I am in love with every church And mosque And temple And any kind of shrine Because I know it is there That people say the different names Of the One God. —Hafiz I was listening to Dr. Wayne Dyer’s audio book—Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life—on my way to work this morning and he…
Monthly Archives: April 2010
Stop Putting Your Foot in Your Mouth
“The most I can do for my friend is simply be his friend.” —Henry David Thoreau Sometimes a lesson presents itself to me once and it sticks with me forever. Don’t put your hand on the hot stove, you’ll get burnt. Always give yourself ten minutes more than you’ll need. And so on. Yet, there…
Are You Oblivious, Aware, or Getting It?
This is a guest post from my friend, Andy Feld.
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As I travel and meet new people all over our country, it seems most everyone falls into one of the three areas mentioned in this month’s title. What am I talking about? It’s the societal evolutionary change which is now in progress, although admittedly sometimes imperceptible. It is easy to see that violence rarely leads to anything but more violence. Overt materialism, absent integrity, brings happiness and abundance to very few. Additionally, centuries of male dominated insensitive energy added to a populace unwilling to take responsibility has us at a precarious tipping point.
So, do you sense what I say is true? Are you oblivious to these changes in the air, or are you ahead of the curve and already taking the steps necessary to not only survive, but thrive in the years to come? Frankly, I am often greeted by individuals with long faces who tell me they will be happy again when things get back to ‘normal’. Normal for many means simply getting back to a life dominated by financial gain and the purchase of new things, but those days may be long gone. Banks are not lending money, our population is increasingly unemployed or aging and dependent, houses are not selling, there seems to be an oversupply of everything and worldwide competition is greater than ever. What if today is the way things will be for the next 20-30 years or longer? What are you going to do to be happy, prosperous, and emotionally abundant?
Make no mistake, everything is changing and just about everyone is affected. Personally, my income does not approach what I once earned as a corporate CEO, my car is not as new and shiny as it once may have been, and I visit fewer restaurants, but my life has never been more pleasant. Would you agree that now is the time to not only re-evaluate, but also re-create our lives? If so, you are GETTING IT loud and clear, but if not, let’s look into what we can do about it.
1. We are all One, connected with a common thread of spirit. When I say WE, I mean ALL humans, animals, plant life, earth, and stars. We all are of the same source energy, and understanding and respecting this Oneness is a key to thriving in our new age. Allowing all else to be, with love and respect, and without judgment of unique individual differences will open our portals to Universal Light. One cannot mistreat another human, the earth, our vegetation, and the animals without also mistreating oneself. We are all connected and what we put forth to others is what will always come back to us.
2. Listen to our heart, our Inner Radar as I call it in my books, without the fear of judgment from others. We are all unique and different, and learning to reach within and hear that guidance we all individually brought forth to this lifetime allows us to grow and prosper in alignment with our life’s purpose. There is no better way to accomplish this than a regular practice of meditation and contemplation.
3. Understanding the process for manifesting our life’s dreams. It takes quite a bit of practice and self-discipline, and you may be getting tired of hearing me speak about it, but we are the product of our thoughts, emotions, words, and actions. Very little we desire will manifest without the alignment of these four elements. Believe in this, practice and have faith and you will embrace your life like never before.
4. Learn to appreciate all that you have. From hot running water, to clothes in your closet, and food in the refrigerator, most of us have so much to be thankful for yet rarely acknowledge. The beauty of nature, our relationships, our health and the list should go on and on. Write it down and truly rejoice in how many ways you are blessed.
5. Diligently work on balancing your male and female attributes. We are all a combination of both masculine and feminine, and the more we keep these two in balance the more we vibrate with the earth.
Yes, everything is changing. First, become aware and then jump on board, but it will always be the choice of the individual. No one, other than you is responsible for your rescue.
Whether it is a business, an organization, or individual, the time for changing the status quo in right now. How to go about it in this new environment is what I speak about and teach. I would love the opportunity to work with you or your group.
With much love and appreciation,
Andy
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Andy lives in Morrison, Colorado outside Denver. He travels the country as a frequent speaker on life inspiration and business sales. He is also a regular guest on radio programs across the United States and on local TV.
You can read more about Andy at his website, Simple Happy, and you can find his books on Amazon at the following links.
Carousel — 04.09.10
Hello Dear Readers & happy Friday! It’s been a bit quiet around here this week because I am preparing for vacation. Yahoo! I leave tomorrow morning and will be returning late next week. You will see a couple of guest posts during that time (if I can properly set that up in WordPress) and a guest post from me will be posted over at a friend’s blog. So keep your eyes open for those things, but my apologies in advance as I will not be replying to comments or emails because…
I plan to be completely disconnected during my trip. That means no Blackberry, Twitter, Facebook, Web, Foursquare, and so on. I need a break from “virtual reality”, my friends. 
