JustGetThere

Psychedelic Adventures | Some call it the 3rd eye or the mind's eye, the pineal gland was the last endocrine gland to have it's functions discovered as it is located deep at the center of the brain, almost hidden away like it were a secret from which comes the word secretion, which is what the pineal gland does. It secretes the hormone melatonin which affects our wake / sleep patterns, photoperiodic (seasonal / circadian) functions and also activates the dormant codons in our DNA often referred to as 'Junk DNA'. Melatonin affects our biorhythms and the aging process ...

The Pineal Gland is found to have piezoelectric calcite crystals which act like transmitters or recievers to channel light or information coming through in waves from the centre of the galaxy or any other resonating transdimensional entities. What may seem as an unusual tickling sensation at the frontal lobe is simply the activation of the Ajna Chakra or the Pineal Gland. We are evolving into multi-sensory entities, beginning to see beyond the limiting 5 senses and awakening our 6th sense, the all seeing mind's eye!

Psychedelic Adventures | Rick Strassman was permitted to embark on the first human research with psychedelic, hallucinogenic, or entheogenic substances in the 1990s in the United States after 20 years' intermission in the field. In the intermission period it has only been legally possible to research on animals.

Strassman's studies investigated the effects of N,N-dimethyltryptamine (DMT), a powerful entheogen, or psychedelic, that he theorizes is a substance produced by the human brain in the pineal gland and an active ingredient in the Ayahuasca brew. Ayahuasca is any of the various psychoactive infusions or decoctions prepared from the Banisteriopsis spp. vine, native to the Amazon Rainforest (which is also called ayahuasca). The resulting drinks are pharmacologically complex and used for shamanic, folk-medicinal, and religious purposes. Occidental ethno-biologists have noted a variety of 200-300 plants used in the different brews made by the Ayahuasceras. It is an open question whether Ayahuasca should be noted as one particular shamanic medicinal brew, or that it should be noted as an entire medicinal tradition alongside, for instance, Ayurveda or Tibetan Medicine.

During the project's five years, he administered approximately 400 doses of DMT to 60 human volunteers. This research took place at the University of New Mexico's School of Medicine in Albuquerque, New Mexico where he was tenured Associate Professor of Psychiatry. Strassman has conjectured that when a person is approaching death, the pineal gland releases DMT, accounting for much of the imagery reported by survivors of near-death experiences.

Strassman wrote about the research program in his book DMT: The Spirit Molecule. A documentary movie based on this book is currently in production.
______

Dr. Rick Strassman writes ...

Cottonwood Research Foundation ( http://cottonwoodresearch.org/ )

The Cottonwood Research Foundation, Inc.
PO Box 1100, Taos, New Mexico, 87571

cottonwood@cottonwoodresearch.org

Rick Strassman MD, President
Steve Barker PhD, Vice-President
Andrew Stone, Treasurer


Dear Friends:

Consciousness is a subject of increasing scientific inquiry in the West. One particular aspect of this research involves how psychoactive medicines affect consciousness. We at the Cottonwood Research Foundation will begin to address some of the most perplexing mysteries of the human mind with the aid of plant-based psychoactive compounds. For example, What are the varieties of human consciousness, and their genetic, biochemical and physiological bases? What are the medical, social, and spiritual implications of these different states, and how can we best apply these states towards healing, creativity, and greater wisdom?

For thousands of years, historical and indigenous cultures have used plant medicines to reliably induce extraordinarily compelling non-ordinary and mystical states of consciousness. Western science has only begun to tap the vast resources of traditional knowledge regarding these plants and their effects. By bringing to bear multiple scientific, anthropological, and spiritual perspectives, we will pursue several important goals: 1) develop a more thorough understanding of these plants? psychological and physical healing properties; 2) explore the states they elicit, in order to gain a deeper and broader understanding of the range of human consciousness; 3) determine how plant-based psychoactive medicines affect consciousness; and 4) clarify the role these compounds, found in our own bodies, play in dreams, mystical and near-death states, creativity, and mental illness.

The work I performed during the early-1990's at the University of New Mexico with DMT, a naturally occurring psychoactive, was the first new clinical research with these compounds in the US in two decades. Our founding of Cottonwood is intended to help revitalize the lagging pace of American research with this and other classical psychoactive compounds since my studies were interrupted in 1995.

We have already started our first research project. Our vice-president Dr. Steven Barker at Louisiana State University is developing a new ultra-sensitive method of measuring naturally occurring DMT and related compounds in the body. By doing so, we will be able to compare normal levels with those found in naturally occurring highly altered states and clinical conditions. We also held our inaugural fund-raiser in Taos, in which Beatriz Labate, a noted Brazilian anthropologist, presented her field research concerning the burgeoning Brazilian ayahuasca religions movement.

Our most enduring legacy will be the establishment of a thriving, independent research center in northern New Mexico structured in the manner of an institute of higher learning, with treatment, education, and research departments and activities. This campus will include living and dining accommodations, research, laboratory, and information technology facilities, a greenhouse, library, and classrooms. Integral to our vision is a vigorous exchange program with indigenous healers and teachers, which will inform our development of new models for the study and application of plant-based psychoactive medicines.

We invite you to help us build a strong foundation for a new model of consciousness studies in the West. It is only with your support and involvement that we can make this dream a reality.

We welcome any and all contributions, monetary or in-kind. All donations are tax deductible, as Cottonwood is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization. ( http://cottonwoodresearch.org/Donate.html )

With warm regards,

Rick Strassman MD
President and Co-Founder
____

Scientists have identified areas of the brain that, when damaged, lead to greater spirituality. The findings hint at the roots of spiritual and religious attitudes, the researchers say.

Live Science | The study, published in the Feb. 11 issue of the journal Neuron, involves a personality trait called self-transcendence, which is a somewhat vague measure of spiritual feeling, thinking, and behaviors. Self-transcendence "reflects a decreased sense of self and an ability to identify one's self as an integral part of the universe as a whole," the researchers explain.

Before and after surgery, the scientists surveyed patients who had brain tumors removed. The surveys generate self-transcendence scores.

Selective damage to the left and right posterior parietal regions of the brain induced a specific increase in self-transcendence, or ST, the surveys showed.

"Our symptom-lesion mapping study is the first demonstration of a causative link between brain functioning and ST," said Dr. Cosimo Urgesi from the University of Udine in Italy. "Damage to posterior parietal areas induced unusually fast changes of a stable personality dimension related to transcendental self-referential awareness. Thus, dysfunctional parietal neural activity may underpin altered spiritual and religious attitudes and behaviors."

Previous neuroimaging studies had linked activity within a large network in the brain that connects the frontal, parietal, and temporal cortexes with spiritual experiences, "but information on the causative link between such a network and spirituality is lacking," explains lead study author, Urgesi said.

One study, reported in 2008, suggested that the brain's right parietal lobe defines "Me," and people with less active Me-Definers are more likely to lead spiritual lives.

The finding could lead to new strategies for treating some forms of mental illness.

"If a stable personality trait like ST can undergo fast changes as a consequence of brain lesions, it would indicate that at least some personality dimensions may be modified by influencing neural activity in specific areas," said Dr. Salvatore M. Aglioti from Sapienza University of Rome. "Perhaps novel approaches aimed at modulating neural activity might ultimately pave the way to new treatments of personality disorders."

Lightworkers | Through music and word is the ability to use sound, music and voice to affect changes in others and in one self. Almost every society has had teachings which usually fell to the individuals schooled in the natural or spiritual laws of the universe. These ancient traditions of the word are not lost. It involves one opening up to heal and be healed through the magic of music and sound.

Take for instance the humming sound. It carries sound internally and can be a powerful tool. Establishing a rapport between our spiritual aspects, and our emotional, mental and physical aspects bringing them into harmony with each other. The power of the mantra can be felt in humming “Om”, it actually performs a micro-massage upon the internal organs, releasing stress and restoring balance creating sympathy, harmony and poise.

Music and singing awakens ones creativity. Singing release’s stress while listening can stimulate movement and thought. Learn to play with your voice and with your singing you may recapture joy and balance in the process. Singing is a way of cleansing the Etheric body, strengthening the flow of energy into the physical body. The Gregorian chants that we know today are still powerful tools of consciousness inspiring awe. They are quite cleansing to any negative environment.

There are many ways in which sound combined with the energy of crystals may restore balance and release stress. Within everyone are all the energies and forces of our universe carrying the potential to manifest greater fulfillment, abundance, health and awareness. Through the transformation of sound we can touch upon learning to use energies and abilities long forgotten but still within our reach.

Excerpted from "Sacred Sounds: Magic & Healing Through Words & Music" By Ted Andrews

THE HEALING ASPECTS OF TONING

Spirit Sound | The voice has a tremendous ability to be an instrument for healing. Pythagoras recognized the considerable therapeutic power of human speech. He treated diseases through the reading of poetry. He taught his students how a skillful, well-modulated voice, with beautiful words and pleasing meter, could restore balance to the body and soul. The belief in the healing capacity of the human voice is common to many parts of the world. Shamans and holy men of primitive societies would use a spirit language to commune with higher intelligences so as to extract proper remedies.

Confession has been used by many societies and religions as a means of accelerating the healing process. This process aligns itself with many of modern psychology's psychosomatic remedies. It was used voluntarily by the Apache Indians during times of illness. The Apaches recognized that all levels of consciousness and action were intimately connected to the physical. By confessing, the individual faced what had created the illness.

