The truth of who you are is love experiencing life through thoughts, emotions, feelings.
Love is Life and love lives itself through you naturally, spontaneously, and effortlessly in the timeless present moment, free of identification with the false, thought-based self that lives in a story of time and feels separate from others and from life.
Artwork by Timothy Helgeson
Friday, November 27, 2009
The Truth of Who You Are Is?
Thursday, November 26, 2009
How Will Religion Evolve?
Does religion have a future? Who looks more like an evolutionary dead end: the religious American or the agnostic European? Or will both give way to some sort of compromise — people bound by new institutions that provide the social benefits of religion without belief in a traditional deity?
I raise these questions after reading my colleague Nicholas Wade’s fascinating new book, “The Faith Instinct: How Religion Evolved and Why It Endures,” in which he argues that people have a genetically based urge to worship, engraved by natural selection in the mind’s neural circuits because of the tremendous advantage religion conferred on early societies. (You can read a summary of the argument in his Week in Review article.)
If there is a religious instinct, how do we make sense of the declining church attendance in western Europe? As an agnostic myself, I’ve tended to see the European trend as a harbinger of a general move toward secularism as societies become richer and more educated. But you don’t see that trend in the United States, where church attendance is still robust, and Nicholas told me that he sees a long future for religion: “The extent to which people practice religion in modern states may wax and wane, depending on social circumstances like war or privation, but religion is unlikely to disappear entirely.”
You might conclude, from the low birth rates (below replacement levels) in European countries, that agnostics and atheists are eventually going to lose out, from an evolutionary standpoint, and be replaced by the growing populations of believers from other societies. But it’s also possible that the nonbelievers could develop new godless institutions that confer the evolutionary benefits of religion.
In “The Faith Instinct,” after discussing some of the challenges to traditional beliefs (like the arguments of scholars that Jesus had little to do with the invention of Christianity, and that Muhammad might not even have existed), Nicholas notes that music appreciation, like religion, is a universal human faculty that draws people together, stirs the emotions, and exalts the mind to a different plane. He then observes:
Is there not some way of transforming religion into versions better suited for a modern age? The three monotheisms were created to meet conditions in societies that existed many centuries ago. The fact that they have endured for so long does not mean they were meant to last for ever, only that they have become like some favorite Mozart opera that people are happy to hear over and over again. But the world of music did not achieve final perfection in Mozart.
Some Mozart devotees might argue with that last assertion, but I like the parallel between opera and religion. Going to the opera has always reminded me of going to church — the solemn congregants dressed in their best clothes, listening to their own sacred hymns and texts — but it doesn’t have the same overall impact. As Nicholas notes, religion has traditionally involved people in a multisensual communal experience (music, poetry, dancing) that touches “the deepest emotions of which the mind is capable, inspiring people to look beyond their own self interest to something they may value more, the health and survival of their society, culture or civilization.”
But nowadays many religions have toned down those experiences (Nicholas notes that pews were put in churches to stop people from dancing), and many people seem untouched by religion. Nicholas suggests this is because “the three monotheisms seem long ago to have reached the limits of their development, lagging behind the increasing complexity of human societies and the vast growth of organized knowledge.” He writes:
Religious behavior evolved for a single reason: to further the survival of human societies. Those who administer religions should not assume they cannot be altered. To the contrary, religions are Durkheimian structures, eminently adjustable to a society’s needs. They are shaped in implicit negotiation with supernatural powers who then give instructions to promote society’s interests. Much of course depends on the craft and inspiration of the negotiators. But first it is necessary to understand that negotiation is possible.
Maybe religion needs to undergo a second transformation, similar in scope to the transition from hunter gatherer religion to that of settled societies. In this new configuration, religion would retain all its old powers of binding people together for a common purpose, whether for morality or defense. It would touch all the senses and lift the mind. It would transcend self. And it would find a way to be equally true to emotion and to reason, to our need to belong to one another and to what has been learned of the human condition through rational inquiry.
What would the product of such a transformation look like? One possibility that occurs to me is a version of environmentalism, but with better music and with rituals that are more elegant than sorting garbage. A Church of Green could provide some of the same moral lessons and communal values as traditional religions, and I suspect it’s no coincidence that green fervor is especially prevalent in European countries where traditional religion is on the decline.
Do you see any possibilities for new religions, or for ways in which current religions could evolve?
Man happy with simple life in Utah cave
A 48-year-old man who has not used money in nine years and resides in a desert cave in Moab, Utah, said he loves his simple existence.
Daniel Suelo said while he shops for clothes by going through garbage, he is content with living an existence where he does not have to worry about a job, mortgage or other concerns that plague most U.S. residents, The Denver Post reported Sunday.
"The understanding that, really, we all possess nothing is the cornerstone of all spiritual endeavors and religions," Suelo said.
A former Peace Corps volunteer, Suelo said he also will not barter for food or rent because he considers bartering another form of currency.
Suelo began his unique style of living nine years ago despite having a master's degree in accounting and a degree in anthropology.
Despite his meager belongings and lack of a traditional home, Suelo insists he will never embrace a regular lifestyle again.
"I have no idea what the future holds, and I don't worry about it. But the longer I do this, it seems absurd to go back," he told the Post. "It would be like going back to slavery."
I believe this man is spiritually awake!
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
What is Spiritual Ascension?
Ascension is ultimately a physical process that this universe, and by this universe I mean the physical matter in this universe, undergoes.
Ascension is a sort of "change of state" or phase transition akin to what happens when ice melts to water.
Ascension is a fundamental shift in the material composition of the physical universe that allows Spirit incarnated in the physical body (that would be you and me) to more efficiently and effectively create this physical universe.
Ascension is occurring right now and is being led by an energetic interplay of life on this planet.
