Archive for Society
Chicago: A City of Life
Posted by: | CommentsGood Day Everyone!
I just took a weekend getaway to Chicago. Wow, what an amazing city! If ever I was going to live the “city” experience, it would be in Chicago.
Years ago I did a marketing gig for the Four Seasons/Ritz Carlton hotels in the dead of winter in Chicago. What I remember most about that week there was Walter Peyton’s Americas Bar and Grill and dancing until about 3:00 am at which point they rolled out a free breakfast so everyone would go home sober. What struck me about that, and the whole city for that matter, was it’s big heart.
Going to Chicago is like getting a giant hug.
I drove from Cleveland via the Ohio Turnpike, the Indiana Turnpike and the Chicago Skyway. Some $21.00 in tolls later, I was just in time for rush hour traffic. But hark! These people are even lovely on the freeway. Unlike Los Angeles or even my beloved San Diego, if you turn on your signal to change lanes, Chicagoans don’t speed up to block you out. No siree. They actually allow you to get in front of them with a graceful hand gesture which seems to say, “Be my guest, please.”
Whoever designed the rail system, the “L”, in Chicago was a genius. You can get anywhere you want to go from the distant suburbs and local neighborhoods. It’s fabulous. And guess what else? They’re clean, graffiti-free, safe and fun to ride. Who woulda thunk?
Whilst there I was able to catch the musical, Jersey Boys, the story of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. That, too, was superb. They replicated the sounds of Frankie Valli so much so that at first I thought they might be lip-syncing. I haven’t enjoyed a show so much since Mama Mia.
I strolled about Millenium Park, went to the old Library which is now the Chicago Cultural Center. This building is absolutely magnificent and made me wish that I’d been able to come here when it was the functioning library. It’s inspiring and beautiful. It sports two Tiffany domes and on the walls and ceilings are myriad mosaics with encouragements for knowledge and books.
Whilst at the Cultural Center, I was able to see an exhibit of journalist cartoonist John T McCutcheon (1879-1949). He was talented, insightful, and his cartoons dealt with many of the same issued we wrestle with even today. However, I was particularly charmed by this cartoon advertising a card game as a “Volcano of Excitement and Laughter”.
Then I went on to walk Millennium Park where people were out strolling, playing, and generally enjoying the day outside without any complaint about weather, temperature, or anything. They were happy!
Chicago is a fabulous town rich in history and with a good sense of humor and a large heart. It combines successfully all the benefits of a big city with the authenticity of Real Life. There is Love in abundance flowing in this town which is evident by the way it feels. It seems to say, “Welcome!”
Thanks for reading!
Kath
Prayer of Appreciation
Posted by: | CommentsGood Day Everyone!
The single most effective prayer is the prayer of appreciation.
What is a prayer of appreciation?
Anytime you are focused on something and appreciating some aspect of it. It is the opposite of criticism. For all practical purposes, prayer is an internal attitude which you are emanating outward as your vibrational countenance, which by the Law of Attraction, Source is matching.
The very best “object” of your appreciation which is in closest alignment with Source, or God, is appreciation of yourSelf. In short, loving and appreciation who you are is the closest vibrational match to God there is.
Imagine that?
Try this for a few weeks. Your intention each morning is to go throughout your day looking for things, people, ideas – anything – that you can appreciate. You intend each day to be the sleuth of those thinks that you like, that put a smile on your face, that make you twinkle back!
After making this a habit, you’ll see a marked difference in the things that are coming into your life. They get better and better. Do this long enough and your life choices go from where you began to good, to great, to wonderful, to stupendous, to fabulous…
And this folks, is very simply how you change your life. It’s entirely up to you and your choice of focus.
Shall we start? Now.
Thanks for reading,
Kath
Irrational Fear: Separation Anxiety
Posted by: | CommentsGood Morning Everyone,
A few days ago the furor over President Obama’s back to school speech reached my awareness, and then, this morning the news about Rep. Joe Wilson’s outburst during the President’s speech last evening regarding health care reform.
I confess I didn’t understand how anyone could oppose the President encouraging kids to make something of themselves. I recall President Kennedy’s famous, “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country” speech. Everyone was charged with becoming their personal “best”. We studied, we applied ourselves, we even did the calisthenics programs he promoted to be fit. That’s what leaders do, they encourage others to become all that they can be. Watch.
