I was blind and now I see, the veil is lifted, an Oprah Ah-ah moment.
Every walk past the same street on the way home and never notice a restaurant or store. Or if you are in "your" town with a tourist friend and see if through their eyes - "wow this view is actually beautiful and I never stopped to notice."
There is "stuff" around you all the time, sometimes you see it sometimes you don't. It is just whether or not you are looking. It just comes down to paying attention....consciousness, awareness, an awakening.Same with spirituality which I see just as consciousness/connectivity with everything - there is an energy and a divine nature around, once you are awakened, you can see it.
"It was easy to love Good in all that was beautiful. The lesson of deeper knowledge, though, instructed me to embrace God in all things.
St Francis of Assisi, 13th century, one of the most respected figures in history
It is ALL within you and whats within you, is within ALL. Finding Connection.
I was lost but now I am found. We seem to have lost our way with the understanding how interconnected we are and we are with our environment. Our current state of the environment, and the hate in the world, scream there is something wrong. Good news, we are making process and these things take time!
Einstein: you expand your circle of companion, by dissolving the optical delusion of separateness.And in the act of doing this you start to re-connect to cause and effect; to the ripple effect of our actions. We lost this, we lost caring. By seeing yourself in others and in your surroundings, you find connection. Connection gives a feeling of contentment, of purpose, a sense of finding your way.
Great example of disconnection: A man was writing a college paper on alienation and anxiety, he got an A, however, he was feeling as alienated and anxious as ever. We fill our head with knowledge and education but not necessary the tools of how to deal with these things as an inner education.
How sweet the sound, but how tasty the experience.
When you read or hear about things, their is a disconnect. There is something powerful in experience, a shift in understanding/interpretation.We can learn and learn about what is it like to swim, but until we swim, we don't know the feeling of weightlessness (something I said in my blog time and time again).
You need a guide like a swim instructor - be it a person, a book (ie: Power of Now, or the Bible) or a combo.
Will lead me.
You cannot teach a man anything; you can only help him discover it in himself.
Galileo Galilei 1500's.
A teacher lifts the burden - whatever it is. Helps one get over self doubt, acceptance of life, self rejection, to expand and expose new things to learn.
Their job is not to give you answer but to remind you who are and the answers are within; a tour guide on the journey of life.
Buddha's last words: be an island to yourself, your own mind is the source of wisdom.
Poof in the pudding mentality:
In America we need scientific evidence, who doesn't like a little reassurance in the form of studies by smart people at Harvard.
More and more studies are coming on the power of meditation:
Cortex frontal lobes get thicker and do not demish with time as they typically do. Some functions are preserved with meditation. Blood pressure decrease and the phsycilogical characteristics change - its true. We buy that.
If you try to be creative every day, that area of the brain gets bigger, smarter. Comes easier. Same with Meditation and finding peace.
Mindful meditation creates a bigger brain; who doesn't want a bigger anything, come on America, we do love our supersize.
Mindful meditation ideas are starting to come to the schools which is amazing! The new abc's - awareness, balance and clarity and compassion (team work notion). It helps empower kids, gives them coping mechanisms. A study in Harvard on ADHD is showing great results on the possibility and power of meditation.
Medication - replace the "c" with a "t". Meditation.
Meditation means cultivating the mind. The mind can be defined as a process that regulates information and energy flow. Attention governs these 2 things. So you would think it would have been put together before.
You are divine. You are grace, believe in yourself and its can be amazing with attention, connection, experience, a guide and practice (whatever it means to you).....
Inspired from the documentary: Spiritual Evolution. (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1276118/)
