Inspired Living

A poem by Dr B

Everything is dark and sad
Anxiety plays on my mind
Fear freaks me, am I mad
Do I believe it? Damn it!

Why now? What have I done?
Is it devil’s advocate in my ear?
The voices and visions are gone
But that took me many years

Is that the reality or delusion?
Who knows? Answer is not easy
Better get to a clear conclusion
Before the people start teasing

The long therapy is useless
The drugs do not bring relief
The psychiatrist is clueless
About jumping off the cliff

Should I try and go on high?
Should I draw more attention?
Should I ignore all and find
the answer to my trepidation?

These are the questions but
The answers do not come by
I am sick and tired of the rut
 Will hang in there for a while

To find a strength in the vessel
To connect with the inner core
To embrace my amazing essence
These are few but there is more

I will surrender to the divine plan
Discover the inner child
Laugh and dance because no man
Can lead me for I am blind

Then my eyes have been opened
The soul rejoiced in violet flame
Life is beautiful. Should I moan?
There is no need for any blame

The karma was cleared
The past was erased
The new life was geared
The saga was at end

Hope, patience and love,
Coupled with a gratitude
Peace and joy from above
Lead me to the new beauty

The mystery of divine life
Living the mission daily
Full with energy and thrive
For the next level maybe

4.10.2008

Johannesburg
 

The Miracle of Life
By Caroline Chaplin

I recently became a grandmother for the first time. Little Elisa Josephine was born just over a month ago in Holland and in true grandmotherly style, I hot footed it across to see this new little being when she was just two weeks old. I was totally unprepared for the depth of emotion I would experience, and the instant bonding with another generation of Chaplin’s that occurred. I was blown away by this beautiful new soul and the miracle of her life. Those perfect little hands, those tiny ears… I could go on forever! It has added incredible impetus to my embracing of the technological age in the form of my learning to use Skype and to put pictures on my cell phone to show off to friends!

Now I may be a besotted granny but this joyful experience did bring two things home to me. Firstly, how often we rush through life without really stopping to savour the moment. We get so hung up on paying our bills, buying our new car, moving on, moving upwards, that we forget to just stop and breathe. When did you last look around you in awe and recognise just how truly amazing it is that we are here and that we exist at all? Life is pretty awesome when you stop to think about it and also very fleeting. I can certainly vouch for the fact that time speeds up as we get older. We become so immersed in the game of life that we fail to stop and appreciate the fragility and brevity of our existence. It is a good discipline to step outside of one’s self occasionally and to ask the question: “If this was my last day left, how I would choose to spend it?” What would you do differently and who would you contact if today was the day your “transfer papers” arrived? Who do you need to mend your fences with? Who needs to be told you love them? What peaks have you yearned to scale and left for later?

Secondly, introducing myself to this new little human being and experiencing her uniqueness made me reflect on how much we hide or deny ourselves as we go through life. When we are born we are complete within ourselves and we demand to have our needs met. We cry when hungry, cold or wet, we smile when we are happy.  We have no angst or fear of rejection. That only comes later. We know beyond a shadow of a doubt that we are perfect droplets from the river of life. Slowly life teaches us to relinquish parts of ourselves and unless we are grounded in a really strong self image, we start to dilute the essence of who we are, in order to fit in and to gain approval. Of course it is necessary for us to learn to live together and value each other but the sad part is that in diluting ourselves we often deny the very essence of who we are, the skills and talents that we bought into the world to share with others. We stop basking in our own individuality and allow mediocrity to enter in. We allow ourselves a diluted existence where we never taste the full flavour of being alive. There is a saying that God has a plan for this world and will achieve it with or without our help, but it is so much more fun to be part of the action!

The Charter for Compassion.
At one with our ignorance. If ever there was a time for compassion, a time to humbly accept what we don't know, it is now.
The best idea humanity has ever had. Each additional name makes the compassionate voice a more potent force in the world. Let us make the silent majority a challenge to extremism and hate. Become a part and affirm the Charter .
Add your name now

Pick a quote a day, write it down, carry it with you and pull it out from time to time to keep you focused on the valuable person you are. The more you can boost your self esteem, the greater your chances are of achieving success. Using self esteem quotes as well as engaging in other self esteem activities will help you to become more of who you truly are. 

