Belief

"What you believe is so important. Belief creates powerful brain chemistry that, collectively, dictates the dominant consensus. Those who control belief control reality. The dark alchemy of religions, politics and the mainstream media has created a pathologically-obedient and mind-controlled society that serves the agenda of those in power. Many are vying for our allegiance to their philosophy. Where do we place our trust in the midst of the many and differing spins on our history and our true identity as Humans...can you even trust your own mind? Perhaps not. However, you can trust your heart-body-mind system and the electromagnetic energy-flow by which it is animated and connected to the Source of Creation."
~ Juliet Carter, 'Worldbridger'

We Were Made For These Times

We Were Made For These Times

Clarissa Pinkola Estes

 

My friends, do not lose heart. We were made for these times. I have heard from so many recently who are deeply and properly bewildered. They are concerned about the state of affairs in our world now. Ours is a time of almost daily astonishment and often righteous rage over the latest degradations of what matters most to civilized, visionary people.

You are right in your assessments. The lustre and hubris some have aspired to while endorsing acts so heinous against children, elders, everyday people, the poor, the unguarded, the helpless, is breathtaking. Yet, I urge you, ask you, gentle you, to please not spend your spirit dry by bewailing these difficult times. Especially do not lose hope. Most particularly because, the fact is that we were made for these times. Yes. For years, we have been learning, practicing, been in training for and just waiting to meet on this exact plain of engagement.

I grew up on the Great Lakes and recognize a seaworthy vessel when I see one. Regarding awakened souls, there have never been more able vessels in the waters than there are right now across the world. And they are fully provisioned and able to signal one another as never before in the history of humankind.

Look out over the prow; there are millions of boats of righteous souls on the waters with you. Even though your veneers may shiver from every wave in this stormy roil, I assure you that the long timbers composing your prow and rudder come from a greater forest. That long-grained lumber is known to withstand storms, to hold together, to hold its own, and to advance, regardless.

In any dark time, there is a tendency to veer toward fainting over how much is wrong or unmended in the world. Do not focus on that. There is a tendency, too, to fall into being weakened by dwelling on what is outside your reach, by what cannot yet be. Do not focus there. That is spending the wind without raising the sails.

We are needed, that is all we can know. And though we meet resistance, we more so will meet great souls who will hail us, love us and guide us, and we will know them when they appear. Didn't you say you were a believer? Didn't you say you pledged to listen to a voice greater? Didn't you ask for grace? Don't you remember that to be in grace means to submit to the voice greater?

Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach. Any small, calm thing that one soul can do to help another soul, to assist some portion of this poor suffering world, will help immensely. It is not given to us to know which acts or by whom, will cause the critical mass to tip toward an enduring good.

What is needed for dramatic change is an accumulation of acts, adding, adding to, adding more, continuing. We know that it does not take everyone on Earth to bring justice and peace, but only a small, determined group who will not give up during the first, second, or hundredth gale.

One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times. The light of the soul throws sparks, can send up flares, builds signal fires, causes proper matters to catch fire. To display the lantern of soul in shadowy times like these - to be fierce and to show mercy toward others; both are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity.

Struggling souls catch light from other souls who are fully lit and willing to show it. If you would help to calm the tumult, this is one of the strongest things you can do.

There will always be times when you feel discouraged. I too have felt despair many times in my life, but I do not keep a chair for it. I will not entertain it. It is not allowed to eat from my plate.

The reason is this: In my uttermost bones I know something, as do you. It is that there can be no despair when you remember why you came to Earth, who you serve, and who sent you here. The good words we say and the good deeds we do are not ours. They are the words and deeds of the One who brought us here. In that spirit, I hope you will write this on your wall: When a great ship is in harbor and moored, it is safe, there can be no doubt. But that is not what great ships are built for.

By Clarissa Pinkola Estes

American poet, post-trauma specialist and Jungian psychoanalyst, author of Women Who Run With the Wolves.

Awaken

we are in the wake
of a great shifting
awaken
you better free your mind
before they illegalize thought
there’s a war going on
the first casualty was truth
and it’s inside you
the universe is counting on our belief
that faith is more powerful than fear
and in that the shifting moment
we’ll all remember why we’re here
in a world where you’re assassinated for having a dream
and the rich spend 9 billion a year to control our ideas
and visions are televised so things aren’t what they seem
we gotta believe
in a world where
there’s room enough for everyone
to breathe
cause reality is made up of
7 billion thoughts
who made up their minds
of what’s real and what’s not
so I stopped believing
in false idols of war
greed and hate
is not worth my faith
my mind’s dedicated
to justice
my soul is devoted
to love
and love is God
and God is truth
and truth is you
and you are me
and I am everything
and everything is nothing
and nothing is the birthplace of creation
and transformation is possible
and you are proof
we were born right now
for a reason
we can be whatever
we give ourselves the power to be
and right now we need
day dreamers
gate keepers
bridge builders
soul speakers
web weavers
light bearers
food growers
wound healers
trail blazers
truth sayers
life lovers
peace makers
give what you most deeply desire
to give
every moment you are choosing to live
or you are waiting
why would a flower hesitate to open?
now is the only moment
rain drop let go
become the ocean
possibility is as wide
as the space
we create
to hold it