More commonly, the Catholic Church still utilizes confession. It has lost the physical healing aspects that once were associated with it. Today it is more focused upon the spiritual and emotional cleansing, and few today acknowledge its intimacy with physical well-being. Our speech is comprised of two elements: consonants and vowels. Every letter and combination of letters has significance. The vowel sounds are the most dynamic aspect of spoken sound, for without them the consonants could not be sounded. Many of the early alphabets excluded the vowels, because they believed they were too stimulating, causing certain energies to be activated.

The Chaldean alphabet, one of the forerunners of our alphabet, was designed to be a tool for attaining higher wisdom. Their letters, sounds, glyphic forms, and their numerological correspondences provide clues to the more archetypal energies operating and activated through the words.

Mantra yoga is a technique of human self-realization through the use of inner sounds or nadas that are awakened through outer toning and chanting. In Tibetan beliefs, the most important musical instrument is the human voice, and the Tibetan shamans are trained in the use of outer sound projection to create inner, esoteric vibrations. They learn to use the head and chest as resonance chambers for the entire human body. The repeated toning of vowels creates a reverberation so that when the chanting stops, the sounds continue to echo within the mind and within the chambers of the body.

Each vowel opens a particular part of the body. This part of the body should be visualized during the inhalation and also when the vowel is spoken or toned internally. This inner sounding is the key to many metaphysical teachings concerning sound and mantras. Without the inner sounding occurring before the outer, audible sounding, the effects are minimized. The process of Directed Esoteric Toning involves both aspects. It is simple: as we inhale, we focus our minds on the region of the body associated with the vowel, and we sound it silently. Then as we exhale, we vibrate or tone the sound again audibly.

This method of opening by the vowels can be better understood if we realize that breath penetrates deeply into the region concerned, according to our thoughts. The breath takes the energy of prana and combines it with the vowel tones and together they open specific inner regions of the body or consciousness.



___

ॐ The OM or AUM

Everything manifest comes from the primal vibration of " AUM " . Creation-Sustenance-Dissolution are part of one continuum, AUM. OM symbolically connects the individual to the cosmos through the sound that represents all aspects of the creative energy from its inception to its transformation.

Solar Healing | Light is absolutely critical to all life that continues to evolve and grow on the surface of our planet, Earth. The Sun is the primary source of life sustaining energy at the core of our solar system nourishing all of creation and if we can learn to sungaze as described beautifully in this video lecture by Hira Ratan Manek (HRM) we can attune to the highest aspects of our being and increase our frequencies to a level where disease and the constant hunger for food can easily be transcended allowing us to recharge and regenerate our bodies naturally with the sun's radiant energy.

The Solar Healing Center is focused on helping humanity to develop a better understanding of how the sun can be used to heal the mind, body and spirit as demonstrated by Hira Ratan Manek, who, as a result of sungazing, has claimed better physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health.

Hira Ratan Manek (HRM), among others, have proven that a person can live just on solar energy for very long periods without eating any food. This has come to be known as the HRM phenomenon. The method is used for curing all kinds of psychosomatic, mental and physical illnesses as well as increasing memory power and mental strength by using sunlight. One can get rid of any kind of psychological problems, and develop confidence to face any problem in life and can overcome any kind of fear including that of death within 3 months after starting to practice this method. As a result, one will be free from mental disturbances and fear, which will result in a perfect balance of mind. If one continues to apply the proper sungazing practice for 6 months, they will be free from physical illnesses. Furthermore, after 9 months, one can eventually win a victory over hunger, which disappears by itself thereafter.



This is a straight-forward yet effective method based on solar energy, which enables one to harmonize and recharge the body with life energy and also invoke the unlimited powers of the mind very easily. Additionally, it allows one to easily liberate from threefold sufferings of humanity such as mental illnesses, physical illnesses and spiritual ignorance.



If we can activate the human brain and awaken these infinite powers inherent in ourselves then we can raise ourselves to higher levels. We can achieve any results we want. In order to operate the brain effectively, it needs to be activated. Being a holistic entity it needs a holistic power supply. Sun energy is the source that powers the brain, which can enter and leave the human body or the brain only through one organ that is the human eye. Eyes are the Sun Energy’s entry door to the human brain. They are also known as the windows of the soul.

The following is excerpted from Spiritual Clearings: Sacred Practices to Release Negative Energy and Harmonize Your Life (North Atlantic Books 2009)

Diana Burney

Chakra Assessments

Reality Sandwich | The word chakra means "wheel" in Sanskrit. Chakras are the body's subtle energy vortices. They have been identified in many ancient cultures. There are seven primary chakras or energy centers including the root, navel, solar plexus, heart, throat, third eye, and crown chakras. These energy centers are the source of all power, all energy, and all activity; the physical, mental, and emotional health of an individual depends on the harmonious working of the chakras. Each of these chakras has a color associated with it. Starting with the root chakra and going to the crown, these colors are red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.

The first chakra is located at the base of the spine. This is the center for survival and also the seat of the Kundalini, the magic serpent power that lies coiled in repose until it is uncoiled through spiritual growth. The root chakra controls the reproductive system. Its color is red and its primal element is earth. It faces downward toward the feet, and any disturbance in its functioning may sometimes cause a sense of insecurity or ungroundedness in a person.

The second chakra is located in the gonads area below the navel. Its color is orange. It controls the kidneys, the bladder, the pelvic area, and the small intestine. Any problem in these organs is a clear indication of malfunctioning in this center. Its prime element is water.

The third chakra is located in the solar plexus above the navel. It controls the liver, the spleen, the stomach, and the large intestine. Its primal element is fire, and its harmonious working is essential in maintaining good health. It is this chakra that gives strength and courage to an individual and prepares him/her to deal with challenges. Its color is yellow.

The fourth chakra is located a little to the right of the heart area. With three centers below and three centers above, it is the turning point of spiritual awakening. It is the center of love and selflessness, and cooperation and humility. The opening of this chakra allows a person's consciousness to undergo subtle changes and to experience a new awareness. Its color is green, and it controls the heart and the entire circulatory system.

The fifth chakra is located in the throat area. It controls the thyroid gland, the parathyroid, and the lungs. Its color is blue, and its basic element is ether. It is the center for communication; thus its awakening enables an individual to become more articulate, discriminating, and selective.

The sixth chakra is located between the eyebrows, just above the bridge of the nose. It is the center responsible for awakening the third eye (insight). It is also the catalyst for developing clairvoyance, clairaudience, clairsentience, and thought projection. Its color is indigo. It controls practically all the lower area of the brain, the pituitary, the hypothalamus, the eyes, the ears, and the entire nervous system. Its spiritual awakening creates certain physical changes in patterns of the myriad tiny cells in the brain. This allows an individual to obtain unusual control over breathing, heartbeat, and metabolic rate while in meditation.

The seventh chakra is located at the top of the pineal gland and controls the upper region of the brain. It is known as the crown chakra and its color is violet. It is the center where the physical consciousness of an individual merges with the Divine. Its activation allows a person's thinking to no longer be bound by time and space.

All seven chakras are interdependent and develop gradually after years of yoga and meditation practices. It is not possible to bypass one chakra to develop the chakra above it first. Thus it is important to follow the effective path of a step-by-step activation of these centers as it occurs when following one's spiritual practices. A person has to be physically, emotionally, and mentally prepared to contain the powerful energy generated by activation of the chakras.

Each chakra nourishes a specific endocrine gland, which energizes different body structures. The crown chakra nourishes the pineal. The third-eye chakra nourishes the pituitary. The throat chakra nourishes the thyroid gland. The heart chakra nourishes the thymus gland. The solar plexus nourishes the pancreas. The sacral chakra nourishes the gonads. Lastly, the root chakra nourishes the adrenal glands.

Please remember that the activation of a chakra cannot be fully accomplished without first working on what you need to learn on the level of the particular chakra. In other words, once the function of the chakra has been accepted as a lesson in everyday life, the quality of the chakra can be integrated.

Due to the multiple functions of the chakra system, it is critically important that a balanced energy flow be maintained to each chakra. If homeostasis cannot be sustained, the chakras may be deficient or develop excessive energy. Both can affect a person's well-being and health.


Characteristics of Chakras

First or Root Chakra -- located at the base of the spine

Function: Survival, grounding

Issues: Fear, insecurity, money, nervousness, anxiety about health

Balanced

Centered

Grounded

Excessive Energy

Greedy

Domineering

Deficient Energy

Lack of confidence

Ungrounded



Second or Navel Chakra -- located one to two inches below the navel

Function: Sexuality, creativity

Issues: Addictions to or cravings for sex, food, smoking, alcohol, or drugs

Balanced

Creative

Healthy sexual drive

Excessive Energy

Aggressive

Overindulgent

Deficient Energy

Burdened by guilt

Distrustful



Third or Solar Plexus Chakra -- located above navel

Function: Will, power

Issues: Helplessness, hopelessness, anger, or apathy

Balanced

Respect for others

Strong sense of personal power

Excessive

Judgmental

Workaholic

Deficient

Depressed

Excessive worry



Fourth or Heart Chakra -- located in center of chest

Function: Love, compassion

Issues: Loneliness, jealousy, disappointment in love, relationship dependency

Balanced

Compassionate

In touch with feelings

Excessive

Overcritical

Possessive

Deficient

Indecisive

Feel unworthy of love



Fifth or Throat Chakra -- located at the throat

Function: Communication, creative expression

Issues: Inability to communicate, under- or over-responsibility

Balanced

Centered

Good speaker

Excessive

Arrogant

Talks too much

Deficient

Quiet

Unable to express thoughts



Sixth or Third-Eye Chakra -- located between eyebrows

Function: Concentration, intuition

Issues: Difficulty planning for the future, poor insight or lack of intuition

Balanced

Able to receive Divine guidance

Master of oneself

Excessive

Manipulative

Authoritarian

Deficient

Oversensitive

Lack of concentration



Seventh or Crown Chakra -- located at top of head

Function: Understanding, oneness

Issues: Spiritual stagnation, major depression, dissociation, or lack of direction

Balanced

Open to the Divine

Total access to conscious and unconscious mind

Excessive

Constant frustration

Headaches

Deficient

Apathy

Confusion




Chakra Balancing Visualization

Allow yourself to become comfortable in a place where you will not be disturbed. Close your eyes and take a deep breath, mentally holding it to the count of four. Now exhale slowly as you mentally count from eight to one. Then take two more deep breaths in the same manner.