 "You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love & affection." Buddha

"Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new." Albert Einstein

"Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead." Louisa May Alcott

"If I am not for myself, who will be?" Pirke Avoth

"The tragedy is that so many people look for self-confidence and self-respect everywhere except within themselves, and so they fail in their search." Dr Nathaniel Branden

"Let the world know you as you are, not as you think you should be, because sooner or later, if you are posing, you will forget the pose, and then where are you?" Fanny Brice

"Other people's opinion of you does not have to become your reality." Les Brown


"It took me a long time not to judge myself through someone else's eyes." Sally Field

"Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one's definition of your life; define yourself." Harvey Fienstein

"The way you treat yourself sets the standard for others." Dr Sonya Friedman

"In my day, we didn't have self-esteem, we had self-respect, and no more of it than we had earned." Jane Haddam

"It's surprising how many persons go through life without ever recognizing that their feelings toward other people are largely determined by their feelings toward themselves, and if you're not comfortable within yourself, you can't be comfortable with others." Sidney J. Harris

"Every individual has a place to fill in the world, and is important, in some respect, whether he chooses to be so or not." Nathaniel Hawthorne

"There is only one corner of the universe you can be certain of improving, and that's your own self." Aldous Leonard Huxley

"Self confidence is the first requisite to great undertakings." Dr. Samuel Johnson

"Accept everything about yourself, I mean everything. You are you and that is the beginning and the end, no apologies, no regrets." Clark Moustakas

 "At bottom every man knows well enough that he is a unique being, only once on this earth; and by no extraordinary chance will such a marvellously picturesque piece of diversity in unity as he is, ever be put together a second time." Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

"If only you could sense how important you are to the lives of those you meet; how important you can be to people you may never even dream of. There is something of yourself that you leave at every meeting with another person." Fred Rogers

"The greatest success is successful self-acceptance." Ben Sweet

"You have within you right now, everything you need to deal with whatever the world can throw at you." Brian Tracy

"I never loved another person the way I loved myself." Mae West

"You don't have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great." Zig Ziglar

"Aerodynamically the bumblebee shouldn't be able to fly, but the bumblebee doesn't know that so it goes on flying anyway." Mary Kay Ash

"You can do what you have to do, and sometimes you can do it even better than you think you can." President Jimmy Carter Jr.

"If you doubt you can accomplish something, then you can't accomplish it. You have to have confidence in your ability, and then be tough enough to follow through." Rosalyn Smith Carter

"Reflect on your present blessings, of which every man has many, not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some." Charles Dickens

"Nurture your mind with great thoughts, for you will never go any higher than you think." Benjamin Disraeli

 "If you want a quality, act as if you already had it." William James "Never bend your head. Always hold it high. Look the world straight in the face." Helen Keller

"Confidence is preparation. Everything else is beyond your control." Richard Kline

"Confidence comes not from always being right but from not fearing to be wrong." Peter Mcintyre

"Don't ask yourself what the world needs, ask yourself what makes you come alive. And then go and do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive." Howard Washington Thurman

  The processes involved in spiritual development By Jimmy Henderson

Let me introduce myself :

I am Jimmy Henderson and the author of a number of articles and two books on spiritual and psychic development. I am based in Durban, South Africa. I am also a trained trauma counselor and a regular radio talk show guest on a local radio station phone-in programme dealing with wellness issues. I also regard myself as a metaphysical teacher and latest book, which is available at most bookshops as well as online, is entitled 'Multi-Dimensional Thinking' . 

• In the past, we have always thought of 'spirituality' as being related only to religion and religious practices. However, I believe that the time has now arrived for it to come out of the closet and takes its rightful place in our world of everyday experience 

• We have now reached the stage where spiritual growth can be seen as a perfectly natural process involving our self-actualisation as human beings and 'spirituality' seen as synonymous with the highest possible levels of personal growth and self-development

• Please note that I am not here to criticise or threaten any existing religious or traditional beliefs. In fact, I believe that the steps mentioned in this process are present in all religious and belief systems in some form or another 

• In my book 'Multi-Dimensional Thinking', I have attempted to de-mystify this whole process by linking it to accepted scientific and psychological research as far as possible and viewing the process of spiritual development in terms of a gradual learning curve which involves completing certain developmental tasks and acquiring new skills relating to the body, mind and spirit 

• Although I would be the first to admit that there are other paths, this particular method involves integrating specific developmental outcomes and skills to produce a new level of 'mindfulness', understanding, perception and psychic awareness

• It is therefore best performed as a series of simple and systematically graded exercises designed to achieve certain desired outcomes in terms of actual experiences 

• I will now briefly describe the process. To begin, one must make two decisions or set two definite intentions One is a willingness to accept responsibility for your own life and actions and the second, a commitment to conscious self-development 

THE BODY

PHYSICAL WELLNESS

• As you begin your the learning curve, your first task will be to reach a certain level of physical wellness as there are a number of body and

lifestyle issues which could affect your spiritual and psychic development.  It makes sense that you would require a reasonably healthy body in

order to maintain the levels of consciousness for which you are striving. Here I refer to bad habits such as smoking and drinking excessively

as well as a bad diet. This can result in the buildup of toxins which will have to be cleansed by changing some of these habits and also detoxing your body regularly

