.

Learn your own nature by learning about Mother Nature:

“There is a voice that doesn’t use words. Listen.” ~Rumi

The most powerful way to hear the “voice that doesn’t use words” is through solitude and meditation. Out away from the things of man, where No-mind is free to remind you that you are a force of nature first and a human being second.

This is perhaps the most powerful strategy for teaching your Self to yourself. Solitude and meditation teaches a particular flavor of humility that gets you over your own ego (codependence) and puts you in touch with the interconnectedness of all things (interdependence). It teaches you how not to take yourself too seriously. When you unbecome yourself, you become everything. You’re free to experience interdependence despite culturally conditioned codependence.

Allowing Nature to become your teacher cuts the uninitiated ego out of the equation and then sneaks in the initiated ego, which utilizes Soul as a tool to leverage a heightened state of awareness. From this heightened state comes the deep interdependent realization that everything is connected to everything else.

In this heightened state of eco-melting your third eye opens, your crown chakra blooms in full flutter, and your oneness with all things becomes paramount. You are suddenly out of your own way. You are free to learn what you must learn. You are free to become what you must become.

The cure for the pain is in the pain:

“Doctors study medicine. Teachers study education. Healers study darkness.” ~Mark Lundy

Just as you are your greatest teacher, you are also your greatest healer. Know thyself and heal thyself are reciprocal properties. Mother Nature teaches you this first. Pain teaches you this second.

Pain is inevitable. It’s a part of life. Avoiding pain just causes more pain. Ignoring or repressing pain just causes unnecessary suffering. Although pain is inevitable, unnecessary suffering is avoidable.

As long as you’re able to learn from the pain, it can be a steppingstone. Seen in this way, pain can be an initiation into wisdom (a sacred wound), and a flourishing into Eudaimonia. Which can be quite pleasurable.

Growth is painful (think: exercise and endurance training). Change is even more painful (think: puberty and vicissitude). But being stuck is arguably the greatest pain of all (think: the unnecessary suffering of unhealthy and inauthentic living).

Pain is a guide, a powerful teacher. And if you can gain the capacity to recognize the guideposts and learn the lessons that Pain provides, you will be more adept at adapting and more likely to grow into a healthier version of yourself.

The Daemonic and the Demonic:

“To learn to creatively live with the daemonic or be violently devoured by it. We will decide our own destiny. Let us choose wisely.” ~Stephen Diamond

The daemonic is the hidden genius within you: your latent creativity. The demonic is the hidden shadow within you: your repressed darkness. Ignore them at your own peril.

The daemon harbors vital knowledge and deep numen. It is your genius loci, your inspiring force, your attendant spirit, your guiding power. It is the quintessential teacher inside you.

It dwells in the fire of your passions, in your love and your anger, in your longing and your jealousy, in your happiness and your sadness. If you conform to your cultural conditioning and ignore or suppress its presence, these passions will eventually transform from a daemonic passion into a demonic rage, with potentially devastating results.

Hence the importance of reconciling the shadow. You do this by making the darkness conscious. By paying attention to your deepest wounds. Becoming curious with your deep wounds is honoring them with your attention. If you’re able to honor your wounds, then you will be more likely to reconcile your demons.

It’s not so much that you’ll suffer less but that you’ll suffer better. You will become healthier in the ways that you suffer. And with the demon as your diamond-backed ally, you add a streak of fierceness to your teaching/learning that can be revolutionary.

Have a good sense of humor about your own fallibility:

“Life is a matter of oscillation. Life is vibration. The question is: how are you going to interpret that. Is it tremble, tremble, tremble; or is it laugh, laugh, laugh?” ~Alan Watts

Laughter is the best medicine. It’s salve for the soul. Laughter reduces pain, forms deep social bonds, fosters brain connectivity, acts as an effective antidepressant, and protects the heart. Besides all these scientific benefits, laughter is flat out enjoyable.

It usually happens when you are having fun. But it is also a vital tool to use in the face of tragedy, fallibility and mortality.

Nothing is more powerful and courageous than laughter in the face of that which seeks to destroy you. Allow your humor to shine even as your soul is breaking under the heavy weight of cosmic nihilism. Allow it to blaze through the cracks of having fallen apart and come back together again. As Charlie Chaplin said, “Smile, though your heart is aching.”

Embrace the fact that you are a stumbling naked ape, fumbling over your barely evolved brain. You’re an anxious mammal with a mortal coil. You’re an insatiable beast with improbable reach. You might imagine that you are a mature, evolved being who is above baser animal instincts, but you’re not.

When it comes down to it, you represent a laughably young species attempting to evolve on an extremely old planet which is hurtling through an unfathomably ancient universe. In the grand scheme of things, you are a member of a floundering baby of a species.

Having a good sense of humor is embracing your own fallibility. It’s accepting that you are prone to mistakes; that you are imperfect, and always will be. It’s injecting a little humility into your human-biased disposition.

Mastering the self is mastering humility and humor. It’s embracing absurdity in a heroic sense. One is both humbled and empowered by a good sense of humor. The shadow’s “gold” and the “secret elixir” are then more easily excavated, and brought forth to others, despite the absurd experience of being a creature torn between spirit and flesh, mortality and eternity, tragedy and comedy.

If, as Karl Frei said, “Attitude is the difference between ordeal and adventure,” then having a good sense of humor is the ideal attitude to have, as your own greatest teacher, going on the greatest adventure you will ever experience: the hero’s journey.

For far too long, but particularly in the modern, Western world we have thought of the heart as simply a pumping mechanism responsible for bringing blood to our organs.

The heart’s physical importance not to be underestimated, it supports life, sending the blood of life to the tree-like limbs of our vascular system – but this is an overly simplistic view of what the heart is capable of.

Gregg Braden’s latest research elaborates on the ancient technique of using the heart as an intelligent organ.

The heart’s intelligence has been ignored for far too long. What we’ve learned about the heart’s wisdom, however, in the past several years through the Heart Math Institute and through the research of psychologists, neurobiologists, and res-surfaced wisdom teachings from our ancient past – should inspire everyone to look at the heart in a completely new way.

For those who are not used to using their innate intelligence – that is their intuition — tuning into the heart for answers to the most profound and difficult questions they could possibly drum up might seem ridiculous. Why ask the heart whether to stay in a relationship that is challenging, or even if you should go through with a medical procedure?

It might seem ignorant or even haphazard to ask the heart questions like these, but it has wisdom that the intellect cannot match. Here’s why:

The heart does not send information through an egoic filter.

The heart knows your past, your present, and your future. Its intelligence does not care about your egoic constructs. The heart simply speaks from a completely neutral place.

You can think of it like a close friend who has your best interest at heart, and who does not care about making themselves look good in your eyes.

Hridaya

There is an ancient term that does not have a direct English translation that describes this intelligence of the heart. Hridaya, is the energy which is contained within the heart chakra. This is not just the physical heart, but the spiritual heart. It contains the intelligence of God, or the transcendental mind.

The word comes from the Sanskrit language, and the closest meaning to English would be something like this:

Hrid = center

Ayam = this

Thus, the spiritual heart always brings you to your center. It will not veer away from your highest self, always taking in a 360-degree (and beyond) view of any situation you could possibly face.

The yogi Bhagavan wrote once to explain this spiritual heart in more detail:

“Just as there is a cosmic center from which the whole universe arises and has its being and functions with the power or the directing energy emanating therefrom, so also is there a center within the frame of the physical body wherein we have our being. This center in the human body is in no way different from the cosmic center. It is this center in us that is called the Hridaya, the seat of Pure Consciousness, realized as Existence, Knowledge and Bliss. This is really what we call the seat of God in us.”

Conversely the mind-brain thinks of our past experiences, our past erroneous beliefs assigned to those experiences, and takes all sorts of twists and turns through a conceptual landscape that we’ve created to give us a “right” answer to life’s deep questions.

A Zen Buddhist can also describe what happens when we think with the head (brain) instead of the heart.

We place a fog – a type of perceptual overlay on top of a situation and then add an emotional investment. We call this “real,” but this couldn’t be further from the truth.

Yet, we think we have to obtain a siddhi (great accomplishment or miracle) in order to obtain supernormal wisdom or intelligence. So, we go on trusting the false perceptions of the mind-brain.

The Neuro-Biology of the Heart

Moreover, if we were to look at the simple neuro-biology of the heart – there are many more fibers leading from the heart to the brain than from the brain to the heart. This means – as Gregg Braden recently pointed out in a Gaia talk – that there is much more communication being sent to the brain then being received from it.

As the HeartMath Institute explains, the heart also begins beating in the unborn fetus before the brain has even been formed, a process scientists call autorhythmic.

We humans also form an emotional brain long before a rational one, and the heart has its own independent complex nervous system known as “the brain in the heart.”

The heart can also create a level of coherence in the body just through its rhythm, which regulates all its systems, and corrects even diseased cells.

And finally, the electromagnetic field of the heart is about 60 times greater in amplitude than the brain, and permeates every cell in the body. The magnetic component is approximately 5000 times stronger than the brain’s magnetic field and can be detected several feet away from the body with sensitive magnetometers.

How to Think with the Heart’s Wisdom

Here’s what Braden suggests to help us learn to tap into the heart’s massive wisdom: 

1. Focus on the heart (and heart chakra). This sends a signal to the heart that you seek its intelligence.
2. Slow your breathing. This sends another signal to your body that you seek higher intelligence, and not that of the normally stressed, and freaked out ego. Deep breathing calms the nervous system and quiets the brain.
3. Conjure a sense of gratitude, compassion, or love. These are the feelings which trigger an activation of the heart’s energy.
4. Ask your heart a question. The question should be brief and to the point.
5. Everyone will experience the heart’s intelligence a bit differently. You may feel butterflies in your gut, a warm sensation growing around your body, or tingling in your fingertips. You may not feel any bodily sensations, but have a clear, short answer that comes through your mind. Know that it likely won’t need a long-drawn out story to “justify” its wisdom. The heart speaks directly and clearly. If it isn’t try this process again to let your body know that you seek the intelligence of the heart and not the ego.
6. Practice makes perfect. The more often you do this, the easier it will be to tap into the seat of pure consciousness – the Hridaya.

Please republish this article freely with credit to The Mind Unleashed, Johanna Bassols, and with all links intact.

By: Johanna Bassols

Johanna Bassols is the creator of the Soul Reprogramming Method and founder of the Healers of the Light Academy.

“There is no bad guy in this,” Sgt. Joseph Corrigan propitiated of an unforgiving crackdown targeting do-gooders with the nerve to voluntarily feed people in need — part of wider law enforcement action to quash the act of feeding houseless people throughout Atlanta — to the Associated Press.

There is no bad guy in this.

Activists and advocates for homeless people everywhere in the United States opine ever-tightening legal strictures regarding ‘sharing food’ in public — how feeding houseless people is classified under the law.

According to Georgia State University Police Sgt. Corrigan, a chaplain and head of the department’s homeless outreach, and a plethora of detractors, giving people food serves an acute need, but does little if anything to solve the twin crises of hunger and shelterlessness in the long term — even exacerbating such issues as left-behind refuse, communicable disease, lack of sanitation and restrooms, and more, if allowed to continue.

Indeed, as the AP reports, “About 40 cities nationwide had active laws to restrict food sharing as of November 2014, and a few dozen more had attempted such restrictions, according to the National Coalition for the Homeless. Interim Director Megan Hustings said she doesn’t have updated numbers but that she’s heard about more cities considering such regulations.”

However, The Nation painted a more appropriately dismal if albeit embarrassing picture on the status of feeding houseless people — nearly three years ago, in February 2015 — reporting,

“According to a survey of more than 180 cities by the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty, anti-homeless laws pervade urban spaces nationwide. Roughly a third of cities barred public ‘camping,’ for example, up 60 percent since 2011. Restrictions range from prohibiting sitting on sidewalks to imposing steep fees or regulations that effectively criminalize actions of charity groups, often using antiseptic ‘quality of life’ terms (a tent pitched under a bridge becomes an unauthorized ‘camp’). Palo Alto has banned sleeping in parked cars. Mobile has imposed zero-tolerance on ‘aggressive panhandling,’ which could involve just ‘request[ing] a donation from a person standing in line…no matter how mildly the request was made.’ Last year, ThinkProgress reported, Fort Lauderdale authorized police to bust people who ‘store possessions’ on public property — suggesting that homeless people don’t deserve to have what little they carry with them, let alone ‘quality of life.’”

Notably, it isn’t as if these cities have implemented far-reaching and successful programs to replace the lost assistance of do-gooders.

In essence, critics of public charitable food-giving adhere to two problematic mainstays of thought: that people must ‘pull themselves up by the bootstraps’; but, failing that, ‘teaching them to fish’ — pointing them in the direction of assistance and having them enroll, for example, in return for food — rather than simply ‘giving them fish,’ is the only valid means of assisting the neediest of individuals.

Our way or no way, they seem to suggest. There is no bad guy in this.

“We don’t want anybody to stop feeding people. We just want it done in a way that’s connected to social services providers,” George Chidi, social impact director for nonprofit community development organization, Central Atlanta Progress, averred to the Associated Press, “and not on the street corner because we can’t make sure those connections are being made in these street corner feedings.”

Thus, Atlanta joins a shamefully lengthening list of cities choosing to declare a de facto war not only against the condition of being homeless, but against anyone willing to offer the stopgap assistance of an immediate meal.

Case in point, volunteer Adele MacLean with Food Not Bombs — who takes issue with the whole of Chidi’s position — landed a citation and court summons from another University of Georgia law enforcement officer on November 19, after the awareness and advocacy group refused to cease feeding houseless people in a downtown park when threats to obtain a permit were ignored. Although the offense was ultimately tossed by a judge, she feels the incident and the fallacious premise of her supposed transgression symptomatic of the crackdown on homelessness, telling the AP,

“Food is a human right, and you don’t force people to do what you want them to do by withholding food.”