In your mind's eye create a relaxing scene somewhere out in nature. Visualize it utilizing all your senses. Now imagine a beautiful ray of sunshine beaming down from the sun into your body in the area of the base of your spine. Take a moment to tune into the present condition of this chakra. Notice if you see or sense any cords, roots, or protrusions. If so, imagine your hands moving into that chakra and removing them. You may also call upon the Archangels to remove them for you. Ask that the correct color (red) be anchored into the chakra after the cords are removed.

Notice now that the sunlight creates a bubble of White Light mixed with iridescent pieces of pink for love and green for healing. In your imagination place this bubble of light over your root chakra. Allow the light bubble to balance and heal the root chakra. Visualize the color red anchored in this area as the sun energy harmonizes and balances the chakra, allowing your vibrations to increase.

The ray of sunshine moves up to the second chakra. Now tune into the current condition of the second chakra. Notice what you see, sense, or feel in this area. Scan it for any cords, threads, roots, or blockages. If you discover any of these, decide if you want them removed. Then proceed with pulling out everything you wish to discard. Again you may call upon the Archangels for healing this or any of your chakras. Ask that the correct color (orange) be anchored into the chakra once the area is cleansed. Another bubble of light with pink and green iridescent colors is formed over this chakra area to balance the energies there. It will also serve to fill any voids left by the cord removals. Visualize the color orange anchored in this area as it is harmonized by the bubble of sun energy and vitalizes your life-force energy.

The sunlight bubble of energy now moves up and covers the solar plexus chakra. As before, check in to discern the present state of this chakra. Since this is your center of personal power, a cord here could prove to be a strong energy drain for you. If you wish, you may follow this cord to its end to find who is connected to it. Remove as many cords and blockages as you are guided to do. Then let this bubble of energy heal and balance this chakra. Anchor and visualize the color yellow in this chakra and become aware of your own personal power.

The bubble of vibrant sun energy mixed with particles of pink and green now moves to the heart chakra. Pay attention to any cords, connections, or blockages you might be experiencing in this area. Evaluate and then remove whatever cords you wish to disengage at this time in your heart chakra. (It is not uncommon to discover trap doors, wounds, or weapons in this area.) Call upon the Archangels to do any additional healing here. Ask that the correct color (green) be anchored into the chakra. Focus your awareness on your heart and feel it becoming warmer. Notice its energy radiating out from your being in waves. Allow the bubble of sunlight to balance and harmonize the heart chakra. Visualize the correct color ray of green in the chakra. Feel the love from the Universe.

The light continues to move upward to the throat chakra. Since this area is your communication center, it is vital that you remove any cords, roots, or protrusion residing there. On occasion, people have felt lumps in their throat area. As always, call for assistance to heal this area. Then request that the correct color (blue) be anchored there. Now the bubble of healing light is formed over your throat area. Let this bubble harmonize the energies in the throat chakra. Visualize and anchor the color blue as your spiritual awareness increases.

The light moves up and forms a bubble over your third-eye chakra. Cords in this area can be quite uncomfortable and may even cause physical sensations, i.e., headaches or dizziness. Focus on the removal of any cords or attachments. Follow that by having the color indigo anchored there and request any necessary healing. Allow the healing bubble of sunlight to vibrate and open your third eye. Visualize the color indigo anchored here as you are bathed in wisdom.

The light moves to the top of the head and forms a protective bubble over this area. This is the chakra for understanding and Oneness. Cords in this area could manifest as feeling controlled. Often people perceive tentacles or puppet strings attached to their head. Remove them all with the Archangels' assistance and request any additional healing. Ask that the correct color (violet) be anchored there. Allow this energy to activate the powers of your mind and spirit. Visualize the color violet at the crown chakra as you reestablish your connection to Source.

Allow the light energy from the root to crown chakras to now flow out the top of your head and cascade down around your auric field. Imagine it as a waterfall of shimmering White Light.

When you are ready, count mentally from one to five. Slowly open your eyes and revel in a state of balance.

Mi Kali D.

Witchvox | It has occurred to me at this time of year that some people are just looking for drama. Maybe you have noticed it too. The thing that I don't get is that being as this is the 'most wonderful time of the year' why do we experience all this emotional, psychological, dogmatic load of horse pookey? What's the point?

I used to get upset when I'd be shopping and the cashier would say, 'Merry Christmas'. I would make it a point to say 'Happy Holidays' or 'Happy Yule' or even the 'Blessed Winter Solstice' back. After a while though, I stopped this practice. Not because I didn't want to make a point that my faith was valid, but because those people never really understood what the point was.

First of all, being in a sales position in the past, one is paid a horribly offensive wage. You are doing a job a trained ape could do, have to put up with people who are less than kind (Some need to ask Santa for soap/Scope for the holidays) and quite frankly, after standing more than a couple hours on your feet, you just don't care.

Also, when I wanted to make sure I countered 'Christmas' with 'Yule' I was young and naive. Notice, I'm not saying everyone who chooses this practice is naive or young, but I was.

Maybe I stopped all this because I just got over it, got bored, got who knows what... but I just was done. I have friends from several different faiths, religions, paths or not much of anything at all. I try to respect them all, but I don't go overboard in protecting everyone's politically correct venue. I try to keep track of who thinks what and send out cards and emails that reflect their personal thing.

But I'm not going to get suckered into some big contest.

If my friend sends me an email about the right-wing conservative view on chicken feathers and the faith of a turnip, I don't send back a nasty reply; I just delete it. I don't respond...like I used to.

Now maybe I've just gotten soft and let those people have their way. But I don't really think so. I think it's just that I don't let it get to me anymore. I now know those people are looking for a reaction, live for it, exist on the energy of those people who send back the replies- knowing the people they send it to won't agree.

So, back to Christmas. I just am like 'whatever.' Maybe it's losing the fight. But maybe I'm above the fight. Maybe I'm too old to be bothered with the fight. Maybe I'm in a phase and lost steam. I can't pretend to have the answer to this but maybe it's not so important after all.

I came to this realization earlier this year. I went through a personal change. I grew up with fundamentalist ideals in all things; everything was church and often conflict for the sake of it. Without being negative, I found another way. I was pretty in your face with my new ideals and was almost preachy. This was precisely the same thing that irritated me about other people of other faiths shoving their doctrines in my ear.

But I was doing it, and I was so in it, I didn't even realize I was doing it. Or when I did realize it, I just didn't care because now I have a point of view that makes more sense than your old tired view does, and you will listen or I'll go mute from the shouting match.

But after 13 years, and after a time of much quieter reflection, I realized I don't need to shout to be heard. In fact almost without exception, people tend to hear more through silence and kindness.

There are members in my family -- as I am sure there are of everyone here -- that are of the more vocal mainstream religious persuasion. They just never seem to be tired of infiltrating my peaceful space with their hate mongering. Though I had at one point tried to counter with my own arguments, I then tried another approach. I read the Bible. I know this sounds odd. It almost can be seen as treason in 'our camp.'

But just give me a minute; there was a plan.

I had already tried to put them on ‘ignore’. I had tried to argue. I had tried to debate peacefully. None of these things worked. So maybe, I could try to understand them. (As I can hear you all gasp aghast...hang in there...)

I took an online Bible class and it was from the conservative point of view. Now I knew I could handle it. I grew up in it. So I knew though I may not agree with it all, I could still read it without falling into convulsions with 'thines' and 'thous' falling out of my mouth.

I also took a class in world religions. It was actually very interesting. Honestly, it was. I didn't agree with it all, but I did learn a few things.

Maybe the most valuable lesson I learned though wasn't in the classes at all because now when I talked to the members of the family that were forcefully attempting to abduct me into their conservative camp, I used logic from their own source. It really confused them.

Now I wasn't hateful about it. I was really nice about it. I admit, maybe that confused them too. But once I said, ’Well, the Bible says this and this in this book and chapter’... Reluctantly the family member often confessed, 'Well, I never really read that part of the Bible.'

I knew I was on to something. They became quiet! Maybe trying to understand them was the answer. At least for these people, at this time.

But this spawned a new line of thinking for me that bled over to this time of year and caused me to re-think my approach to the dreaded 'Merry Christmas.' I take people where they are.

Maybe it's not my job to make people say 'Blessed Winter Solstice' or to even understand what that means. It's not my job to educate all those Christians with the fact that Jesus could have been born on September 29, 5 B.C., (1) April 17, 6BC (2) June 17, 2 BC, (3) or any other time with endless supplies of data backing up what I believe to be so.

What difference does it really make in the world? Is arguing really going to make a difference? Isn't it the point to just be kind this time of year anyway?

Isn't that what 'the most wonderful time of the year' is all about?

