Musings

Musings – No Title (4/26/21) While sitting with my 16-pound male tabby across my lap in the morning I thought about how our pets demand that we love them and how that benefits us. As we give them love, we are reminded that we have love to give. This makes us aware of the love that we are. If only we could see that every person who we have contact with is also asking for love. If we could only love each of them with the love that we show a pet. If only...

 Musings 2 – No Title (8/23/21)

Amy and I were at Kennywood on Wednesday, waiting in an S-shaped line for a ride on the Racer (a vintage roller coaster with 2 sets of cars that race each other). I asked Amy if she could identify with the concept of Oneness as we surveyed the diversity of ages, shapes, heights, gender, and color of the people around us. She responded that it was easy to feel Oneness with this group, since we were all there for the same purpose and anticipating the same experience. Perhaps this is the same experience that we have waiting to be born. We are waiting on the other side of the veil, waiting with our group of fellow travelers in anticipation of an adventure together. And as we start that adventure we race against each other, one group against the other and come up winners or losers by a fraction of a second. The experience of the journey being more important than the victory. And when we get off the ride, we hurry to get back in line to repeat that journey, just for the experience of it.

Musings 3 - Purr First (10/10/21)

Tigger, our large orange tabby has a loud purr. Every morning (almost), he brings his loud purr to us in bed and lays splayed across my chest, inviting us to stroke his chin, his head and his back until he has had his fill of love for the moment and saunters off. His actions remind me of Wayne Dyer's thoughts in "The Power of Intention." One of his suggestions in the first chapter is to "act as if anything you desire is already here...Treat yourself as if you already are what you would like to become." Tigger purrs before getting his loving strokes, not because of them. If we all learned to purr first, we would be happier more of the time we spend here on earth.

Musings 4 – Victor (10/18/21)

Yesterday, a year after the passing of Victor Tatum, a memorial service was held at the Edgewood Country Club to celebrate his life. It was a beautiful event. To be in a room full of love where the purpose of the event is to express the love that everyone in the room felt for one person is to experience the power and the energy of love. And how fitting since, as many of the speakers pointed out, Victor was the personification of love. No one used those exact words, but it was the meaning behind their words. The light that shone from his smile was a light that we all basked in. He was someone you wanted to be around, to share space with, just to have his light shine on you. He was a living example of the fact that we are created by love, we are love, and we return to Love. It is the energy that powers the universe. Thank you Victor for so freely sharing the love. Thank you Colleen for creating an event where we could all bask in that love for a few hours. A love that was and is and ever shall be.

More about Victor -

I was reading Wayne Dyer's, “The Power of Intention” this morning, about how to raise your energy vibration. One of his recommendations is to become conscious of the energy levels of your acquaintances, friends, and extended family. "You can raise your own energy levels by being in the energy field of others who resonate closely to spiritual consciousness. Choose to be in close proximity to people who are empowering...who feel connected to God, and who live a life that gives evidence that Spirit has found celebration through them...Stay in the energy field of higher-energy people and your anger, hate, fear and depression will melt--magically converting to the higher expressions of intention." Victor was one of those people.

Musings 5 – Untitled (11/18/21)

While visiting my brother in Anthem, AZ (near Phoenix) last week, I watched him play a video game (Conan Exiles, I think it was called) and got an education. I've never been into video games, although The Sims got my daughter Amanda through the early days of the Covid lockdown in NZ. It was one of those team player survival games. I watched as he and his two teammates provided each other with resources and battled the bad guys to the death. As each player learned from their mistakes and died only to be reborn and fight another day, rising to meet new challenges and proceed to higher levels of possibility. One could even commit suicide in order to be reborn at another place to gather additional resources and live a new life. It just dawned on me that my own beliefs about birth and death and reincarnation were being played out on his computer screen, including the importance of helping each other along the way as we follow our own paths toward Oneness with God. So now I see the attraction to such games and understand their value during times of seeming isolation.

Musings 6 - IF I WAS GOD THE CREATOR (11/22/21)

I'd look at all that I'd created with wonder and amusement: the colors in rainbows and flowers, in sunrise and sunset, in bird plumage and shades of human skin. This last bit of color creativity seems to be a problem for some parts of humanity. Those same humans who appreciate and marvel at rainbows and flowers, a sunrise or sunset, and the plumage on a male bird, create judgments based on skin color that have no place in the world I created. I don't ask that humans be color blind, that would be unnatural. I do wish that they would appreciate the variety of color in themselves as much as they do the rest of creation. I created humans in my image, so I know they are capable of such appreciation. I only ask that they behold my creation and pronounce it GOOD.

 Musings 7 - Black Friday (11/27/21)

Yesterday was Black Friday. I know that because it was the day that I spent time trying to get the black goo off the bottom of the pan that remained there as due of all the Thanksgiving cooking. Cooking and baking were basically "chemistry in the kitchen" as Amy pointed out to me. I happen to believe that the most important ingredient in the chemistry cooking mix is that spice known as love. Love is the energy that enhances the flavor of all that it touches, and this year's Thanksgiving meal overflowed with a cacophony of flavors that only love could provide. As I worked to remove the black love leavings stuck to the no-stick pan, my heart was warmed by these thoughts of the love chemistry that created the Thanksgiving experience that I am most grateful for. Thank you Adam Dove and Dominique Dove for hosting the Thanksgiving feast once again.

Musings 8 - Prisoners of our Perceptions (12/17/21)

Studying the 4th O Antiphon (Google it) in Adult Sunday School last Sunday with its focus on setting the prisoners free, I can't help but think that the numerous biblical references to freeing the prisoners are not about opening prison doors to let criminals roam the streets. These references are really about setting every one of us free from the prisons that we erect for ourselves to live and die in. And we have a lot of help constructing these prisons. These are the prisons of our perceptions.

Every one of us perceives the world from a unique perspective, and thus live in a slightly different world. Our prison walls of perspective are formed by our beliefs and our beliefs are shaped by the many influences of our childhood and adulthood. These include: parents, teachers, mentors, peers, colleagues, friends, advertising, books, television, and social media.

To be freed of this prison of our perception the O Antiphons herald the coming of Christ during Advent. What we are offered in the coming of the Christ is the key to unlocking our own prison, the prison of our own making, the prison that keeps us from knowing who and what we are. And what are we?

I believe that we are what Christ was here to show us. What He exemplified. We are eternal beings of Love and Light. Every one of us.

Musings 9 – Where do Prayers Go? (12/30/21)

When I was little, I always thought that my prayers went up.  Up to heaven.  Up to God.  And if God happened to be listening at the time that I prayed, then perhaps my prayers would be answered.  As I grew a little older, I understood that God might not answer my prayers if he was too busy or if my prayer was too insignificant.  A little older still, I understood that God's answer might not be to my liking or on my timetable.

Maturity led me to the understanding of praying across rather than praying up.  I liked the idea of praying directly toward the person I was praying for, rather than having a prayer have to go up and the answer then come back down.  No longer would I wait for a bearded old man in the sky to pick up the prayer line and respond - sometimes to my liking and sometimes not.

This praying across idea felt empowering.  I could send love and light and wishes for healing directly to those who I knew were in need and weighing heavily on my mind.  No, I wasn't trying to circumvent God.  I just began to see God differently.  God is Love.  I am made in the image of God.  I am Love.  The recent findings of Quantum Physics show that we are all made of energy and that we exist in a field of energy known as The Field by investigative journalist, Lynne McTaggart or the Devine Matrix by geologist, Gregg Braden or the Zero-Point field by most scientists.  Ever since Einstein's theory of relativity, we have been aware that solid matter is just a denser form of energy.

Scientists working in the realm of Quantum Physics have shown that our thoughts can affect others, that we can use our minds to heal ourselves, and that group prayer has the power to provide positive results.  As McTaggart summarizes the findings of the scientists she interviewed:  "A substructure underpins the universe that is essentially a recording medium of everything, providing a means for everything to communicate with everything else…People are indivisible from their environment.  Living consciousness is not an isolated entity…The consciousness of human beings has incredible powers, to heal ourselves, to heal the world – in a sense, to make it as we wish it to be."

Now, when I pray, I can picture the energy of love affecting the person I am sending the prayer to.  I do not pray for the result that I think is best for them, but rather for the result that will be for their highest good.  Picturing God as the universal creative force of Love allows me to work in conjunction with the will of God to help who I can by giving them my focused attention.  That is my intention when I pray.

Musings 10 – I See You (1/4/22)

Throughout 2021 Amy and I read the daily thoughts of poet, Mark Nepo in The Book of Awakening.  Each entry of the 365 is anywhere from 3-7 paragraphs long and followed by a mediation on the concepts focused on in the paragraph or an instruction to engage another person in a dialogue concerning those concepts.  The final entry, December 31, is titled: "I See You!  I Am Here!" and it focuses on the way that African Bushmen have greeted each other for centuries.

Nepo sees this as a "timeless bearing witness…both simple and profound" that "is telling that much of our modern therapeutic journey is suffered to this end: to have who we are and share where we've been be seen.  For with this simple and direct affirmation, it is possible to claim our own presence, to say, 'I am here'…For as stars need open space to be seen, as waves need shore to crest, as dew needs grass to soak into, our vitality depends on how we exclaim and rejoice, 'I See You!' 'I Am Here!'"

Is this not what Facebook and other social media have provided us during these COVID times?  A place to say, "I am here" and "I see you."

The subtitle to The Book of Awakening is: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.  It seemed altogether appropriate for him to end on this note since he states: "For with this simple and direct affirmation, it is possible to claim our own presence, to say, "I am here."  What an appropriate ending to the year we just left behind.

AMusings 11 – Fun Thoughts (1/4/22)

I woke up this morning with this thought in my head: two feet and one shoe were walking through the forest.  Nothing else.  Just "two feet and one shoe."  I felt compelled to do something with that.

Two feet and one shoe walk into a bar.  The bartender says to the right foot, "If the shoe fits, wear it."  The right foot tries on the shoe and it fits perfectly.  The left foot begins to sob uncontrollably.  The bartender says to the left foot, "Don't have a fit, they were made for each other."

Not so good.  I had to try another.  Two feet and one shoe walk into a bar, but the feet belong in a poem, so the shoe is left sitting alone.

This got me to thinking about where our thoughts come from.  So many random thoughts run through our heads every day.  What or who puts them there?  I know that I am not my thoughts. I choose to ignore most of them.  I guess I should have ignored this one about the two shoes too.  In considering the question of "who am I?" one thing I know is that I am not my thoughts.  My monkey mind throws too many at me daily and I discard the majority of them.  I also know that I am not my body, since there is an "I" that observes and makes judgments about it, separate from it.

This also got me thinking about fun and laughter.  If I am "the hands and feet of God" implementing God's will on earth, perhaps I can also be an expression of God's joy and laughter (or at least a chuckle).  Today's random thoughts.    

Musings 12 - Unity and Quantum Physics (1/7/22)

“…with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another through love, striving to preserve the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace…” (Eph 4:2, 3).

“I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me” (John 17: 20, 21).

These are just two of the many biblical examples of our unity with the Trinity: God, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Franciscan priest, Richard Rohr, in The Universal Christ put it this way:  "The essential Gospel of God's loving union with all of creation from the beginning was seldom believed – and usually actively denied or ignored by most clergy…Yet these very scriptures say that the "Word" was "from the beginning" (John 1:1) and that Word was always identified with "Christ" – which in time "became flesh and lived among us" (1:14).  St. Bonaventure believed that every creature is a word of God, and this was the first book of "the Bible."

Quantum Physics has caught up with this sense of the unity of all things, the oneness of the universe.  Rohr called it Christ Consciousness.  As I have mentioned before, Quantum Physics labels it The Field, The Divine Matrix, or the Zero Point Field.  Whatever you want to call it, our Christian faith and science have come together on the subject of Oneness.  You in me and I in you and we in the us of the trinity.

My new favorite book, Oneness, as received through Rasha, deals with this at length.  Amy and I are going to lead a study group that will discuss this fascinating book every Monday at 10 a.m. beginning January 10 over Zoom.  So far 12 people have asked to join the group, but there is room for more.  If you Google "onenesswebsite" you will see why we are feeling the need to discuss this book in depth.  Feel free to contact me if you are interested in joining us…Namaste.