Atlanta and other cities added to obstacles between houseless people and those who would provide them nourishment, predicating any immediate assistance on their entrée into the impoverishment assistance complex — while simultaneously frustrating activists and advocates with a deluge of impossible red tape making the act of sharing food a laborious chore for those attempting to work within its confines.

Indeed, shady tactics apparently land within the purview of enforcing the law.

According to the AP, attorneys for MacLean say police have gone so far as to disseminate a “misleading pamphlet” emblazoned with the city seal and a statement indicating a permit is required to feed homeless people in public — but it isn’t true. A previously unenforced county law exists, notes Reason — which only saw enforcement beginning around Thanksgiving — but none does explicitly for the City of Atlanta.

Southern Center for Human Rights attorney Gerry Weber, representing MacLean, explained restaurants, food trucks, and festival vendors may indeed require permits from the city — people voluntarily sharing food in public without charge, not so much.

Food Not Bombs was forced to challenge a similarly callous ordinance in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, arguing before the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in August such crackdowns on feeding houseless people infringe on the group’s constitutional right to free speech, since members share food “as an expression of their political message that hunger and poverty can be ended if society’s resources are redirected from the military and war.”

A decision in the matter has yet to be rendered.

In the interim, charity workers advocating for homeless people in cities across this putatively Great (or, perhaps, Getting There) nation will have to contend with an ambivalent public, ludicrous restrictions, and an eagerly authoritarian body of law enforcement in order to give hungry people food in a public setting.

“I salute genuinely the good will and good nature of all these people,” Sgt. Corrigan insisted to the Associated Press.

“There is no bad guy in this.”

Image: Public domain.

“A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it. Science advances one funeral at a time.” ~Max Planck

1.) White Holes and the Theory of Eternal Black Holes:

“Not only does God throw dice, but he sometimes throws them where they cannot be seen.” ~Stephen Hawking

Black holes are the most powerful things in the universe. Their mass is so dense that gravity becomes almost infinitely powerful. Not even light can escape black holes.

White holes are the deeply theoretical hidden mirror twins of black holes. Stranger than black holes, white holes are literally the opposite of a black hole. Their mass is constantly being ejected. Light can only escape a white hole.

An eternal black hole is the simplest black hole possible according to the mathematics of Karl Schwarzschild. He came up with what is known as the Schwarzchild Metric, which describes a black hole without spin, charge, or change, and which doesn’t grow or shrink but has always existed.

Basically, the eternal black hole’s singularity exists both in the infinite future and in the infinite past. Wow! And, here’s the fascinating rub, the eternal singularity of the past matches the mathematical description of a white hole. It obeys the laws of general relativity, and the mathematics of relativity is time-reversal-symmetric. So, a white hole could be a big bang. The big bang could very well be a white hole which was the result of a super massive black hole in another space-time that reached an infinite singularity, took a dip in entropy, and then erupted into our space-time as a white hole big bang. Wrap your frontal lobe around that.

2.) Fermat’s Last Theorem:

“Problems worthy of attack prove their worth by fighting back.” ~Piet Hein

Fermat’s last theorem was the most notorious problem in the history of mathematics. Pierre De Fermat was one of the all-time great mathematical geniuses. Posthumously, mathematicians discovered many of his proofs in the margins of books. Over time, all but one of them was solved: Fermat’s Last Theorem. It was almost universally considered inaccessible to proof by contemporary mathematicians, seen as virtually impossible to prove using current knowledge.

For three centuries, mathematicians had been trying to find a proof for Fermat’s last theorem. Its fame became world renown. But where other mathematicians failed, Andrew Wiles succeeded. Wiles’ proof is a whopping 129 pages long and contains the usage of many techniques from modern algebraic geometry, number theory, Iwasawa theory, and the Taniyama-Shimura conjecture. All of which were largely unavailable in Fermat’s time.

Published in 1995, it is widely regarded as the proof of the century. Here’s an article explaining exactly why it is so impressive. It has taken years to be fully embraced. But since then, Andrew Wiles earned a knighthood and the 2016 Abel Prize for his efforts.

3.) The Many-Worlds theory (multiverse):

“Applying the uncertainty principle to the universe naturally leads to a multiverse” ~Michio Kaku

Hugh Everett came up with the idea in the 1950’s to allow cosmology to treat a wavefunction for the universe. The many-worlds interpretation resolves the mystery of the conscious observer by the sensible-seeming ploy of including consciousness as part of the physical universe described by quantum mechanics.

Governing the precepts of the many-worlds interpretation, it stands to reason that each and every electron, photon, and proton are in an infinite superposition across the multiverse of reality. The wavefunction of each infinite element collapses only when something (a conscious observer for example) attempts to measure it. In fact, if you want to take the interpretation literally, the photon itself is not even a photon until it is observed. Before observation, the photon is merely an infinite smeared-out wavefunction entangled with everything else.

The many worlds interpretation is sometimes claimed to beat all others by Occam’s razor, on the grounds that it requires no physical assumptions. Accepting it requires only the courage necessary to accept that the same rules that apply to small isolated systems, like bunches of atoms, also apply to larger isolated systems without limit, therefore including the largest possible one –our universe taken as a whole.

4.) Dunning-Kruger effect:

“I am wiser than this man, for neither of us appears to know anything great and good; but he fancies he knows something, although he knows nothing; whereas I, as I do not know anything, so I do not fancy I do. In this trifling particular, then, I appear to be wiser than he, because I do not fancy I know what I do not know.” ~Socrates, Plato’s Apology

The Dunning-Kruger effect is a type of illusory superiority that arises when our unconscious insecurities develop delusions of grandeur to overcompensate and alleviate the conflicting feeling of discomfort going on inside us. Put simply: stupid people are less likely to know how stupid they really are and more likely to think they are smarter than they really are.

The opposite of this is the imposter syndrome, where smart people tend to underestimate their abilities compared to others. So, let’s get this straight. If you’re dumb, you think you’re smart; and if you’re smart, you think you’re dumb. Great!

When it comes down to it, most of us are either confident idiots or incompetent smarty-pants. It’s just that some of us are better at recognizing it than others. This short video by John Cleese sums it up hilariously.

The interesting thing is this: You are more likely to be right by admitting that you are more likely wrong than by declaring that you are more likely right. As The Bard himself surmised, “The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”

5.) Epistemological Solipsism (simulated universe):

“I think therefore I am(?)” ~René Descartes

Also known as the brain in a jar thought experiment, epistemological solipsism is solipsism taken to the nth degree. Basic solipsism asserts that nothing exists but one’s own consciousness. But, existentially speaking, there’s no reason why solipsism can’t be taken further, where one cannot even be certain of one’s own consciousness. Despite Descartes’ cogito ergo sum. Because even our thoughts could be predetermined aspects of reality that cause us to imagine that they are our own.

It could very well be a something controlling a something else controlling a brain controlling another brain, controlling our brain, ad absurdum and ad nauseum. And then there is the idea that everything could be a simulation. Like the brain in a jar meets computation and virtual reality. Even Elon Musk thinks we could be living in a simulation.

Certainty can be a tricky thing. Especially when we are questioning things with a wide epistemological brush using solipsistic paint on an existential canvas. The best we can do is doubt. Certainty seemingly gets us nowhere but stuck in either a cognitive bias, a logical fallacy, or both.

Of course, nothing is resolved by solipsism or the brain in a jar thought experiment. It cannot be proved either way. As such, epistemological solipsists consider this an “unresolvable” question. Making it one of the most powerful as well as the most irrelevant (albeit entertaining) of philosophical issues.

6.) Perspectivism:

“Why should we be forced to assume that there is an essential difference between ‘true’ and ‘false’ in the first place? Isn’t enough to assume that there are degrees of apparency,… lighter and darker shadows and hues of appearance.” ~Friedrich Nietzsche

Touched upon as far back as Plato’s rendition of Protagoras, perspectivism is a philosophical view coined and expounded upon by Friedrich Nietzsche who argued that no purely objective science can exist because no idea or thought can exist outside the influences of an individual perception. There will always be the influence of culture and context which will always lead to biased perception. And since our perceptions are flawed and we cannot experience the world ‘as it is’, but always selectively, in a way that reflects our values, “truth” will always be limited by our flawed perspectives.

The beauty of perspectivism is that although no way of perceiving the world can be taken as definitively true, some ways of perceiving the world are more valid than others. The validity of the perception is determined by the interpretation of universal laws, and “truth” is determined by integrating different vantage points together regarding the interpretation of those laws; similar to Consilience, the unity of knowledge. As such, the laws are constantly reassessed according to the circumstances and accumulation of individual perspectives through time.

7.) Fallibilism:

“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” ~Aristotle

Fallibilism is Latin for “liable to err.” It is the understanding that we can never know anything for sure and is implied within the sciences. The basic claim is that all human knowledge could, in the end, due to our fallibility as a species and our inherent hypocrisy, be completely and utterly mistaken. In the most commonly used sense of the term, fallibilism implies an openness to new evidence that may refute a previously held opinion or belief while recognizing that any claim, scientific or otherwise, validated today may need to be revised or even withdrawn in light of new evidence, new disputes, and new encounters in the future. It embraces human fallibility and is therefore a benchmark toward understanding the human condition in relation to an ever-changing reality.

People tend to think that we have only two options regarding our approach to knowledge: certainty and uncertainty. But neither one gets us anywhere and leads to cognitive complacency. Certainty without uncertainty leads to cognitive stagnation. Uncertainty without certainty leads to cognitive trepidation. Between the two, there is a third option: cognitive integrity, which is founded upon implementing the philosophical tool of fallibilism. It’s just a matter of embracing and owning up to our fallibility as a species. Plus, it can prevent us from falling for #4 on this list. As St. Augustine famously said, “I err, therefore I am.”

8.) Saṃsāra’s Punarmrityu (re-death):

“The first truth, suffering, is characteristic of existence in the realm of rebirth, called samsara (literally “wandering”). ~Donald Lope

Samsara is the wandering karmic suffering that takes place between the parenthetic unchanging absolute –Atman (the self) and Brahman (the absolute)– on either end of the phenomenal world. It has been developed into a foundational theory of the nature of existence and the transmigration of the soul, shared by all Indian religions. Shirley Firth explains it in Dying, Death, and Bereavement as, “a cycle of aimless drifting, wandering or mundane existence.”

Punarmrityu, or re-death, is the birth and death process in a new existence. It follows the transmigration of the soul (Atman) through its reincarnations. Basically, Punarmrityu is both the death of the afterlife-life which reemerges into a rebirth into the next life, as well as the death of the life lived after the rebirth back into the afterlife, in which the cycle continues: Birth/life/death; afterlife/re-death; rebirth/next-life/re-death; afterlife/re-death, so on and so forth.

The entire process is known as the doctrine of Samsara (reincarnation), which is attributed to the sage Uddalaka Aruni, and is also based on the doctrine of karma (“actions”), according to which the soul achieves a happy or unhappy rebirth (and re-death) according to its works in the previous life/afterlife.

9.) The Fermi Paradox:

“Perhaps we’ve never been visited by aliens because they have looked upon Earth and decided there’s no sign of intelligent life.” ~Neil deGrasse Tyson

Where are all the aliens? Are they hiding behind dark energy? Are they simply too far away and the expansion of the universe keeps the growing distance too far for any intelligent life to reach any other intelligent life? Are we simply too different? Are we like ants to the advanced aliens who will just crush us when we get too big for our britches? Or is our human-centric bias blinding us to such an extent that we can’t see the answers because we don’t even understand the questions? Could the answer really be 42?

There is no way to know for sure. Perhaps we are simply too young of a species to even fathom the true nature of the universe and what it contains to even begin to beg the question of where all the aliens are. After all, we haven’t even reached a type-I civilization yet. Which leads us to the last brain-flipping theory on our list…

10.) The Kardashev Scale:

Nikolai S. Kardashev was a radio astronomer and among the pioneers of SETI. He is famous for categorizing future civilizations based on their ability to harness energy. Here are the main three (there are also types IV-VII proposed, but we’ll leave it with these three).

Type I civilization: This type can harness all the sunlight that falls on its planet. It can harness energy from its planet’s core. And it can conceivably control the weather, volcanoes and even earthquakes. We would need to boost our current energy production over 100,000 times to reach this status. Carl Sagan said that the Earth is more accurately described as a Type .7 civilization.

Type II civilization: This type can harness energy directly from its planet’s star by successfully constructing a “Dyson sphere,” which captures the suns energy and stores it for planetary use. This type can also utilize its solar system’s gas giants for hydrogen and other gases, as well as mine nearby asteroids.

Type III civilization: This type has gone galactic. It can harness the energy of an entire galaxy, siphoning billions of star systems. This type could conceivably even harness dark energy and dark matter however it saw fit to use it. With billions of Dyson spheres spread throughout the galaxy there will probably also be billions more advanced robots traversing star systems. At this point the mind boggles imagining what humans will be like. Will they even be human as we know it? We’ll never know.

As Donald Rumsfeld, of all people, said, unwittingly stumbling into deep philosophy, “There are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say, we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns –the ones we don’t know we don’t know.”

Image: Pixabay

Adopting a pet in California may soon assist in curbing an astronomical explosion in stray and feral animals, if Governor Jerry Brown signs unprecedented legislation banning the state’s pet stores from sales of cats, dogs, and rabbits not originating from a shelter or rescue organization.

Animal rights activists and advocates believe the proposed Pet Rescue and Adoption Act (AB 485) would effectively end the use of breeding operations — termed “puppy mills” (or other species), these massive operations churn out a constant stream of puppies, kittens, and other companion animals, often in abominable, abusive, or neglected conditions — and aspire to choke out retailers who insist on sourcing animals that way.