Not about dogma but about just enjoying it. I live in Wisconsin -- and in the middle of the winter there isn't much to look forward to – so if I can smile in the middle of a snowstorm, it's a pretty good thing. Maybe the holiday season has simply become about making cookies, and singing stupid songs that make no sense, and watching old holiday specials on the TV… but so what if it has? It's still better than being bitter about ‘words’.

Though I admit it is tempting -- and sometimes entertaining -- to catch people who don't know what they believe (and just follow blindly) in their uneducated mind traps, it's probably much better karma to try to just let it go. It's not my job to get these people to understand that the whole holiday bloomed from the Solstice. That would be the same thing as me knocking door-to-door and handing out message-inscribed Yule logs and mead- a total waste of my time and energy.

I started to think with this phrase in mind: 'Sometimes when you win, you loose.'

So now, when I go to the store and someone says, 'Merry Christmas', I say, “To you, too.”

Happily.

I realize that this person isn't putting a 'Jesus is the reason for the season' sticker on my forehead. They aren't vindictive psycho-religious fascists wanting to hose down on my Yule log. They are just being who they are.

“Half of the world's population adheres to Christianity. Islam is the second most popular religion with more than a billion followers. Hinduism, which is mainly practiced in India, claims over seven hundred million members. There are close to four hundred million Buddhists, mostly in Asia. And fifteen million people are Jewish”, according to Susan Solomon Yem (4) .

I just doubt all those people want to snub those of us who are into celebrating the more obscure Yuletime cheer. So in that vein, I hope everyone has at least a few moments to celebrate (or not) in any way they choose: Happy Yule, Winter Solstice, Winter Holidays, Christmas, Hanukkah, and Kwanzaa, Ramadan, Dewali, Three Kings Day, Epiphany...

As I sit in front of my computer here now, candy cane in my mouth, I wish you all a happy whatever!

"Synchronicity can be defined as a non-causal but meaningful relationship between events or states of mind within the human psyche and events in the outside world. More simply, we could call it the experiences of "meaningful coincidence". We have all had experiences that we intuitively recognize as meaningful, though we would be hard pressed to explain them in rational terms. In fact, these "meaningful coincidences" are not coincidences at all but spontaneous realizations of the underlying interconnectedness of all things within the Universe."

Laurence Boldt - Tao of Abundance

Psychedelic Adventure | As Heraclitus put it, "The unseen design of things is more harmonious than the seen." James Redfield, in the 'Celestine Prophecy', describes the first insight which is about following meaningful coincidences. Coincidences, if followed through, are seen as away of evolving, to a higher level of vibration. When we are in the flow we experience more synchronous events, more pleasure and less pain. The flow of coincidences is our path to higher ground.

If you bump into someone you haven't met in a long time then it is advisable to stop and talk to them. Be aware of a message that they might have for you. Follow the coincidence through and you'll be amazed, as I am, on a increasingly regular basis!

Coincidences are often a sign that you are going with the flow of life, doing what your heart desires (divine will) and following your in-tuition (inner guidance - gut feeling).

Meaningful Coincidences fill us with a sense of awe, even shock, as we experience more and more unexplainable similarities with our thought patterns and our experienced reality! The emergent has it's seed sown in the garden of thought.

Be prepared to take off!!

The magic of coincidence is the magic of consciousness that creates and shapes all matter in the cosmos. There is meaning in all that comes forth, though sometimes our intellect clouds the message coming through ... The random events which bring about a mystical coincidence are something you should probably be paying more attention to as there seems to be a message coming through from the invisible universe.

Consciousness drives certain unseen forces which create our experience and by living a life that is conscious and with intent, we begin to change at an individual level which affects everything and everyone around us like the domino effect sending ripples of energy across Mother Gaia and throughout the infinite cosmos.

So consciously create !

Psychedelic Adventure | What is it like to live in the moment ? This shift in consciousness for most people is not a single event, but a process, a gradual disidentification from thoughts and emotions through the arising of awareness.

Eckhart Tolle was born in Germany, where he spent the first thirteen years of his life. After graduating from the University of London, he was a research scholar and supervisor at Cambridge University. When he was twenty-nine, a profound spiritual transformation virtually dissolved his old identity and radically changed the course of his life. The next few years were devoted to understanding, integrating and deepening that transformation, which marked the beginning of an intense inward journey.

Eckhart Tolle is not aligned with any particular religion or tradition. In his teaching, he conveys a simple yet profound message with the timeless and uncomplicated clarity of the ancient spiritual masters: there is a way out of suffering and into peace. It is to live in the eternal NOW ... in the tranquil silence of the moment ! Underneath the words, between them, in the energy of presence conveyed by them, we find the power of Stillness. This vibrantly alive state found only in the Here and Now, is one with our Being and the field out of which all "arises".

Eckhart feels a strong connection to J Krishnamurti and Ramana Maharshi and says that his teaching is a coming together of the teachings of both those teachers, and it is a continuation of that. In addition, he states that by listening to and speaking with the spiritual teacher Barry Long, he understood things more deeply.

Eckhart Tolle's message is simple: living in the now is the truest path to happiness and enlightenment. And while this message may not seem stunningly original or fresh, Tolle's clear writing, supportive voice, and enthusiasm make this an excellent manual for anyone who's ever wondered what exactly "living in the now" means. Foremost, Tolle is a world-class teacher, able to explain complicated concepts in concrete language. More importantly, within a chapter of reading this book, readers are already holding the world in a different container--more conscious of how thoughts and emotions get in the way of their ability to live in genuine peace and happiness.

Eckhart's words may at times be difficult to fully understand for they do not fit into the framework of a linear time i-am-in-a-hurry construct. Once we consciously choose to chill out and allow we begin to grasp the essence of being in the moment, in the now.



Eckhart's Words :

"There are three words that convey the secret of the art of living, the secret of all success and happiness: One With Life. Being one with life is being one with Now. You then realise that you don't live your life, but life lives you. Life is the dancer, and you are the dance"

"You do not become good by trying to be good, but by finding the goodness that is already within you, and allowing that goodness to emerge. But it can only emerge if something fundamental changes in your state of consciousness"

"In the normal, mind-identified or unenlightened state of consciousness, the power and creative potential that lie concealed in the Now are completely obscured by psychological time. You cannot find yourself by going into the past. You can find yourself by coming into the present. Life is now. There was never a time when your life was not now, nor will there ever be"!

You can find Eckhart Tolle's Books on Namaste Publishing!

Download "The Power Of Now" Audio Book Torrent

Download "The Power Of Now E-Book"

Buy The Book

By Altazar Rossiter

Dream Manifesto | The secret to all personal transformation is intent. We can only transform ourselves to the degree that our intent is engaged. The good news is that it’s easier to engage our intent than it may seem initially.
The first step is to actually decide that transformation is what you want, and this is not such an easy decision to make as you might think.

If you consider that transformation is the process of changing the expression of your being so as to embody as much of the true essence of who you are as possible, you will realize that implicit in this process is the possibility that your whole world will change. It is a paradigm shift of immense proportion. Are you really ready to be all you can be and accept everything that entails? Are you really ready to take full responsibility for who you are? Do you feel the inherent empowerment that this will bring you, and is this what you want?

The truth is that very few of us are prepared for the shock that a fundamental change in the paradigms that structure our lives brings. Let’s face it, it hurts. It hurts because so much of our identity is invested in our old ways. But when it hurts even more to continue living as we have been the possibility exists that the old paradigms have outworn their usefulness. The time has come to shift them out of our reality portfolio and invest our energies somewhere else. We can initiate this by consciously giving intent.

When I give conscious intent to be all that I can be I implicitly give intent to bring myself into alignment with my Spiritual Intelligence. This is the very essence of the principle of in-formation and in-tuition, which I choose to allow.

Inherent in this intent is a further intent to continually optimise this alignment in my unique way, as this is the nature of evolution. Once this compound intent is given – and it is given automatically in holding the intent to be all I can be – it is then necessary only to allow the mystery to unfold. The results are both subtle and profound, bringing a sustained increase in personal effectiveness to all aspects of life.

If this is what you want, the next step is to stop wanting and commit to the process. This means that you choose to do your best to be all you can be in all situations, and you make an agreement with yourself that you will do whatever it takes to sustain your commitment. This is the scary part, and the fear element is not to be underestimated.

In the very moment of making this agreement you engage your intent, and the chances are you will feel it somewhere inside your body, in the area of your heart. There is nothing wrong if you don’t feel this, it merely means your intent has another way of signalling its engagement to you, which is yet to be revealed. However, the most common cause of feeling nothing is the self-numbing effect of continual denial of a subtle feeling.

What is really important here is to remain open to possibilities, and pay attention to the subtlest changes and sensations in and around your body, as this is how you receive the signals from your non-physical aspects. There is a whole new language to be learned here, and if at first you don’t recognize that something’s been communicated all that signifies is that you’re unused to the medium of communication.

Furthermore in the very instant of making this commitment you are already doing your best to be all you can be, and this means your Spiritual Intelligence is already on-line even if you don’t know it. From this moment on you will always be doing your best to be all you can be in all situations, and that best will be evolving.

When you commit to yourself in this way, whether you’re aware of it or not, you send a clear compelling signal to your Spiritual Intelligence inviting it to join in partnership with your present understanding of your worldly expression. If you think about it you’ll recognize that the entire process of committing to your transformation is an admission that you believe you’ve been under-expressing yourself. In it’s own way this is a powerful self-acknowledgement, and I don’t mean this in the way of acknowledging your past mistakes!