AMusings 13 – Why Reiki? (1/22/22)

Once again, two feet and a shoe walk into a bar and the bartender says to the right foot, "If the shoe fits, wear it."  The shoe did fit.  And the right foot hopped out of the bar hoppy (ouch!).  The left foot looked at the bartender and said, "What about me?" and start to cry.  His sobs grew louder and louder.  The bartender said, "If you don't quiet down I'll have to do something drastic."  The sobs from the left foot just got louder, so the bartender reared back and gave him a sock.  The left foot put on the sock and hopped away happy.

And now to today's theme: "Why Reiki?"

Last October, at age 75, I became certified as a Reiki practitioner.  Some of you wondered why, at this stage of my life, would I do such a thing?  No, it wasn't to create a new revenue stream to supplement my social security.  I offer Reiki at no charge except for a donation to one of my favorite Rwandan nonprofits.

This is a personal journey into the depths of who we are as humans in a body that is more of an electromagnetic field than anything else.  Every cell in our bodies pulsates with energy.  Physics tells us that energy can be converted in form, but it can't be created or destroyed.  That means that all the energy that exists now, has existed from the beginning of time.  Everything is made of energy, the denser the energy the more solid the form.

The cells in our bodies conduct electrical currents.  Electricity is required for the nervous system to send signals throughout the body and to the brain, making it possible for us to think, move and feel.  The electricity is generated through the elements in our bodies, like sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium, which have a specific electrical charge.  Most of our cells are able to use these charged elements (ions) to generate electricity.

A disruption in electrical currents can lead to illness.  Consider modern medicine's use of EKGs, EEGs and MRIs to diagnose potential heart attacks, epilepsy and other major health problems.  Scientists have found that the body is an oscillator (a circuit which produces a continuous, repeated, alternating waveform without any input) that vibrates at a measurable rate of 7 Hz and that our atoms vibrate at a much higher rate of 10 quadrillion Hz, a frequency that is too high to measure.  So what does all of the have to do with Reiki?

Through my recent readings and training, I have discovered that we all have the capability of healing each other and ourselves by channeling the energy that is all around us and focusing it on the energy centers within the body (chakras).  Given this possibility and capability, I felt called to do energy healing.  What better way to love thy neighbor than to offer healing to anyone who seeks it?

Musings 14 - Opportunities to show love (2/4/2022)

Last week, after the Fern Hollow Bridge collapse, my church at the corner of Forbes and Braddock opened its doors 24/7 to allow emergency personnel access to warmth, food, and restrooms while keeping the public safe. Members of the church stepped up to prepare and deliver food and take 2-hour shifts at the church to keep the doors open and welcoming. Our pastor described this as an opportunity for the church to fulfill its function in the community as an expression of love for each other.

This got me to thinking about the natural inclination of humanity to respond to major crises with love as expressed by the outpouring of prayers, food, clothing and financial aid sent to flood, fire and famine areas around the world from people who have no obvious connection to those impacted by tragedy. There is something deep within every one of us that understands that we are all connected, that at some deeper level what impacts one of us, impacts all of us.

Crises provide opportunities for us to show love on a grand scale, but these opportunities also abound in our everyday lives, in our daily interactions with each other. Showing love and compassion for our neighbors; for the checkout person at the grocery store; for the wait staff at the restaurant; for the drivers on the roads we travel, for the beggar on the street corner; or the parents of the screaming child on our plane. We have it within our power to smile, show patience, share a compliment, and make their day a little brighter.

 Musings 15 – Thinking with Your Heart (2-27-22)

"Le cœur a ses raisons que la raison ne connaît point."  Loosely translated, this quote from Pascal means " the heart has its reasons, which reason knows nothing of."  I learned this many years ago in a high school French class and never forgot it.  Just one of those obscure tidbits from school that sticks with you because; well because the heart has its reasons, which reason knows nothing of.

Recent work done by the Heartmath Institute (founded in 1991, see www.heartmath.org) shows that the heart communicates with the brain in 4 major ways: 1) neurologically through the transmission of nerve impulses, 2) biochemically via hormones and neurotransmitters, 3) biophysically through pressure waves, and 4) through electromagnetic field interactions.  "The heart is, in fact, a highly complex,self-organized information processing center with its own functional 'brain' that communicates with and influences the brain…"  "The hearts nervous system contains about 40,000 neurons, called sensory neurites."

So the heart sends messages to the brain that may influence perception, decision making and other cognitive processes.  I think that this is something that most of us have known, intuitively, but now science is proving what we already knew and showing us how it all works.  I was listening to Greg Braden on You Tube last week and he was discussing the importance of the work being done by the Heartmath Institute in this area of the heart-brain connection with suggestions for applications that might benefit us. More about that in the next installment of Musings.

Musings 16 – Achieving Inner Peace (3-5-22)

As promised, some things you can do to make your life calmer using HeartMath Institute suggestions based on research. 

Making coherent, heartfelt connections enhances harmonious relationships within families, teams, groups or organizations. This harmony creates coherent energetic field environments and has a positive, uplifting effect on social behaviors and interactions. It helps us feel better, safer and more comfortable, resulting in increased flow and energy efficiency in our communication.

Here is one example:

HeartMath’s Heart-Focused Breathing® Technique can guide you to a state of ease in just a few minutes.  The technique is as powerful as it is simple and can be used anytime you want to create greater relaxation or more energy. Heart-Focused Breathing™ Technique:

1.         Heart Focus: Focus your attention on your heart area. Breathe a little deeper than normal, in for 5 or 6 seconds and out 5 or 6 seconds. You may find that placing your hand over your heart helps you maintain your focus there.

2.         Heart Breathing: Now imagine while breathing that you’re doing it through your heart. Picture yourself slowly breathing in and slowly breathing out through your heart area.

(Maintaining your focus and breathing through the heart area leads you naturally into a state of ease. When you’re ready to proceed with the rest of your day, you’ll do so with more energy and resilience for future challenges.)     

The scientific term for this simple and quick tool is psychophysiological coherence:

"Coherence is the state when the heart, mind and emotions are in energetic alignment and cooperation," according to HeartMath Institute Research Director Dr. Rollin McCraty. "When the physiological coherence mode is driven by a positive emotional state, we call it psychophysiological coherence."

Those who’ve practiced Heart-Focused Breathing through the years say they have experienced: a sense of being uplifted and alive; more peaceful and less rushed in their busy lives; a deeper heart connection within and with others.

Musings 17 – Selfish Service to God (3-19-22)

Amy and I belong to a weekly book study group that is discussing A Course of Love on Wednesday nights.  The following quote was a recent topic of discussion:

Life is service to God.  God is service to life.  You are God in life.  Thus, you are both life and service to life, both God and service to God.  All of the vast universe was created the same: to live and to serve life, to be of God and to be service to God.  To be served and to serve.  To be provided for and to provide.  To have needs met and to meet needs.  This circular nature of the universe leaves no one unattended.  Yet you realize this not.

I was struck by how profound and yet simple the message of this paragraph was.  Is there blasphemy in this message?  I think not.  "You are God in life," holds the same Christian truth as: "You are the hands and feet of God."  To be "both God and service to God" as well as "to be of God," are in alignment with being made in God's image and being infused with the Holy Spirit.  We are here on this earth to serve each other and God; to give and receive; to be in relationship with each other and in relationship with God.  And that relationship is much more intimate than we could ever imagine.

Musings 18 – I will not cry for Reg          (3-22-2022)

I received word from my son-in-law, Chris, in New Zealand this morning that Reg Charlton passed away peacefully.  I will not cry for Reg. 

When I learned last December that he had terminal cancer, he was already under Hospice care.  With him in New Zealand and me in Pennsylvania, I did the only thing I could do: I emailed him words of comfort and love and sent him distance Reiki energy and prayers.  I had only met Reg in person 3 or 4 times in this lifetime, during the two trips that Amy and I have made to New Zealand, but Reg and I had recognized each other immediately as having been together in other lifetimes.

Some of his thoughts from our final emails:

" I thank my trillions of cells for the tireless work they do for me, and send them Love & Light. I also give thanks for being part of this incredible universe. I aim to be positive each day, though sometimes I do get annoyed with myself."

"I believe that when it’s time to go, that’s it, so although I do self-healing, I know it will help, however if it’s my time to go, so be it."

Reg knew that he was not his body, but a soul spirit having an experience in a body.  If you ever met him, you knew that he lived life to the fullest.  He brought joy to everyone around him, even with his sometimes lame dad jokes you had to laugh at the effort.  In homage to Reg, I tried one on Amy this morning.  We were making the bed together, as we do most mornings and she pointed to the corner of the bed closest to me.  I feigned ignorance, so she said, "Pull it," and I said, "There aren't any chickens here."  (That one's for you Reg.)

Beside me now, I have a framed photograph of my son-in-law's family around a table in a restaurant on the occasion of his mother's birthday.  Reg is in his blue Hawaiian shirt lifting a glass of wine and smiling that merry prankster smile of his that always made me feel his joy.  I will not cry for Reg.

Last week I was watching a YouTube video of a spiritual leader in dialogue with someone who was coming from a place of despair and hopelessness as he recited a litany of the horrors that humans perpetrated on each other and on the planet.  The spiritual leader was in agreement with his facts, but explained why there was reason for hope for humanity and for the planet.  He wasn't having any of it.  When I turned off the television, I sobbed uncontrollably for 5 minutes.  But, I will not cry for Reg.

This morning I finished reading "In Search of the Mother Tree" by Suzanne Simard.  I cried for the ecosystem and the forest and for the devastating effects of climate change.  But I will not cry for Reg.  If you see my tears, they are for the world he left behind.  A world that is a better place for him having been in it.

Reg, I'll see you next time around.

Musings 19 - Spiritual Discipline During Lent and Beyond (4-4-2-22)

This from Mama Arlene at Urukundo Village in Rwanda:

I am not into fasting. Nevertheless, I do believe truly in these fasting. Think about them, please. This has been widely circulated on the Internet; some attribute it to Pope Francis.

Fast from hurting words – and say kind words.

Fast from sadness – and be filled with gratitude.

Fast from anger – and be filled with patience.

Fast from pessimism – and be filled with hope.

Fast from worries – and trust in God.

Fast from complaints – and contemplate simplicity.

Fast from pressure – and be prayerful.

Fast from bitterness – and fill your heart with joy.

Fast from selfishness – and be compassionate.

Fast from grudges – and be reconciled.

Fast from words – be silent and listen.

 Our adult group at Waverly began a Lenten series on Spiritual Disciplines a few weeks ago.  The first to be addressed was the discipline of Fasting, a concept that doesn't usually resonate with me as with Mama Arlene.  I decided to give up chocolate for Lent to as a way to practice spiritual discipline, using the time of each desire for chocolate to refocus that desire onto matters of spirit and thoughts of appreciation and love.  This choice reminded me that life is about our choices and that we create our lives through our choices.  Science has shown that 90-95% of our daily lives are governed by our subconscious minds full of conditioned responses and habitual patterns.  Our autonomic nervous system kicks in and we operate on automatic pilot most days and wonder at the end of the day where the time went.

I found that making one conscious choice to give up habitually reaching for chocolate le”d me to awareness of other things that I did during the day without thinking. This led to a greater awareness of how I was using my time, which led to some other changes based on more conscious choices.   This small change that resulted in some bigger changes is part of what some are now calling "mindfulness."  Dr. Joe Dispenza, in his book You Are the Placebo; Making Your Mind Matter,” takes the reader through the process of how all this works scientifically, and then provides numerous examples of many people who have healed themselves using nothing but their own thoughts.  He then provides readers with the keys to self-healing.

It amazes me what we humans are capable of if we just apply our minds to something.  It boggles the mind.

Musings 20 – Liminal (4-7-2022)

Yeah, it was a new word for me too.  I was familiar with subliminal, as in "existing or functioning below the threshold of consciousness" (Webster)

Liminal is a more intriguing word for me than subliminal.  Webster's has it as: 1. of or relating to a sensory threshold 2. barely perceptible.  While Oxford Languages has: 1. relating to a transitional or initial stage of a process 2. occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold.

In anthropology, liminality is the quality of ambiguity or disorientation that occurs in the middle stage of a rite of passage, when participants no longer hold their pre-ritual status but have not yet begun the transition to the status they will hold when the rite is complete. Wikipedia

I ran into this word while in a book study group for "The Pilgrim's Compass; Finding and Following the God We Seek," by Paul H. Lang.  In it he says: "Because the discipline of pilgrimage often aims to bring us to a liminal state, it is essential that we regularly cross the threshold of our home life and pass into the broader world where we can become disentangled from the many ways that we typically define ourselves and are set free to consider seeing ourselves simply as God's beloved children."