Legitimate criticism certainly exists in the law’s inherent elimination of choice from the marketplace, as far as the retail pursuit of specific pet breeds is concerned, with detractors pegging a dearth of reliable genetic and medical information available for individual shelter animals, as well as the fact many popular breeds never wind up housed in such facilities.

Proponents rightly point to abandoned and unwanted animals, as the United States continues grappling with an astronomical explosion in feral and stray populations — which the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals reports ‘forced’ the euthanization of at least 1.5 million unadopted shelter companion animals — in just 2016, alone.

“California taxpayers spend over a quarter of a billion dollars every year to house homeless animals,” San Diego Humane Society CEO and President Dr. Gary Weitzman told Huffington Post in an emailed ASPCA statement pertaining to the new bill, adding the strongest potential lies in the elimination of “a main source of sales for inhumane commercial breeders.”

In fact, as the San Diego Tribune points out, well over 200 areas around the U.S. have implemented policies like the California legislation, and have indeed severely crippled pet breeding operations to the betterment of strays and mill animals, alike, over the past decade, and reports,

“California has more than 33 cities with these ordinances, from South Lake Tahoe in 2009 to Oceanside in 2015, to Los Angeles in 2016, to San Francisco and Sacramento this year.

“Most of these rules allow storefronts to sell animals acquired from shelters, rescue groups and nonprofits. In practice, many of the targeted pet-store merchants have gone out of business or been forced to move locations.

“Supporters said the bans are a local reaction to breeders, mostly located in the Midwest, who warehouse dogs and cats like livestock. They said too often, animals, especially breeding mothers, are locked in unsanitary and inhumane conditions without proper access to medicine, exercise and contact with people.”

And HuffPost expounds, “One of the most comprehensive of those measures was passed in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in August. Cambridge’s ordinance bans pet stores from selling any non-rescue animals other than fish — meaning that besides dogs and cats, it also covers everything from birds to snakes to small animals like mice, rats and hamsters.”

Advocates reiterate the measure only affects retail sales of pets, and anyone searching for a specific breed would be free to contact an ethical breeder privately — an obstacle critics feel places too many barriers between customer and product, thus threatening to erase the market of many popular breeds never making it to shelters.

“Pet stores represent a well-regulated and reliable source for responsibly raised animals, often breeds which are not readily available nearby,” Mike Bober, president and CEO of the Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council, told HuffPost. “We do think that consumer choice is an important part of this.”

Although Bober’s latter point is again valid, the idea problematic breeding farms are the rarity rather than the rule is preposterous when examined in the context of an unending list of horrendous animal abusers calling themselves reputable to reap profit, supply the vast majority of pet stores — from the little guy to corporate behemoths.

Paul Solotaroff toured an illegal puppy mill as part of an investigation into such facilities for Rolling Stone in January 2017, observing,

“Out the back door and up a dirt trail, the worst was yet to come. A cinder-block kennel, hidden from the street, housed the bulk of this puppy-mill stock: 50 or 60 more parent dogs who’d likely never seen sunlight or spent a day outside this toxic room. They wept and bayed and spun in crazed circles as we toured the maze of cages. Some went limp as the rescuers knelt to scoop them. Each was photographed, then carried downhill to the giant rig at the curb. There, teams of vets from the Cabarrus Animal Hospital worked briskly to assess each rescue. Once triaged and tagged, they were loaded into crates on the Humane Society’s mammoth truck, an 80-foot land-ship with clean-room conditions, and taken to a staging shelter. One hundred and five dogs came out of that house, many of them pregnant or in heat. I turned to John Goodwin, the director of the puppy-mills campaign for HSUS, and asked him how many puppies sold in this country — at Petland and Citipups and a thousand other pet stores — come from puppy mills as dire as this one.”

Emaciated animals, deplorably filthy conditions, disease, parasites, and other issues plague the animal prisoners of breeding-mill hell — and with profit potential tantalizingly large, violation of regulations and animal rights comprise a risk worth taking for the unscrupulous, to the detriment of the pets.

“Most every pup sold in stores in America comes from this kind of suffering — or worse,” Goodwin insisted. “If you buy a puppy from a pet store, this is what you’re paying for and nothing else: a dog raised in puppy-mill evil.”

Matt Bershadker, president and CEO of the ASPCA, added, “Puppy mills house breeding dogs in small, wire-floored cages, separate puppies from their mothers at a very young age, and ship them hundreds of miles to pet stores around the country.”

While the proposed legislation in California might not be ideal, it could save state residents a small fortune, as the San Diego Tribune notes, since “it costs taxpayers an estimated $250 million each year to pick up, house and often euthanize unwanted animals, including more than 800,000 dogs, cats and rabbits, according to the same legislative analysis.”

To begin thwarting the animal abusers on an individual level, the ASPCA maintains a mapped and updated list of puppy mills and pointers for animal advocates on their website, in this link.

Governor Brown has until October 15 to sign the bill into law, but — as to his intentions — remained tight-lipped when the Associated Press requested comment.

(Image: Puppy Mill. Credit: ASPCA)

There are moments, days and sometimes even months where we must face our darkest hour. Sometimes this is represented by things happening in the world around us that create deep sadness, despair, and anger within us. Yet other times this can come about through our own inner world when we are going through some challenging emotions around our own personal experience. Often both the inner and the outer can intertwine and we do not always know what is our own sadness, anger and rage, and what is that of others or that of the world around us.

The first step to take is to focus on our breath while breathing in and out of our heart center. We can do this for some time, and then begin to deepen the breath by bringing it into the stomach while gently and lovingly guiding the breath as deep as it may go into the pelvis region. Then pause, and begin the inhale moving up through the body. See where the inhale stops, and then begin the whole process again. We can do this for some time until we feel at ease.

By focusing on our breath, we can tune into our very being and essence. This can be a form of meditation as well as a very healthy step to include in with other daily rituals of self-love, self-care and meditation.

Now let us tune into our heart. What is our heart trying to say? This may take some time as we are only now beginning to truly understand how important it is to listen to our heart. What is our heart trying to tell us about any given situation or emotion? The more this becomes a daily practice, the more the true safety of our very existence begins to become clear, and the more we begin to realize and make manifest our true hearts desire. On the outside, the more we practice this, the more we can become a part of co-creating a heart-based world.

“As we learn to tap into our heart’s intelligence, it increases our vitality, our resilience, and especially our health and happiness.”

-Dr. Rollin McCraty

Often the first instinct is to run away from these emotions and situations.  Now, if there is an environment or person who is unable to value and treat us as the beautiful souls we are, walking away and giving them space to heal what is going on within them can be a true act of love towards that person and our self. When we recognize that the behavior is not ours and is unwanted and harmful, we can walk away and bless them. Wish them well, wish them healing, and know that they have probably had a painful past that they need to heal. Forgive them, and move forward.

Forgiving does not mean this person or situation needs to ever be a part of our life again, yet it does allow us to create healing space for them while freeing us of the need to carry their emotions any longer.

Sometimes it can seem more difficult to let go and let the Universe handle the harm and destruction that takes place in the world around us. When there is injustice and great harm on the Earth, it is then most especially time for us to up our level of kindness, love, compassion, respect, humility, integrity and demonstrate what true healing is by being the light in times of darkness.

There is a very magical and powerful transformation from dark to light that takes place when individuals refuse to give up and give away their power, and instead up their game of self-love, self-care and kindness and compassion towards others.

“We have within us, a power that is greater than anything we shall ever contact in the outer, a power that can overcome every obstacle in our life and set us safe, satisfied and at peace, healed and prosperous, in a new light, and in a new life.”

Ernest Holmes

When we trust in our heart, follow our guidance, and discern what is right for our beautiful soul, we help the world to do so as well. There are situations and lessons that may arise, yet the more we learn to go within, and navigate them through our focused breath and heart space, the more we learn to let go and let the Universe, the more we learn to stand in our lighted power and walk into any darkness knowing by our very presence we will transform it.

Always remember, each one of us has a very beautiful and unique song to sing to the world. The more we shine our light like the stars we truly are, and the louder we sing our beautiful songs with our very own fragrance, the more the world responds with love. Let’s celebrate each other, let’s honor each other, and let us always remember that there is only one you and there is only one me. What are we waiting for, and when will we begin to light the world with our love? The time for me, and the time for you is now.

Let’s take three deep breaths together, tune in and turn up the love. Let’s follow the inner guidance of our heart so we can all arrive. We are growing, we are expanding, we are raising our consciousness and creating a new reality and thus a new world unlike any other. Yesterday already was, and tomorrow has yet to be, will you join us in filling today with hope, goodness, truth, love and beauty? We always have a choice. What will you choose?

Cover Image Credit: no more lookism discovered on Conscious Lifestyle Magazine

Ulonda Faye has a B.A. in Political Science and International Studies, and studied Peace and Conflict Research during her Masters program in International Relations. She survived a Near Death Experience during an accident that led her into Mind-Body-Spirit studies. She is a certified Wellness Practitioner, Rejuv Miracles Practitioner, and holistic esthetician as well as an ordained spiritual minister. Her services are available in person or through Skype and are offered in English and German. For more information, please visit fayenaturales.com

The time between Christmas and the New Year, is a precious space where one can go within and ask valuable questions. It’s a potent portal of self evaluation and reflection. This magical week gives us the insight of the previous 365 days of the year. We can ask ourselves where we have gotten off course from our goals, dreams and visions, and we can also ask ourselves if those are indeed our true desires.

Looking forward, is there a deep yearning for something more? Yes, one can make New Years Resolutions, but by getting to know our true self and desires more, we are able to move forward with more inner awareness. What is even more sustainable is to go within and ask some valuable questions that have the potential to guide our lives into more purpose. Everything begins with a strong self, and a deep awareness of our inner purpose.

Let’s reflect on some questions. There is enormous potential in answering questions for oneself. It is not to be undervalued. We are all intelligent and creative human beings with vast potential. Sometimes all we need are good questions, time to answer them, and space to help the answers be planted into our lives as seeds that will grow come spring and bloom in the summer. Maybe it is time for all of us to go within?

What is strength? What is it to you? What is it to the society you live in? Is that the kind of strength you want for yourself? What kind of strength is calling you? It’s important to answer the question of what strength is for us by looking within in order to fulfill our truth versus that of our culture. What is strength to you?

Are there things you must do? How would it feel to no longer feel you must, but to decide that you want to do it? That is, to fully be aware and empowered in the words we speak. For example, instead of, I must go to work, we could say, I choose to go to work. This brings us into a state of empowerment where we are not a victim of circumstances, but rather a co-creator of our own lives. It also leads us into a state of gratitude for what is, which helps us create more goodness in our lives.

Another great example is the statement, I have to lose weight. How about accepting that part of our physical self where we desire to have less body weight? How does it feel? We can acknowledge it, accept and love it. We can recognize that we don’t truly have to do anything; including loosing weight. One path to take, could be to give it time, and consciously choose to eat healthier meals in moderation, and create a routine that provides us with more balance and movement in our life. If you dislike working out, perhaps join a dance or yoga class if you prefer to move that way. We must find a way to move that brings us joy for it to last.

By loving and accepting ourselves, and giving ourselves time and space to create, we receive the results we need. By force, it is often not only more challenging, but often leads to dis-empowering short-term effects that are not sustainable. By tapping into our true self, we can find answers to all our questions in life. It starts with us.

Let’s pause for a moment, and take a deep breath. Your life is so incredibly valuable. It’s more valuable than anything we could imagine to buy. Are you happy? Let’s take another deep breath, and look at ourselves with courage. Now is the time to take back our lives because we are so very precious and needed. It’s time for us all to relearn how to live from the inside out. Let’s arrive within ourselves. Let’s let go of everything outside of us in this moment. Let’s be here now.

Who am I? Who am I, really? Every step we take is motivated by this question.

We are all a beautiful flower. What kind of flower are you? What do you need to grow and bloom? What kind of environment do you need? What kind of garden do you belong in?

What brings me joy, and what are my values?

What have I grown tired of this year?

What strengthens me, and what feels good?

If 2017 was my last year to live, what would be the one thing I would feel the strongest desire to do?

Also, if 2017 was my first year of life, what would I long to begin? Imagine the possibility to begin anew. What would that be for you? If you had no fear of failure, what would you do?

Please, write down these questions, and reflect on them. Go within, and write down the answers that come to you. When you have found answers that make YOUR heart beat, then you know you have arrived at a point where you can begin to create your true vision.

At the same time, we recognize the following:

I allow myself to not have to change this year. I accept myself. I truly arrive within myself, and allow myself to be. With a strong self in the forefront, I simply learn more about myself and arrive at my true self. I give myself the space and time to go within, and in that place I feel, see, and hear my true desires.

May the answers come to us all, and may we all follow our hearts’ desire. We all have a unique calling. There is only one of us in the whole world. We are incomparable, and it is time that we all give the world the gift of our true authentic selves. If you have already done so, perhaps this will open you up to what is next in your life.

Here is one more question to ask: How can I serve? This leads our strong self into a strong us and into a strong world. Let’s affirm, I am a unique and special human being with a divine purpose. The time is now for a strong self, and a strong self knowing. We are the change that the world is waiting for, for us.

Let’s remember, we must not change anything in the coming year. Who we are is enough, and we can continue to be as we now are. What if we simply choose to be happy, and only do what makes us happy? What if I choose to be me, not the expectations of me from others, but the me that came to me when I asked myself, who am I?

You are waiting for you. The answers inside are waiting to come forth. Why wait any longer? By building our lives from the inside out, while loving and appreciating ourselves, we are unlimited in what we can do and achieve. It’s time to shine. What are you waiting for?