by Naima

Awaken

we are in the wake
of a great shifting
awaken
you better free your mind
before they illegalize thought
there’s a war going on
the first casualty was truth
and it’s inside you
the universe is counting on our belief
that faith is more powerful than fear
and in that the shifting moment
we’ll all remember why we’re here
in a world where you’re assassinated for having a dream
and the rich spend 9 billion a year to control our ideas
and visions are televised so things aren’t what they seem
we gotta believe
in a world where
there’s room enough for everyone
to breathe
cause reality is made up of
7 billion thoughts
who made up their minds
of what’s real and what’s not
so I stopped believing
in false idols of war
greed and hate
is not worth my faith
my mind’s dedicated
to justice
my soul is devoted
to love
and love is God
and God is truth
and truth is you
and you are me
and I am everything
and everything is nothing
and nothing is the birthplace of creation
and transformation is possible
and you are proof
we were born right now
for a reason
we can be whatever
we give ourselves the power to be
and right now we need
day dreamers
gate keepers
bridge builders
soul speakers
web weavers
light bearers
food growers
wound healers
trail blazers
truth sayers
life lovers
peace makers
give what you most deeply desire
to give
every moment you are choosing to live
or you are waiting
why would a flower hesitate to open?
now is the only moment
rain drop let go
become the ocean
possibility is as wide
as the space
we create
to hold it

by Naima

Desert Ruminations

Still processing the mysterious journey into landscape and soulscape in the Anza Borrego desert with Yasmin as my guide, and friends alongside.  While there, as I contemplated the lost and broken bones of my soul and the shadowy figures that need illumination or cremation, Ben Howard's song Gracious kept coming up.  Something about allowing what no longer serves to die away but to honor those things as teachers.  To let the ego die but to honor it's purpose and it's protection in wholeness. Blooming right out of all that needs to die.  All over the landscape there was evidence of how life and growth come out of what has died away.  I've more to process and integrate and consider.  For now I will leave you with the song that kept me company during my exploration into soul.  Lyrics and video below.

"Gracious"

How would you know?
When everything around you's changing like the weather,
A big black storm.
And who would you turn to?
Or hide a ghost, a shadow at the most, would you let me know?
Cause I don't want to,
To trouble your mind with the childish design of how it all should go.
But I love you so,
But it all comes clear, when the wind is settled, I'll be here, you know.

Cause you said ours were the lighthouse towers
The sand upon that place
Darling I'll grow weary, happy still
With just the memory of your face

Gracious goes the ghost of you
And I will never forget the plans and the
Silhouettes you drew here and
Gracious goes the ghost of you
My dear

And how would you know?
When everything around you's bruised and battered
Like the cold night storm.
And who would you turn to?
Or hide a ghost, a shadow at the most, would you tell me so?
Cause I, I adore you so
When it all comes clear, the wind is settled, I'll be here, you know.

Cause you said ours were the lighthouse towers
The sand upon that place
Darling I'll grow weary, happy still
With just the memory of your face

Gracious goes the ghost of you
And I will never forget the plans and the
Silhouettes you drew here and
Gracious goes the ghost of you
My dear

Gracious goes the ghost of you
And I will never forget the plans and the
Silhouettes you drew here and
Gracious goes the ghost of you
My dear

Home

Home

I've gotta get home
There's a garden to tend
All the fruit's on the ground
The birds have all moved back into my attic,
Whistled in static
The young learn to fly
I will patch up the holes once again

Well, I can't believe that my lime tree is dead
I thought it was sleeping, I guess it got fed up with not being fed
And I would be too, I keep food in my belly
And hope that my time isn't soon.
Isn't soon.