I mean that when you do actually commit to your own transformation, you acknowledge the part of yourself that has been sitting in the background of your reality, virtually unnoticed. Now you are saying: ‘I see there is much more to me than I thought; it’s time I found out what is there – in the background; I’m going to explore who I am and be all that I am.’ This is a major step in reclaiming your power. You have opened the door for non-physical and spiritual aspects of yourself to show themselves, even if you have no belief in them. You have already made a strategic shift, albeit unconsciously.

It’s worth pointing here that the best you can be will continue to get better, so when you look back over past events you may be tempted to think you could or should have done things better. This is a sometimes quite subtle, but nevertheless insidious excursion into self-criticism. It will only undermine your self-esteem to look at your life in this way. Realize that even when you may have been widely off in your discernment of the way forward you were doing the best you could in the circumstances, and these circumstances include your personal level of (un)consciousness. Compassion for yourself is vital, and it is not to be confused with self-pity.

Much will change in your life merely as a consequence of following the above process of giving intent. Things will be helped along, though, if you make conscious statements of your intent, and make this a regular practice. Such statements are best made aloud, so some preparation, and even ceremony, is helpful. This is a matter of individual preference. There are many ways of giving significance to your actions; they will all reinforce your intent. They will also serve to strengthen your connection with Spiritual Intelligence.

I recommend you borrow ideas from any ceremony or practice that appeals to you, but however you do this the most important thing is to give yourself the time that you need. Simple procedures like sitting quietly with yourself, lighting a candle and burning some incense are generally best. Find something that works for you and don’t be afraid to change things around. Your ceremonies will need to evolve with you or they will become another millstone mindset that anchors you in the fear of getting it wrong.

Excerpt from Developing Spiritual Intelligence – The Power of You. Published by O-Books 2006: Winchester, U.K. and New York U.S.A. ISBN 1-90504-764-9. © Altazar Rossiter 2006. For more information visit his website at: www.altazarrossiter.com

Give intent for what you want to achieve. Commit to engaging with whatever is necessary to bring about this desire. Rest assured it will happen. How it will happen is not your business and trying to figure it out is a serious drain on your creative power.

Omniscience is omnipotent and omnipresent. There's no distance between the unknown and the known --the known is manifest from the unknown merely by the asking. For example, the Empire State Building was born in the mind of its architects --human consciousness is the agent that can transform an unseen concept into its manifested experience, which is therefore frozen in time ...

... Time, then, is much like a hologram that already stands complete; it's a subjective, sensory effect of a progressively moving point of view. There's no beginning or end to a hologram, it's already everywhere, complete --in fact, the appearance of being "unfinished" is part of its completeness. Even the phenomenon of "unfoldment" itself reflects a limited point of view; There is no enfolded and unfolded universe, only a becoming awareness. Our perception of events happening in time is analogous to a traveler watching the landscape unfold before him. But to say that the landscape unfolds before a traveller is merely a figure of speech --nothing is actually unfolding: nothing is actually becoming manifest. There's only the progression of awareness.

The Maker of all things in Heaven and on Earth, of all things visible and invisible, stands beyond both, includes both, and is one with both. Existence, is, therefore, merely a statement that awareness is aware of its awareness and of its expression as consciousness ...

Related: Consciousness and the progression of awareness

Jonathan Phillips

Reality Sandwich | During a client’s first bionenergetic session, the healer will most likely have their eyes half-focused in a “healer’s gaze,” reading the patient’s energy field, body type, posture, mannerisms, and even speech patterns to figure out what are the primary defense structures at work. For bioenergetic practitioners, these defense systems provide both the car keys and road map for navigating the client’s return journey to health and the higher self.

Going beyond talk therapy, bioenergetics is an intuitive science that combines psychoanalysis and hands on energy healing. It considers our entire emotional history to be crystallized in the body and that our blocks and difficulties in accessing our own power (and a deeper connection in our lives) are the results of “unfinished business” from early childhood. While growing up, we develop defense systems to prevent us from being overwhelmed by difficult experiences. The only problem is that we don’t release the fear and resistance afterwards, which leads to tension, constriction, illness, and a skewed worldview. We, to some degree, perceive our reality through the lens of a traumatized child.

Developed by Alexander Lowen as an extension of Wilhelm Reich's vegetotherapy, bioenergetic analysis utilizes several central personality types, each consisting of different body characteristics, defenses, life tasks, and gifts. A brief overview of these personalities reveals the provocative titles of the “schizoid,” “oral,” “masochist,” “psychopath,” “rigid," and, in some modalities, "narcissist." (Each of these character structures is complex and worthy of articles in themselves, which I hope to address in the future). According to bionergetic philosophy, every person has at least a portion of each personality type within their character make-up but typically one or two of these defenses will be more predominant than the others, requiring more attention in the healing process.

Becoming a bioenergetic practitioner, I soon realized it wasn’t just individuals who held these energy defense structures, but that these characteristics were also prevalent in communities, groups, organizations, institutions, and even nations. When looking at the US government, it didn’t take long to perceive the primary defense system at work in the land of the brave. First and foremost, America was a “psychopath.”

In the bioenergetic model, psychopaths will generally have athletic builds with inflated chests and upper bodies. They are ungrounded and disconnected from their legs and the earth energies below them. If we look at America as a body, we can see how it has built up its own biceps and pectorals, spending trillions on armaments and military fortification while putting few resources into environmental efforts and natural preservation, which ground us in the earth plane. Psychopaths have fierce, piercing eyes that keep watch for the next threat against their existence. On a national level, this can be seen in the proliferation of surveillance cameras, FBI profiling, and domestic spying upon a public that is not to be trusted. In foreign policy, this manifests in satellite spy technology, CIA operatives, and a general suspicion of the United Nations.

According to bioenergetics, the psychopath suffers from an excessive, over-charged third chakra (the energy center at the solar plexus), which is a masculine force of ambition, achievement, and willpower. Lacking a deeper sense of self, they are only as good as their achievements. They must be “special” or better than others in order not to feel like a failure. The space race, the drive to build New York’s Freedom Tower over Ground Zero, or the desire to win Survivor can be seen as examples of societal psychopathy. It’s all about being on top. In America, we are defined not by who we are, but by what we do. Profession, career, and economic status become far more important than family, community, self-understanding and personal/spiritual growth. The psychopath stays busy to avoid facing the suppressed fear and anger that may arise from connecting with the present moment. They work hard, wrangle kids to soccer practice, watch blockbuster films, and buy material things in order to avoid the terror of being still.

Often, the psychopath’s need to achieve is a result of a manipulative parent (especially of the opposite sex) who says that the child is special one moment, only to treat them as worthless the next. This takes away inner feelings of trust, confidence, and safety. One simply is not good enough being who they are and therefore, must prove themselves to be worthy of love. Western Civilization itself seems to suffer from this condition due to its mythological underpinnings. According to The Book of Genesis, humans were once in their Father’s favor, but that love was revoked and they were kicked out of their home (the Garden of Eden) and forced to toil in the fields. Cain and Abel, the offspring of those in exile, had to prove their worthiness to God by bringing him offerings from their hard work at harvest time. The fierce competition between these two sons led to the first recorded act of psychopathic violence in the Fertile Crescent, which just happened to be the birthplace of agriculture and civilization as we know it.

Future generations inherited this false energetic construct, spreading it like a virus wherever western civilization expanded. Empires rose and fell, only for new ones to take their place. The disfunctional energetic patterns continued on to the thirteen colonies of North America, where the condition may have been exacerbated by the violent disapproval from “Mother England” when the young colonies asserted their independence. In order to survive this trauma, Americans began thinking in absolutes, such as “Give me liberty or give me death,” warning their own parent, “Don’t tread on me.” Nobody could be trusted after that.

In order to ensure their “special” status, psychopaths feel they must dominate others. They have an immense drive for power, bullying everyone around them. Since its beginnings, America has lived by a sense of “manifest destiny,” decimating the Native Americans, enslaving blacks, and invading Cuba, Mexico, the Philippines, Afghanistan, and Iraq – to name a few places. This imperialism can be seen in our domestic policy and societal hierarchies where corporations privatize resources and control the citizenry, leaving few social nets for those unwilling to participate in the endemic psychopathy within these systems. Living within this defense structure, one can believe it is "normal" to have poor, disenfranchised citizens in society, as these individuals simply have not proven themselves worthy of love and success.

Psychopaths can also be very charming and charismatic, using seduction as a means of gaining power and control over others. Hollywood and Madison Avenue have become masters of this tactic, fashioning a media landscape that constantly informs us how we are not sexy enough, healthy enough, rich enough, or good enough unless we buy their products. For the psychopath, sex is not primarily about pleasure and connection, but conquest over another.

“Being right” is essential to the psychopath’s egoic self. They create an idealized view of themselves where they are better than everyone else around them. They become rugged individualists, believing in “God, guns, and country,” chant “USA #1”, and claim that “America is the best country in the world.” The need to be right has become especially prevalent in the rise of the Christian fundamentalist movement, where evangelists claim to know the one true way. Although this superiority complex can be vast, it actually masks deep insecurities and an unstable foundation.

Typically, it is only after the psychopath has experienced some type of personal collapse that they will seek help. They don’t want to believe that there is a problem, nor do they trust others to help. Psychopathy can be one of the most challenging personalities to work with, because the fear of betrayal always lurks in the patient's subconscious, even toward the healer.

People often feel the need to judge the psychopath, since their defense system overtly hurts others. In bionergetics no personality structure is better than another. They all create walls of disconnection and “dis-ease” and although it may seem hard to believe, especially when they appear to be at the top of the social ladder, the psychopath is a suffering individual. Since psychopaths can be externally violent, connecting with the guilt of their behavior is one of their basic fears. Therefore, it is important for healers to create an environment where the clients feel safe and free of judgment.