This is based on the first of a series of 3 Mastery of Life videos from Veit Lindau, who is a German life coach, motivational speaker, author, absolute lover of life, and a wonderful human being. He founded Human Trust together with his wife, Andrea Lindau, and together they guide, teach and inspire coaches in what is now Europe’s largest life coaching platform. His work is mainly available in German; however, some of his books are available in English. There is no dogma, but rather practical and useful information that he and his wife live out in their everyday lives. I personally love how they set an example of how we can grow and evolve through our relationships. You can follow Veit and The Human Trust Community on Facebook.

It is my desire to bring both awareness of his work and message to English speakers as well as inspiration through his words to anyone reading this piece. Almost everything written here, I have translated. These are my words that I have interpreted through his message in German. I have chosen not to use quotations as I believe once the message is in another language, that it is best approved by the author before quoting in a language he or she did not write or speak in. I hope this inspires you as it has inspired me.

Let’s move forward with a strong self, and share our individual gifts with the world. We are all divine masters.

Ulonda Faye has a B.A. in Political Science and International Studies, and studied Peace and Conflict Research during her Masters program in International Relations. She survived a Near Death Experience during an accident that led her into Mind-Body-Spirit studies. She is a certified Wellness Practitioner, Rejuv Miracles Practitioner, and holistic esthetician as well as an ordained spiritual minister. Her services are available in person or through Skype and are offered in English and German. For more information, please visit her FB page or fayenaturales.com

Image featured; Image 1, 2, 3

Solstice blessings to ALL. We find ourselves moving more and more into a new way of being, and this Solstice is offering up to us a time to renew ourselves as we fill ourselves up with more strength and courage to embrace all that is longing to come into our lives. It is also a time to honor and revitalize the Sacred Masculine within all of us, and to balance and nurture it with our Divine Feminine presence. We all have this need to balance the feminine and masculine within, and now is a great time to utilize this ability.

No matter what was, and what is before us, we stay strong and centered upon our trust in the greater plan that always has our highest good at heart. Trust and faith in ourselves, others, and the greater plan, are important.

Wednesday, December 21st, marks the Solstice celebration for all people (winter solstice in the Northern Hemisphere and Summer Solstice in the Southern Hemisphere). How can we bless ourselves, our lives, and that of others even more this season? How can we heal more, and help others heal and forgive during this time?

“Faith is being sure of what we hope for, and certain of what we do not see.” -Hebrews 11:1

We can begin by acknowledging the challenges that have come forth in our lives. On this day, we can honor the anchoring in of more light as we too can honor the places where darkness has come forth. This has been a challenging time for many, and when we begin to accept and embrace what has been, we can then fully embrace the wealth of healing and love that is calling us.

The dark moments have been here to teach us, to bring things out from under the shadows, to help us grow and heal by revealing that which has been hidden from us. This is often referred to as our shadow side, and it comes forth to help us transform. It can bring forth such deep hurt and pain, but through that it also gives us an opportunity to heal something and move forth into more light and love.

Moments, that feel so very beyond our control, are ultimately here to bring us together and renew our faith.

The moments of light, and there are so many moments of light, are here to illuminate that which shines so bright within and without. We feel it, and others feel it too. It is us in our most beautiful state and nature, and it is the world as we most love to see and cherish it. No matter what happens in our personal lives or in the world, let’s be reminded of the strength of the light.

We can set an intention today, and everyday for what we desire to bring into our lives. When we write down this intention, and hold it dear to our hearts, it begins to bloom. First, we feel it inside our hearts, then we see it start to take shape and form in our outer world. What kind of intention are you ready to set for your next step in life as you move forward into greater personal power? Are you ready to listen to your heart, and follow your dreams?

“When your intention is clear, so is the way.” -Alan Cohen

We can commit to allowing the challenges of our lives to bring forth all that we need to heal. We can allow it, and let it come forth with compassion. We can see it as our teacher, and we can bless it for it is blessing us with a chance to move through yet another hidden pain that wants to be healed in order to enlighten us more.

Are you ready? I am ready. So many of us are ready. Let’s anchor in more light and healing this season. Let’s share our light with the world, and when it gets painful, let’s remember our true nature and send deep love and healing to our hearts and the world. This may be the turning point, that brings balance back into our lives. What are you ready to transition into?

“Promise me you’ll always remember:

You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.”

-Christopher Robin to Winnie-the-Pooh (A. A. Milne)

We may be faced with challenges, but with love, compassion and kindness we can survive in strength. It is time to bless and release all fear, doubt, judgment, hurt, worry, and pain. Only allow love and inspiration to bless your body, mind and spirit.

Let’s affirm:

• Winter Solstice Celebration, Mary Kate Hagan, The Furrow, Vol. 61, No. 3 (March 2010), pp. 185-188
• The Shadow Effect: Illuminating the Hidden Power of Your True Self, by Deepak Chopra, Debbie Ford, and Marianne Williamson
• The Power Is Within You, by Louise L. Hay

Namaste.

Many people are concerned about the increasing pollution, violence and suffering. We want to help, but many times we feel that we are powerless against these trends. However, there is an universal law that you should take into account before trying to help: You should clean up your mental garbage. The largest manufacturer of junk in our lives is our own Minds, so first of all we need to know clean it up and to recognize its functioning.

The Nature of the Mind

In order to control something, we first need to know the thing concerned¸ so we must know our Mind so as to be in charge of it. The most important thing we need to about our Mind is that it is not something that exists separately, individually, like some inanimate object.

The Mind is not an object–it is a process. The process of constantly streaming thoughts. This stream of the thoughts is what we perceive as the Mind. When these thoughts disappear, the Mind disappears with them, as the two are only able to exist together. The very basic nature of thoughts is that they are in a constant move, and this motion, almost automatically, creates the Mind.

A characteristic feature of our Mind is that it keeps roaming, wandering; it operates in something like an automatic mode. Thoughts come and go all the time. If we attempt to suppress them, it is only possible with considerable efforts, and even then to a short time only. In most of our waking time, our Mind wanders either in the past or in the future, in our thoughts we deal with our experience of the past, offences we suffered in the past, or with our future plans, goals and fears.

Another characteristic of our Mind is that it constantly evaluates things. It means that we do not simply live through our experiences, but we also categorize them as good or bad. We judge everything that happens to us and everybody we meet in our lives. This permanent categorization may easily lead to a distorted perception of the world, as we evaluate our new experiences in these categories. If we find an experience negative, we will tend to keep–and reinforce–that category for similar experiences in the future. Our perception will therefore be selective, and we will only accept the stimuli that reinforces our categorization, and we tend to ignore those that fall outside our usual categories.

The third important characteristic of the Mind is that it permanently produces stories. These stories often have a disastrous end. For instance, I suddenly try to remember whether I locked the door of my home or not. The Mind immediately fabricates a whole story around the idea: I did leave it open, a burglar came, my valuables have been stolen, and the police, instead of chasing the thief, will harass me with their questions. We often experience the ends and emotional consequences of these stories. Another type of stories deals with us, who are we, what are we like, what we should do or should have done. The entirety of these stories comprises our personal histories.

A Foolish Game

Most people tend to identify with their thoughts and personal histories, that is, with their Minds. A lot of us are not satisfied with what we are, and we would like to have a better and more beautiful personal history. That is why we create a mental image of our desired personal development, and the ways of making the work of our Minds more effective.

In order to achieve the mental image we ourselves have created, we embark on a foolish game, as we attempt to bring our Minds under our own control, and be the masters of our own development. Since we do not know the nature of the Mind, this venture is destined to failure right from the beginning.

This game is foolish, since in fact one half of the Mind attempts to bring the other half under control. Our Mind itself deems our own mental image of our personal development good. At the same time, this half of the Mind deems the other half, the one we wish to change, bad. Mental images fight against each other, trying to overcome each other, using the weapons of selective perception and story fabrication. The struggle goes on, with changing luck, all through our lives. Sometimes we believe that we are making some progress, we are improving, and a few weeks, months or years later we drop into the abyss of despair.

A lot of us play this foolish game all through our lives, because we are unable to recognize the simple fact that a Mind is unable to overcome itself. We may, perhaps, with the utmost effort, suppress what we believe is bad in us. That is, however, just a virtual victory, leading us to virtual calm and personal development, because when our power declines, the suppressed forces break out again, destroying all the temporary results that we achieved previously, washing away the results of our personal development.

The Freedom of Tolerance

Now we can see that the way leading to our control over our Minds does not lead through suppressing them. It is not possible to control the Mind in the ordinary sense of the word. Partly because it only exists in its functions and operation, and partly because there is nobody to control it. One half of the Mind, as we have seen, does not control, only suppresses the other half.

In order to be able to control our Minds, we must step outside of them. This statement may sound surprising to a lot of us, since we tend to fully identify with our Minds and their operations. As long as this identification is strong, we shall not be able to step outside the crazy dance of our Minds; we will have to merely suffer its consequences.

Nowadays, however, more and more of us begin to realize and experience that we are more than our Minds, more that our thoughts and emotions, and the personal history these thoughts and emotions build up. Our attention is no longer completely engaged by telling our personal history and identifying with that personal history, and we become more and more sensitive to the deeper dimensions of our life. We also begin to notice the breaks between thoughts, and we begin to turn towards these gates leading beyond the Mind.

In these breaks between thoughts, Mind does not work, it is not there–it simply vanishes. What is left there is the alertly watching Consciousness. If we are able to take roots in that alert Consciousness, we recognize that this watching alertness is tolerant with the Mind and its operations. We shall see that there is nothing wrong with thoughts, nothing wrong with the operations of the Mind. It is not necessary to struggle against the Mind, as it is not an enemy, only an instrument that, without control, tends to function chaotically.

We only have a chance to know the true nature of thoughts and the functions of the Mind if we detach ourselves from them, keep a distance, and do not consider them as enemies. They will reveal their secrets to the alert Consciousness, watching with affection, and we will see the subtle shades of the Mind, the games it plays and the dreams it evokes.

Controlling the Mind

This tolerant, alert, watching attitude to the functions of the Mind will give us the ability of stopping our thinking effortlessly. Once thinking has been suspended, the continuous stream of thoughts stops, the Mind itself disappears and stops working.

Now we shall not seek our own identity in an identification with the Mind, since we have found our real center, our real self, our alertly watching Consciousness. We will be aware that thoughts and the Mind have not really disappeared, they are still there, only in a dormant state. Our attitude to thoughts and the Mind will entirely change at that moment. We think when necessary, and we do not need the Mind, we put it aside. The Mind no longer dominates our life, it is not more than an obedient tool that we use or not use as we please.

That is when we realize how wonderful an instrument the Mind is, and now we are able to use it for its original purpose. And the purpose of the Mind is to serve as a means of connections, to connect us to the world to each other. Through the Mind, used with alert Consciousness, creative energies are released to the world, and create a wonderful harmony there.

From the book>> : Frank M. Wanderer: The Revolution of Consciousness: Deconditioning the Programmed Mind

Read more articles from Frank M. Wanderer

Many of us think that we are not only the main actors of the films of our lives but also the directors of it. But the more detailed analysis of the reality shows that this is only an illusion. In most cases our mind directs the film of our lives, not we. I’ve previously introduced in my articles how the mind works, now I only wish to point out those factors, which manipulate our film of life unconsciously. 3 type of social engineering attacks  are the following: the Consumer Social Pattern, the Power of Expectations and the Mirror of Opinions.

The Consumer Social Pattern

The most important system of social co-existence on Earth today is the consumer society. It means that the basis of social development is economic growth and economic growth depends on how much we consume.

The most important consumer is Ego, since all products obtained (house, car, expensive clothes), improve the imaginary greatness of the Ego. The more commodities or more power we possess, the more important members of consumer society we are.

If we are able to divert our attention from Ego, and concentrate on our internal development and our spiritual birth, our qualities as consumers will considerably drop, since we are no longer attracted to the things that so far fattened our Egos.

As in the recent decades more and more people have felt a need for spiritual birth, social strategy changed accordingly. Spiritual development has also been made a consumer product, which largely supported by the survival instinct of the Ego. The Ego, which has been interested in money and power, now turns towards spiritual development, and disguises itself in the dress of a spiritual Ego. We try to decorate those spiritual clothes by adding more and more spiritual knowledge and experience so as to make it more colorful and individual.  With all that, we hope that our spiritual progress will serve the further increase and eternal happiness of our spiritual Ego.

Consumer society is all too pleased to serve us in those needs. A glance at the vivid market of spiritual books, methods and masters will suffice to convince us about that. Nothing has really changed; the pattern of the consumer society is the same, only its contents have been partially replaced.

The Power of Expectations

The more complex a society is, the more space a specific member of it is supposed to occupy in the complicated system of human relationships. Every such occupied status involves a set of rules, the system of expectations that dictate how the individual occupying the status is supposed to behave in a specific situation, how to behave as a man, a father, a doctor etc.

These expectations tell us how we must and how we must not behave in a specific situation and in connection with a specific person.

In the majority of cases, these expectations work unconsciously, almost like automatic programs running in our life. These deep programs have become a part of our mind in the course of our upbringing, and they are activated by a specific situation in which we are or a person we get into contact with. Then we put on the appropriate mask, tailored to the specific situation or person.

We occupy several statuses at the same time, so it seems that we drown in the sea of expectations. It is also common that the various expectations attached to various statuses collide with each other, generating further anxiety and stress for us.

What keeps us on the forced track of expectations, why do not we simply leave it behind?

The dynamizing power of the social expectations is provided by our identification with the internal and external expectations, and base our identity on them. We identify with our social statuses, with the masks of our roles in our gender, family and occupation. These masks are attached to us so closely that we would not be able to exist without them. We indentify ourselves with our internal expectations, and our scruples and level of demands often constitute the cornerstone of our identity.