Our danger lies not without, but within each individual who feels the separation from Source, God, All That Is. When we cannot feel out connection, the love that that imparts to us, we are alone, naked, scared and see out through a human mind stranded in fear. From this place we are irrational, devious, and unreasonable. We cannot hear anything of Love, for we are on the frequency of fear. Love and fear are opposite frequencies.
Make no mistake, both Democrats and Republicans alike suffer from this separation anxiety. Indeed, our whole nation suffers from it and this is what is eroding us – from the inside out.
If a man awakes every morning, conservative or liberal, and believes he lives in a malevolent world with no support, no love, no eternality, no infinite possibilites, and in an indifferent Universe, he will do anything – good man or no – to feel safe.
We are a spiritually poor nation. Organized religion has failed us, but our own efforts to reconnect with Who We Really Are individually are the route, now. The feeling of fear provokes within us a profound desire for internal peace, calm and rationality. This will guide us inward where each of us has our own, personal connection with God for comfort and Truth.
Do not have the hubris to think this doesn’t include you. For if you are someone who is waging war on anything – saving the wolves, saving Tibet, saving the environment, feeling hate and anger at conservatives or liberals, then, you do not understand the Oneness of all things either.
It is each individual’s job to find their personal alignment with Source daily – even moment to moment. This is unconditional Love: that external circumstances do not have to change in order for me to feel my Connection to Source. Can you say that? Can you do that? Do you even realize that is the most important awareness that you can take with you into your day?
Even Jesus wasn’t in Connection 100% of the time. He got angry in the temple and overturned the money changers tables. And on the cross he is said to have cried out, “Father, why hast thou forsaken me.”
If realizing out Oneness with God were easy, this world would look very different indeed. None the less, it is our quest, individually, to return home. Each prodigal is charged with this journey, for therein lies the answer to a world that is heaven on earth.
Thanks for reading!
Kath
Healthcare: A Right or Not?
Posted by: | CommentsGood Day Everyone,
I so applaud us as a nation for undertaking the great debate on health care. Not because I have a vested interested either way, but because it opens up such a can of worms of beliefs that we must deal with first before we can come to any consensus of what to do.
I’m thinking that at the heart of the debate of the forms of health care is the issue of whether or not health care is a right or a privilege in America. This is really something we’ve never talked about. We hash about the flag, and voting, and speech – but this is something we’ve never asked ourselves. And probably that’s the first thing we should tackle before we attempt any reform in the health care system.
As you can probably see, if we decide that it’s a right, then it becomes something that we have to protect for each and every individual. Right away people divide into liberal and conservative thinking lines: more government or less government and the labeling starts to fly. As we all know, once labels start being bantied about, people stop listening to the idea if it happens to be coming from a source other than their particular political persuasion. From that point on it devolves into name calling and it gets ugly, nothing gets done, and all we do is squabble.
If on the other hand we decide it’s a privilege, then that doesn’t feel right either, because it cuts against the core of Who We Really Are – love. But alas, love is not considered valid in a political debate. What to do? What to do?
Complete and perfect health is our inheritance, our birthright just as freedom and joy are. The conundrum comes when we look out into the world and see so much of just the opposite. We know in our core beingness that everyone deserves complete and perfect health just as they are endowed with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Our mistake is thinking that we can legislate such a thing, when it is totally a personal state of beingness that brings this to manifestation or not.
Out of the human-mind’s belief in separation from Source we have created a gigantic mindset of health, health care methods, medicine, hospitals, doctors, medicines, pharmacy, herbs, chiropractic, accupuncture, etc. to support the body, to create health, to restore well being.
What has been forgotten is that the state of wellness is our natural state of being if we are aligned with It; that is to say if we have closed the gap of separation between our human mind’s belief and our Godself knowing of only Well Being. When any individual closes this gap, complete and perfect health is made manifest in that moment. Modern medicine calls this a miracle, but in Truth access to this is equally available to each and every person.
So, complete and perfect health is our birthright, just as all the other freedoms delineated in the Declaration of Independence. Realization of them is an inside job, applying our spirituality and creating deliberately the life experience we choose. The realization of heaven on earth is all about a state of being, not legislation.
Is health care a right or a privilege? It’s not a right, but the laws of love demand that we support individual physicality whilst they are actively gaining the consciousness of Oneness. Now how about a discussion of importance of applied spirituality with respect to health care and the sovereign ability of an individual to respond to Life and create their own reality.