This got me to thinking about our two years of COVID homebound living and how, for many, it may feel like that disorientation that is leading us through a rite of passage where we are no longer living in the world of pre-COVID days, but we have yet to begin the transition to the status we will hold when the rite is complete.  I know that I have been devouring numerous scientific and spiritual books, and engaging in virtual discussion groups that are helping me with that transition.  Not sure how other folks are dealing with it beyond those I have encountered within these study groups.

For me, "liminal" pretty much defines the last couple of years and we should consider making it the word of the hour (or decade) since it sums up the current state of humanity.  We are in the midst of a transition and we seem to be gaining momentum toward a future that feels full of uncertainty.  It seems that the best we can do is to find our inner compass, the guidance system that will serve us well no matter what the future holds.

Musings 21 – Epigenetics (April 8, 2022)

Another new word I've added to my vocabulary, obviously related to genetics.  It means "above the gene" and refers to the control of genes by messages coming from outside the cell rather than from within the DNA itself.  "Epigenetics teaches that we, indeed, are not doomed by our genes and that a change in human consciousness can produce physical changes, both in structure and function, in the human body.  We can modify our genetic destiny by turning on the genes we want and turning off the ones we don't want through working with the various factors in the environment that program our genes."  I learned about this reading "You Are the Placebo; making your mind matter," by Dr. Joe Dispenza (mentioned in Musings 19).

The Human Epigenome Project, began in Europe in 2003 just as the Human Genome Project was winding down.  Researchers are excited because, "…though our DNA code never changes, thousands of combinations, sequences, and patterned variations in a single gene are possible."  The author concludes that genes are, "…providers of possibility, resources of unlimited potential, a code system of personal commands – in truth, they're nothing short of tools for transformation…"

I was discussing the Placebo Effect with a retired Navy nurse this week.  She told me that one of her illustrations of that was contained in a situation where a patient was in obvious pain.  He was yelling for more pain medication, but his chart showed that he wasn't scheduled for more pain meds to be given for another 3 hours.  He was, however, scheduled to receive a shot of penicillin. As she put the needle in his arm, she told him that it contained his pain medication.  He instantly stopped yelling and all his pain went away.  His mind turned off the pain by sending a signal to his genes.

Just as the word "liminal" makes me think of the need to find an inner compass to navigate an uncertain future, the word "epigenetics" offers me hope that I can adapt to any environmental changes thrown my way.  If we can use our minds to turn some genes on and some genes off and provide commands to our genes, then we are truly capable of maintaining perfect health under any circumstances.  All we need do is train our minds.

Musings 22 – Victor's Jacket (April 22, 2022)

I was raised as the youngest of three brothers.  There were also two sisters in the mix.  Having two older brothers meant never having new clothes, other than socks and underwear.  I could always count on Christmas and my birthday as socks and underwear events.  Somehow, I've carried that tradition into old age, requesting socks and underwear as gifts when asked what I wanted that year.  This history of wearing hand-me-down clothes has provided me with a certain comfort when purchasing clothes from Goodwill and other thrift shops, not only during my college years, but throughout my life.  An Eddie Bauer shirt from Goodwill lasts longer and is still in fashion years after store bought cheaper brands are out of style or worn thin. 

Lee Child's Jack Reacher and the sustainability movement has made thrift store clothes more of a popular fashion statement these days.  My favorite hand-me-down did not come from a thrift shop, however.  As I write these words, I am sitting in my pajamas with Victor's jacket over top of them.

Victor was a good friend who transitioned from his physical form over two years ago.  His wife, Colleen, was preparing to give his clothes and other items to Goodwill in preparation for a move a couple of months ago.  Colleen offered Victor's jacket to Amy to give to me, as she and friend Mary were helping Colleen to determine the disposition of a variety of items.  I had always appreciated Victor's fashion sense, although it may have been more a reflection of Colleen's taste than his own.

Wearing this jacket makes me feel closer to Victor.  Somehow wrapped in his love beyond his physical death.  I have read that when we touch someone we leave some of our DNA behind on the other person and that our DNA has an effect on their DNA.  I can imagine that some of Victor's DNA left on the inside of this jacket is in contact with my DNA.  Whatever the reality, I feel loved by this jacket, and I love it in return.  I remember Victor every time I put it on.  Thanks to the continuing cool weather in Pittsburgh, that has been almost daily for the past two months.

Musings 23 – Community Energy (4/28/2022)

Last Sunday was a great day for a community event.  Eighty-three degrees and sunny, with low humidity and no more mask mandates.  The 13th annual Chili Cook Off had returned after a 2-year hiatus and the Rotary Club of Forest Hills was ready to bring everyone together for a good time.  The result was fantastic.  The crowd was larger than ever and you could feel the positive energy as families and individuals who hadn't seen each other for a while laughed and joked and got caught up with two years of live events.  This got me to think about community energy.

The Heart Math Institute offered this recently:

"Did you know our thoughts, attitudes and emotions emit energetic fields, creating field environments that affect our perspective, relationships and others’ environments?  The good news is we can positively change our individual and social field environments with attitudes of genuine love, appreciation, care and compassion, which moves us into coherence.  Coherence is a highly efficient state in which all of the body’s systems work together in harmony. Increasing personal coherence creates an alignment of mind, body, emotions and spirit through the power of the heart."

The Heart Math Institute (HMI) calls the field generated by the heart the electromagnetic field.  "It is the most powerful rhythmic energy field produced by the body as it becomes more organized during positive emotional – heart-coherent – states. So it’s within all of our power to create the field environment we desire."  Studies conducted in HMI’s laboratory have shown that the heart’s electromagnetic field can be detected by other individuals and can produce measurable effects in a person several feet away.

What I witnessed at this community event was an environment of positive emotional energy multiplied by the many people who were present.  So much positive energy that people stayed much longer than they intended and some people who had to leave, due to additional commitments, told me later that they had wanted to stay longer.  It's what happens when you feel the energy of love that is all around us, just waiting for us to tap into it.

Some churches are able to help us tap into it, Waverly is one of them.  Some organizations help us tap into it; Rotary is one of them.  Some nonprofits tap into them, The Cancer Bridges (formerly Our House, formerly Gilda's Club) and Now Creations are both able to do this.  I have been blessed with having all of these in my life.  As individuals we have the power to help create these communities wherever we go, with whomever we choose to interact.  It's our superpower!

Musings 24 - War and Peace (5/13/2022)

Lysistrata, a comedy by Aristophanes, was supposedly first performed in Athens in 411 B.C. It is a comic account of a woman's mission to end the Peloponnesian War between Greek city states by organizing women to deny all the men of the land any sex.  I recall seeing it performed when I was an undergraduate at Pitt back in the '60's.  Back then many of us demonstrated against the war in Vietnam and many of my friends never returned from that war.  I was one of the lucky ones.  I was sent to Korea to serve my tour of duty.

World peace has probably been a longing for much of humanity since the first time men went to war.  Every Miss America has asked for it.  Every church congregation has prayed for it.  Every mother, wife, and lover has wished for it.  During the last two presidential campaigns there was even talk of establishing a cabinet level Department of Peace.  That idea never gained traction.

When we look at wars currently in progress around the globe: there are 5 major wars (those exceeding 10,000 combat deaths in the current or past year); 18 additional wars (those exceeding 1,000 combat deaths but less than 10,000) and 20 minor conflicts (exceeding 100 but less than 1,000 violent deaths).  That's a lot of carnage.  A lot of wives and mothers and lovers crying out in pain. And yes, men grieve too. Somehow the carnage in our own backyard, Mexico, had escape my notice.  Since 2006 there have been over 62,000 fatalities at the hands for the drug cartels in Mexico with around 10,000 in the last year and a half.

In the U.S., we tend to highlight one war at a time, just so we don't lose focus.  Ukraine is in our sights right now, so we can pretty much look away from all the other wars.  Perhaps it is time to look at our own individual responsibility concerning war, before we consider how we might contribute to peace.

Consider this as a possibility: "In truth all are responsible, energetically, for co-creating global conflict.  And all are capable of making a measurable difference in the efforts toward world peace, by taking responsibility for the energy projected in every encounter with every fellow being with whom one shares the adventure known as 'life'." (from "Oneness" by Rasha.)  You see, we are all connected (as proven by quantum physics) and what affects one of us affects all of us (think gas prices).  Instantaneous mass communication has given us a strong sense of how we are all connected and how we all share in the responsibility for conflict as well as conflict resolution.

For each one of us to stop contributing to global conflict that we have collectively co-created, we must individually halt our penchant for needing to be right, needing to be victorious, needing to be in control.  We must stop verbally and physically attacking those with whom we disagree and just allow for differences in opinion and perspective.  We either individually; by thought, word, and deed, contribute to the energy of conflict or the energy of peace.  If enough of us focus our intention and attention on peace and withdraw from our need to engage in or contribute to conflict, perhaps we can undo what we have co-created and instead co-create world peace. 

Musings 25 – A Walk in the Park (6/15/2022)

This morning's Qigong class was held outside at Westinghouse park lodge, with clover under our feet, tree branches overhead and bird songs in the air.  Adding to this sylvan scene was a young deer that decided to graze a few feet behind our instructor during most of the class.  The setting was reminiscent of Sunday morning, the first time Amy and I played hooky from church in a long time.

Last Sunday, Amy and I attended a workshop in the woods at Beechwood Farms Nature Reserve near Hartwood Acres.  Promoted as an "Introduction to the Art of Plant Communication," the workshop was led by a friend and we anticipated an instructive and relaxed communing with nature.  When we arrived we received a text from my son and daughter-in-law with a photo of the opening slide on the screen at church.  It read: "Those who read the pages of nature ascend to higher plateaus of insight and awareness of the creator" – Maria Paige Vosacek.  So maybe we didn't miss church after all.

Without providing every detail of the workshop I will say that I learned a lot and was able to communicate with some fungi that called to me.  When we consider that we have a symbiotic relationship with most plants as they provide us with oxygen and we provide them with carbon dioxide so that our breath and their breath complement each other and that your houseplants thrive when we talk to them, there is much to explore about plant communication.  Beyond that, I recently finished reading "Finding the Mother Tree; Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest," which provided me with insights into the important role that fungi play in keeping our forests healthy and happy.  So yes, I decided to communicate with a cluster of mushrooms that appeared to be dancing under a tall maple tree.

Before you question my sanity, consider this: new research by a computer scientist, Andrew Adamatzky from the University of the West of England, suggests that fungi have an electrical "language" all of its own.  According to the study, fungi might even use "words" to form "sentences" to communicate with neighbors. (see Discover Magazine, April 13, 2022) Using tiny electrodes, Adamatzky recorded the rhythmic electrical impulses transmitted across the mycelium of four different species of fungi.  The impulses varied by amplitude, frequency and duration.  He suggests that they form the basis of a fungal language similar to English and Swedish comprising of up to 50 words organized into sentences.

So what was communicated to me by this group of mushrooms was that they worked together to provide support for the tree that I was sitting under.  They were sharing love and interconnectedness in the giving and receiving of gifts, from the smallest to the tallest.  And they were happy to share their tree with me and happy that I took the time to notice their efforts.

If God is in everything, then there is no reason why the God in Me cannot see the God in plants, even fungi.

Musings 26 – Cities of Cloud and Earth FIFTH CLASS (6/23/2022)

I don't read romance fiction.  In fact, I've read few fiction novels of any genre during the past three years.  Nonfiction has been my passion for a while now.  Also, I'm not much interested in reading dystopian fantasies.  Yet I just finished reading, in three days, the above titled novel.  It is a dystopian fantasy-romance spicy (X rated) novel that is quite the page turner.  It's the author's first novel, with two more to follow in this gripping trilogy.  However, it does not read like a first novel.  It is well crafted with character and plot development that keeps the tension mounting and the action moving through short chapters that make you want to read more to find out what happens next.  It's been described as a great beach read, but its structure makes it just as easily read on the bus or the subway (short, punchy chapters).

So why did I pick this up?  Why did I order six copies on Amazon the first week it was published?  Amy actually finished it on our Kindle before it arrived in paperback form.  The author is A. Jane Dove.  You guessed it.  Daughter, Amanda's first published novel.  She timed it to drop on her birthday, June 13.  With 74 copies already sold, and Amazon Prime Unlimited readers as far away as the U.K., Australia, and Germany flipping pages, she's flying high right now.