We are so deeply identified with these social expectations, we do not notice that these very expectations convert us into replicas, fake personalities. The pages of our personal history are written by these external forces imposed upon us by society, they determine how to see the world, how to think about the world, how to think about it, what to believe in, what is good for us and what we should avoid.

That is how we have lost our individuality over the years and became unconsciously the victims of a manipulation based upon public agreement. The social expectations have been shaped through a general agreement over the centuries, and became manipulative because we insisted on our identification with the separate state of consciousness.

That is how we jointly sustain this identity, rooted in isolation, this social ”creatureness,” because, due to our ignorance, we stick to the world of forms and shapes. We are only able to imagine our personal existence in the here and now.

The Mirror of Opinions

”Tell me, what do you think about me, what is your opinion about me?” we have asked other people this question a number of times. What we have gathered from the opinions received from others, we forged an image of ourselves, who we are and what our mission in life is. We have gradually identified with the image, we believed that the image is really us; we have pinned it up on the wall of our room, and proudly show it to any coming our way: look, that is me.

On the other hand, the image in the mirror has also caused us a lot of worry, since there is always a doubt in us: does that image really meet the expectations of others, do we appear good, decent, religious enough in the eyes of others?

As a consequence, we spend our whole life polishing and improving the image in order to make it look better and better for others. We tend to believe that the best strategy in this process is copying, imitating others. This is a strategy that we use from our babyhood onward, that is how we learn our native language, and that is how we acquire the elements of our culture. Later, when we are older, we continue copying others, since if we follow the ways of those who lead a decent and good life, we cannot be wrong.

Another characteristic feature of our image in the mirror is that it is contradictory by nature. We receive almost as many opinions as many friends and acquaintances we have. Some may consider as clever, whereas others do not find that the most important feature of ours. It generates a permanent state of uncertainty in connection with the image, that is, in connection with ourselves.

This uncertainty in connection with ourselves shall serve as a basis for our desire to convince other people that the image in the mirror is true, and we really are the way other people see us. If our identification wirth the image in the mirror, generated from the opinions of others, is strong, it keeps us in a virtually hypnotic state, and we life our whole life under the spell of that image.

Be the Director of the Film of your Life

If we realise how these unconscious processes affect our lives, we can become the directors of the films of our lives.

Our internal development therefore does not only depend on our life experience; it depends much more on our ability to divert our attention from the outside world to our internal world. The patterns of the consumer society are determined to prevent us from making the necessary adjustments in our orientation by gluing our attention to various consumer products or a spiritual development scheme that involves the Ego. A major element of this spiritual development pattern is that we are trying to understand the contents of our Minds, to analyze our thoughts and emotions. Our attention is thus engaged by the various methods that we are using to examine our thoughts and emotions. That is what we regard as our real internal world, and we create the illusion of toiling on our spiritual birth.

From the aspect of our spiritual growth the –often chaotic– world of our Mind and emotions is not our real internal world. Our attention should not be directed to the analysis and comprehension of these; instead, we need to concentrate on becoming conscious of our existence, to find the center of our Self behind our external life and personal history. That is our real internal world.

In the course of our spiritual world we become conscious of, and alert to that internal center, to that internal world. Once that has been accomplished, our life is placed on entirely new foundations. The Mind stops functioning the way it used to and, together with that, our sense of identifying with the Mind vanishes. The spiritual Ego, our separate little self disappears, and we are permeated by a permanent, light presence. The personality is gone, and what remains is silence and presence, as the real essence of our existence. From that time on, that will serve as the real foundation for our internal development.

We submerge into the present moment, we shall experience a miracle. At present, the program of our internal expectations have already been dissolved, and we no longer identify with our expectations of the other people.  The mirror of opinions blurs, and our wholesome Self, the pleasure of Existence shall be revealed.

From the new book>>Frank M. Wanderer Ph.D  3 Stages in the Evolution of the Human Spirit EGO – ALERTNESS – CONSCIOUSNESS

Read more articles from Frank M. Wanderer

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Today, it is clear for almost every spiritual seeker that we live in the era of awakening. However, what is the awakening is most misinterpreted. Many people think that awakening and enlightenment is the same, it’s a single-time event: it’s happening for once and you are done!. On the contrary, the truth is that enlightenment is a process that is actually a series of awakenings. Let’s take a look to the three most important turning points during awakening.

Awakening from Identification

Every waking moment of our life fits a personal history with our own Self in its focus. Our life can only be interpreted within the framework of that history. The reason for that is that we identify with the voice of the Ego, the narrator of our own story, so closely that our personal history becomes the foundation of our entire life.

What does this identification mean? It means that we identify with a form (e. g. our name) that originally did not belong to us (we are all born without a name), but through identification this specific form has become a part of our existence.

A closer look at that personal history will, reveal that our internal story consists of a fabric of experiences and thoughts. Thoughts that explain our experiences, thoughts that we believe and with which we identified, thoughts that will thus provide the foundations of our self-determination.

Our personal history keeps us under its spell, in a hypnotic state in which all our attention is devoted to the inner voice and story it tells. In this way we give up our alertness, the world passes by us, because we only concentrate on the elements of reality that appear to confirm our personal history. We therefore lose our grip on the deeper dimensions of life. The deeper dimensions are present in our life, but we lose contact with them because of our lack of alertness.

The question may arise in us whether we are really identical with our own personal history, or perhaps we are more than that? Everybody has some vague suspicion that our personal history does not reflect reality, we are in fact at a deeper level than that.

When everything is apparently all right in our personal history, we achieve our goals, we are happy, and the vague suspicion vanishes entirely in us, and our identification with our personal history becomes more powerful. There are, however, moments in our life when nothing appears to succeed, so we are unhappy and we suffer. The suspicion then reinforces in us, and we tend to believe that we are more than the cluster of thoughts that constitute our personal history. We realize that we are more than mere thoughts.

If we become aware and conscious of our own personal history that we are telling ourselves, we have a chance to wake up from the hypnotic spell of our personal history. This is the first major turning point in the process of awakening.

Awakening from Ego

When the Consciousness identifies with a form, the Ego appears. The Ego always means some sort of an identification, self-determination (I am a man, I am a father, I am an Englishman, I am Christian etc.) The Ego therefore rests upon our identification with things that are important for us ego.

The Ego is the central figure of our personal history, based upon the past and looking into the future. The components of the Ego are thoughts, emotions, memories (with which the person identifies as “my story”), fixed unconscious roles and collective identifications (nationality, religion, etc.). Most people completely identify with these components of the Ego, and for them no self “outside” of this exists.

The identification of the Ego with things (object, the person’s own body, way of thinking) creates the link of the individual to various things. The Ego (and thus the spiritually unconscious person) experiences his/her existence through the possession of various objects. The satisfaction provided by the sense of possession is, however, short, so the individual usually carries on the pursuit for new objects. There is a powerful motivation behind this activity of the individual, a psychological demand to obtain more, the unconscious sense of “not yet enough,” and this feeling surfaces in a want for more. This want is a more powerful driving force for the Ego than the desire to possess. The uneasy feelings, recklessness, boredom, stress and dissatisfaction are all largely the products of the dissatisfied longing for more.

The thoughts such as “it’s mine,” “I want it,” “I need it,” “it is not enough,” belong to the structure of the Ego. The content of the Ego changes with time; it is replaced with new contents. No content is, however, able to lastingly satisfy the Ego as long as the structure of the Ego remains in its place. The individual keeps looking for something different, something that promises a greater satisfaction, making the sense of self of the individual more complete.

The Ego intends to elevate the forms (including its own form) to eternity, which is impossible. This intention of the Ego will be the source of all sufferings, because its world of forms and shapes shall collapse like a sandcastle after a while, until death snatches away the last of the forms: its body from it. It came empty-handed from Nothing, and that is how it is going to return there. The only treasure it could take along with it is its wakefulness, but the Ego considers that worthless in the world of forms and shapes, as it was not a means of increasing the power the Ego

The Ego is not bad, it is simply unconscious. Ego is the deepest dream of the Consciousness. If an individual is able to notice and observe the functions of the Ego, he or she will be able to transcend it. In that case, the individual who has been looking for a more complete perception of the self will recognize that it has always been there, but the functions of the Ego—identification with objects and thoughts—has pushed it into the background. One of the ways of transcending the Ego is not reacting wholeheartedly to the ever-changing kaleidoscope of thoughts and emotions, but concentrating on the alert consciousness in the background instead.

In most people, the term “consciousness” identifies with that socially conditioned Ego. At a number of people this identification is so powerful that they are unaware that their life is governed by a socially conditioned mind.

Those who are able to go beyond that identification with the mind recognize this state of being socially conditioned, and are also able to leave the social conditioning behind. Such a person will not identify with the mind but, increasingly, with the Consciousness. The Alertness shall, therefore, control the mind to an increasing extent and will be manifested through the tranquilized mind

When our identification with a form ceases, a new space is generated between us and the form and we are able to see and recognize that we are not identical with that form. With the dissolution of the identification, the Ego also disappears. This is the second major turning point in the process of awakening.

Awakening in Alertness

The gateway leading us to the deeper dimensions of Life is Alertness, which appears as a result of the release of our attention from the hypnotic state of listening to our personal story. The new Alertness enables us to learn about ourselves without identifying with our thoughts and emotions.

What we first experience in this new, alert state beyond our thoughts and emotions is the completeness of existence. In that state all fragmentation disappears from our life, we recognize the inner spaciousness of our existence, our inner happiness and tranqulity. We feel at home in our own skin, and we realize that our alert consciousness is free from all kinds of thoughts and emotions.

In that state of Consciousness an entirely new dimension of existence opens up for us, showing us Existence from a completely new perspective. The unity behind the controversies is revealed in front of our eyes, and we no longer insist on looking on the sunny side of life, as we are able to discover beauty on the dark side, too.

We accept life as it is, and it is not done under pressure, since that acceptance is the result of our complete freedom. The freedom is, in turn, a fruit of our escape from the world of Shapes and Forms. We have understood and experienced the process of awakening. The time has come for us to take control over our mind whenever it is required by the circumstances. When we do not need the work of the mind directly, let us give it some rest.

Everything will be quiet and peaceful in us. We are beyond all good and evil, we are a mere Consciousness that does not analyze or judge, only contemplates. We realize that the same contemplating soul lives in everybody, so the differences between human beings are only superficial, and deep inside we are all the same. Experiencing that unity will bring us the ecstasy of Life, the perfect joy of Existence.

From the new book>>Frank M. Wanderer Ph.D  3 Stages in the Evolution of the Human Spirit EGO – ALERTNESS – CONSCIOUSNESS

Read more articles from Frank M. Wanderer

Time and energy are the fundamental resources we have in this existence. We spend our time acquiring energy to exist, and we spend our energy to experience what time can give us. We spend our time surviving, providing for ourselves, our loved ones, and improving the quality of our experience in this reality. Time is the currency we will focus on in this segment, as it is a more valuable asset than money.

Many of us in our fast-paced modern world feel as though we never have enough time to get everything done. We find we do not have the quality of time to spend with our loved ones and we often feel there’s also not enough time to fulfill our goals and deepest desires.

Time is not only life’s inherent currency, but it is also the space in which we live out our experiences. Our experiences then, are products of our choices we make and when we make the choice to invest (or waste) time on an activity, we are ‘spending’ that currency, thus perpetually altering our account balance of life.

Ultimately, the balance in our account is the result of our life choices, which reflects whether we have invested our time wisely or wasted it frivolously. At the end of the day, regardless of circumstance, we still remain ultimately accountable for what and who, we have spent our time on, and then must live with the results we are left with.

In reality though, time is only an illusion, created by our physical experience and interpretation of reality. The truth is, there is only this present moment. Being fully mindful of this present moment, while both gaining wisdom from the past, and planning to apply this wisdom to our future choices, is the best utilization of time. Unfortunately we often waste the present moment on things that steal our attention and focus, such as sorrows, traumas, and regrets of the past, as well as the stresses, worries, and anxieties of the future. All the while missing the opportunities that pass us by in the present moment. Other things that waste our time are the many meaningless distractions that add no value to our account’s bottom line, diverting us away from our goals and decreasing the quality of our experience and the potential possibilities of banking on one’s wisest use of time. These can take the form of time wasting activities like types of entertainment that dull the mind and distract us in our personal life, as well as the ever common destructive habit of over-thinking. These are examples of a general lack of awareness.

We all need fun and entertainment to feel alive but the question I beg you to ask yourself is, what kind of entertainment are you engaged in and how much time do you spend on it? I am not one to judge other people’s tastes, as a former musician I enjoy indulging in various forms of entertainment, I’m just trying to get you to analyze what you spend your time and attention on and to ask yourself if those things bring true value to your life.

There are many things in our culture that distract our attention away from what’s important. Amusements and entertainment that do a better job at distracting us than making us truly happy.

Entertainment and amusement are good experiences, we need them to be happy, but are we over indulging in it? They are experiences that have the ability to prevent your mind from critically thinking about what is taking place within the psyche, within the self, as well as preventing us from paying attention to what’s going on around us.

Most people work, and the stress of work can cause us to want to escape during our time off and indulge in various activities to take our minds off of stress and to “unwind”. This is one of the areas that become time spending traps. Think if there are things you can unwind and relax doing that also are in tune with personal growth.

What are you doing to invest in yourself and enhance the quality of your experience? How much time will pass before you take your current state of awareness and development to the next level? Where are you placing your focus? What are you getting back in return for the investment of focus?

These are questions that we need to ask ourselves and be mindful of.

Awareness of the present moment is important. When we are unaware, many things in life can be hidden in plain sight. Another way of looking at it is that things can be simply hidden in time because our awareness is not focused on the Now, causing us to overlook many details. The average human life span is a blink of an eye in the cosmic perspective, but our choice of how we spend our limited time in this life can feel like an eternity of boredom and misery or, in contrast, it can be filled with excitement and accomplishment. Experiences can pass us by quickly, or we can savor them by focusing our attention on the things that enhance the quality of our experience and productivity. We are the architects of our collective experience.