The Economics of Self Esteem
Posted by: | CommentsHello Everyone,
I spend a lot of time noticing people, behavior, money and time. In ‘this economy’ It’s the catch phrase these days, so I have to use it for Googling purposes. But people seem to be working harder and faster, taking on more and more with a sense of desperation.
Perhaps they’re fueled by the idea that the unemployment benefits are going to run out; or they have to find that job, right now; or I’ve only got a certain amount of severance, so I’ve got to launch this business pronto. Always we are thinking there’s not enough – for me.
It’s precisely thinking like this that got us into this recession in the first place. No where else on Earth, save the UK, maybe, do people work so hard and so long for so little. It defies logic and common sense. I wonder how much we make per hour as a nation. Now there’s a question. If we added up the earnings of everyone in the US, then added up the hours worked and divided that into the earnings, what would we be making per hour? I can assure you it would be a pittance compared to our True Value.
This of course doesn’t even take into account the “j” factor – you know, J.O.Y. Now, let’s ask that question: how many of us really LOVE what we’re doing? Preposterous!
We’ve got it all backwards, because we think the harder we work the more money we will make.
Forget the penalty in stress paid by the body. We work for those benefits, after all. We stick at jobs we hate, damaging our physicality so we can cash in on those benefits when we have that stroke, the heart attack or get the big “C” – which by the way we wouldn’t have if we’d spent our days in joy.
How the heck did we get here?
I’d like to say it was a big conspiracy, but we all went along willingly like lambs to slaughter buying into the “American Dream” that the marketers were selling on behalf of the Banks, the HMO’s, the insurance companies, and the pharmaceuticals.
They package it up real pretty and sell it; we buy it lock, stock and barrel. We should have that McMansion, those cars, these clothes, this gadget and that particular widget. Then we’ll feel like we’ve made it; we’ve arrived – then there will be material proof that we’re good enough – at last.
Hamsters on the wheel, we are. Hamsters on the wheel.
What fuels this? Why could they sell us this crock?
We have a national deficit, but it’s not cash. It is a national deficit of personal and individual self-esteem.
We are poor in Spirit. We are poor in Who We Really Are. We don’t know our own value, our own worth, and we do not trust our own internal thought processes as valid. We don’t think for ourselves, we don’t question the premise, and we think they know more than we do.
In the old days, I think they called it Common Sense. Today, we’ve all but abdicated our personal sense of what’s a right and appropriate response to life. We trust ‘them’ to tell us what to watch on TV, what to wear, what to eat, what drugs to ask for at the doctor’s, what symptoms to have, what beauty is, what to think about the ‘news’, and we do it it all. We follow so well.
Nothing will change until we remember and value above all else, Who We Really Are – individually – you and me.
When we truly trust our responses to life as right and appropriate; when we value ourselves, our opinions, our time, our talents, our very being as the precious and beautifully unique thing that it is – then, folks, the economy of our nation will thrive, because we individually are thriving.
Only we can do this. Only you and I can begin the transformation of poor self esteem into one of personal high regard and respect. This is our job.
Then, one day, in the midst of our work day, we will stop at least once and say, “I cannot believe they pay me to do this! I love my work.”
Imagine this.
Thanks for reading!
Kath
Who Are We Really Forgiving
Posted by: | CommentsGood Morning Everyone,
Recently I’ve been brought to my wee knees in a realization that first rocked me, then relieved me. I want to share it with you.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve been vexed by several different situations.
One involved a dear friend, whose personal situation really made me mad. Her situation didn’t affect me in anyway, shape or form, but that she found herself in her situation really angered me.
Another involved two dear friends of mine, married for a very long time, whose personal dynamic between themselves angered me.
Then, two situations involving me, where people failed to live up to their agreements, but also failed to realize how much value I had put into the situation, ignored that, and then, demanded even more of me as if I’d given nothing.
I tell you these things, because I know that I am just like you. I walk through my days endeavoring to do my very best, to be more Godlike, to bring more love into the world and then, bam! Like Wylie Coyote, I find myself a puddle at the base of a wall wondering what the heck happened here.
The “wall” was my inability to forgive. Everyday across America we pray: “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” All of us know these words, and pray them, but today I understand them. This is what I want to share with you today.