• Your present lifestyle could also be an obstacle to spiritual and psychic development. For instance, excessive partying, drugs, obsessions with sex and materialism can be great distractions to someone who is striving for higher levels of consciousness, and you may need to look at changes to your lifestyle

• The desired outcome for this first stage would be a commitment to improving your health and simplifying your life to create the time and space for spiritual and psychic development to take place

 

THE MIND

EMOTIONAL WELLNESS (EQ)

• Your second task will be to reach a certain level of emotional wellness (EQ). This can be explained as the ability to remain reasonably

emotionally 'at ease' and suggests a certain amount of resilience to day-to-day concerns. The reason for this task is that, in my experience, past traumas, emotional pain and instability will hold you back in terms of your spiritual and psychic development. This stage therefore includes a period of healing to extricate yourself from the web of doubts, fears and negative emotions based on unpleasant memories from the past. This healing can be concluded with assistance from traditional or holistic therapists or by means of self-healing processes. In my book I do provide a 'toolbox' of common therapeutic techniques, such as journaling and rational-emotive techniques to release unhelpful emotions and challenge self-defeating beliefs, as well as new methods to deal with past traumas and restore broken relationships

• The desired outcome for this stage is divine forgiveness or self-forgiveness (depending on your belief system) which initiates a break with the past and ushers in a new beginning

EMOTIONAL EMPOWERMENT

• The third developmental task to be mastered is 'emotional empowerment', which can be described as building a healthy self-

image and high self-esteem. The path of spiritual and psychic development is often lonely and you will require an inner strength based on a new knowledge of who and what you really are, and your true purpose in this life, in order to succeed. Before beginning the deeper processes of spiritual and psychic study, you should therefore include a period of 'time-out' for self-introspection and contemplation on these important issues

• The desired outcome for this stage is therefore a sense of total confidence and belief in yourself that will prove to be useful during the more advanced processes.

A NEW FRAMEWORK OF THINKING (IQ)

• At the level of the mind there are also a number of tasks to be mastered.  It will be necessary to clean out your mind and free it of self-

defeating thoughts and beliefs based on fear and which do not allow you the freedom to explore the deeper mysteries of life. For instance 'I cannot /should not do this or that' (religious or self-imposed beliefs). Apart from holding you back, you simply will not be able to be make sense of any new experiences if they are not acceptable to your mind and thinking. You may therefore require a shift in consciousness as well as a new framework (or paradigm) of beliefs in order to move forward and to process the experiences, concepts and ideas associated with spiritual and psychic development.

• Completing this shift is not always easy and could also be tackled in stages. For example, a useful start would be to begin to think holistically

and be more open to new ideas. One way of doing this is to do self-introspection, learn to reflect on life more deeply and to approach important questions in life by cross-referencing and combining information from various areas of knowledge such as the natural and human sciences, philosophy, metaphysics and even religion. Another method is to begin classes in basic meditation and learn to quiet your mind and free it from the clutter of everyday thinking. This will also raise your consciousness which is required for later stages.

• Your desired outcome for this stage would be success in clearing the unwanted debris from your mind and 'shifting gears' to a more universal paradigm of thinking.

 

THE SPIRIT

THE DEVELOPMENT OF SPIRITUAL SKILLS (SQ)

• The slope of your developmental curve has now increased and you are ready to begin to develop new 'skills' such as heightened sense perception, intuition, psychic sight and a conscious connection with your higher self, all associated with a higher spiritual experience or

spiritual wellness (SQ).

• The first and most important task is building a relationship with your subconscious mind, as this provides the underlying power for

your later spiritual and psychic skills.

• I liken your subconscious to a lover who needs to be wooed before she will trust you and admit you into her chamber of mysteries. This building of trust takes place gradually as you learn to use affirmations, intentions and begin to build channels of two-way communication using dreams, collages and symbolic drawings. You will also need to increase your sensitivity to cues and impressions from your subconscious. This will become possible during training in more advanced meditations and visualization (imagery) which you should undertake with an experienced teacher or a reputable metaphysical college. These processes are also explained in detail in the exercises in my

book.

• The desired outcome for this stage is a relationship of trust with your subconscious mind in which it communicates readily with you through dreams and meditations and provides the basis for your developing psychic abilities such as intuition and spontaneous imagery.