Everyday you’re given a deposit of 86,400 seconds to waste or invest. Time is currency, so PAY attention to what you SPEND you’re time on.

Change is the one thing in life that is guaranteed, it is going to happen whether you like it or not. The question that remains at the core of all of this is, what type of change do you want in your life? How can you flow with and navigate the wave of changes that take you from A to B?

Bringing it back to the core of this message, Time (and energy) are the primary currencies you have to spend to enact change and to improve the quality of your experience within the string of events called your life, so you can live fully Now. How are you spending the 86,400 seconds you’re allocated each day?

How are you maximizing your work day and getting the most done as efficiently as possible?

What is stealing your time and attention both at home and at work?

What can you spend your time and attention on for better personal growth?

Everything is in motion. The things that effect you are the things that move you physically. The things that affect you are the things that move you emotionally. It is for this reason why I will depict the external and internal manifestation of an “affect/effect” because karma operates through both of these motions.

In the west we look at karma as a cosmic law of justice, cause and affect/effect, what goes around comes around, etc. You may be part of the majority of people in the west who acutely look at karma as the balancing scale of justice that distinguishes right from wrong, moral and immoral behaviour. Spiritual traditions teach karma as something that will affect/effect you lifetime after lifetime, as in, the actions that you make in this life will affect/effect the way you live in the next life.

I don’t have any knowledge of what is beyond the here and now, with regard to this present moment of understanding life, this is the space of time where you and I exist, and that is as much certainty as we can get. It is for this reason why I will not talk about karma’s affects/effects on the next life. What I will talk about is the way in which karma affects/effects you in this lifetime. It is in this lifetime where we forget about the multiple levels of knowledge and understanding that we can ascend to the deeper we dive within, symbolically rebirthing ourselves into wiser and happier people.

There are a lot more subtleties and layers of the human psyche involved in the way karma plays out. Your reality is your perspective, over time, your perspective of yourself is going to be based off of the memories of your past actions and intentions. This will project an identity of who you think you are, which will glorify or diminish your self-worth as you identify with those roles, depending on the supporting experiences within those memories. One thing that is for sure is that who we are at the present moment is not who we will be in the future. As we live life and collect wisdom in our library of experiences, we will become more conscious of ourselves. Whether we chose to use this ever growing consciousness to guide our actions is up to us (bearing in mind the consequences if we don’t). The simple awareness of your ego, past actions, behaviors, and intentions, gives you the free choice to walk a new destiny that will release you from your karma.

Awareness is the first step when it comes to removing karma. If you’re not aware of your actions, thoughts, feelings, (which ultimately manifest your intentions) you’ll continue to make free choices that are heavily influenced by these same feelings–>intentions–>actions. People who are unconscious remain in a fixed position, they do not evolve. They are forced to learn things the hard way in life, and the more stubborn they are the more difficult it becomes for them to break free of their cycle, thus they remain karmically challenged. Living an unconscious life, even if you get away with your choices, will bring you closer to more situations that stop you from being free, because you’ll have more things to worry about, weighing you down because you’re not aligned with truth. The truth of why you’re doing what you’re doing, and the compassionate understanding of how it’s impacting you and your surroundings. Even innocent and well-meaning actions based in fear can create karmic challenges for you if you deny the bitter (first time you taste it) truth about yourself.

Again, this isn’t just about the popular depiction of karma as a universal punishment, or a cosmic law of justice. The universe is indifferent to what is not aligned with it’s natural laws. Good and bad are relative constructs of the mind, yet there is an objective truth that binds us into a contract of experience driven understanding. Breaching this contract will yield experiences that gradually become harsher the more we fear and resist their lessons. Intentions, behaviors, and actions with no karmic consequence are ones that don’t harm sentient life, including yourself. It is not just about what you do to other people; it is also about the thoughts, emotions, actions, cycles and patterns of behaviour that eventually affect/effect you. An intention, behavior, or action that harms you or another sentient being is bad karma. This is the objective form of karma that we have the choice to disobey, but cannot escape the ramifications. Although it doesn’t always manifest as an immediately realized consequence, time reveals the karmic cycle of finding yourself in similar circumstances that reflect back to you what you put out into the world. Karma is a direct experience of something happening to you and/or something happening within you that was caused by your past choices of thinking, feeling, and behaving.

Since karma is anything you do that causes harm to sentient consciousness, which includes yourself, it is easier to awaken to the truth of understanding that we are our own worst enemies. We are the architects with the power to build or destroy the quality of our experience in this existence. This is why everyone has karma, including “good” people. Even if you aren’t harming others, you’re probably harming yourself in some way with a habit, pattern of thinking, or pattern of feeling. The ignorance of what is causing this self harm, which is rooted in fear, is preventing you from being whole and secure. Until you acknowledge the truth of what is dividing you within, you’ll continue to find yourself in the same self defeating patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving.

Karma is a way of handling challenges. You may be the victim of someone harming you, which may cause you to become harmful to other people, creating a domino effect of negative behaviour passed down from one person to the next. Choosing to engage in less than evolutionary choices that harm or take from someone else (physically or emotionally) invites more circumstances into your life that will reflect this behaviour happening to you, and you will once again become a victim of it while the cycle will continue until you break out of it. If you chose to react to the challenge of karma by separating yourself from the trauma while retaining the lesson, you can freely move forward unaffected and/or benefited by it. One less thing slowing you down on your evolutionary path.

Those who are unconscious will experience karma through the cycle of circumstances that they repeatedly put themselves in as a result of their choices. As long as they lack awareness, they will continue to swim against a current of possibilities that reflect the same level of thinking as their initial intentions. Circumstances blind and turn people against themselves, continually chipping away at the freedom of their own consciousness, thus creating more circumstances that reinforce negative beliefs, feelings, and actions.

People who have awareness of themselves are in a much better position than the unconscious person. This person may still continue to make selfish and/or self-defeating choices, yet far more likely to be slapped in the face by the guilt, regret, and shame, unworthiness all of which affect/effects the quality of your experiences. As a result of battling and reconciling those feelings, one changes their actions. The guilt, shame, or regret that one experiences should not become an identity, but rather a wake-up call to step into a better role. This is the type of karma where you’re feeling judged and divided from within as your emotional guidance system tells you that you’re out of sync with truth.

“Karma is real, part of it starts with how you’re starting to feel” – H.B.M.S

Adding to your current understanding of karma, the most important addition to your awareness of karma is to understand that karma is not just about bad deeds, it is also about how you perceive and feel about yourself. Your feelings and emotions have a lot to do with your karma. The pain body, as Eckhart Tole describes is a form of ego identification that weakens or strengthens depending on how we handle our karmic hurdles.

“The pain-body is a term for the accumulation of old emotional pain that almost all people carry in the body of their experiences. I see it as a semi-autonomous psychic entity. [an inner demon in the shadows of your subconscious mind] It consists of negative emotions that were not faced, accepted, and let go in the moment of their origin”

We often feel like victims whenever we don’t get what we want, feel misunderstood, or victimized. There are legitimate times when we feel wronged but the degree to which we wallow in our own sorrow and/or anger creates karma for ourselves even if we truly were initially victimized and wronged by a circumstance. Continuing to identify with these emotions will effect your perspective, adding a negative filter to your world. You will then make actions based on this perspective which could lead to more circumstances that caused the initial sadness/anger. This will lead you to create problems in your reality that don’t even exist, arising only because you’re identifying with a state of mind that is not conducive to getting what you need. These problems that don’t exist, fester into problems that become reality, because it navigates your actions, and your trajectory into the future.

Karma is nothing more than the ingrained attributes within you that hold you back. When working on your karma, everything on the radar is just a tip of the iceberg. Karma is often a lack of awareness of how your patterns of behaviour beneath the surface are holding you back. When your thoughts, emotions, and actions aren’t aligned, you’re divided within and separated from wholeness, which creates karma. Subconsciously, unresolved emotions, negative thoughts, and trauma programming navigate our ego through potentially destructive terrain. This can leave karmic imprints that create a repeat cycle of more unhappy thoughts, feelings, actions and circumstances. In addition, unresolved emotions and trauma that we hold onto can manifest into stress which can cause all sorts of physical symptoms. It can even change the way the brain is hardwired. The Vedic and Buddhist philosophy describes this inability to get your mind right as, “Sanskara”.

The Vedic teachings of ancient India would wrote about Sanskara when defining karma. Sanskara is defined as “mental impression, recollection, psychological imprint”, meaning that these things place the individual in an ongoing cycle of repeating those patterns which originate in the mind and are carried out through taking action on those thoughts, embeded mental impressions, and distressing memories, repeating the cycle until one breaks out of Sanskara. It is a disposition, character or behavioral trait, that runs like a default program, which is perfected by it’s slave over a lifetime until the controlled individual breaks free from it. This karmic program is imprinted deep in the subconscious mind of that which it controls.

“According to various schools of Indian philosophy, every action, intent or preparation by an individual leaves a sanskara (impression, impact, imprint) in the deeper structure of his or her mind. These impressions then await volitional fruition in that individual’s future, in the form of hidden expectations, circumstances or unconscious sense of self-worth. These Sanskaras manifest as tendency, karmic impulses, subliminal impressions, habitual potency, or innate dispositions.” – Wikipedia

Whatever we manifest must first manifest in the mind before it can manifest physically. Causality begins in the mind with a desire, intention, emotion and thought, which then expresses itself through the will and force of taking action in the physical domain. The mind is a plane of causality where causes (temptations, desires, habits, traumatic experiences, etc) are checked or unchecked by the will power of choice before manifesting as a formed reality in the plane of effects. The causal factors of WHY, which underly and proceeds all manifested things and events that are unnatural (Unnatural meaning, created by man/woman, not nature) begins in the mind.

You’re not the center of reality (subjective moral relativism), but significant power to affect/effect change in your reality exist within your mind. Many people are stuck in the affects/effects of causality but fail to take responsibility and look at the causal factors they contribute out of ignorance and/or fear. Responsibility is the awareness of and power and ability to respond to the circumstances that exist within and outside of you; response + ability. The causal factors lie in how we think, feel, and act, so until those three are unified, there will likely be disharmony within, which affects how we create and respond to our external manifestations, receiving back our newly created manifestations as external conditions. Unity is the simplicity of this lesson. Clearing the contradiction between thought, emotion, and action is unity consciousness, otherwise we are divided within. Acting from a place of chaos within, contributes to chaos in your external environment, a chaotic environment (such as hostile or damaged relationships for example) that will be reflected back into the disorder that already exist within, further perpetuating the karmic cycle.

Who or what controls our options?

Choice has no boundary but it’s rewards are aligned with one truth. Karma doesn’t care if you’re a victim of circumstance. What is done to you by others is their karma, how you react is your karma. Causation can originate in many ways but nothing escapes the natural law of karma. We have free will but we don’t have free will to ignore causation without consequence, it operates within boundary conditions that cannot be exceeded without consequence. It’s a natural law that can be broken with free will, but it can’t be broken without consequence. Within your own inner universe, free will and determinism are like a feedback loop with one co-creating the other. Our choices reinforce patterns that serve us, or hold us back, yet our predetermined patterns of behaviour influence our choices. Awareness is needed to break this cycle.

Embrace your karma, use it as a teacher, make friends with karma. It’s not judging or punishing you, but it’s telling you the truth about yourself, the truth about how you think, feel, and act, without holding anything back. It is the most honest lesson of how to conduct your human experience in this game called life. As long as you chose to evolve, you can suffer successfully through the events in life that slow you down and make you feel insecure. In those moments of insecurity, take some time to process the thoughts and feelings that are separating you from wholeness. You are the only one that is giving it power by identifying with it, as well as taking actions that identify with those thoughts and feelings, giving you a role, a character in the game.

The Hermetic law of Mentalism, a theory that physical and psychological phenomena ultimately account for or is understood only in terms of a creative and interpretive mind. It is not just our actions that create karma, but also the way we think, especially the way we think about ourselves. The grumpier you are, the more assholes you meet, the happier you are, the more good people you’ll attract. Our Ego and the actions that come from it bring us into resonance with situations and people of similar vibration. These conditions that we unknowingly throw ourselves in facilitate more actions and ways of thinking that lead to more karmic consequences/rewards. Does the ego create the conditions or do the conditions create the ego? It’s a chicken and the egg paradox, but a cycle that traps us all. A simple awareness of your conditions and how you react to those conditions can go a long way in your evolution. Nobody’s perfect, don’t strive for perfection, just strive for progress.

“Don’t try to be superior to your fellow man, aim to be superior to your former self.”

Who you are at the present moment is a different incarnation of who you were in the past, whether it’s 24 hours ago or 10 years ago. If you allow yourself to devolve, existing in time with an ever diminishing understanding of yourself (core needs, fears, and desires) and others, you’ll increasingly become confined to the conditions of your karma. If you evolve through reason and intuition, you’ll gradually escape the physical manifestations of your karma through proper action, even if the odds are stacked against you (your conditions).

The obstacle is the path, karma is the path. As you become more aware of your thoughts, emotions, and actions, you’ll learn to make choices that are mindful. Awareness leads to knowledge of self, which leads understanding, which leads to a better application of free will. Freewill to create what you desire without consequence, with more ease, with less resistance, living life more effortlessly, Growing with the Flow.
Bodhidharma said that your choices are like seeds, each of which will harvest at the right time in your life. Karma hits you at an unexpected time in ways you cannot prepare for, therefore making the consequences of your actions more devastating due to the inability to prepare for them.