How much credit do we get to take for the achievements of our children?  Are we proud of them because we think that their achievements reflect well on us or can we just happy for them?  I take no credit for Amanda's novels or Adam's short stories.  I do appreciate reading their works, since I like both of their writing styles, which are very different and different from my own.  I do believe that we choose our parents, and in this case they chose parents who are readers and writers.  No, I don't believe I can take any credit for their achievements.  Their successes belong to them and them alone.  But, boy am I happy for Amanda right now!

Musings 27 – It Called To Me (7/1/2022)

I took an early walk around Edgewood this morning, due to the forecast of 91 degrees and high humidity for later in the day.  Not a long walk.  1.8 miles or around 5,000 steps according to my iphone activity tracker.  Just after stopping to talk with a friendly stranger who was walking Drago on a short leash and patting Drago on the head after I let him sniff my hand, I noticed one of those Little Free Libraries next to the sidewalk.  Anytime I pass one of these libraries, and they seem to be popping up everywhere, my curiosity gets the best of me and I have to see what titles are being offered.  Many of them seem to specialize in one particular genre, reflecting the taste of their owners or their children, while others are purely eclectic, perhaps due to the take one – give one nature of that particular spot.

I’m currently in the midst of three books; two I’ll finish soon and one that I just started 30 minutes before setting out on this walk.  Needless to say, I wasn’t looking for another read just yet, but there it was calling me.  John Milton’s “Paradise Lost” is an epic poem that is required reading at the university level and for many an AP English class in high school.  It’s been a good 50+ years since I picked it up.  The beauty of revisiting something we read because we had to at a time when we can just read it for enjoyment is that we bring a different perspective to it and it suddenly becomes something totally different; it takes us to places we failed to go with it the first time.

From the pages of "Paradise Lost" –

Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit

Of the forbidden tree, whose mortal taste

Brought death into the world, and all our woe,

With loss of Eden, till one greater Man

Restore us, and regain the blissful seat,

Sing heavenly Muse.

And

The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.

And so it calls to me again.

Musings 28 – The Sixth Mass Extinction (7/7/2022)

Coming to a planet near you.  WARNING: the following contains graphic violence and a fear factor of 10+.

I feel the need to include that warning because, if you are anything like me, you try to limit your intake of negative, violent, anxiety, and stress producing news and information during the day and eliminate it totally near bedtime.  We seem to be under a constant barrage from fear producing media, whether it's messages from politicians trying to manipulate us, advertisers trying to get us to buy something, 24-hour news stations fighting for our attention, or big pharma trying to convince us that we are going to die or suffer from the latest problem they have just named and created a pill for.

There's so much to fear and our bodies, minds and spirits can only take so much of this before they begin to break down.  Recent discoveries by cell biologists and bio-physicists have revealed that cells communicate with each other using frequencies of light; and that, when a cell does not emit enough organized and coherent electromagnetic energy, that cell becomes unhealthy; it's not able to share information with other cells very well and doesn't get what it needs.  Fear causes major issues for cell communication.

If stress hormones are constantly pumping through your cells, helping you to be at the ready to fight, flee or freeze, they cause incoherence in the brain.  When your brain is not working right, you make decisions that are not in your best interest and not for your highest good.  Another way to look at this is that when you are operating from a place of fear, your autonomic nervous system directs your heart to pump more blood to your extremities and less to your brain.  Your extremities need the extra push to fight or flee, but with little blood going to the brain, you aren't thinking very clearly and become vulnerable to suggestion and manipulation.

I do not want to add to your fears and I certainly do not want to create additional stress and anxiety in your life, but I do hope to convince you of the need to change some behaviors in ways that will help all of us.  Patricia DeMarco's book: "Pathways to Our Sustainable Future; A Global Perspective from Pittsburgh," provides a direction for us to follow to create a world with clean air and water, fertile soil and a world where people can thrive.  She warns us of the dangers of our current actions that contribute to climate change and environmental pollution, but then offers solutions.  I highly recommend this book and her blog.  She is a voice worth listening to.  See patriciademarco.com.  I hope to provide you with a wakeup call in Musings 29 with some suggested solutions ala my friend and fellow Rotarian, Patty DeMarco.

So, you've been warned.  Read Musings 29 from a place of peace and coherence and you will be okay.  Otherwise just skip it.  You don't need the added stress.  To find that place of coherence, where the mind and the heart are in sync, the Heartmath Institute suggests that you place your hand on your heart and take three deep breaths while thinking of things that you are grateful for.  This practice should bring you to a place of internal peace that will allow your nervous system to handle most anything life throws at you.

 Musings 29 – Sixth Mass Extinction Part 2 (7/14/2022)

This is just one reason why I'm focused on reducing my carbon footprint and my use of plastics when possible.  Here's the scoop on something that scientists have been warning us about for the past 15 years or so. 

According to PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) The ongoing sixth mass extinction is more than likely the most serious environmental threat to the persistence of civilization, because it is irreversible. Thousands of populations of critically endangered species have been lost in a century, pointing to the fact that the sixth mass extinction is human caused and accelerating. The acceleration of the extinction crisis is predictable because of the constant growth in the human population and human consumption rates. Since species are integral parts of ecosystems, and, as they fall out, the species they interact with are likely to go also. In the regions where disappearing species are concentrated, regional biodiversity collapses. Thus, the extreme urgency of taking coordinated intentional global actions to save our crucial life-support systems.

The first five mass extinctions occurred 443, 374, 250, 200, and 65 million years ago and we lost anywhere from 75% to 95% of all species that existed at the time.  The current extinction crisis is linked to the toxification and climate crises and it poses an immediate existential threat to civilization. Its magnitude and likely impacts on human well-being are largely unexplored by governments, the private sector, and civil society because there seems to be little political will to address the issue.

It is a moral imperative for scientists and the rest of us to take whatever actions we can to stop extinction. For example, in relation to all under 5,000s species, they should be immediately classified as critically endangered. Among the possible actions, a global comprehensive binding agreement is required to address the extinction crisis, including tackling the legal and illegal trade in wild species. Research shows that if we change the way we use natural resources right now, the future could be a lot more positive.  Steps we can take right now include: reducing our impact on climate change, prioritizing the protection and preservation of nature over the interests of financial systems, pressuring policy makers, and creating an international effort to transform our values, behaviors and attitudes.

What a self-destructive species we are.  Even though we are aware of the problem, and have been for some time, we continue along a path that is leading to our own extinction.  The suggestion that we create an international effort to transform our values, behaviors and attitudes is not as farfetched as it seems, in fact it is underway on many fronts right now.  The next Musings will provide some background on these efforts.

Musings 30 – Praying is taking action (7-24-2022)

I used to be one of those prayer skeptics, who agreed with those who said, "When all else fails, try prayer."  Basically, feeling that take every action possible first, then when you give up, ask God for help, knowing that you can't really rely on a response, but it might make you feel a little better.  I now know differently and tend to rely on setting an intention during a meditation and praying before trying anything else because this produces two benefits.  The first is that the best action for me to take next will often come to me during this process, so I go forward with the knowledge that I am proceeding in the best possible way for the highest good of all concerned.  The second benefit is that I am sending loving energy toward the person or situation and that energy can only benefit those involved.

Before you scoff at this idea, let me introduce you to the science behind my comments.  The science comes from the discoveries of Quantum Physics during the past 50 years and authors such as Gregg Braden, Dr. Joe Dispenza, Dr. Sue Morter, Dr. Bruce Lipton, Lynne McTaggart, Dr. Gary Schwartz, and Dr. Linda Russek, among others, who have successfully explained the science to the average reader (me). I'm not going to try to explain the science here, it would take more time than you have right now.  I will try to summarize the salient points, however.

1.      There is no such thing as an observer.  Our act of observing something changes that something.  Thus, we are a participator in that which we observe.

2.     We participate in creation.  We don't just pass through that which has already been created.

3.     The universe is a single unified system of nature, connected in ways that aren't always obvious.

4.     The universe is unfinished and constantly responding to consciousness.

5.     We are all connected by the quantum field, the Divine Matrix, or just "the field," as it has been called.  A field of energy that connects all of creation.

6.     We are a part of this field, as is everything else and we can communicate with it through our consciousness and the language of consciousness is our emotions.

7.     Recognizing that our feelings are the instructions that program this field, we can hone our skills to bring joy, healing and peace to our lives and to others.

8.     You are made of the same energy as everything in the universe and therefore connected to it all.  You are both energy and matter.  Think about Einstein's famous equation.

There is much more, but the point is that when we focus our intentions with positive emotions like compassion, gratitude, love, and peace toward a person or event through prayer, that energy is conveyed through an energy field and has an impact on the object of our intention.  More than 50 demonstration projects and 23 peer-reviewed scientific studies scrutinized by independent scholars around the world have revealed positive effects of peace-gathering projects.  These projects involve a group of people coming together with the specific intention to produce an outcome without physically doing anything.  It has been shown that measurable outcomes like a consistent 70% or more reduction in crime rates, episodes of warfare and/or terrorism has resulted from these efforts during the time of the project.

My point is, prayer with intention works.  Perhaps not in the way that we might hope sometimes, but it does have positive effects on the person praying as well as on the person receiving the positive energy being sent by that person.  If you are interested in adding your prayer energy to the energy of others to work on world peace you might consider joining Humanity's Team (humanitysteam.org), Project Coherence (www.drjoedispenza.com) the Association for Research and Enlightenment (edgarcayce.org), Now Creations (nowcreations.org), The World Peace Prayer Society (https://www.goipeace.org.jp), the Ananda community, the Heartmath Institute (HMI), The Foundation for Inner Peace, The Shift Network, the Institute for Noetic Sciences (IONS), Gaia, or your local church, to name a few.

There are many actors out there working toward creating chaos in the world right now, but there is a counter-balancing set of like-minded people working toward coherence and peace.  You are not a helpless victim, but a powerful creator and prayer is one of the creative tools at your disposal.

Musings 31 – The Power of Knowing the Answer to: "Who Am I?" (7/26/2022)

Have you ever taken the time to answer the question: "Who Am I?"  If so, have you done it recently?  I know that I asked that question when I was in a college philosophy course as an undergrad and again as a PhD student, but a lot of time passed before I did it again.  The answer changes over time, but I think that I have finally nailed down the eternal me that doesn't change.

Two books that I have recently been immersed in:  "You Can Heal Your Life," by Louise Hay and "I Am; The Power of Discovering Who You Really Are," by Howard Falco, dig deep into the importance of our answers to this question and how it effects the way that we live our lives.  Both authors point out that we live and make decisions from our belief about who we are. 

A prime example from my own life was something that happened when I was in grade school.  When I was in 4th grade, we lived in Squirrel Hill and I attended Linden School.  I was pretty much an average student who got mostly "C" grades and who kept his head down and was socially shy.  That summer we moved to Plum Borough, a very rural school district at the time and almost a year behind Linden school in their curriculum.  Suddenly I was one of the smartest kids in the 5th grade, getting all "A" grades and often recognized for my work by the teacher.  I became a friend of the "in crowd" and socially acceptable to all.  My self-esteem soared, and by the time I reached high school, I was junior class president.  What a difference a move made.  That shift in my belief in who I AM has made a major difference in my life.

We have been on the road to self-discovery our entire lives whether consciously or not.  To make it a conscious effort we could begin with some I AM statements, just to play around with the concept.  One choice might be statements like: I AM a victim of circumstances; I AM ugly; I AM a loser; I AM destined to failure; I AM poor; I AM fat; I AM powerless; I AM not entitled to happiness; I AM stupid; I AM unworthy of living the life I want; I AM not loveable.  Another set of choices might be:  I AM capable; I AM fearless; I AM a joy to be around; I AM a problem solver; I AM a good friend; I AM loveable; I AM compassionate.  You get the idea.  How you define yourself is what you live into.  Your beliefs about yourself tend to structure the life you lead and if you want to change your life you need to start with changing some of those beliefs.

This is another superpower that you have.  The power to change what you believe about yourself.  Once you change some of those beliefs, you will see that the people closest to you will begin to change their beliefs about you too.  Suddenly you may become a role model for empowering others to change their beliefs.  Try it.  You might like it.

Musings 32 – On the Nature of God (7/31/2022)

I was recently reminded that if I'm going to make statements like, "God is Love," I'd better be able to articulate my concept of God, since we all have our own thoughts about God and different pictures of God in our minds.  Thank you Patrick O'Gara for that.  This challenge got me to thinking about the evolution of my concept of God.  It has changed quite a bit over the years, but more drastically during the COVID years.