And so I try to understand
What I can't hold in my hand
And whatever I find, I'll find my way back to you
And if you could try to find it too
'Cause this place is overgrown, it's a waxing moon.
Home is wherever we are if there's love here too

In the back of my house there's a trail that won't end
We went walking so far
It grew back again
And now there's no trail at all
Only grass growing taller
Get out my machete and battle with time once again
But I'm bound to lose 'cause I'll be damned if time don't win

I've gotta get home
There's a garden to tend
All the seeds from the fruit buried and began
Their own family trees teach them, thank you and please
They spread their own roots, then watch their young fruit grow again
And this old trail will lead me right back to where it begins

And so I try to understand
What I can't hold in my hand
And whatever I find I'll find my way back to you
And if you could try to find it too
'Cause this place is overgrown, it's a waxing moon.
Home is wherever we are if there's love here too

I said,
Home is wherever we are if there's love here too
Home is wherever we are if there's love here too

-Jack Johnson
Home Music and Video

Happy Winter Solstice

Today is the shortest day of the year.  The Sun appears dead on the horizon for a few days, but it always rises.   In a few days the Sun will begin its ascent back to the North bringing with it more light and longer days.  In this we rejoice in all that the Sun offers us.  Life, warmth, and illumination.

"Solstice: from the Latin sol stetit meaning sun stood still.  For six days in the northern hemisphere's December, the sun ceases its southerly crawl on the horizon and appears to rise and set in the almost the same spot.  The ancients watched this quiet drama with drawn breathe.  Wood the sun begin to move again?  Would the light grow anew on the great wheel of life?  Would life itself continue?

A few millennia and several hundred generations later, our won deepest questions, though not so literal as those of our ancestors, are nonetheless profound.  Beneath our nuanced sophistication, we too, like preschoolers, hate transition.  But we live on an earth where change is the only thing we can be sure of.  And our silky bodies, webbed with wisdoms belied by the rushings of our twenty-first century lives, have the pacings of plants budding and light expanding.  At the moment of winter solstice, we stand at the brink of external and internal change.  This primordial turning of the year, both inside and out, has the tangled, branching rhythms of modern science's chaos theory.  The ancients didn't call it chaos.  But they personified those same meldings and shatterings in the cunning shenanigans of their tricksters who finagle the boundaries of what we know and what we don't.  Now, at the winter solstice, we ask ourselves:  What are the private and shared natures of our inner and outer boundaries?  What is our place in the great cycle?  What the actions and restraints required of us?

Since time out of mind humans have marked the externally vital crossing from dark to light.  ... Though we now light our world with bulbs and take for granted not only the external day but often even our food, we still make the return of the sun's light a joyful metaphor for social and personal renewal.

...We await the return of the light, outside ourselves and within.  Cold and darkness color and shiver the psyche.  The sky turns gray.  Fatally beautiful frost laces the remaining green.  Rain pours.  Snow drifts.  We gaze a the mystery of the great cycle, full of our own deaths and births and lives.  Where is the wisdom for this gateway?

...Like vessels, the stories [myths about the Solstice] carry us across the stormy, flotsamy, slippery edge of night.  We cross over in three different ways:  by theft, by surrender, through graces.  ...When our personalities clutch their old habits, the thief may have to grab what we otherwise won't let go.  When our deeper self finally surrenders to the new.  And then, there are those miraculous gifts, those blessings that shower down upon us.

...The personality is always busy.  It is making its reputation, building its stash, wanting admiration, wielding its power, enraged at the rejections an the invisibility.  All else that could be, lies in the dark parts of ourselves, disowned, unexamined, pushed aside.  But a  deep power lies there, too.  And out of the psychic collisions between the unknown self and the life flow of the universe uncoils a vast energy.  Here snatches the thief's claw--perhaps in the form of a plot, an unavoidable circumstance, or a tumultuous collapse of what is.  But the tricky purpose is to unseat the entrenchments and crack the certainties, opening us to the deeper than personality truths of our selves and our worlds."

The Return of the LIGHT Twelve Tales from Around the World for the Winter Solstice 
by Carolyn McVickar Edwards

There Will Come a Time

"After The Storm"

And after the storm,
I run and run as the rains come
And I look up, I look up,
on my knees and out of luck,
I look up.

Night has always pushed up day
You must know life to see decay
But I won't rot, I won't rot
Not this mind and not this heart,
I won't rot.

And I took you by the hand
And we stood tall,
And remembered our own land,
What we lived for.

And there will come a time, you'll see, with no more tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.

And now I cling to what I knew
I saw exactly what was true
But oh no more.
That's why I hold,
That's why I hold with all I have.
That's why I hold.

And I won't die alone and be left there.
Well I guess I'll just go home,
Oh God knows where.
Because death is just so full and man so small.
Well I'm scared of what's behind and what's before.

And there will come a time, you'll see, with no more tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.

And there will come a time, you'll see, with no more tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair. 

-Mumford and Sons