If you feel guilty about something, that’s your karma

If you feel insecure about something, that’s your karma

If you feel frustrated about something, that’s your karma

If you feel anxious about something, that’s your karma

If you feel angry about something, that’s your karma

If you feel depressed about something, that’s your karma

It always starts with YOU, that’s the truth. We live in a society that demands truth from one and other, but we don’t like the truth about ourselves. The inner work is a laborious alchemical process for the soul. Changing a thought on the surface level appears to be incredibly easy compared to building a physical structure with large heavy pieces of bricks. Inside, changing our thoughts, emotions, and beliefs is like lifting tons of stone for the soul. As we build ourselves from within, we must not divert from the path because we were afraid to go through the process, the struggle, the journey. As sovereign sentients, we must learn to govern ourselves from within. Take control of the inner child and inner demons silently pulling the strings. “As Solomon builds his temple, so shall one build himself“. You are who you associate with as well, you don’t have to be a snob and cut people off who you don’t think are “on your level”; allow those who make an effort to grow to be in your life, and cut people off who are toxic to your growth. “As iron sharpens Iron, so too shall one sharpen another”

Understand that the predicaments that originated outside of your responsibility, meaning that they were genuinely caused by other people and circumstances that you shouldn’t be held accountable for; the way in which you handle them ultimately affects/effects your karma. In life, there is only one direction….FORWARD! Allowing your thinking, emotions, and circumstances (no matter how hard) to hold you back from Initiating progressive change in your life is a widely overlooked form of karma. It’s not just about what you do to others, it’s also about what you do to yourself!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpzEAsHhVSw

Creativity. What is it? And how do you know if you’ve got it? The most used buzzword in self-descriptions on linked in profiles for 2 years running. The number one factor, across 33 industries, to which Fortune 500 CEOs attribute their success. We’re fascinated by creativity and yet we continue to struggle in defining it. Perhaps we can benefit by examining those individuals hailed as creative geniuses. Picasso, Einstein, Edison, Steve Jobs… What did all of these people have in common? Below I list 15 surprising qualities of the Creative Genius.

1. Creative Geniuses are open to new experiences. On an individual level, psychologists have identified “openness to experience” as the single most important trait of exceptionally creative people. Creative geniuses make a conscious effort to introduce change into their lives. They often put themselves in situations in which they’re more likely to experience the unexpected.

2. Creative Geniuses have a high tolerance for uncertainty. Many of us cringe at the thought of the unknown and fear being out of control. Creative geniuses, on the other hand, have a high tolerance for uncertainty. Picasso was once asked if he knew what a painting was going to look like when he started it. He answered, “No, of course not. If I knew, I wouldn’t bother doing it.” In general, creative geniuses tend to care less about the destination and more about the journey.

3. Creative Geniuses practice diffused attention. Most exceptional creators are working on multiple projects at a time. They’re often restless and have a variety of outside interests. Psychologists refer to this as “diffused attention”, or defocused. While periods of intense concentration are useful for balancing checkbooks and taking exams, creative breakthroughs are most likely to occur when we’re in a state of diffused attention.

4. Creative Geniuses don’t care much about what other people think. Another trait common to creative geniuses is their utter and complete lack of self-consciousness. They simply don’t care what others think of them. Take Socrates’ nose, for example. Or Einstein’s hair. However, what they lack in self-consciousness, they tend to make up for in self-awareness. Creative geniuses are constantly reflecting on what they’re doing at any given moment and they’re always listening to themselves.

5. Creative Geniuses are more sensitive than most. The old stereotype of the sensitive artist is true. Creative geniuses are physiologically more sensitive to stimuli. In experiments, they consistently rate various stimuli (electric shocks and loud noises, for example) more intensely than less creative people. This could also explain why creative people periodically retreat from the world.

6. Creative Geniuses are unusually optimistic. While many of us approach a new challenge with, “Why?” Creative geniuses challenge themselves with, “Why not?” It seems that optimism plays an essential role in creativity for all of us. For example, one recent study found that optimistic employees are more creative than pessimistic ones.

7. Creative Geniuses are motivated by something other than personal gain. Contrary to many great artists of today seeking fame, success, or money, creative geniuses aren’t motivated by personal gain. They’re not doing it for themselves. At least, not only for themselves. Creative geniuses create in order to further their beliefs. They create with the distinct goal of making the world a better place and transforming it through the power of their creativity.

8. Creative Geniuses have cognitive flexibility. Cognitive flexibility is defined as the ability to see the world with new eyes. Creative geniuses view obstacles as opportunities. They possess this capacity to transform random events, even mistakes, into a chance to veer in an entirely new and unexpected direction. In other words, creative geniuses are able to switch tracks with ease. They value the process above all else, so they keep their minds and eyes open.

9. Creative Geniuses are active. Darwin’s theory of evolution came together while he was riding in the back of a carriage. Mark Twain was notorious for pacing his study. Mozart always traveled with scraps of paper tucked into his side pocket. Creativity requires kinetic energy and motion primes creative thinking. Creative geniuses understand this and make sure to stay active. They may not get anywhere physically, but such consistent movement allows them to travel far in their minds. As the saying goes, “I have never heard of anyone stumbling upon something while sitting down.”

10. Creative Geniuses view themselves as outsiders. They may be part of a group, but they never quite feel as though they fit in. They are simultaneously accepted and shunned. Though not a comfortable position, it’s the perfect configuration for creative genius, as all genuinely creative ideas are initially met with rejection. Researchers at John Hopkins University found that rejection boosts creativity most markedly in individuals who consider themselves to be “independent minded”. That is, those who stand apart from the world and rejoice in their Otherness. Creative geniuses are always marginalized to one degree or another. Which makes sense since someone wholly invested in the status quo is unlikely to disrupt it.

11. Creative Geniuses make a lot of mistakes. The idea that highly creative people get it “right” the first time and don’t make any mistakes is perhaps the greatest myth of creativity. In reality, creative geniuses make more mistakes than the rest of us. This makes sense when we consider that the more shots we take at a target, the more likely we’ll eventually hit the bull’s eye (and the more misses we’ll accumulate, as well). Creative geniuses tend to rightfully view their mistakes as stepping-stones.

12. Creative Geniuses fail well. Closely related to their tendency towards mistakes, creative geniuses also know how to fail. They embrace failure because they know it can provide a useful learning experience, as long as it’s in the aid of a continuing process. Creative geniuses fail well. They fail until they get it right. They fail in a thoughtful and efficient manner. And perhaps most importantly, they fail early.

13. Creative Geniuses crave chaos. The word “chaos” is often misused as a synonym for “anarchy”. We seem to have given it a false negative connotation. But creative breakthroughs arrive in the midst of chaos. Thus, creative geniuses crave chaos. If it doesn’t present itself naturally, they produce it. Think about Beethoven’s notoriously messy desk, for example. Or Einstein’s messy love life. These are examples of self-induced chaos. Far from being an impediment to creativity, chaos is an essential ingredient.

14. Creative Geniuses are good at “connecting the dots”. All geniuses make the world a bit simpler. There is this chaotic mess of seemingly unconnected data and then someone says, “Wait, here is how it all fits together.” And we like that. Dots are connected. Relationships uncovered. Creative geniuses take great pleasure in connecting many phenomena, which at first sight appear to have nothing in common.

15. Creative Geniuses take a lot of risks. When stumbling upon a new path, we don’t necessarily know whether it will lead to a dead-end or a breakthrough. Creative geniuses don’t care. They take the path anyway. It helps that creative geniuses have a high tolerance for uncertainty because they are, by nature, risk takers. Risk and creative genius are inseparable. Sometimes the genius risks professional ridicule, and sometimes much more. But genius always comes at a price. Creative geniuses are simply more willing to pay that price than others.

If you are feeling down and out I can let you in on a quick way to turn your mood (and possibly your life) around. It’s all about perspective really. We can take some concepts used in art and apply them to human happiness. Art is all about observation really, and the skills we develop as artists can be applied to many things, including peace of mind and happiness.

Let’s say you set up a still life on your table. Maybe some fruit or a nice bouquet of flowers and a charming old-fashioned oil lamp. You can take that subject and look at it from many different angles and see many different things. Each angle or perspective would be different though no less correct. What each individual perspective has in common other than the subject matter itself is that it’s an incomplete view of the subject at hand. You can approach the subject from one angle and it will look totally different when you zoom in from a different direction. We can apply this idea to our own lives by simply remembering that we can’t always see the full picture when it comes to a person, a thing, or a situation.

via wallpaperup.com

This idea helps us to be more tolerant toward others, and it helps us maintain our own sense of peace when we feel life is treating us unfairly. Remember when considering the subject of yourself, the most important perspective you should be concerned with is your own; because you have the most complete picture of yourself as a person. You alone have access to your thoughts and all the myriad of variables and circumstances that cause you to make the decisions you do. Everyone else just has pieces of the puzzle, you have the full picture and it’s up to you to decide how you want to look at it. Just remember, good or bad you are the one who has to live in your head. On that note, I should add that consistency will go a long way toward preserving your sanity and peace of mind. While the side of ourselves we present to different people might differ in some ways if we can keep our facts somewhat consistent we’ll keep our lives simpler in the long run.

In the art world, we understand that not only does our perspective alter the image we see, so too does the lighting. Generally speaking, the brighter something is the more positively we view it.  We all know a room that is lit up is generally a lot less frightening and imposing as the thought of something hiding in the darkness. We can take this idea of lighting and compare it with gratitude. Gratitude is like the light we shine into the darkness that chases away the shadows of our fears and reveals to us the blessings we truly have. The more we shine the light of gratitude, the more we are able to see those blessings that were once hidden from us.

If we were to go back to the still-life analogy, we can start off by striking a match or sparking a lighter in a darkened room. We have a small amount of light that allows us to find a bowl of fruit or flowers to paint then we notice a lantern we can turn on. The lantern gives us a better view of the room and from there we’ve illuminated the door which we can pass through to see a beautiful sunset for us to paint ablaze with all the beauty and splendor nature possesses.

via gwoltal.myfastmail.com

I should also add that what you put in is key. If you had ignored the fact you had a match or a flashlight and just focused on the darkness and wandered in said darkness you probably would have stubbed your toe or bumped your shin. Next, you might have stumbled around the room cursing and knocked over the table or stepped on the cat and gotten clawed.

The law of Karma or the law of Attraction is real; you get what you give. If you are an angry bitter person you’ll have an angry bitter life. If you are peaceful and loving, chances are your life will be peaceful and loving as well. Think of it as making a sandwich. If you put good healthy ingredients into the sandwich you’ll have a wholesome tasty lunch. If you squeeze a bunch of hate and angst and anger between a couple of slices of apathy you’re bound to get a s**t sandwich. Just simple logic.

Now most of our power comes from within, from the perspective we choose to look at things, and from the light we choose to shine; our power comes from how we choose to ACT in situations (thoughtfully, mindfully, aware, as opposed to reacting blindly or emotionally).

We can choose to paint a happy scene and happy places, or we can choose to paint a scary terrifying scene of our own personal hell and focus on that for half of forever. It’s up to us what kind of subject matter we want to focus on… You are the god of your own universe as am I, but we’re also co-creating with all the other gods and goddesses around us, it’s important to honor that and our ability to choose, and how necessary that ability is sometimes.

Think about all the different perspectives that are out there and surround yourself with the people who build and empower you to become the kind of person you want to be. Keep the healthy mirrors around you; cherish the people who will believe in you and lift you up. They will give you strength when you are feeling weak. They will make you smile when you want to cry.

Surround yourself with people who reinforce your perspective of good in yourself and the world. When you encounter negative people who try and cut you down or make you feel small remember they are coming from their own small perspective. Try and see them in another light and hold space for the beauty that’s inherent within, while respecting that sometimes the best way to do that is with space.

Finally, remember the words of Bob Ross while you are painting your life,

“This is your world, you can make it however you want.”

Written by Rebecca River

Sources-

Shared with permission from original author.

Featured Image credit: banashreepalit.files.wordpress.com

My life has gone through a series of ups and downs over the last year. I’ve had incredible high’s and have experienced some deep, dark lows. I attribute my ability to bounce back from situations in life to living intentionally.

But what does that mean?

Well…I guess it means, in simple terms…knowing what you’re doing…at all times.

To me it means, being with yourself…feeling your breath on your lips when you breathe. Feeling the rise and fall of your chest. Feeling the ground underneath you when you walk. Watching your thoughts as you think and enjoying the moment of being alive.

Doing things intentionally isn’t nearly as common as you think.

Studies show that about 45% of what we do every day feels like decisions, but they’re actually habits.

That means almost half of the actions we take every day are actually happening on auto pilot.

Well, when we live on auto-pilot, we’re certainly not in full control of our lives, meaning that we’re giving a percentage of our control and power away to habits that we’ve formed in the past.

There is also a great chance that the habits you have either

1. Aren’t serving you to the highest potential
2. Possibly Destructive

The reason I say that is that there is a fundamental truth about Humans: We aren’t perfect. Even people performing at a very high level could always improve at something. There’s always a way to be more efficient in our lives. And there is always room for improving our mental game.

I’m sure you’ve also heard about the concept that 70-90% of our thoughts are the same as yesterday.

Well…if you’re in it to win it. Having the same thoughts over and over again probably isn’t serving you either.

So…

Here are 10 ways To Live More Intentionally so that you have more control over your life and ultimately become happier.

 1. Write Things Down

Make lists. Write things down. It truly works wonders. People often overestimate some abilities while they underestimate others. Most people overestimate their ability to stay organized, remember things and follow through on tasks or goals they need to achieve. Writing things down is one of the key’s that has helped me accomplish many of the things I’m proud of in my life. Don’t underestimate the power of a pen and paper. If you don’t usually write things down and you start the habit, you’re making a conscious decision to do something that is outside of your normal routine and pattern. By writing things down like your inner thoughts, feelings, daily tasks and goals you not only gain a better understanding of yourself through self-reflection but you also now have some additional motivation to follow through on the things you’ve written down.