As I say this, I realize that it isn't my concept of God that has changed as much as my ability to articulate what that concept is.  For me, God has always been the big three: omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent.  That hasn't changed.  Genderless; for sure.  Creator; oh yes.  It's some of the basic terminology for God that has evolved for me; moving from God The Father, to God the Creator, to Source, and finally landing on Oneness.  I like Oneness.  It kind of says it all.  Much of this evolution has been sparked by reading "A Course In Miracles," "A Course Of Love," and "Oneness," and also participating in discussion groups around those three very consistent channeled texts.  At the same time, during these COVID years, I have been reading up on the latest findings of quantum physics and discovering that scientific discoveries are validating and confirming my own discoveries during my spiritual journey.

And then, there is my evolving relationship to and with God.  That relationship has evolved from one of communication with a God "out there" to a God "in here."  You see, if God is Oneness, then we are a part of that Oneness, a part of God.  Think of it in terms of the ocean with God being the ocean and us being individual drops of water in the ocean.  We are part of the ocean, but we are not the ocean.  We are part of Oneness, but not the entirety of Oneness.  Made in the image of Oneness, to use a Biblical reference.

Oneness is the original creator of all that is.  As part of Oneness, we are co-creators on a daily basis.  This is our relationship to Oneness, that of co-creation.  We are extensions of Oneness, and as such, co-creators of our experience. As I create these words, these paragraphs, I am not doing it alone.

So there you have it.  When I use the term God or Oneness, this is what I am referring to.  When I say, "God is Love," what I mean is that Love is the term for the energy field, the Divine Matrix that is Oneness.  As a part of Oneness, we are also Love.  More on that next time.

 Musings 33 - What's Love Got To Do With? (8/11/2022)

"What love is cannot be taught.  It cannot be learned.  But it can be recognized." – A Course of Love, page 22.

As I look at my cat, Tigger, lying beside me, I find it easy to accept that our pets are made of love.  And unconditional love at that.  They are quick to forgive if we accidentally step on a paw.  They are often waiting for us at the door when we return home, sensing our approach before we get to the threshold.  They offer their bellies for a rub and offer a vulnerability that is endearing.

So what about us?  Growing up, I had no idea what love was.  I didn't have examples of it at home, hadn't heard the word used at home that I can remember, and I wasn't sure what it looked like or felt like.  I did see representations of it on television and in the movies, but didn't identify with what I was viewing.  As I have matured I have discovered that love was in me, a part of me, all along.

A concept that resonates with me concerning love is that we only know that we have love when we give it away.  You cannot give something that you don't have, so if I love my cat, or love my wife, I must have love to give.  It is in loving that I experience love.  This is a love that is unconditional and has no expectations.  It is a prime example of "giving is receiving." 

What do I mean when I say, "God is Love?"  I figure that the Bible tells us that we are made in God's image and that this doesn't mean that we look like God, but that we too are Love.  That our purpose on earth is to give love, to receive love, to be Love?  This love is a natural expression of the energy that makes up who we are and what God is.  The expression Namaste basically means that the divine in me recognizes the divine in you…the love at my core sees the love at your core.  So when we love our neighbors and our enemies, we are loving ourselves, not just because we are all one, but because the love we give is the love we receive.

"Love is not something you do.  It is what you are." – A Course of Love, page 23

Musings 34 – Remembering Buechner (8/28/2022)

Carl Frederick Buechner, one of my favorite theologians had ties to Pittsburgh, since his maternal grandparents lived in East Liberty and he spent a lot of time with them in his youth.  His passing on August 15 at age 96 took me back to some of my favorite quotes of his:

(1)   "The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet."  This quote is known to many who have been in the job market over the past few decades as many job coaches and job search manuals used it as a foundation for beginning a job search.  I always had trouble with it as someone who had over 30 jobs in his work life and was never quite sure of how to discover my "deep gladness."  I was 50 before I finally found my calling, but I guess "better late than never," as the saying goes.

 (2)   "Life is grave.  Sleep is forgiveness.  The night absolves.  Darkness wipes the slate clean, not spotless to be sure, but clean enough for another day's chalking."  This seems to be such a poetic way of saying that every sunrise gives you the opportunity to start your life anew.  You have the opportunity to make new choices and see things differently each time you get out of bed in the morning.  The past you does not have to determine the future you.  I love the promise this holds and the excitement it can bring to the dawning of every day.

 (3)   "Without somehow destroying me in the process, how could God reveal Himself in a way that would leave no room for doubt?  If there was no room for doubt, there would be no room for me."  I have always seen doubt as a critical component of faith.  If I had no doubts along my spiritual journey, I would not have questioned the tenets of my faith nor would I have examined it and myself closely enough to discover the essence of both.  I enjoy attending a church where we see ourselves as a family that is seeking spiritual answers together rather than asking to be told what to think.

I see parallels in Buechner's life and writings to those of C.S. Lewis.  They both brought contemporary Christian beliefs into mainstream literature, often from a non-believer's point of view.  Having made it age 96 and published 39 books, I can't help but think that he made it to a place where his deep gladness met the world's deep hunger.

Musings 35 – A Transactional vs Transformational Church (9/6/2022)

Having looked at the objects of the universe,

I find there is no one, nor any particle of one,

But has reference to the soul.

--Walt Whitman

Another favorite theologian of mine is Franciscan Friar, Richard Rohr.  His book, "The Universal Christ" first introduced me to the concept of Christ Consciousness.  He quotes the Bible often: "There is only Christ.  He is everything and he is in everything." (Colossians 3:11) "All Fullness is found in him, through him all things are reconciled, everything in heaven and everything on earth." (Colossians 1:19-20) And he chastises the Western church by saying that, "We would have helped history and individuals so much more if we had spent our time revealing how Christ is everywhere instead of proving that Jesus was God."

Rohr pictures future Christians as "having long discarded the notion of Christian salvation being the private evacuation plan that gets a few select humans into the next world."  As I recently watched Richard Rohr on YouTube delivering his message, I was impressed by what he had to say about the current state of the church and Christianity in general.  One of his main themes was that much of the decline of the Christian church is due to its transactional nature.  He attributes this to an error in translation by St. Jerome who turned the Greek word for "change your mind" or "go beyond your mind" to the Latin word for "repent."  That error has led to a Christianity that is largely about "external requirements that could be enforced, punished, and rewarded much more than an actual change of heart and mind."

Rohr's point is that people who are leaving the church, or just not even considering it, are looking for a spirituality that is transformational, not transactional.  The Christ that walked the earth a couple of thousand years ago was about transforming the faith that he was born into.  He chastised the Pharisees and the Sadducees for focusing on form and ignoring the substance of the faith. He was all about changing hearts and minds.  Rohr suggests that the church must return to Christ's original mission or be irrelevant to current and future generations.

In my opinion, a transformational church starts with the question, "do you believe you have a soul?"  If your answer is, "yes," then it asks you to consider what that means.  It asks you to take your soul seriously.  The fact that this internal you is the eternal you should mean that its care, growth and development should be the central focus of your life, not just a Sunday consideration.  If your soul is something that lives on after the body dies, then you have to consider where it came from and where it goes.  You also need to consider that everyone you interact with, no matter their color, sexual orientation, gender or political learnings are also souls, spiritual beings temporarily in a body.  The church that helps you find answers to these questions, and provides clues as to how to deal with their ramifications is a church that will transform your life.  It will give you a new lens from which to view the world.

Musings 36 – Forest Bathing (9/9/2022)

Amy and I recently participated in a forest bathing experience at Beechwood Farms Nature Reserve with four other explorers and our guide.  In case you aren't familiar with this practice, I offer this from the Kaiser Permanente "Thrive" website:

            "In 1982, the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries created the term shinrin-yoku, which translates to forest bathing or absorbing the forest atmosphere…The goal of forest bathing is to live in the present moment while immersing your senses in the sights and sounds of a natural setting…the more in-depth practice of forest bathing has been found to lower blood pressure, heart rate, and levels of harmful hormones."  Other studies show that it can "lead to increased well-being and happiness – and decreased amounts of stress."

Our guide was Linda Despines, who I highly recommend.  I now understand why this practice is also known as "forest therapy."  As we focused on our five senses and how each sense individually connects us to the environment, I experienced a communication with nature that was beyond any previous experience.  The peace and tranquility of the sight of trees, grasses, flowers, moss, and fish; combined with the sounds of birds, chipmunks, squirrels and bees; the feel of the wind on my face and the ground beneath my feet; the smell of the fresh air and the lake; and the taste of sweat on a hot summer day, all provided a heightened sensual experience that made one feel the joy of being alive.

I have taken walks in the woods many times over the years, but none so impactful as this.  It will forever provide a new lens for me to view my surroundings on future walks.  My life is richer and my senses more acute.  I highly recommend it.

Musings 37 – Immortality (9/23/22)

Not one to follow the royals, I had no plans to tune into the funeral services for Elizabeth II this past week, but I couldn't avoid it.  My kitchen radio is permanently tuned to NPR and part of the Monday morning broadcast of the funeral service accompanied my washing of the Sunday night dishes.  A statement from a reading by Patricia Scotland, Secretary General of the Commonwealth that caught my attention was, "…now this mortal must put on immortality."  The implication being that someone who is mortal while alive becomes immortal in death.

This very Christian funeral service, with multiple archbishops and high church muckety-mucks presiding, with every word published in advance for those in attendance to read along (yes, I admit to watching the full service afterwards, to be sure I heard correctly).  Perhaps this is a part of a general Christian agreement that I never put much thought to.  Is immortality something that we achieve through the death of our corporal selves?  A curious concept to my way of thinking.

My own belief is that my soul is that part of me which is immortal, not discernable through the five senses, but a positive purposeful force at my core and the center of my essence.  This means that for all intents and purposes, my true self and your true self is an immortal self.  Accepting our immortality is no small thing.  For if you are indeed immortal, then you have nothing to fear and fear is the basis for much of what our culture throws at us.  Our politics is based on fear, the media pushes fear at us 24/7, and many corporations as well as big pharma sell us their products based on our fears.  If we suddenly become fearless, our world gets turned upside-down.  How transformational a concept is this?

We are often taken to contemplating our own mortality, but do we seriously contemplate our immortality?  Consider what it means to be immortal.  Does that thought make you want to   change your behavior?  Does it change the way you view others, considering that they are immortal too? You don't have to be a Christian to have a soul.  Everyone's got one.  And if the soul is my connection to the Divine, and your connection to the Divine, then perhaps we are all connected.

Think about it.

Musings 38 – Incarnation and Resurrection (10-28-22)

Last week I was working on putting together the Sunday greeters' schedule for our church for November, December and January.  Without thinking about it too much, I inadvertently added Good Friday to the December calendar on the Friday before Christmas and assigned greeters to that date.  It seemed to make perfect sense to me at the time, that Christ's rebirth should follow his death.  Is that not the meaning of the resurrection?  If virgin Mary gave birth through Divine intervention, could it not signify the rebirth of the Christ within us?

I was pondering this when confronted with words from chapter 8 of "A Course of Love" during a study group this week.  "The resurrection is the cause and effect of the union of the human and divine…This is in effect the way in which the man Jesus became the Christ.  This is in effect the way…Now how could one man's resurrection be the way or even a way?  How can resurrection provide a path or example for you to follow?  You must see the link between resurrection and incarnation, the link between resurrection and the birth of the god-man." (p. 232)

The suggestion in this chapter is that our birth involves the divine.  Every one of us has a bit of divinity within us.  It is our connection to God.  Our job, our purpose, is to accept that part of us that is divine and to live into it and live from it.  This is what is meant by "seeing through the eyes of God" and becoming "the hands and feet of God." 

My belief, from what I have read here and elsewhere, what resonates with my heart is that the crucifixion is not about suffering, but about forgiveness.  "Forgive them Father for they know not what they do" means that everyone is worthy of forgiveness, even those who want to crucify you.  The resurrection was to teach us that we are not our bodies; that we live on after our bodies are dead and buried.  Our bodies are merely a vessel for our soul-spirit to travel in during this incarnation.

When I consider the birth of Christ at Christmas I also consider the rebirth of the Christ within each one of us…known to many as the second coming.

Things to ponder.

Musings 39 – Gender Benders (11/10/22)

I was walking down Maple Avenue enjoying the unseasonably warm sunny day when I noticed that three dads and a mom were waiting at the school bus stop.  The scene made me smile.  My first thought was that there are children who will have memories of their dads taking time out to meet them at the bus stop and walk with them until they arrive safe at home.