In fact, we all do from time to time!
That said, let’s move on to this week’s Carousel. I’ve got some very sweet goodies to share with you this week.
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Every Friday, I post my favourite links, posts, & resources from around the Web. Expect to learn, grow, & be inspired.
1. Coming across hurting people: Every now & again, I come across a piece that touches me in a deep, profound way. Usually the piece is not too long, but it is always powerful and tugs at my heart strings in a soft, yet poignant way.
This blog post is one of those pieces. If you read nothing else from this week’s Carousel, read this.
2. Eco-Bootcamp: The sustainable, savvy heroines over at Your Daily Thread have kicked off a month long going green boot camp in honor of the 40th anniversary of Earth Day on April 22nd. Their goal is to turn Eco-zeros, to Eco-heroes even if you’ve never recycled before.
3. Soda: A Sin We Sip Instead of Smoke? and Junk food ‘as addictive as heroin and smoking’: I am extremely passionate about healthy living & lifestyles. My passion has been really intense lately as I become increasingly aware of the disturbing truths about modern “food”.
I view the recent elimination of sugary beverages (soda) from school systems as a huge triumph. I look forward to the continuation of this important trend. Education and awareness is crucial.
4. create luck, embrace chance & tune in to your serendipity: What is it about lucky people? Have they all got horseshoes tucked into their backsides? 
Amber doesn’t think so & neither do I.
5. 7 Sources of Deep Clutter: Some great advice about how to eliminate the “shoulds, have-tos, and people-pleasing” bad habits that are cluttering your life & soul.
(And as a side note, the Good Life Zen blog is really fantastic. Each post is insightful, inspirational, and well-written.)
6. Remaining Calm in Stressful Situations: I like this post because it teaches us something that we can all benefit from (remaining calm) but I love it because it reminds us of something even more important — that mental/emotional stress does cause physical illness.
7. 40 Belief-Shaking Remarks From a Ruthless Nonconformist: Ah, yes! We can always count on Friedrich Nietzsche to obliterate the complacent, feel-good beliefs that we hold about ourselves. This collection of quotes will stir your pot and get your wheels spinning.
8. The Top 10 Online Habits That Make My Life Simpler: If you’re like me—meaning you spend several hours a day online—then you know that the Web can be the biggest time-vacuum known to man (if you let it). This post lists lots of simple yet effective ways that will help you make the most of your precious time spent online.
9. Why You Should Be More Decisive: Truth: I am an extremely indecisive woman by nature. Those closest to me will tell you this.
I have trouble deciding upon the simplest of things—which restaurant to visit, which shirt to wear, which road to take, whether or not to put salt on my food, which movie to watch, and so on. Well, a couple of years ago I found an ingenious method for dealing with this problem: I started flipping a coin! Yes, that’s my secret.
While the coin-flipping model has worked well for me, I still really enjoyed this post. It teaches us why some people have so much trouble being decisive in today’s world and why it is really important that we become more decisive overall. Perhaps I should stop relying so heavily on the coin and start aiming to be more decisive myself…
10. How To Fund Your Travels With Creativity: I have several friends who are currently living outside of the United States, seeing the world, gaining incredible life experience, and living the lives of their dreams. If you want to know how 95% of them are doing it, read this post. It will tell you exactly what they’re doing and how you can do it too.
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That’s it for this week. I’ll see you all on the other side.
In love & light,
Dena
Review: The Power of Now
The Power of Now
The Unreal Past & Future
In The Power of Now
When I first heard this concept I refused to believe or comprehend it. Of course my past is real, I thought. Of course my future is real, too. How dare someone suggest that it is not? My ego lashed out; but then I thought more about it. I listened, opened my mind, and realized that it was true. I am going to ask you to walk through an exercise with me to help you understand.
Let’s recall a memory in which you are eating something. Let’s say, for example, it’s a hot summer day and you’re licking an ice cream cone. Now, where ever you are—right now, present moment, not in the memory—I’d like you to stick your finger right into the ice cream and then throw it to the floor. Can you do that? Can you touch that ice cream cone from your memory? No, of course you can’t (unless you’re on hallucinogenics but that’s another story).
The fact is that right now you can not touch that ice cream cone and therefore it is not real. It may seem real in your memory—in your mind—but it is not really “real”…not here, not now, not in existence. It is only a memory and it only exists in your mind.