2. Notice The Finer Details In Your Environment

When life becomes routine, our surroundings start to blend in and we start overlooking some of the little things. Ever wondered why moving to a new place, seeing a new site, or traveling is so gratifying or exciting? As humans, we’re predominantly visual creatures and our eyes play a big part in everything we feel. Consciously choosing to notice different things in your environment that you wouldn’t usually look at brings you back to yourself. It brings you back into your body and allows you cut the pattern you might be in at the moment. Our eyes are one of the greatest gifts we have as human beings and it’s important that we use them consciously and in a way that serves us.

3. Drink More Water

Water plays an incredibly important role in your health and unfortunately in today’s society, most people are dehydrated. With the abundance of processed foods, sugary drinks and restaurant options available, many people aren’t getting proper nutrition and still neglecting their water intake. By carrying around a large water bottle with you at all times, you’re not only contributing to your health (more energy, a clearer mind, better skin, more functional cells and better detoxification) you’re actually creating a positive habit that’s going to serve you well beyond most other habits you could form.

Taking a drink of water from your water bottle a few times per hour not only hydrates you, but also allows you to live consciously by breaking the pattern you are in and consciously choosing to do something positive for your health. Each positive thing you do builds momentum and momentum is the secret key to creating sustainable positive change.

4.  Learn To Say No

Learning to say no to is like a muscle. And with any new muscle that you haven’t worked out and strengthened, it’s going to be weak at first. Learning to say no can be one of the best things you can do for your life in the long run. Because it’s easy to say yes to the things that aren’t that good for you. And it’s easy to say yes to things that would distract you from what you need to be doing. Learning to say no allows you to take control of your life so that you can live more intentionally and more consciously.

5. Take Deep Breaths Often

Let alone the fact that many people aren’t engaging In some type of moderate or vigorous exercise regularly to get their blood flowing to oxygenate their muscles and cells, many people just don’t breathe deeply. By consciously taking deep breaths every so often, you bring yourself back into your body and break your pattern. Taking a moment to take a deep breathe is also a perfect time to be grateful for your health, the oxygen of the earth that is always there keeping you alive, and the moment you’re in. Because the truth is, that moment won’t last forever…

6. Stand Up For What You Believe In

All of us have things we feel strongly or are passionate about. And we’ve all been in a situation where we didn’t quite speak up about something, whether it was to fit in, not cause an argument, or we simply let it pass as “it’s not THAT important.” The problem with that is, is that every time you don’t say something when you want to, you end up walking away feeling a little dis-empowered. And feeling disempowered is never good for our growth.

The problem most people encounter when trying to stand up for what they believe in is that it opens them up to possible attack and criticism. In other words, haters. And most people are scared of that.

The flip side is, when you stand up for what you believe in, your life has the possibility to improve beyond your wildest dreams. Everything people want is on the other side of fear.

7. Do Something You Feel is Out of Your Character

Living intentionally doesn’t just mean breathing deeply and drinking more water. It means congruency between your thoughts and your actions. It means being in control of your life and the direction it’s headed.

That means that if you have thoughts about taking an action, take the action.

The world needs more action…from everyone.

You might have heard of Charles Cooley’s Looking glass Self which describes “Other people’s views build, change and maintain our self-image, and thus, there is an interaction between how we see ourselves and how others see us.”

To reduce this drastically, we could say that our personalities are a reflection of our “thoughts” about our environment. We might act, behave and think in a certain way as a result of us imagining that that is how our friends, family and acquaintances perceive us to be.

And so in turn…people create a box for themselves and for their life. They believe they can only do certain things and that other things are out of their reach.

But all that is false.

Doing something out of your character is one of the best ways to live intentionally. Because none of us have accomplished 100% of what we want in life and many people have things that they want to do, but are afraid of what might happen.

Doing something you think might be out of character is only in your head.

People accept you for who you are at face value.

The truth is that people aren’t in your head.

They don’t know your inner dialogue and every detail of your past.

They understand what you present them. So if you want to start acting “out of character” just do it. And you’ll find that people are far more accepting about it than you might have thought.

Living Intentionally through some of these practices are just some of the ways you can start taking control of your life, your health and your destiny. This post was inspired from my recent experiences and remembering that we are here on earth only for a short period of time…and that every moment is a gift.

The word “heart” is an anagram for the word “earth”. Hence, the phrase “home is where the heart is”.

Did you know that the human heart is the organ that generates the strongest electromagnetic field of any organ of the human body? In fact, the electromagnetic field of your heart can be measured up to a few feet away from your body. Furthermore, this energy field changes in relation to your emotions. One thing you should know about electromagnetic field is that every organ and cell in your body generate an energy field.

i-uv.com

Because the heart generates the strongest electromagnetic field, the information stored in its electromagnetic field affects every organ and cell in your body. Could this be why the heart is the first organ to function in a fetus? Besides generating the strongest electromagnetic field, the heart has an intelligence of its own, which is why certain neurocardiologists refer to it as the heart-brain or the fifth brain.

According to neurocardiologists, the heart is not only made of muscle cells but also neurons. Researchers at the Institute of HeartMath have done experiments proving that the heart’s role is not limited to just pumping blood. They believe it has intelligence and plays a major role in the perception of reality.

Here is an excerpt from my book Staradigm that talks about the deeper roles of the heart:

The heart is one of the most important organs in the human body, because it is one of the main mediums for connecting us to each other and the Universe. Conventional science has taught us that the main role of the heart is to pump blood to all the systems of the body. This definition of the heart is not very accurate. Besides pumping blood, the heart also has an intelligence of its own.

According to neurocardiologists, 60 to 65 percent of heart cells are neuron cells, not muscle cells.¹This discovery has helped them to develop experiments that have proved the heart works similar to the brain and in some ways is even superior to the brain. This may be the reason why the heart is the first organ to function after conception. Within about 20 days after conception the heart starts to function, but the brain does not function until after roughly 90 days. This information tells us that the brain is secondary to the heart.

The Heart, Brain, and Feelings

The brain and the heart are sometimes said to work in opposition. We are constantly trying to determine whether to place more emphasis on our thoughts or feelings. Rational people would say that the mind is the key to keeping us out of trouble, as the mind thinks in terms of what has the most payoff and is quite possible the safest or most calculated risk.

Image: Heartmath

The heart on the other hand allows us to feel what is best at an internal level that connects to our intuition. Operating with either one of these alone, only the mind or the heart, can sometimes lead us into trouble. The mind can be afraid to seek happiness outside of the comfort zone, and the heart sometimes urges decisions that are unknown and risky, but using the two in balance can bring great clarity to a person.

Follow the heart is a common phrase that is tossed around, but it is not necessarily easy to enact. Follow the heart means letting deep feelings draw us one way or another without a logical answer or obvious reasoning. This organ provides a feeling of intuition or guidance, but we must have the contentment and the confidence to understand when it is pushing us in a direction, and then act upon this with complete faith in the outcome. Our feelings are what help us to understand the world beyond logic and therefore they are the keys to understanding the spiritual aspects of ourselves.

The Intelligence of the Heart

Some researchers and neurocardiologists are pushing the idea that the heart can actually act like another brain, helping to guide us with a different form of intelligence. Many physiological studies are currently being done regarding the interconnection of the heart and the brain, and why certain sensations and feelings are experienced at the level of the heart. Generally, love and certain emotional states are felt at the heart level, producing different physiological reactions of the heart.

www.heartmath.org

Heartbeats have been found to be affected by inner states and emotions, including disorder in heart rhythms when we are experiencing stress or negative emotion. Conversely, when we are feeling positively, the heart rhythms are more cohesive and beat more regularly and steadily.

The nervous system of the heart contains roughly 40,000 neurons or sensory neurites. One of its roles is to monitor the heart’s hormones, neurochemicals, heart rate, and pressure information. The information of how these chemicals behave is also sent to the brain. The heart and brain are always communicating through the vagus nerve system and the electromagnetic field of the body. It is through this dynamic communication process that the consciousness of the heart can change how the brain process information. This process can also affect how energy flows in the body.

These findings indicate that the heart works with the brain and body, including the amygdala, to process emotions and incorporate emotional memories. The amygdala is the part of the brain that assists us in making decisions about incoming information and processing them based on our past experiences. This shows a link between the emotions and feelings and the actual brain and body physiology.

Other mental attitudes and stress also affect the body and our overall health, and these issues can be linked to the heart as well. Recent scientific research has determined that the emotions of anger, anxiety, and other negative feelings can significantly increase the risk of heart disease. Therefore, stressful situations and high anxiety levels negatively affect the heart as an organ.

Connecting the brain and the heart as its own emotional processing center is a topic that many researchers are focusing on. It has been shown that emotions experienced mentally will also manifest physically in the body, and feelings can affect the rhythms and beating of the heart. The best way to maintain a healthy heart is to not only eat a healthy diet, but also incorporate meditation techniques to balance the energy of the heart and brain.

Why the Heart Holds the key to World Peace

The heart helps us to understand the world through feelings. It allows us to understand our reality in a universal kind of way, giving us universal characteristics. This biological electromagnetic field generator allows us to understand each other at the emotional level and beyond, giving us a sense of connection to all things. This emotional connection is what creates bonding between individuals.

When we learn how to think with our hearts, it becomes easier for us to understand others and live in harmony with them. For these reasons, the heart holds the key to uniting humanity and achieving world peace.

Mysteries of the Heart

**Also featured at Waking Times.

At it’s deepest level, most of us have no clue as to what the word government truly means.

The word government is a word that we hear all the time, so we are well aware of what this word implies. However, at deeper levels, most of us have no clue as to what the word government truly means. To find the deeper meanings of the word government, we need to research its origins and use the art of anagram to split it into two words.

The Occult Definition of the Word Government

The common and overt definition of the word government is “the form or system of rule by which a state, community, etc., is governed”.

Here is one of the legal definitions of the word government:

The system of polity in a state; that form of fundamental rules and principles by which a nation or state is governed, or by which individual members of a body politicare to regulate their social actions; a constitution, either written or unwritten, by which the rights and duties of citizens and public officers are prescribed and defined, as amonarchical government, a republican government, etc.

The word government originated from the Old French word governement, meaning “control, direction, administration”. To find the occult definition of the word government, you need to split it into two words, transforming the word government into “govern-ment” or “govern ment“.

One of the origins of the word govern is the Latin word gubernare, which translates to English as “to direct, rule, guide, govern”. The suffix ment has a few different origins. One of them comes from the Latin word ment, meaning “mind”.

Based on these occult definitions, the word government means “to rule the mind” or “govern the mind“. Throughout history, governments across the world have always used “mind control” techniques, such as subliminal messages and propaganda to condition us how to think. The purpose of this is to control how we think, so that they can rule our minds.

One of the most popular and effective mind control techniques that the government likes to use to rule our minds is mnemonic. For an informative article about mnemonic, read this article titled How Mnemonic is Used to Program and Control Your Mind.

One very important thing you need to know about the government is that it is a corporation. According to Black’s Law Dictionary 6th edition, a corporation is “an artificial person or legal entity created by or under the authority of the laws of a state.” Because the government is a corporation (artificial person), it is a fictitious entity that has no natural rights and power. Its main source of power comes from feeding on the energy of the people.

The Government Has No Power Without the People’s Support

Since the government needs the energy of the people to have power, it has no power without the support of the people. Unfortunately, most people have been brainwashed to think that the government has power over them. Whenever the government becomes tyrannical, all we need to do is remove our support and it will collapse on its own. This is how we can stop tyrannical governments without violent revolutions.

Because the government is an artificial person, it can not directly deal with a natural person (living, breathing person). To overcome this problem, the people who control the government, which are the leaders of the New World Order (NWO), created another artificial person. This artificial person is known as the legal name, which is the name on your birth certificate, driver’s license, etc.

To rule our minds and control us, the leaders of the NWO (deep state) used their government to trick us to consent to play the legal name game. By participating in the legal name game, we unknowingly agree to be a corporation (artificial person). This allows the government to do business with us and have jurisdiction over us. Do you understand now why the word government means “to rule the mind”?

To learn more about the legal name game, read this empowering article titled The Legal Name Game to Enslave Your Soul.

Here are some great quotes from the article titled The U.S. Constitution Con: Why Freedom in the USA is an Illusion about the dangers of a corrupt government:

Criminals are a small minority in any age or community. And the harm they have dome to mankind is infinitesimal when compared to the horrors – the bloodshed, the wars, the persecution, the famines, the enslavements, the wholesale destruction – perpetrated by mankind’s governments. Potentially, a government is the most dangerous threat to man’s rights – When unlimited and unrestricted by individual rights, a government is men’s deadliest enemy.

… What, then, do they (Humans) want a government for? Not to regulate commerce; not to educate the people; not to teach religion; not to administer charity; not to make roads and railways; but simply to defend the natural rights of man – to protect person and property – to prevent the aggressions of the powerful upon the weak – in a word, to administer justice. This is the natural, the original, office of a government. It was not intended to do less: it ought not to be allowed to do more – (The Man Versus the State)

… It is unfortunately none too well understood that, just as the State has no money of its own, so it has no power of its own. All power it has is what society gives it, plus what it confiscates from time to time on one pretext or another; there is no other source from which State power can be drawn. Therefore every assumption of State power, whether by gift or seizure, leaves society with so much less power; there is never, nor can be, any strengthening of State power without a corresponding and roughly equivalent depletion of social power.

… Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civil obedience. Our problem is that numbers of people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of the leaders of their government and have gone to war, and millions have been killed because of this obedience…Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves, and all the while the grand thieves are running the country. That’s our problem – Howard Zinn

Also featured at Waking Times.

Featured image from: Ask