My mind wandered, as it tends to do, and it landed on a memory of a piece I heard just this morning on NPR that recounted the history of women’s rights in Iran.  It seems that just as women in Iran were being granted the right to the same education as men and the freedom to wear whatever they wished, the religious conservative regime took those rights away to the point of policing women’s clothes and punishing them (recently to death) for incorrect clothing choices.  The backlash against recent harsh measures may not recede until the women of Iran have regained some measure of freedom.

These thoughts quite naturally lead my mind to the US and the Roe vs Wade debacle which helped to turn out more voters than usual to disrupt mid-term political expectations.  Another example of a women’s right to choose being given and then taken away.  The need for men to exert control over women is steeped in the history of humanity but, it leads to women marching in the streets until men realize the error of their ways. 

My wandering mind moved on to a discussion group that I participated in last night.  The book that we were discussing was pointing out that more and more men are turning away from the intellectual realm ruled by their ego and responding instead from their feelings.  Women, on the other hand, are turning away from the feeling realm where their egos hold sway and responding from their intellect more often.  This embracing of both our male and female attributes results in a more wholistic approach to life and to each other.

Gender-fluid is a term that was introduced to me by my children, who are now past their 30th birthdays.  Gender-fluid people tend to identify as one gender one day and the opposite gender the next or maybe one gender for many years, then the other for a few years and then back again.  Trans-gender folks tend to just make the switch once in their lives.  These terms have led to the need for “cisgender” as a term to designate those who maintain the same gender as is on their birth certificate.  It can all be a bit confusing for people of a certain age, but the younger generation seems to adapt well to the changing times and many now indicate how they want to be considered by including pronouns with their names.  Many professionals are following suit using he/him, she/her as gender indicators.

The times they are a changing.  I’m finally getting more comfortable with the terminology and with the concepts behind a more open approach to gender.  Since I’m a strong believer in the fact that we are not our bodies, but spirits temporarily housed in a body, the gender of that spirit is irrelevant.  Just as we shouldn’t assign a gender to a concept like God is it really that critical what gender our friends and family members choose to identify with?  Can we just see them all as God’s children and love them for who they are?

Musings 40 – The Value of Online Study Groups

One of the positive outcomes of the COVID pandemic, in my mind, is the growth of online book discussion groups, also known as study groups. Prior to 2020, the groups that I participated in were always in person and thus reliant on my ability to have a vehicle and the travel time available in addition to the actual meeting time. Currently I am a participant in six online study groups and sometimes a seventh, when I have time to join a church book study.

Now Creations (nowcreations.org) is the host organization for 4 of the 6 groups that I keep up with. I like to think of these groups as applying old meanings to new texts and new meanings to old texts. This occurs through the life experiences and knowledge base of the participants as well as strong leadership and guidance from Vince Lisi, the principal teacher and program director of Now Creations.

The books we are currently exploring are: "Oneness," "A Course In Miracles," "A Course In Mastering Alchemy," and "The Tao Te Ching." This last is where the new meanings to an old text comes into play. The Oneness group meets once a month, the Tao Te Ching group meets twice a month, while the others are weekly.

Amy and I also participate in a bimonthly group working through "A Course Of Love" with Lynn Alms as leader and we lead our own weekly "Oneness" group on Monday mornings at ten. Other meeting times are all over the place: Saturday from 9-12, Wednesday from 10-11:30, Wednesday from 7–8:30 p.m. and Thursday from 7-8:30 p.m. Now Creations offers a number of different options with different days and times. The point is that there is probably at least one spiritual topic/book and time that would interest most people.

The pandemic produced a feeling of isolation for many people as well as time for quiet introspection and spiritual contemplation. It also produced an opportunity for growth for spiritual groups like Now Creations, Humanities Team (Neale Donald Walsh), the Center for Action and Contemplation (Richard Rohr), and others, to reach a broader audience. Our sense of community and neighborhood has expanded beyond our prior definitions and our deeper knowledge of each other in these online communities lets us know that we are not alone physically or in our thinking as well as in the love and compassion that we have for one another. If you think this sounds therapeutic, you are right. You may want to consider an online study group if you are not already part of one.

Musings 41 – Saint John of the Cross

When I was in the midst of my morning spiritual reading, I came across this quote from “Ascent of Mount Carmel” published in 1618 and written by the Spanish Catholic Mystic, Saint John of the Cross:

   In order to arrive at knowing the All

   Desire to know nothing in anything…

   In order to arrive at being All

   Desire to be nothing in anything…

   In order to come to that for which you have no taste

   You must go by the way of that for which you have no taste

I was reading these words in the Thomas Merton book, “The Sign of Jonas.”  Merton said that when he read these words he realized, “that my spiritual life hasn’t even begun.”  He said this after 6 years as a Trappist Monk and a year away from the priesthood.

When I read these words, my first thought was that the tone sounded awfully familiar as though to mimic the first verse of the Tao Te Ching, written by Lao Tsu around 2,500 years ago:

   The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.

   The name that can be named is not the eternal name.

   The nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth.

   The named is the mother of the ten thousand things.

   Ever desireless, one can see the mystery.

   Ever desiring, one can see the manifestations.

   These two spring from the same source but differ in name;

   This appears as darkness.

   Darkness within darkness.

   The gate to all mystery.

I’m working through my third translation of the Tao Te Ching with a study group twice a month, but I have never read anything by Saint John of the Cross.  I think it may be time to explore him further, since divine inspiration comes in many forms, leading down different paths to God.

Musings 42 – Carrying the Past into the Future

A Zen tale (compliments of Amit Goswami “The Everything Answer Book”):  Two monks were about to cross a muddy river.  Although a high current was making the river muddy, it was not really very deep, and was quite fordable.  Just then, a maiden appeared in a beautiful kimono that went all the way to her ankles.  Naturally the maiden was hesitant to step into the river lest her clothes be ruined.  One of the monks asked permission to pick her up.  When she nodded, he picked her up and carried her across the river and put her down.  The maiden thanked him and went on her way.  The other monk soon caught up with the first and they both continued on their way.

     After about an hour, the second monk spoke: “Brother, you did something very wrong back there, you know.  We monks are not supposed to touch women, let alone carry them for as long as it took you to cross the river—a full five minutes, and you held her so close.”

     The first monk said: “Brother, I carried the maiden for five minutes, but you are still carrying her.”

And this, from “A Course in Mastering Alchemy” by Jim Self and Roxane Burnett (p.51-52): Third-dimensional time was not created as a straight line of events with aa beginning, middle and end.  It’s actually a continuous loop consisting of past and future, with a single identified point known as the present moment  (or present time).  It’s here where we can take the opportunity to make new choices based upon past experiences and future desires.  Far more often, however, we make decisions by reacting to situations with the emotions of fear, doubt or lack of self-worth.  Our decisions about the future are based upon the painful past or an uncertain worrisome future…Many of us waste a great deal of our energy ensnared in an endless cycle where our past haunts our future, and our future echoes our past…In short, we take our past experiences and project them into our future.  We then step into that experience in a future present-time moment to feel that pain all over again.

The monk’s tale combined with the passage from “Mastering Alchemy” got me to thinking about the need to break that continuous loop of past and future thinking by responding to events from our intuition out of love rather a place of judgment and our conditioned ego.  If we can train ourselves to come from a place of love and compassion, moment to moment, we can more easily live our own Truth and experience a more fulfilling and satisfying life.  A goal that all of us can benefit from.

 Musings 43 – Time to take the words of Jesus Christ seriously.

There are some concepts in the Bible that we Christians tend to gloss over when we read them, not because they are difficult to understand, but because they frighten us, or require us to take on more responsibility than we are willing to assume.  If we consider passages such as John 17:19-22, 1 Corinthians 12-16, John 10:30 and 17:23 and 17:26 or Romans 12:5 or 1 Corinthians 3:8, 10:17 and 12:20, we are provided with messages that we are one with Christ and one with God and one with each other.

Looking at Psalms 82:6, “I have said, Gods ye are, And sons of the Most High – all of you.”  Or John 10:34, “Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, Ye are Gods?’”

Consider the change in you if you were to accept the fact that you are connected to the divine and that we are all one in God.  If we all accepted these two basic principles, that we are spiritual beings experiencing life in physical form and that we are just one being, all a part of God (or the All That Is), would we suddenly stop fighting each other, fearing each other,  hating what others stand for.  As Pogo once said, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”

If you are not Christian but believe in scientific findings or maybe are both Christian and a believer in science, consider the findings of quantum physics.  Quantum physics tells us that we are all nothing but energy, and as such, all really the same.  We are also all connected through an energy field, or quantum matrix, and thus all one.  What happens to one of us, indeed effects all of us.  When we attack another, we are attacking ourselves.  When we mistreat the earth, we are mistreating ourselves.  When we pollute the oceans, we pollute ourselves.  You get the idea.

If you consider our current mindset, that of being separate from each other and separate from God, we have used this belief system to create the mess of a world that we live in today.  A world of dualism that has created an us-them mentality.  What if we decided that, since this belief system really isn’t working out very well for humanity, that we adopted the belief system that Jesus, quantum physics and most Eastern philosophy teaches.  Imagine a world where we treated each other and everything on the earth as we want to be treated.  A little 119-page book by Neale Donald Walsh, “The Essential Path,” takes us there in a very methodical way.  I highly recommend it.

Musings 44 – Being Vulnerable While Living Invulnerability

Beginning this Sunday, March 12, my podcast “Your Spiritual Journey” will debut on YouTube.  This is a major step for me because it exposes the “thorn in my flesh,” to quote Paul in 2 Cor. 12:1-10.  The Bible never explains what Paul’s thorn is.  Mine is called “essential tremors” and is so obvious that complete strangers have walked up to me and asked me how I’m dealing with my Parkinson’s, explaining that they also have it or that a family member has it. My tremors reveal themselves as uncontrollable hand movements and a bobble-head at times.  I can never trust myself at a salad bar, but I am fortunate not to have Parkinson’s.

Until now I have been able to hide my thorn behind the microphone, since audio recording doesn’t reveal it.  Once you see me on YouTube you may cringe and feel the need to look away.  If that is the case, just listen, don’t watch.

My decision to broadcast on YouTube is based on my own spiritual journey and it’s also out of respect for my guests.  They are making something typically private public, to help others.  When a guest reveals a traumatic event from their past that changed their life, or a moment of spiritual awakening, they are making themselves vulnerable in a very public way.  I decided that if my guests were willing to make themselves vulnerable to my audience, then I needed to do likewise.

When I think about blatant examples of vulnerability I think about pets, cats and dogs that ask for belly rubs by stretching out beside us and exposing their bellies.  What they are communicating is “I love you and I trust you.”  It certainly endears us to them.  My guests are often saying the same thing when they reveal certain experiences, sometimes for the first time.  They are saying “I love you and I trust you.”  When the discussion results in tears from the guest or me or both, you will be able to see that on YouTube.

In one of our recent study groups with Vince Lisi (this week’s guest), the discussion turned to what it means to be vulnerable and invulnerable.  If being vulnerable means ‘susceptible to physical or emotional attack or harm” then being invulnerable means that it is no longer the case. When I say that I am broadcasting on YouTube to make myself vulnerable, that’s not quite true, because I feel invulnerable.  There is nothing that you can do or say that can harm me because I don’t give up that power to anyone. The fact that I am not my body, but an immortal spirit in a body makes me invulnerable. However, I do love you and trust you, so in that way you could say I’m making myself vulnerable by appearing on YouTube. Please rub my belly.

Musings 45 - What is sport? (3/20/2023)

As I watch a 4-year-old glued to a television show on YouTube that has him watching two young girls play a video game and he excitedly responds to their victories and defeats that result in death, which they quickly recover from, I think about what is really going on here. His fascination comes from watching his sister play this game at home. This game and many similar are under the title of Roblox and are aimed at the youngest children with themes based on daycare centers and monsters under the bed, etc.

These childish games graduate to more challenging scenarios into what is known as esports that fall into a few major genres like fighting games, first-person shooters, real-time strategy or multi-player battle arena games (the most popular)...see wikipedia. They are considered esports when played in professional competitions, with players around the world competing for large prizes.

I guess thumb dexterity is just as challenging as walking across a golf course following a ball you just walloped with an iron stick with thousands of people watching. Why pay to watch either? Why watch it on TV? Match your strategy against the players maybe?