Joel Goldsmith in his book, The Thunder of Silence
So the real spiritual journey is not about becoming good humans, but rather to realize our freedom. We need nothing from anyone. We release everyone from their obligations, when we realize our Oneness with Source, where everything is complete, fulfilled and whole. No one need to be or do something for our happiness.
My big Ah-Ha! this morning was that any block in consciousness is an impediment to the realization of Oneness,not just hatred or anger. The obvious blocks are :he did this to me, but I choose to forgive and turn my cheek. But that’s just the beginning of the True meaning.
The rest of it is that any “judgment” on someone else: he/she didn’t try hard enough, therefore didn’t meet my expectations, do enough and so fell short in someway – these are seeing something other than God. This is buying into the belief of two powers, not One. This is the “lead me not into temptation, but deliver me from evil” part. The temptation to believe that there is anything other than God, Source, Oneness.
Now, for the explosive kicker. By the Law of Attraction, these people, situations and dramas came into my personal experience one after the other, increasing the emotion of anger within me. By last night if I could have left myself, I would have. Instead, I went for a swim in the light of the full moon and asked for illumination, which I received this morning.
These people, these circumstances came to me by the Law of Attraction. Like attracting like thoughts. These people, these circumstances are my mirror: they reflect back to me what I am thinking, believing about….me. Holy smokes.
Only once before can I recall feeling this conviction so clearly. All at once I know it is True ;and it doesn’t feel good to realize that which I perceive is me. I mean, UGH!
But I pressed on this morning, because I want released from this prison of ‘ugh ‘that I’ve been feeling. I have kept myself in bondage; but the key to the prison door was in the realization that I hold these self same judgments, which I have transposed on to my friends, on myself. Oh, double ARG! And then, double Ah-HA! Relief.
So it is not just forgiving others my perception of their shortcomings after all. In Truth I am to forgive myself – releasing myself from my own judgments and condemnations of my shortcomings and failings.
Forgive me for failing to see that my human self is not, after all, Who I REally Am.
So, miraculously once I got that big twig out of my own eye, I am able to see that the human self that others show me (my own human self) is not Who They Really Are and is certainly not Who I Really Am. That I was tempted to see something other than God, in them, showed me that I am seeing something other than God in myself. It is I who have bought into the human belief of duality – something other than Source.
“Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Forgive me for failing to see my own Oneness, Who I Really Am; and forgive those who fail to see the God in me.
This is why we pray for our enemies: they are a gift to us. They are our mirror to show us our own consciousness blocks which block our own Realization of Oneness and block our liberty.
Such Perfection for which I am grateful…and now I am relieved and feel Good once again.
Thanks for reading!
Kath
Soothing Someone Back Into Well Being
Posted by: | CommentsGood Morning Everyone,
Recently I heard the best story. It involves friends of mine in Descanso. Jack is involved with Parkinson’s. When I lived in Descanso, I used to go over to Jack and Doreen’s because I just loved them as people and I would do energy work on both of them. Those times with them were amazing and fun. As the symptoms of Parkinson’s progressed in Jack, Doreen moved with elegance to assist and care for him, as she still does.
Doreen is the portrait of True Love. She and Jack are entirely devoted to each other. They came to the US from Scotland back in the 60′s. Jack’s trade was that he was a glass man. So they started their own window and stained glass company, which is now run by their eldest daughter.
Jack is the quintessential Scot; he plays the bagpipes and has read every Scottish author and poet, and can quote them all. Together they are simply a joy to be around. As a couple they love and respect each other fundamentally. Even in this difficult circumstance, I have never heard them utter a disparaging word or use an insulting tone. It just isn’t in their awareness, so replete is their joy in each other.
As time as gone on, Jack’s ability to move about and communicate has become severely hampered. Doreen literally lifts him from his bed and moves him to place to place. And only she can understand his communications at this point, so in tune are they with each other.
Recently in Southern California the temperatures have topped 100 degrees over many days with crippling humidity.
The neighborhood guys got an idea. Once a week these fellows gather at Jack and Doreen’s house to play snooker, although Jack can’t play anymore, they have continued to come and have their weekly game including Jack in their fun.
Well, seems Tom, a neighbor, got the idea that if they all helped, they could take Jack on a field trip to his house where he has a swimming pool. This was executed last week.