 

THE RECONNECTION WITH THE HIGHER SELF

• The next stage of spiritual and psychic development involves a reconnection with your higher self (or soul-consciousness)

• This provides the power and consciousness needed for the development of advanced psychic skills such as clairvoyance, clairaudience and clairsentience and the perception of energy

• This is where your earlier work in dealing with your past and clearing out the pathways of your consciousness will be of such great value, as it is unlikely that you will have much success at his level if the previous tasks have not been satisfactorily completed

 As you approach the end of your developmental curve, you need to prepare for this meeting and merging with your higher self or soul, your true spiritual identity.  Once again, this will be achieved during advanced training in meditation which should be undertaken with experienced teachers

 

• Your desired outcome is the successful re-integration of your inner and outer self. This introduces a state of mindfulness or self-actualization in which you are able to manifest psychic abilities and take a quantum leap into a new life filled with meaning and power.  In practice, this should result in your becoming happier, more insightful, understanding, tolerant, moral and spiritual. All that now remains is to apply this to your everyday life.

Taken with permission from www.jimmyhendersonbooks.blogspot.com

 

 

 

You & Universal Consciousness
By Keith Sherwood
    The goal of every human being alive today whether they can articulate it or not,  is to experience  union with  universal consciousness. Although this goal may appear to be illusive the simple fact is that everyone is in union with universal consciousness  regardless of  their physical, emotional, mental and-or spiritual condition. 
     Indeed, union with universal consciousness is not  something  that must be achieved through self-improvement or learned through a course of study. It is not reserved for the  elect or for those who believe in some special doctrine. Union with universal consciousness is a condition which  exists a priori in everyone including you. Though you may not be consciously aware of it  as you  progress spiritually  this unique relationship will grow until union with  universal consciousness becomes your moment to moment experience. Until then  it is important to  to  get  some idea of what  universal consciousness  is, how it functions and what union with universal consciousness would be like.
Who Is Universal Consciousness?
     Much has been written about  universal consciousness in Yogic, Tantric and Taoist  literature.  But it’s important to  note that universal consciousness is not  an object of knowledge and  has  no defining qualities.  So, a precise definition of the universal is impossible.
   Although a precise definition may be impossible what we do know is that  universal consciousness  is the source  of time-space  and the  consciousness,  energy and matter that fills it on  all worlds and dimensions. It is alive and aware and the source of  human life as well as the wellspring of bliss, joy and love  which animates it.
    Universal consciousness transcends the limits imposed by time-space as we experience it through the five senses. Thus, it  can never die nor is it subject to the rhythms of birth, life  and death. It never changes  and is not bound by the limitations imposed on the phenomenal universe by the processes of  evolution and involution, which compel everything to change.
    ‘The mandukya Upanishad’ calls universal consciousness ‘Santam Sivam, Adwaitam’ (Mand. UP. VII).  Universal consciousness is  peaceful,  blessed and  non-dual.  It is tranquil, infinite, and  complete.  It is intelligent and blissful.  Universal consciousness  is the impersonal absolute. It contains within itself all that has emerged  and therefore has no second’. 
      If you still don’t know exactly what universal consciousness is don’t dismay, you’re in good company because most  of the worlds sages, seers,  theologians and psychologists have had the same problem with universal consciousness as  you.  The truth is that it’s impossible to know the universal consciousness using the individual mind and ego as a tool because by identifying yourself as an individual you limit your perception to finite things. Indeed, what is finite and continually changing  cannot conceive of universal consciousness which  is eternal  and doesn’t change.
A metaphor of Reunion
    However, you can  get an idea of what  your relationship to universal consciousness would be like  once you experiences the benefits  of union,  by using a metaphor. 
     For a moment imagine that you’re  in a theater,  the sole  spectator  of  a movie  in which you star. Now, imagine that after a while  you became so engrossed in the film and the character you were playing  that you  forgot  you were in union with universal consciousness and  began to identify exclusively  with  the  part  you were playing  on the screen. Eventually, you might   become so immersed in  the thoughts, feelings and sensations elicited by the events and characters in the movie  that the movie  might become more real than the ‘real’ world.
         Now, imagine that after identifying with the character on the screen you once again remembered that the movie wasn’t real and you no longer  chose to identify with your character  and the thoughts  feelings and sensations  which supported it.  By withdrawing from the affect, the movie, and returning to the cause, universal consciousness you would once again remember who you really were. You would remember that you as well as the movie  and everything else   emerged from and remain part of universal consciousness. 
     Having recognized  the truth  you wouldn’t  become more spiritual in any real sense or  become a better person. You would  simply remember who you were.  And once again you would  experience your union with universal consciousness consciously and the benefits which include pleasure, love, intimacy and joy.
Find out more about Keith Sherwood on www.wholelove.com