It was only a matter of time before you would see a university major in e-sports. This Sunday's Post-Gazette featured an insert titled "Education Guide." This appears to be the paper's overt strategy to obtain ad revenues from many of the educational institutions in the region and has been going on for many years. On page 15 of the 16-page insert, the Carlow University headline is LEADERS WANTED IN ESPORTS. They invite you to pursue a BS in Esports Business Management...an industry where passion meets opportunity. This being an industry that accounts for nearly 2 million jobs across the nation.

Video games got many people through the pandemic with their sanity. They don't intrigue me, but to each their own. Can you come up with the next big sport? After all, someone invented Frisbee Golf.

Musings 46 – Fantastic Fascia (5/18/2023)

I spent the first weekend of May at the Northeast Reiki Retreat in the Adirondacks.  At Crystal Bay on Lake George, to be precise.  The weekend was chock full of interesting speakers and topics.  One that I found to be of particular interest was “Fascinating Fascia” presented by Sarah Saltow.  What I learned was that our fascia, the connective tissue that holds us together, is a highly ordered crystalline living matrix that generates our bioelectric and bio magnetic fields.  It is a super conductor that facilitates communication throughout the body and beyond the body.

Recent studies show that while nervous system impulses travel at speeds varying from 7 to 170 mph, communications through the fascia system travel at 720 mph – the speed of sound.  It qualifies as liquid crystal and thus can be tuned to frequencies and harmonized within itself.  It not only holds us together, but it holds our past traumas.  Some traumas are with us for life as they are stored within the fascia of our bodies.

The research that the presenter based her comments on was impressive, and since the first real studies of fascia didn’t start until 20 years ago, there is a lot more to discover.  When she quoted one author who said that “the qualities of the fascia system enable to be our sixth sense,” I began to see the scientific basis for how Reiki works as a healing process that can provide peace and a feeling of well-being for the recipient. 

Consider that a walk in the woods provides you with a calming effect as the vibrational frequency of the earth meets with the vibrational frequency of your fascia traveling at the speed of sound throughout your body.  Next time you take a walk, close your eyes and feel that calming sensation.

Musings 47 – Do you place limits on your kindness?

Kindness is “in” these days.  Random Acts of Kindness are regularly published in the newspaper and lauded on the airwaves.  People report having their Starbucks order paid for by the car in front of them or their groceries paid for by the person behind them. I know I have done both things and felt good about it, asking the person to pay it forward if they wish.  And yet, I recently discovered that there is a limit to my kindness.

I believe that most strangers that we meet are there to help us learn a lesson.  So, when a perfect stranger with swollen legs who was walking with a cane asked me for a lift since he was going my way, I said yes.  Once in the car he revealed that he was a diabetic and that he had run out of his medication.  The lift was to a friend’s house to get the money for his medication, but it was unsuccessful, since his friend wasn’t home.  He began to show signs of extreme pain and cried out in agony.  I asked, “what is the cost of your medication?” He showed me the prescription bottle and said, “$42.”  I gave him $40 and left him at a bus stop to catch a bus to the pharmacy, at his request.

When I got home, Amy asked me what lesson I thought was to be found in this transaction. I told her that I wasn’t sure, but it might reveal itself later.  The next day, another stranger reinforced the lesson.

It was dark and raining when a car pulled over in front of our house.  An Amazon delivery I assumed.  A knock on the door. When I opened the door, a woman stood under our awning asking if it was okay to leave her car in front of our house while she walked to a friend’s house nearby.  She had run out of gas and her friend would help her get what she needed. “No problem,” I said. An hour later, another knock on the door.  The rain hadn’t stopped and now the same woman, soaking wet, asked if she could leave her car overnight, since her friend wasn’t home, she was going to walk home.  I offered her a ride home, which she accepted, since she had groceries in her car and had planned to carry them in the rain the two miles to her house.

The discussion on the trip to her house revealed that she lived alone, was divorced, had two children and three grandchildren, and was doing her best to make ends meet.  I dropped her off and wished her well.

The next day the lesson of the strangers dawned on me.  They had both been sent to me to show me that I placed limits on my kindness.  The first stranger needed $42 and bus fare.  I drew the line at $40 for some arbitrary reason, even though I had the additional money that he needed.  I felt I was being taken advantage of and drew an arbitrary line.  The second stranger obviously needed more than a ride home.  An offer to pick her up in the morning and help her obtain gas and drive her back to her car would have fulfilled the need, but I ignored it.

We probably all think of ourselves as being kind, but how kind are we really? I’ve learned my lesson.  Unconditional love is now going to be joined by unconditional kindness.

Musings 48 - The Dream and the Dreamer

Last night I had what turned out to be a lucid dream.  You know, one of those dreams where you eventually realize that you are dreaming and then begin to manipulate the dream to fit your desire to have a happy ending, or at least a more pleasant ending than where the dream seems to be heading. As with many dreams, it began as an extension of something I had been doing in real life.  I just finished a consulting contract with the U.S. Department of Labor reviewing grant proposals asking for funding.  My dream began with me reviewing my life story as though it was a grant proposal.

What if I had made a contract with God prior to incarnating on earth and was now facing judgment day?  Judgment day being that time after my passing that I judge myself based on a life review.  A time when I determine whether I lived up to my contract with God, or if I need a do-over to learn the lessons that I had committed to learning this time around.

So, the first part of the dream has me wandering through classrooms.  In one room my name is on the blackboard where the teacher’s name goes.  A student wanders in after school and asks a question, prior to leaving for the bus.  I then wander into another room and suddenly I’m a student, gathering up my books to get on the bus to start my summer vacation.

The scene shifts to an adult me having a discussion with three other people about job offers that all of us have received that require us to move to Phoenix.  We are discussing the high cost of living there and housing costs and how long it will take on the new job to save enough money for a down payment on a house.  I ask my colleagues if they have started to look for affordable housing.  No one admits it because we are all looking in the same housing market.

I share an idea that I have with the group.  “What if the four of us rent a house together for a year or two while we scope out the housing market and save money and settle into our new jobs?”  We all agree that this is a brilliant idea.

“Wait just a minute”, my sleeping mind interjects.  The temperatures in Phoenix have been over 110 degrees for 31 straight days.  I don’t like the heat.  To lure me to Arizona, where both my brother and sister live, my sister Holly had just sent me a card with an ad for senior living spaces in Sedona.

The dream/reality overlap begins to be too obvious, and I have a conversation with my sister, in my head, “Oh no you don’t.  Get out of my dream.  I’m not moving to Arizona!” I woke myself up to avoid moving to Arizona.

The first part of the dream about being a teacher and a student reminded me that throughout life we are both teachers and learners. The second sequence of events led me to thoughts of the creation story in Genesis 1; after creating everything else, God created humans. Yes, we were created as an idea in the mind of God, just as our dreams are creations in our minds. You might say God just dreamed us up. Genesis goes on to let us know that we are made in the image of God. We have God’s spirit within us. Thus, we are both the dream and the dreamer.

Musings 49 – The man or the message?

 In his introduction to the Swami Prabhavananda and Christopher Isherwood translation of the Bhagavad Gita, © 1944, Signet Classics - Aldous Huxley explains the four fundamental doctrines of the Perennial Philosophy (the foundation of all religions):

1.  Everything comes from one source (God, Source, The Creator, Oneness, The Divine, etc.)

2.  You can know the Divine by direct intuition and/or by discursive reasoning (which brings you back to the "first cause").

3.  Man has a double nature - the phenomenal (ego) and an eternal self (spirit). You can choose to identify with either.

4.  Man's purpose on earth is to identify with his eternal self.

Avatars periodically incarnate to teach the perennial philosophy (Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, Lao Tse, Moses, etc.) but man tends to focus on the Avatar rather than the message. It is this focus on the teacher rather than the teaching that tends to lead to idolatry and a loss of much that was being taught.

Huxley goes on to postulate that we will all never agree on one universal religion however, he does find hope in the possibility that perhaps all religions can be united in full agreement on the basic doctrines of the Perennial Philosophy.

A recent Wahington Post review of ‘The Great Dechurching,’ Post Opinions columnist Perry Bacon Jr comments that authors Jim Davis, Michael Graham and Ryan Burge estimate that about 40 million Americans used to attend church but don’t now,” Perry writes. “I could not have imagined when I was a kid or even a decade ago that I would be in this group.”

“Many Americans, including me, were once part of churches that were essential parts of our lives,” Perry writes. “It’s strange to me that America… is abandoning this institution, as opposed to reinventing to align with our 2023 values.”

I would suggest that perhaps aligning with current values is not as critical to a new, reimagined vibrant church as aligning to the Perennial Philosophy which has stood the test of time across the ages and across all major religions.  Could we dig deep and discover that the mystics’ focus on the messages rather than the avatars, and the Christ Consciousness (ala Richard Rohr) provide a solid foundation for a universal church that has a broad appeal to what the Post article refers to as the “nones?”  Nones is the term given to those who belong to no particular religious faith.

Your thoughts are welcome.

Musings 50 – Living the moment

On Sunday morning I wrote a note to myself to remember to tell Amy that I appreciate her ability to look at the possibilities for each day rather than just following routine habits.  On Saturday night she recommended that we skip church and use the morning for a riverfront walk at the Waterfront followed by a stop at Starbucks.  A welcome break prior to resuming the many church obligations that resume in September.

Each day is full of possibilities and choices and our routine habits get in the way of being present to daily possibilities.  Intentionally abandoning a routine, if only for a day, is a way to remind ourselves that whatever we are doing is a choice.  Every moment of every day we make a choice to do what we are doing and to not do something else.  And beyond that, every thought is a choice.  We can choose to think negative thoughts about people and events, or we can choose positive thoughts.  We can even choose to be happy rather than unhappy.  Yep, we don’t have to wait for anything outside of ourselves to make us happy, we can just choose to be happy with what we have and who we are.

I understand the difficulty in taking responsibility for our actions, thoughts, and feelings.  It means that we must give up being a victim of our circumstances, environment, and upbringing.  No one to blame for anything.  We get to take credit for everything that manifests in our lives, the good and the bad.  It’s a decision to assume our power and reject powerlessness.

This is a gift that you can give yourself.  In fact, you are the only one who can give this gift.  No one can bestow this power on you, but you.  Consider giving yourself this gift today.  You won’t regret it.

Musings 51 – Expansion

As a couple in our early and late 70’s, Amy and I recently moved from a two-bedroom apartment to a three-bedroom house with an integral garage, second full bathroom, finished basement and deck.  Seems counter-intuitive, right?  We downsized from a three-bedroom house that we had lived in for 25 plus years to an apartment just four years ago, congratulating ourselves for having gotten rid of so much unnecessary “stuff” and passing the concerns for lawncare, snow removal, home upkeep and appliance repair onto someone else.

We are still renters.  I wasn’t about to take on those homeowner responsibilities that can be such a drag on old bones and finances, although I do welcome the opportunity to cut the grass and shovel the walk.  There is a lot to be said for what we have gained: space to get away from each other as we move into our separate creative spaces, room to entertain, space for a flower garden and a veggie garden (currently on the deck).  The deck overlooks a level yard and trees frequently visited by birds, and occasionally groundhogs, deer and even a cayote once.  Blue Jays, Cardinals and a pair of yellow Finches have entertained us and Tigger, our cat.

An unexpected benefit of this move has been soul expansion, a feeling of being able to breathe deeper and longer.  Or, as our welcome mat reads: “Inhale Love – Exhale Gratitude.”  I’m tempted to say that this is an intangible benefit, but really it is very tangible.  A move from a house to an apartment can be felt as a contraction of your life.  An attempt to make life more manageable as a natural part of the aging process.  Maybe even part of the natural order of things.

A move from an apartment to a house, something that you did when you were younger and more active, is an expansion.  Your creativity kicks into gear as you pick out new rugs and new pictures to fill empty walls.  You find joy in placing furniture in new configurations and get playful with spaces that are different from the old ones.  Synapses that were dormant begin to fire again.  Such a move brings with it expansive thinking that feeds the soul.  There is something hopeful and future-oriented about moving into new surroundings, no matter what your age.

This kind of a move isn’t for everyone at this stage in their lives.  What is relevant is your will to let go of a limited idea of who you are, to make way for something much more expansive.  An expanded awareness of who you are and what is possible for you in life breathes more energy into your body and soul and with that expanded awareness you can make choices and take actions that construct a more fulfilling reality.  It is the path to claiming more of the unlimited creative power within you. (with thanks to Howard Falco author of “I AM.”)