The guys came and got Jack and they all trooped over to Tom’s house where they had a pool party. Jack, included. They got Jack into the swimming pool, where for 2 uninterrupted hours, Jack was in heaven, diverted from the constancy of the Parkinson’s.
He floated and wiggled and felt his body weightless and cool – almost free. For two hours, Jack was back in Well Being, diverted from his usual focus – the prison of his body.
According to all reports, a magical time was had by all.
The greatest gift we can give anyone who is focused on something “unwanted” is to soothe them back into Well Being. These guys, his friends and neighbors, and fellow Light Beings did just that.
When someone can be diverted from what is (unwanted) and soothed back into Oneness, that vibration goes out into the Universe and is answered. What is more is that in this place of Well Being, Jack is allowing his Good to be received. Amen.
Of course I know these guys, and all I can say is that I’ve never heard of a more wonderful INSPIRATION and just hearing the story put the biggest smile on my face. Well done, indeed, guys. Very, very well done.
Thanks for reading!
Kath
Ocean Wave Energy: Limitless Energy Gift
Posted by: | Comments2009-06-01
Good Morning Everyone!
In all the discussions about renewable and sustainable energy, how often have we heard anything about Ocean Wave Energy? I know I haven’t.
This morning there’s a really informative story in McClatchy News detailing the fact that the current proposed budget will cut research funding for this type of sustainable energy source in favor of an 86% increase in funding for solar and wind.
The article goes on to say that this technology is already being used in Europe and could be online in Puget Sound by 2011.
Seems to me that with America being blessed with two enormous lengths of coastline, and most of each coastline having the highest population densities, that this is a no brainer.
The technology was developed by Seabased AB, a Swedish company; and has projects considered, planned or installed in Spain, Portugal, Scotland, Ireland and Norway. There have also been discussions about projects in South Korea, the Philippines, India and Canada’s Maritime provinces.
Still another company,OPT,is under contract with the US Navy right now for a similar technology to supply the Navy world wide.
I’ve traveled the United States by car many, many times and have seen the windmills. They are NOT attractive and they do change ground weather, not to mention being at the whimsy of the wind. Wind power has it’s application in small projects, to be sure, but certainly not the large scale of supplying electricity to all of America.
Similarly, solar’s draw backs are those batteries and solar panels. They’re fine on roof tops, but to cover large portions of our deserts again means messing with the ecology of the desert and the life forms there. In defined applications, sun is appropriate, just as wind; but here’s a solution that promises big return for the long haul.
And get this, the technology is – simple. Holy Toledo!
Let’s keep it simple. Use our dollars wisely and put them where it makes Good Common Sense.
If you’d like to make comment to the White House about redirecting the dollars in sustainable energy research back to ocean wave technology, you can do so directly . I already have.
Put your two cents worth in! This is your government, and it’s your tax dollars, so participate!
Thanks for reading!
Kath
Blessed Are the Peacemakers: Obama’s Speech in Cairo
Posted by: | Comments2009-06-05
Good Morning Everyone!
In my life I have born witness to the Cold War, Vietnam, the Kuwait War, 9/11, the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and myriad other acts of violence and hatred. Always I have been told to accept that this is just a part of life.
Never have I accepted it as the way it has to be. Perhaps, it is the way it is, for now; but it is not the way it has to be.
I have included Present Obama’s speech in Egypt here for you to listen to and view. He sees what I see; he knows what I know: that the way it is or has been, is only to give rise to the desire and dream for a better way.
We are the Creators of whatever we experience here on Earth. We have been given dominion of all that happens here on Earth by our choices and through our focus.
View the President’s speech. Then read 1Corinthians 13. I provide it below.
1 Corinthians 13
Love
1If I speak in the tongues[a] of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames,[b] but have not love, I gain nothing.
4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
8Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 12Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
13And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
‘Then‘ is now. In the evolution of mankind we have come to the time when it is time to grow up spiritually, from spiritual children to spiritual adulthood.
Why is love the greatest of these things? Because it is God expressing within you. You can only recognize love by the way it feels. This is the realization of Love is, which is the realization of God – which is who We Really Are.
This means realizing God in our human mind consciousness and carrying into our daily activities.
Let go of the ways of children and embrace your spiritual adulthood, which is the Consciousness of God.
Welcome the God Consciousness that is the same God of us all, which is Who We All Really Are.
E pluribus unium – From the many is One.
Thanks for reading!
Kath