The healer holds the space for psychopaths to face, experience, and process transgressions against others (and themselves). This work can be quite beautiful and revealing when the client expresses (and releases) real emotional regret, and not simply false pride about not living up to a self-idealized image. From this point, clients may be able to confess and make restitution for their actions, as the healer helps them name specific examples to release karmic bonds. Finally, the client learns to recognize destructive pleasure (like living on adrenaline) and replace it with actual pleasure within oneself and a community of people.

By staying neutral and focused, the healer assists the psychopath in letting down their guard and opening to be present with stillness and intimacy. The psychopath learns to feel safe and trust in the moment, being receptive to the energies around them. They learn to receive, and conversely give, love. This part of the process is much more about “allowing” than “doing.” It is not about proving the psychopath wrong, which only inflates their defense response. For example, arguing against Fox News, Dick Cheney, or the Iraq War, may only bring out more of the defense structures at work. But if one stays present during the conversation, giving eye contact and connecting from the heart center, the healing power of spirit comes in and expands a once tightly controlled reality. With this approach, battling ideologies dissipate, as we simply become humans sharing an intimate moment together. We feel loved, trusted and supported.

All it takes is a dent in the psychopath’s ego for the entire house of cards to come crashing down. And we are due for a karmic reckoning that’s been several thousand years in the making. Much like the psychopathic client, western civilization (and especially the US) are coming upon a time where we will have to face and feel the pain of our transgressions against mother Earth, each other, and, in the end, ourselves. The aggrandized belief in the “rightness” of the capitalist system or America’s own power and glory is tottering on the thin wooden stilts holding it up. And with the faltering economy, the walls created by our national psychopathy are cracking wide open.

Countries, communities, and individuals could react by pointing fingers and saying, “We told you so,” but that would simply put the psychopath back in their defenses, making them want to lash back in potentially dangerous ways. Instead, I’m hoping a growing “transformational network” on the planet can serve as helpers, healers and guides. Those who’ve already embarked on the healing path can reach out to those just stepping onto it. It’s like the story of the prodigal son in The New Testament. Rather than criticize and chastise the lost soul, we welcome our relations back into the unity of the world family tree. After all, none of us are without sin since we were all “raised” within this corrupted system.

We need to look at our own patterns and see where the need for specialness, control, and manipulation emerge. As we learn this process for ourselves, we can then hold space for others to connect with and release their guilt, confess and make restitution for their actions, and experience the exponential healing power of forgiveness. This stage is usually difficult for my individual clients and I can only imagine how challenging it might be with entire nations processing the environmental wreckage and karmic devastation we’ve laid upon our home, and each other.

Grounding is essential for healing the psychopath. They are trapped in an overcharged third chakra, and bringing in soothing earth energies can free up their internal circuitry. We, as a society, need to reconnect with the planetary rhythms and vibrations that have supported life for over four billion years, reintegrating that wisdom into our daily lives. Fortunately, there seems to be a growing mobilization to make this happen with various organizations and individuals engaging in permaculture, slow food, green design, eco villages, and other sustainable practices.

Perhaps those who hold the most grounding vibrations are the ones who have not fully strayed into the dominator model of civilization. Many tribal elders are carrying these earth frequencies of the first and second charkas (and the heart center) and have been coming together to hold space to heal our planet in crisis. This can be seen with Return of the Ancestors Gatherings in Sedona, The International Council of Thirteen Indigenous Grandmothers, and The Gathering of Nations, not to mention the emergence of shamanic practices and teacher plants into western culture.

Ceremony may be the greatest antidote to the psychopath. If done in a safe space and with sacred intention, a circle of joined hands brings the psychopath out of their head and into the loving energetic field of the communal heart. I’ve especially seen this manifest when singing is involved, harmonizing the individual with the frequencies of the larger collective voice.

Many yogis believe it is the powerful furnace of the third chakra that thrusts us up into the heart center -- the gateway between spirit and matter, the ultimate unifier of opposites that brings heaven onto hearth. In our adventure through civilization, we have walked through the planetary fires of over-charged third chakra energies. Now, as we face our own demise, we are being asked to purify ourselves in these flames and let go of limiting egoic constructs. As the shell of materialist consumerism dries up in front of us, we open up to spirit and the mystery of the inner self. Rather than filling our lives with actions, accolades, and appliances, we uncover the treasury within our own hearts and its connection to all beings around us.

Of course, some would argue that we should physically stop the psychopath in their tracks, putting an immediate end to America's plundering of the planet before it's too late. Admittedly, I'm not qualified to answer this question (no martial arts training here) and there are likely potentialies for doing this.

However, given my own experience as a healer, I do question the effectiveness or current necessity of fighting the psychopath head-on. Recently, I've been astounded by the number of "psychopathic" friends and clients who are having their own personalized egoic break-downs that lead to an opening of the heart center, allowing them to connect with grace, themselves, and their community. Although I'm hesitant to believe it, I feel that after centuries of seemingly unmitigated rule by psychopath energy patterns, the vibrational environment is changing around us due to a collective rise in globlal frequency. As healers and helpers, we can access, or channel, these higher frequencies to assist others embarking on their evolutionary journey.

To do this, we’ll need to unlearn what has been handed down to us and liberate ourselves from dangerous and dysfunctional paradigms. We can begin by re-imagining the nuclear family, taking out the fission of sibling rivalries and domestic abuse while allowing for divine presence, joy, and revelation within community. Instead of giving shallow rewards of grades for “outstanding achievement,” we could introduce yoga, meditation, and healing courses to cure the divisive habit of cliques, competitiveness, and popularity contests in our educational institutions. We could even resurrect the ancient model of the Mystery Schools, where studies in reading, writing, and arithmetic were balanced with the intuitive wisdom of the initiatory process.

And as strange as it may sound, given the seriousness of the global situation, we’re most likely going to need the psychopaths’ assistance in actualizing a worldwide healing effort. In a positive light, the psychopath is also known as “the defender,” since they are aces at championing causes. Once their heart fully opens, the defenders become extremely sensitive to those who are suffering, especially the underdogs, who they feel they have an affiliation with. Not only do they feel their pain, but they also know how to act to alleviate that suffering. If you want someone to kick-start a nonprofit, pass human rights legislation, or spearhead an environmental campaign, a defender would be your best bet. They are natural team leaders who have a knack for manifesting the visions and intentions of entire communities. That is their gift. (It’s just important that they don’t get lost in the “uniqueness” of their role.) Given their past transgressions, they often see their work as a matter of service with those around them.

Feeling true remorse for consuming more than our fair share of resources, the United States (and western culture in general) could move beyond ineffective ego-guilt and transmute these energies for engaging in a type of joyful restitution and devotional service to humanity and our great mother. Connecting our inherent motivation and entrepreneurial spirit with the greater needs of the world community, we can play our part in cleaning up the planet, and birthing equitable, compassionate societies. I believe we are already seeing this with the mass proliferation of NGOs in our culture.

Ironically, the psychopaths who got us into this planetary mess may assist us in reaching a new level of global awareness. Once they’ve received the message that it’s not “me against them,” but “just us,” the defenders become champions of the shift in consciousness. They help spearhead that bioremediation project, open the yoga school for at-risk kids, coordinate the neo-tribal festival, and invite the elders to guide us in sacred ceremony.

I realize it may seem a challenge to love the psychopath, but I’ve seen miracles in my healing work, and I know that they can become vessels of great love and beauty. The thing I’ve come to admire most about the defender personality type is that they don’t merely dream up new worlds, they help us build them.

David Hawkins

Source: Power vs. Force

THe database behaves like an electrostatic condenser with a field of potentiality, rather than a battery with a stored charge. A question can't be asked unless there's already the potentiality of the answer. The reason for this is that the question and answer are both created out of the same paradigm and , therefore, are exactly symeterical --there can be no "up" without an already existent "down". Causality occurs as simultaneity rather than as a sequence; synchronicity is the term used by Jung to explain this phenomenon in human experience. As we understand from our examination of physics, an event "here" in the universe doesn't "cause" an event to occur "there" --instead, both appear at the same time.

WHat's the connection between these events, then, if it isn't a Newtonian linear sequence of cause and effect? Obviously, the two are related or connected to each other in some invisible manner, but not by gravity or magnetism, or even by a cosmic field of such magnitude that it includes both events. The "connection" between any two events occurs only in the observer's consciousness --he "sees" a connection and describes a "pair" of events, hypothesizing a relationship. This relationship is a concept in the mind of the observer; it isn't necessary that any corollary external event exists in the universe. Unless there's an underlying attractor pattern, nothing can be experienced. Thus, the entire manifest universe is its own simultaneous expression and experience of itself.

Omniscience is omnipotent and omnipresent. There's no distance between the unknown and the known --the known is manifest from the unknown merely by the asking. For example, the Empire State Building was born in the mind of its achitects --human consciousness is the agent that can transform an unseen concept into its manifested experience, which is therefore frozen in time ...

... Time, then, is much like a hologram that already stands complete; it's a subjective, sensory effect of a progressively moving point of view. There's no beginning or end to a hologram, it's already everywhere, complete --in fact, the appearance of being "unfinished" is part of its completeness. Even the phenomenon of "unfoldment" itself reflects a limited point of view; There is no enfolded and unfolded universe, only a becoming awareness. Our perception of events happening in time is analogous to a traveler watching the landscape unfold before him. But to say that the landscape unfolds before a traveller is merely a figure of speech --nothing is actually unfolding: nothing is actually becoming manifest. There's only the progression of awareness.