Musings 52 – Matter and Spirit

Amy and I are leading a book study group that meets on Mondays at 10 a.m.  We are working on “I AM: the Power of Discovering Who You Really Are” by Howard Falco (you are invited to join us).  As I was reading the meditation from Richard Rohr earlier in the week on my computer, I was struck by how his commentary on St Francis of Assisi coincided with our study group discussion on Monday.

The discussion centered on Falco’s first chapter: “You Are Energy and Matter.”  He begins with the provocative statement that Your existence as matter is the self-evident truth that you matter. He then goes on to provide scientific proof of this statement, referencing Einstein, Quantum Physics, biology, epigenetics, sociology, the latest theories of evolution, and astronomy.  He ends this chapter with: “Your life is a journey of the awareness, cultivation, and experience of new possibilities.  Through this unfolding you are led to the realization that it is not death that you are ultimately destined to, but rather the infinite experience of the creative evolution of life.”

So here you are, on this planet existing as matter and energy.  Matter being the physical you observable by those around you and energy being the non-physical you; the life force within you.  Richard Rohr’s essay on St. Francis offers these two quotes: “The visible world is an active doorway to the invisible world, and the invisible world is much larger than the visible,” and “Matter is, and has always been, the hiding place for Spirit, forever offering itself to be discovered anew.”  Rohr calls this essential union of the material and spiritual worlds “Christ.”

If we assume an understanding of ourselves as both physical and nonphysical beings, as matter and energy, as physicality and spirituality, then we need to nourish both to flourish.  The physical you requires food, water, clothing and shelter.  The spiritual you also needs to be fed and cared for with prayer and meditation if it is to flourish.  However, there is more to this relationship of matter and energy than meets the eye.

Quantum physicists discovered that physical atoms are made up of vortices of energy that are constantly spinning and vibrating and radiating energy and each atom has its own energy signature.  Molecules, which are assemblies of atoms, radiate their own energy patterns.  “So every material structure in the universe, including you and me, radiates a unique energy signature.” (The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter, and Miracles, by Bruce Lipton, PhD, © 2005). Dr. Lipton goes on to say that the worldview of science is now in line with those of aboriginal cultures wherein everything is imbued with spirit including rocks, air, and humans and that the whole planet is considered to be one living, breathing organism.  For more on this listen to my Podcast (episode 43) with aboriginal Grand YNGA Chief Pomaj-chakmann-yajalaji scheduled to air on November 5.

Dr. Lipton further believes that an individual’s cells have a unique set of receptors on the membrane’s outer surface that act as antennae or signal receivers that download broadcasts from the environment, broadcasts that represent the “self” that continue on after the death of the body. His supporting evidence for that belief includes testimonials from heart transplant recipients as recorded in Claire Sylvia’s book A Change of Heart and Paul P. Pearsall’s book The Heart’s Code: Tapping the Wisdom and the Power of Our Heart Energy. You can hear more about this in my interview with Rob A. Gentile, a heart transplant recipient and the author of Quarks of Light.  That interview (Episode 42) will air on October 29. In it he reveals that he has memories associated with his heart donor.

The belief that we are spiritual beings living in a physical body is not a new one.  It’s a belief held by many ancient and current cultures. Having a spirit that continues to exist beyond the death of the body and that is in communication with other spirits beyond our physical world is the topic of this week’s podcast (episode 39) with Richard Renault. He has created, with the help of his spirit guides, a technology that will connect you with your spirit guides. In this episode, he connects to mine.

As a spiritual being in a physical body, be sure to nurture both as you live each day, and you will find that each day is a joy.

Musings 53 – The Wisdom of Ted Lasso

Amy and I finished watching season 3 of Ted Lasso on Apple TV a week ago and then went back and watched all 3 seasons again…just two more episodes to go.  My favorite episode is Season 3: Episode 6, most of which takes place in Amsterdam.  It is an uplifting, feel-good episode that leaves me in tears from the joy it gives me. I think I’d like to watch it at least once every 3 months until I tire of it.

The beauty of Ted Lasso the series is that the writers pepper each episode with wit and wisdom that is spread among many of the characters, even those with minor roles, like Sam’s father who contributes “If you want to piss off your enemies…forgive them,” and “Don’t fight back, fight forward.” Or the Dutch airline pilot who proclaims, “This thing didn’t happen to me, it happened for me,” when he realizes there was a lesson to be learned from what seemed to be a bad turn of events.

I think my favorite line comes out of the mouth of Leslie Higgins, the manager of football (think soccer) operations when he says, “I love my father for who he is and forgive him for who he isn’t.” There is so much wisdom packed into that concept. Imagine if we could love everyone for being who they are and forgive them for not being who we want them to be and for not living up to our expectations. Imagine being able to love yourself for just being yourself, and forgiving yourself for not living up to the perfect version of yourself that you picture in your mind…that person who is always just out of your reach.

We all have the capacity to love, and forgiveness makes it easy. I have challenged myself, and I challenge you to consider loving someone you don’t like after forgiving them for not being who you think they should be or for not acting the way you think they should act. Jesus not only said, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” (Mark 12:30-31) but also “Love your enemies.” (Matthew 5:43-44). If I want peace, then it must begin with me.

Musings 54 – Prayer Vigil for Peace; Why Bother?

Waverly Presbyterian Church is holding a prayer vigil for peace on their front lawn at 7 p.m. this evening (Tuesday, October 24, 2023). In the past, I have scoffed at these kinds of events, thinking that they were like spitting into the wind. What good is a prayer from one person or even 50 people going to do for some folks killing each other halfway across the world? Reading that I did during the past 3 years has changed my thinking on this.

The HeartMath Institute has done research that shows that the power of intention through prayer has reduced violence in areas where groups of people have focused their prayerful thoughts. The Global Coherence™ Initiative is another initiative of the HeartMath Institute that is a science-based, co-creative project to unite people in heart-focused love and intention, to facilitate the shift in global consciousness from instability and discord to compassionate care, cooperation and increasing peace. It is an ongoing initiative that is showing promising results.

Based on this and other research concerning the beneficial effects of prayer and my belief in the collective consciousness.  As Carl Jung put it, “The collective unconscious contains the whole spiritual heritage of mankind’s evolution born anew in the brain structure of every individual.” The science behind this is called the “hundredth monkey effect” and is named after observations by a group of biologists. They discovered that around the time that the hundredth monkey learned a skill or discovered something about its habitat, that skill or discovery got assimilated by other groups of monkeys living great distances apart and even on separate islands. Science has come up with many other examples of the collective consciousness at work. I think of how cats seem to know what a litter box is for, even as kittens, or when in a new household environment.

I am aware of several spiritual initiatives from many parts of the world that are focused right now on the intention of producing peace in the Middle East and their members number in the thousands. I will be at the prayer vigil tonight because I believe in the power of prayer, I believe in the power of intention, I believe in the power of one voice, and I believe that we are all connected through a collective consciousness that can be influenced by the power of love.

Musing 55 – The Power of Intention and Attention

As a student of Reiki and a Reiki practitioner, I have, at times practiced distance Reiki. This is a practice that transcends time and space to allowing healing, or at least energy transfer, to happen over long distances. You may need to read Stephen Hawkings “A Brief History of Time” or some quantum physics to get to the science of how this works. I thought I might share a recent experience that affirmed for me the power of this energy work that has western medical practitioners rethinking the value of Eastern approaches to healing.

The setting for this experience was a Zoom class in Usui Holy Fire Reiki III. The instructor had the students (myself and one other) prepare to practice distance Reiki on each other. When it was my turn, I had decided to use one of the methods proposed in the book that I hadn’t tried before, that of using a teddy bear as a stand-in or surrogate for the person. In normal Reiki sessions, I typically use a pendulum (a crystal at the end of a chain) to show me and the client where energy blockages are in evidence by the speed and rotation of the pendulum as it responds to the energy output of each chakra. I usually do this twice, once prior to the Reiki session and then afterwards to show the difference in the energy flow to confirm that what they are feeling is true.

In a moment of inspiration, I decided to focus my attention and intention on the teddy bear as representing my classmate. As she lay flat in her home in Mount Lebanon and I standing in Braddock Hills, I held the pendulum above each of the chakras as though the teddy bear was alive. The pendulum spun clockwise at each of the 7 points as though it were a living being. At the end of the 20-minute session, a second check of the teddy bear chakras indicated a stronger flow of energy by a faster and wider spin at each point.

I used this process without telling my classmate what I was doing and when the teacher asked her about her experience, she revealed that she was aware of a spinning sensation that was not unpleasant. It was only after her revelation that I revealed what I had done with the pendulum. The next day, just to confirm for myself the efficacy of what had taken place, I tried the pendulum on the bear again and nothing happened. No movement at all.

There is an energy field that connects us all. It is limitless and does not recognize gender, skin color, nationality, or political party. We are all one and have the potential to heal ourselves and each other. So let’s get on with it and stop all this silly bickering.

Namaste.

Musings 56 – The Extra-Terrestrial You

As I navigate this space-time experience, I can’t help but feel like an alien. Not an alien from another country, but an alien who is not of this world. Contemplating my existence as a spiritual being within a physical body on a temporary basis I realize that it is the energy of love that brought me into physical being, the energy of love that courses through my veins, and the energy of love to which I shall return when I shed this body and leave this physical world. When I look in the mirror, I know this to be true.

When I look at you, I also know that this is true about you, even if you are unaware of this truth of mine. For what is my truth, may not be your truth as you know it. From the Christian perspective it is what is known as being in this world, but not of this world. From the Buddhist perspective, it is being part of Indra’s Net. From the perspective of my truth, you and I and everyone else are here on a temporary basis to have an experience that will live on within us as soul-spirits when we move on from this earthly plane. From the beginning (Genesis 1:9) we were “an idea in the mind of God.”

This idea, to have a physical world with physical beings

Hope; Nowhere or Now here?

“Hope is the most powerful tool anyone can wield.”

-Cities of Cloud and Earth; First Class by A. Jane Dove

The season of Advent begins with the lighting of the candle of Hope in Christian churches.  For news junkies, hope can be in short supply as they bear witness to wars, political upheavals, economic downturns, ecological devastation, climate change inevitability, refugee crises, extreme weather events, wildfires, population growth, and a never-ending list of things and people we should fear.  For those living in poverty, the thought that the minimum wage in America hasn’t risen since 2009 is enough to dampen any consideration of hope, especially when prices are rising, and inflation is reducing their buying power. 

It the midst of all the chaos swirling around us, messages of hope are coming from a variety of places and authors.  Patricia DeMarco, author of Pathways to Our Sustainable Future (2017) and In The Footsteps of Rachel Carson (2022) provides us with many devastating examples of climate issues and sustainability problems, but then leads us to solutions that make sense. 

 Musings 57 – Move Over and Let Me Drive (3/28/24)

That was this morning’s message delivered from my higher self during that theta state when I’m  not quite awake and yet not asleep. “Move over and let me drive.”

4:44 a.m. is when my higher self likes to communicate with me, give or take a few minutes. It’s when clarity arrives, and answers come. Answers that may arrive before the questions are asked. Science has shown that our brain waves arrive at this state during periods of meditation and when we are not quite awake. They are also prevalent among preteen children. As adults, we can choose to ignore the messages that we get during theta just by going back to sleep. When I first began getting messages this way years ago, that’s exactly what I did.

It took me a while to understand the value of these messages. When I did, I started to keep pen and paper on my nightstand to capture what I could remember. There were times when complete poems would come through, as though a muse was whispering to me. Over the years, I have learned to listen closely to this morning voice and pay attention to the wisdom it provides. Many of my “musings” have come to me this way and most of my poetry. “Move over and let Me drive” played over and over in my head so that I didn’t need to write it down nor did I need to spend a lot of time figuring out the meaning of these words.

The message is for me to get my ego out of the way and turn my life over to a higher power, one that has my best interests in mind. It’s time to relinquish control (as if I were ever in control) and allow love to lead the way. From this day forward, I will do my best to process thoughts, actions, and speech through my heart before speaking or acting. I will work to have thoughtful responses rather than thoughtless reactions. I will put my ego aside and respond with love and compassion to strangers, to those with opposing points of view as well as with friends and acquaintances.

It matters not whether I call this voice my higher self, my guardian angel, the Holy Spirit, the voice of God, the Christ Consciousness, Source, Jeshua, or my Buddha self. What matters to me is that I trust the wisdom that I am being given and believe the truth of the message. This is a voice that has only had my best interest at heart but knows more about what’s best for me than I do. And so, I am going to move over.