This principle is also true for the future. Imagine any future scenario in your mind. You win the lottery. You get fired from your job. You purchase a house. You fall off of a cliff. You can play each of those scenes out in your head. You can fill in as much detail as you like. You can mentally experience the future, but the truth remains that the future scenario isn’t “real”. You can’t actually reach out and touch anything in the future right now. The future only exists in your mind.
When I finally grasped this concept I was shocked & amazed. It seems simple, but somehow I had been missing it for my entire life! To me, the past and the future were as real as the present. The past happened to me. The future was going to happen to me. I held on to these concepts for dear life. But then I realized the truth… the past and the present are not that important. They’re not even real. They are only in my head.
You might be feeling a bit angry right now. (I know because I was at this point.) You might be thinking, How dare you claim that my past is not real? I’ve suffered, I’ve lived, I’ve triumphed, I’ve done X, Y, and Z. And my future, that is real too! I am going to do things 1, 2, 3, and so on!
Your Ego Feeds on the Past & Future
Well, my friend, I am not sorry to break it to you. That voice of anger is fueled by fear and the fear is coming from your ego.
For your entire life, your ego has been calling the shots. He rules you by fear—fear over your past and fear over your future. So long as you believe in the reality of your past and your future, your ego has control over you. It uses every thing that ever happened in the past against you. It uses everything that you hope to happen in the future against you.
There is only one way to overcome your ego and that is to live completely in the now. Let go of the past and the future. Be fully present in this moment.
It is not easy. You’ve spent your entire life ruled by your ego, living in the past and present. But while it’s not easy, it is possible. It’s entirely possible for you to begin living entirely in the present moment, entirely in peace, love, & light, entirely free from the chains of your ego.
The Power of Now
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Here are some of my favourite pieces from The Power of Now along with my interpretations of each.
You have it already. You just can’t feel it because your mind is making too much noise.
Eckhart Tolle tells us that that many people ask him to “give” them his gift. His response is always the same, You already have it.
This is entirely true. Each of us already has the immense power of now within. Tolle nor anyone else can “give” that to us—but what he can do (and does in the book) is to show you how to harness the power in your own life.
Not to be able to stop thinking is a dreadful affliction; but we don’t realize it because almost everyone is suffering from it. So, it is considered normal.
After reading (listening to) The Power of Now
It is so obvious to me now! How many millions of people are suffering from anxiety, depression, and so on? Most of these individuals are suffering as such simply because of compulsive over thinking.
When we stop our compulsive, ego-driven thoughts, we live in harmony. Sadly, however, most people just don’t know how to stop those thoughts.
We must become the silent observer, as Tolle describes in the book. The first step to overcoming the compulsive thoughts is to recognize them, to be the silent observer of your mind.
To see, but not see. To hear, but not hear.
Have you ever had a moment, an hour, or a day where you were entirely mindless?
For example, you are driving along the road completely spaced out from reality and suddenly you “wake up” and you don’t know where your head has been for some stretch of time. You know that you must have been seeing and aware, because you didn’t crash your vehicle. But you weren’t really there. You were seeing but not seeing.
Another example, you are in conversation with a friend or loved one and you begin zoning out. You hear words coming out of her mouth, but when she finally stops talking, you realize that you have no idea what she just said. You were listening, but you weren’t really there. You were hearing but not hearing.
This is what it means to see, but not see; to hear, but not hear. It is living life in an unconscious state, on autopilot. Most likely you are daydreaming about the unreal past or future. You can overcome this state of nothingness and time wasting by harnessing the power of now and being fully present in each moment.
Humanity is under great pressure to evolve because it is the only chance for the survival of our species.
“Humanity is under great pressure to evolve because it is our only chance of survival as a race. This will affect every aspect of your life and close relationships in particular. Never before have relationships been as problematic and conflict ridden as they are now. As you may continue to pursue the goal of salvation through a relationship, you will be disillusioned again and again. But if you accept that the relationship is here to make you conscious instead of happy, then the relationship will offer you salvation, and you will be aligning yourself with the higher consciousness that wants to be born into this world. For those who hold to the old patterns, there will be increasing pain, violence, confusion, and madness.”
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I could write ten posts about The Power of Now
The audio book does span several hours, but it is entirely worth every moment. If you can not afford to buy the audio book, you should consider borrowing it from your local library.
If you decide to read or have read this book, I would love to hear your thoughts. Whether or not you decide to, I hope that you will consider the ideas that I have shared in this post.
Thinking about being somewhere else uses up your precious, present moments. Be here now. —Wayne Dyer