These paradoxes dissolve in the greater paradigm that includes both opposites, wherein oppositions as such are only related to the locations of the observer. This transcendence of opposition occurs sponteneously at consciousness levels of 600 and above. The notion that there's a "knower" and a "known" is in itself dualistic, in that it implies a separation between subject and object (which, again, can only be inferred by the artificial adoption of a point of observation). The Maker of all things in Heaven and on Earth, of all things visible and invisible, stands beyond both, includes both, and is one with both. Existence, is, therefore, merely a statement that awareness is aware of its awareness and of its expression as consciousness ...

In the interest of providing another perspective on the growing truth movement, is a video from Chris White. In this video he questions the new paradigm being created that believes in a unified social Utopia, human origins from alien beings and the demonization of Christians. I agree with some of what he is saying about the new paradigm being steered and co-opted by the "NWO". With the growing awareness of the history and plans of the so called "Illuminati" by the public, discernment is imperative in order to keep from being herded into a new mental prison of control. This journey of knowledge is about truth, wherever it leads you, and not about the personalities of the message who can be torn down by true or false information. In essence, you know your intentions are good, so do your own research, listen to your gut instincts, and let YOUR path of synchronicities guide you through life.

God said, "Let there be light!" And there was light. -- Genesis 1:1


It was an old story that was no longer true. Truth can go out of stories you know. What was true becomes meaningless, even a lie, because the truth has gone into another story. The water of the spring rises in another place.
-- Ursula K. LeGuin

By Charles Eisenstein

Reality Sandwich | The purpose of this essay is to illuminate how we might restore the sacred, world-creating Power of Word.

Powerful words - those that affect physical reality beyond the capacity of one set of hands - are those that create a story that enrolls other people. By a story, I mean a system of meaning that focuses human intention and assigns roles to those involved in that story. Here are some examples of stories: America, France, money, the government, property, marriage, the War on Drugs, the War on Terror, Citibank. That these things are stories becomes clear when people stop believing them. When people lose confidence in a government, it is no longer a government but just a bunch of men and women in suits. When people lose confidence in a currency, it becomes mere slips of paper. When people stop agreeing that your possessions are "yours," they become just things.

Stories have their own life cycle. Stories that were once true and potent grow old and infirm, and eventually they die. Today this is happening to some of our deepest stories, the great myths of our civilization. In particular, two related stories have created the world we know today, and both of them are nearing their end. Ultimately, it is because they have entered their terminal phase that we have the ubiquitous matrix of lies I wrote about in Part 1 of this essay. Lies have a way of growing until they consume all life.

The first of these world-creating stories is the Story of Ascent. It is our story of the people. It says the humanity has risen from a state of nature, a state of scientific ignorance and technological impotence, to becoming nature's lords and masters. We have harnessed natural forces, penetrated the mysteries of the universe, overcome natural limitations with technology. Someday, says the story, our understanding and control will be complete, thanks to nanotechnology, space travel, infinite energy, social and genetic engineering, etc. Humanity: conquerors of nature, onward and upward forever!

The second defining story of our civilization is our Story of Self: that we are discrete and separate beings living in an objective universe. You and I are separate - mutually dependent, perhaps, in a practical way, but independent of each other or anyone else for our basic being-ness. From the selfish gene of biology to the rational actor of economics to the flesh-encapsulated soul of religion, all of our ideologies are aligned with our story of self. And, from the medical system to the criminal justice system to the money system, all of our social institutions enact it.

Both of these defining stories are crumbling around us. Neither is true any more. Few people today greet the Story of Ascent with the same near-universal fervor of, say, the 1950s, as all the promises of technotopia (the end of disease, unlimited energy, a leisure society, space colonies) fade into legend. Collapse, not ascent, is the new meme, and this collapse ushers in new realization of connectedness, of interdependency, and along with it the end of the story of the discrete and separate self. The independent, unencumbered man of reason no longer beckons as an ideal: we crave now community, intimacy and connection.

It is time now to tell a new Story of the People and a new Story of Self. The first might be something like, "A peaceful humanity living in co-creative partnership with a wild garden earth." It is a humanity that no longer takes unthinkingly from Mother Earth, but a humanity that co-creates and coevolves together with Lover Earth, starting, I think, with an initial centuries-long phase of healing the wounds to nature and the indigenous spirit that civilization has inflicted. The second new story is the connected self: a nexus of relationships, a node in the cosmic cycle of gifts, an individual dependent not only for survival, but for her very being, on her relationship to all that was Other.

As the old stories collapse, truth will imbue new stories that spring from "co-creative humanity on Lover Earth" and "the connected self." The primary task is not to articulate these overarching meta-stories directly, but to flesh out the constellations of stories that bring them to life. One such example is the story of money -- a currency system that embodies the truth of the connected self and which does not necessitate endless exponential growth - "more for me is more for you" - rather than the truth of the current usury-based system - "more for me is less for you." Another story would be any medical paradigm based not on the conquest of germs and the pharmaceutical control of body systems, but on the connections among all aspects of a person's extended being. I could list more examples, from every field, encompassing nearly anything today that goes under the category of "holistic" or "alternative."

You might be thinking, "I've been telling such stories for years, but no one seems to be listening. I thought this essay was going to tell me how to invest my words with power." Ok. For words to have power, they must be the truth for the person speaking them, and there must be listeners who are ready to move into that story as well. Let's consider both of these conditions.

Many people who tell these new stories, based on the connected self, don't really believe them. If you believe them, your life will be very different from the typical life of the Age of Separation. Beliefs are not mere vapors in the head; they manifest in all aspects of one's life and relationships. To speak a story compellingly, you must live within it. Consider the difference between someone preaching the gospel of trust in Providence who is afraid to leave his job and follow his bliss, and one who walks the walk. The words of the former won't be very convincing. Consider someone telling you all about the benefits of her meditation practice, when she is actually doing it to proudly establish a new identity as a spiritual or "conscious" meditator. Either way, even if you have no evidence of hypocrisy, you can feel it. Their words will sound like, well, bullshit.

At a festival recently I sat down for dinner next to a young man who had entered a certain Hindu monastic tradition. After mentioning several times that he is a vegan, he spent about an hour regaling me with his spiritual teachings: the illusion of all sensory perception, the principle of karma, the nature of the ego, the mastery of the monkey mind, the illusion of the self, and so on. He also expressed a thinly veiled frustration that hardly anyone listens to him, that they ignore what he says. I said little, just listening, except when I asked him if he thinks he is better than other people because he is so conscious (not as conscious as the senior teachers in his tradition, but working on it) and they are so ignorant. He said they just aren't making the effort - spirituality requires effort you know. "You are making the effort and they aren't - that means you're better, right?" But my words fell on deaf ears.

In that conversation, neither of our words had much power. His had no power because the teachings he was articulating were not actually true for him. He says, "I believe this, I believe that," but these teachings are only powerful if they spring from direct realization. When they do, they find the right words for anyone "with ears to hear," and most likely these words won't include much spiritual jargon, but will sound fresh, arresting. Even though the self is in fact an illusory construct, it was nonetheless untrue when he said it. Truth is only circumstantially related to facts. Truth is something you can feel. If he really knew what he spoke, that knowledge would affect every fiber of his being. You would be able to see it in his movements, in his life, in his eyes; you would hear it in his voice.

My words to him weren't powerful either: not because they didn't come from direct knowledge, but because I was foolishly saying them to someone who wasn't ready to hear them. Humility reminds us to answer only when asked (though the question might be silent), but I was indulging in an arrogance that has repeatedly impoverished and isolated me in this world. It is actually quite arrogant to presume to know who needs what knowledge when. I was speaking from annoyance, impatience, and perhaps a touch of contempt. I had lost touch with the humility that knows that I am not a teacher, only the agent of people's self-teaching, a conduit for the right message at the right time. If I had been wiser, I would have realized that he was asking for affirmation, that he was still growing within the new identity his monastic order had given him, and was not nearly ready to grow out of it. There we were, a couple of bullshitters. He was right to ignore my words.

Entry into a new story of self or story of the world is (usually) not a sudden, all-at-once process, and it never happens by an act of will. One sign of incomplete integration into the connected self is a feeling of despair in the face of the enormous forces blocking good in this world. The feeling of individual powerlessness buys into the ideology of the separate self, who can affect an objective universe of force and mass only through whatever puny force it can muster. But if you have truly entered into the truth of the connected self, you will know that your personal choices have cosmic significance.

Words that are powerful are words that are true for both speaker and listener, creating a story both enact. This truth can come from direct knowledge or, more commonly, from the ambient meta-stories of the society. Today those meta-stories are dying, compelling us to return to the original source of the power of story: truth. Today we are so immersed in a ubiquitous matrix of lies that we have nearly forgotten what the truth feels like. So my first suggestion for restoring the sacred Power of Word is to re-sensitize our selves to the ring of truth, the feeling of authenticity.

There are many ways to do this. Practice hearing the lingua adamica, the calls of the human animal that underlie all speech, the voice behind the words. You can hear it most clearly in the sounds of emotional expression, of lovemaking, of children playing, and in words that don't mean but are: "yippee," "wow," "oh," etc. These are real and intimate sounds that hide nothing. You will fall in love with a lot of people because you will hear their soul speaking. Do the same with your eyes: When you look at people, see the god behind the mask by letting go of interpretations such as "What must she be thinking about me?" You will catch glimpses of naked divinity. Surround yourself as much as possible by imperfect objects, especially handmade ones, not the abstract perfection of machine made articles, which embody the same perceptual mentality as symbolic culture. Immerse yourself for a few days in the sounds and sights of nature, without speaking or reading - when you return, the lie in almost all speech will be painfully obvious, and the occasional truth like music. (And in music too there is truth.)

