[:en]Some Context[:]

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If you want to identify me, ask me not where I live, or what I like to eat, or how I comb my hair, but ask me what I am living for, in detail, ask me what I think is keeping me from living fully for the thing I want to live for.  Between these two answers you can determine the identity of any person. The better the answer he has, the more of a person he is.

                                                                               –  Thomas Merton  

 

 

 

Archaic Torso of Apollo

 

We have no idea what his fantastic head

was like, where the eyeballs were slowly swelling.  But

his body now is glowing like a lamp

whose inner eyes, only turned down a little,

hold their flame, shine.  If there weren’t light, the curve

of the breast wouldn’t blind you, and in the swerve

if the thighs a smile wouldn’t keep on going

towards the place where the seeds are.

If there weren’t light, this stone would look cut off

where it drops so clearly from the shoulders,

its skin wouldn’t gleam like the fur of a wild animal,

and the body wouldn’t send out light from every edge

as a star does … for there is no place at all

that isn’t looking at you.  You must change your life.

                                             –   Rainer Maria Rilke  

                                                                       (transl: Robert Bly) 

 

 

 

Burning the Old Year

 

Letters swallow themselves in seconds.   

Notes friends tied to the doorknob,   

transparent scarlet paper,

sizzle like moth wings,

marry the air.

So much of any year is flammable,   

lists of vegetables, partial poems.   

Orange swirling flame of days,   

so little is a stone.

Where there was something and suddenly isn’t,   

an absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space.   

I begin again with the smallest numbers.

Quick dance, shuffle of losses and leaves,   

only the things I didn’t do   

crackle after the blazing dies.

                          

                                                        –    Naomi Shihab Nye                 

 

 

 

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

We live on a planet where the chief life form is genuinely confused as to whether his grandfather was God … or a monkey.    

                                                                                                                                        – Archy [the cockroach] / Don Marquis

 

 

We know that we are killing the planet we live on, but we have not yet made up our mind to stop.

 

 

We could choose to survive.

 

 

From most points of view, THIS is another planet.

 

 

 

The Great War of Ideas continues to rage   all around us … and IN us.   (We are ALL participants)

 

 

There are planners … and there are plannees.             – Ursula Franklin

 

The Super Rich     are NOT our friends.   They keep us from living in a state of (universal) affluence.   They have undermined our education system and reshaped our society to suite their (own, sleezy) purposes.   (Our hope in defeating them lies in  educating ourselves … coming to understand them and our situation   BETTER than they understand us.)        [please see the Chris Hedges video at the end of this essay]

 

 

Everyone has 24 hours (every day)  – in which to do the things that are the most important.

 

 

We do not know who we are.   We are (as William Irwin Thompson says)   ‘like flies crawling around on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.’           The greatest miracles are invisibly close.

 

We are multi-dimensional beings living in a multidimensional universe.  (our experience ranges from Selfless Love … to diarrhea)

 

‘You are not a human being having a spiritual experience, you are a spirit being having a human experience.’

 

Despite the fact that most people BELIEVE that happiness comes from the outside … it is not so.   Our happiness comes from WITHIN us.   We need to learn to take responsibility for our own feelings (and not blame others).

 

We are always training SOMETHING.   I need to adjust my habits & daily routine   to align with and support my goals & aspirations.

 

Our failures and our achievements are less important than our aspirations and habits.                

  [ref; https://worldfamilytrading.com/our-tetrahedron/  ]     

 

 

“In the affairs of men’s hearts the Universal Father may not always have his way; but in the conduct and destiny of a planet the divine plan prevails. …”                –   The Urantia Book,  p. 51

 

Nature bats last.

 

 

We COULD adopt laws which prohibit destruction of the planet.

 

 

       [Please do not fail to watch this following video.  It’s true. It’s relevant. And it’s less than five minutes long.]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQz5vjt_HYI     (Change Your Life)

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The Only New Year’s Resolution I Ever Make

A new year means New Year’s resolutions for many people. I want to share with you the only New Year’s resolution I ever make.  This one New Year’s resolution is all encompassing – it will take care of all your other resolutions in one go, whether that’s to find love, lose weight, be healthier, make more money, or whatever it is you want for 2020.

Be positive!

Make a promise to yourself to be as positive as you can possibly be.  Make a promise to yourself to be more positive than you’ve ever been in your life.  At the beginning of each day promise yourself: “Today, wherever I go and whatever I’m doing, I will be positive!”

Being positive means that you will look for the positive things in people, circumstances, and all things.

Being positive means that if any negative words come out of your mouth, you will stop mid-sentence and immediately turn the sentence into a positive one.

Being positive means that you will have fewer negative emotions, and even if a negative emotion arises you will be positive about it too by allowing the negative emotion to be rather than trying to push it away.

Being positive means that you will automatically focus on what you want, not on what you don’t want.

Being positive means that you will become an attractive force for what you want.

Being positive means that negative thoughts and words will begin to fall away.

Being positive means that you will begin to feel happier and happier each day.

Being positive means that you will have fewer problems.

Being positive means that life will go smoothly for you, everyday events will fall into place, and things will go your way.

Being positive means that you will feel good!

Make a commitment to change your entire life in 2020 through the simple, singular act of being positive!

Wishing you a Happy, Positive New Year for 2020!

                                                                                                                      — Rhonda Byrne

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klXj198vY4A

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfFZtn2MU4A

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[If we had to ‘sail into the mystic’  to get to here … then WHERE are we NOW? ]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLHq8V1V-aw[:]