I will describe the feeling of truth as I experience it. I don't know if your experience will be the same. True words pierce all the way through me. They convict me, in the archaic sense of that word. I feel a sense of awe, the presence of the sacred. Doubt is out of the question, though I might struggle for a while against a painful truth. Yet even then, there is a sense of homecoming, a reunion with something I have always known. Often, I hear truth in the voice behind the words, the poetry. To me, true words are beautiful words, and beautiful words are true. Lies, no matter how pretty, ring hollow.

Here is an example now of some words that carry truth. It is a poem spoken by the Navajo Tom Torlino in 1890. It must be read slowly, slowly enough that you can hear his voice speaking through the words.

I am humbled before the earth
I am humbled before the sky
I am humbled before the dawn
I am humbled before the evening twilight
I am humbled before the blue sky
I am humbled before the darkness
I am humbled before the sun
I am humbled before that standing within me which speaks with me
Some of these things are always looking at me
I am never out of sight
Therefore I always tell the truth
That is why I always tell the truth
I hold my word tight to my breast.*

You know the feeling of truth. You know when someone is speaking truth. The more you pay attention to this feeling, the more sensitive to it you will become. The more sensitive to it you become, the more unpleasant will be the phony, incontinent feeling of not being in truth. You will want, as Tom Torlino says, to "hold your word tight to your breast." You will listen for the truth not just in others' words, but in your own. When you do not hear it, you will wish to investigate why. Are you speaking from direct knowledge? Is this knowledge something you have integrated into your life? Are you speaking it to someone who will hear?

One change I noticed in my speech, as I became more aware of the potential power and pleasure of my words, is that I began to swear less - not out of any principle, but because the resentful impotence encoded in "fuckin' this" and "fuckin' that," the tired cynicism of calling everything "shit," the helpless rage at an unchangeable, unjust world that made me want to damn things and swear at things, was no longer consistent with my story of the world and my story of self, and that inconsistency was something I learned to feel. And it felt bad! I like to feel good, so I stopped speaking in expletives so much. Habitual swearing weakens one's words. Nonetheless I do not necessarily suggest that you make a willful effort to stop. Instead, notice the mindset and feeling that goes along with it. Notice it, and the change will come naturally. An added benefit is that when you stop habitual swearing, then non-habitual swearing becomes more fun and more powerful too. Fuck yeah!

The quintessential creative statement is: "So it shall be." Or, as in Genesis: "Let there be." According to spiritual literature, when spoken by a highly enlightened being such statements have enormous generative power. They work only to the extent that the speaker speaks in truth. If you say, "Let there be light," hoping that there will be light, wishing that there will be light, or even believing that there is a possibility that there won't be light, then there will be no light. But how could anyone stand so strongly in truth when he or she habitually uses words to deceive ("I'll call you back tomorrow”) or uses them careless of the truth ("I'm am going to quit smoking tomorrow") or for purposes that are not sacred, like gossip? Then the connection between our words and the truth atrophies, and they become impotent. That is another reason to hold your word tight to your breast. Keep it sacred. Keep it true. That doesn't necessarily mean solemnity - there is great truth in humor and fun. It means that what you say is consistent with the true story of who you are and the world you want to live in. In the coming age, these will derive, respectively, from the great meta-stories of the connected self and Lover Earth.

I am sure you know people of powerful word. When they say, "Such-and-such will be," it actually happens. Ram Dass describes how his guru, Neem Karoli Baba, would travel around India and occasionally say, "There will be a hospital here," or "There will be a temple here." His followers and devotees, some of whom were quite wealthy, would then build one. This is a pure example of the Power of Word. You might say, "Nothing magical happened here. It wasn't Neem Karoli that caused those hospitals to be built. It was his followers, who revered him." But the means doesn't matter. By whatever means, a word spoken in truth becomes real.

There is no dichotomy between some "magical" creative power of word and the ordinary means through which we create our world through our shared stories. When the state legislature says, through its layers of symbols and rituals (legislation, appropriations bills, etc.), "Let there be a road here," a road indeed manifests. The stories that embed such documents and the agreements around them lend their truth to them. (Today, for example, for most, there is still such as thing as the "State of Pennsylvania.") When President Obama says (not in so many words), "Let there be more troops in Afghanistan!" he has no doubt - nor does anyone else - that it shall come to pass. He and the rest of us have assistance in believing his words. Obama is “President of the United States" which connotes a vast constellation of meaning. Our Story of the People invests his words with power. It is when our symbols, our words and rituals, stop creating reality that we know our Story of the People is coming to an end. When that happens, as at the end of the U.S.S.R., the words of government officials become mere noise, and no one listens because no one buys into the story that gave them power. That is why I think the failure of our elites to speak the economy back to health are significant. Their rituals are losing their power, because the deep stories of our civilization are coming to an end. What was once true is true no longer. Eventually, what was once real will become unreal: the President will be just a man, money will be just slips of paper, a nation just lines on maps.

Such a time is ripe for the creation of new stories, a new matrix of truth. Unencumbered by the world as it was, we can speak new worlds into existence. We can proclaim truths that are free of the past. In times of a crisis of story, when systems of meaning are falling apart, there are many with the ears to hear a new one. At such times, a small group of people or even a single person can weave a new world for millions. To be able to do this, you must be able to hold your story, in truth, without the reinforcement of the conventional stories that surround you. You are an inventor, a pioneer, on your own in a search for truth - a new truth, not the one you grew up with, not the old stories of what is.

For decades now, perceptive people have been sensing the lie of this world. In the heady days of Ascent, only a few cultural sensitives were aware of it, the lonely voices of romantics, artists, and Beats. Since the counterculture movement of the 1960s, we have all been growingly cognizant of the ubiquitous matrix of lies. New stories are emerging, narratives of a more beautiful world. They beckon us, but we dare not believe they could really come to pass. People love the idea, for example, of alternative currencies, but how many, even among the activists, can say in truth, "The world financial system as we know it will be gone in five years, replaced by a demurrage-charged global currency that arises organically from thousands of community currencies?" Or even in fifty years? How many activists can look upon the crumbling of the old world and KNOW that a more beautiful one will take its place? How many can see the inevitable disintegration of the story of Ascent, and KNOW that the age of co-creative partnership with Lover Earth is dawning? But this is the level of knowing that is necessary right now. To be a storyteller of the Age of Reunion, you must be able to hold onto your knowing of the truth so steadfastly that you can know it on behalf of those who do not yet know. You must know it for those who are still wandering between stories. To speak a new world into existence, you must know it before anyone else does (else it would not be new). It is of no great difficulty to speak the old world into existence. We do that all the time. But now we cannot, because the story of that world is in its last stages.

In other words, to speak a new world into existence we must have great faith in the truth. We don't have the ambient stories of society as allies, nor do we even have evidence as our ally. If you speak the new stories from a place less than real knowing - say from hope or belief - then your words will have insufficient power to draw others into the story or to empower them to enact the role that that story has for them.

Sometimes people think I am advocating a kind of insanity. Isn't that what insane people do: base their beliefs not on evidence, but on what they want to be true? If you want something to be true, does that make it true? Am I saying that we are greater than the truth? Not at all. I am not talking about making up the truth. I am talking about humbling ourselves to the truth, listening for it and to it. It is when we mortgage truth to evidence that we are in hubris, imagining we can become truth's masters.

There are many stories out there today, and all of them fit the evidence. All of the evidence can be made to fit a conspiracy story involving secret cabals and alien visitors, just as it can fit the conventional story of science and politics. If he follows evidence as the royal road to truth, then the honest man eventually ends up not at the palace, but in a place called "I don't know."** Walking the road of evidence, the truth is visible out there, right on the horizon. Maybe a few more miles and one will reach it. But the horizon gets no closer.

Many people write me letters from the place between stories, the place of "I don't know." They hear the stories of a more beautiful world and basically think, "Well, it would sure be nice..." The old story is over, but they dare not embrace the new. They dare not believe, especially in the absence of evidence. (All the evidence seems to indicate that the power-hungry people who control the world will just tighten their grip forever, and the rest of us are too ignorant or puny to stop them.) The catch-22 is that the evidence will only - can only - follow the belief. When America's "Founding Fathers" declared independence, there was no evidence of it. Only when enough people believed that declaration and carried out roles in conformity to it, did the fact of independence emerge. So it is today. The pioneering storytellers must believe without evidence. They must trust truth instead.

(I don't suggest flouting evidence either. Indeed, the occurrences of our lives can open our hearts to the truth. Evidence is a servant of truth; we have made it into its master.)

At some point, if we want to be creators of the more beautiful world our hearts tell us is possible, we must let go of "I don't know" and choose, without evidence, the story that is true. Again, we recognize the truth by how it feels. We do not choose what is true - that would indeed be insane. We choose stories, not truth. We can choose them based on many things: evidence, truth, wishful thinking, fear, ego, gratitude, and obligation. What I am suggesting is to choose our stories based on truth, and with them to manifest truth in the world.

I will leave you with a paradox. Creative statements of what shall be are powerful when they are spoken in the authentic knowledge of inevitability. Yet, if they are not spoken in that knowledge, the inevitable is instead impossible. Through us - the truth-speakers, the storytellers - the truth speaks itself into existence.