Ascension will lead, all other things being equal, to an increase in your ability to "manifest." This manifestation, or "co-creation" as some call it, will be guided by the principle as above , so below . That is, the ideas in your head, whether you are conscious or not, will manifest in the world around you.
Friday, November 20, 2009
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Ripples in space divide classical and quantum worlds
WHY can't we be in two places at the same time? The simple answer is that it's because large objects appear not to be subject to the same wacky laws of quantum mechanics that rule subatomic particles. But why not - and how big does something have to be for quantum physics no longer to apply? Ripples in space-time could hold the answer.
The location of the boundary between the classical and quantum worlds is a long-standing mystery. One idea is that everything starts off as a quantum system, existing in a superposition of states. This would make an object capable of being, for example, in many places at once. But when this system interacts with its environment, it collapses into a single classical state - a phenomenon called quantum decoherence.
Brahim Lamine of Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris, France, and colleagues say that gravitational waves may be responsible for this. These waves in the very fabric of the universe were generated by its rapid expansion soon after the big bang, as well as by violent astrophysical events such as colliding black holes. As a consequence, a background of ripples at very low amplitudes pervades space-time.
Lamine and colleagues calculated how this fluctuating space-time might contribute to quantum decoherence. They found that for systems with very large mass, such as the moon, decoherence induced by the gravitational waves would have caused any quantum superposition to dissipate immediately. At the other end of the scale, such waves would have a negligible effect on massless photons.
To test whether gravitational waves do in fact cause the decoherence seen in large objects, the researchers suggest using a set-up called a matter-wave interferometer in which molecules are made to pass through multiple gratings. The wave-like nature of the molecules causes them to diffract, and the diffracted waves interact to give rise to an interference pattern. Quantum decoherence destroys this pattern, so in principle this could provide a test for whether the decohering effect of background space-time fluctuations matches predictions. Such a system would have to be completely isolated to rule out other effects.
This is, however, impossible in practice - with today's interferometers, at least. Experiments pioneered by Anton Zeilinger, Markus Arndt and colleagues at the University of Vienna, Austria, have been able to generate interference with beams of 60-atom carbon buckyballs, but even with molecules of this size the effect of gravitational waves would be too small to be observed.
According to Lamine, who presented his work last month at the Gravitation and Fundamental Physics in Space meeting at Les Houches in the French Alps, the effect should be measurable in larger systems at high energy. Supersonic beams of about 3000 carbon atoms would do the trick if made to interfere over an effective area of about 1 square metre. This is far beyond the reach of any foreseeable technology.
Some speculative theories predict, however, that quantum decoherence will occur on a lower energy scale than that suggested by Lamine. If so, this could be within experimental reach. "That is why our experiments are pushing [up] the interference mass limit, step by step," says Arndt.
Humans Still Evolving as Our Brains Shrink
Evolution in humans is commonly thought to have essentially stopped in recent times. But there are plenty of examples that the human race is still evolving, including our brains, and there are even signs that our evolution may be accelerating.
Shrinking brains
Comprehensive scans of the human genome reveal that hundreds of our genes show evidence of changes during the past 10,000 years of human evolution.
"We know the brain has been evolving in human populations quite recently," said paleoanthropologist John Hawks at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.
Surprisingly, based on skull measurements, the human brain appears to have been shrinking over the last 5,000 or so years.
"When it comes to recent evolutionary changes, we currently maybe have the least specific details with regard the brain, but we do know from archaeological data that pretty much everywhere we can measure — Europe, China, South Africa, Australia — that brains have shrunk about 150 cubic centimeters, off a mean of about 1,350. That's roughly 10 percent," Hawks said.
"As to why is it shrinking, perhaps in big societies, as opposed to hunter-gatherer lifestyles, we can rely on other people for more things, can specialize our behavior to a greater extent, and maybe not need our brains as much," he added.
Mutations against malaria
In contrast to our limited but growing knowledge regarding the modern evolution of the human brain, the best example we see of evolution of humans in recent history is linked with malaria, Hawks said. Since the disease often targets humans early in life, there was a strong pressure to evolve defenses from malaria — any genetic factor that confers resistance against it would give descendents a chance to have offspring, while those without such protection were more likely to not reproduce.
There are lots of examples of defenses against malaria. Sickle cell anemia is the best known —the disorder deforms red blood cells into sickle shapes, which can impair blood flow, thus damaging tissues, this malformation also prevents the malaria parasite from infesting blood cells.
"Although sickle cell is best known in Africa, there is also an India-Pakistan variant of it that seems to have evolved separately," Hawks explained. "Both variants have evolved very recently, in the last three or four thousand years, and in that time have risen to as much as 10 to 15 percent of the populations. That's pretty rapid change."
Food and drink
Lactose tolerance is another recent example of a recent evolutionary change.
Most of the world remains lactose intolerant, unable to digest the complex milk sugar lactose as adults, but the evolution of lactose tolerance perhaps some 7,500 years ago in Europe enabled people there to take advantage of non-human milk, a highly nutritious food source one can sustainably procure instead of slaughtering animals.
Other evolutionary changes linked with diet appear to deal with genes conferring protection against type II diabetes.
"When you develop agricultural diets, you might need adaptations to survive on them, the way the digestive systems are regulated," Hawks said.
Is our evolution accelerating?
There are signs that human evolution may not only be continuing, but that its rate has even accelerated in recent times. Hawks and his colleagues have found evidence of rapid change, with a host of new mutations originating in the last 40,000 years.
So what might explain this apparent acceleration?
"The ecology of humans has been changing," Hawks said. "The biggest changes have to do with agriculture and its consequences — dealing with a new subsistence pattern that caused people to rely on foods that were never very important before, a radical shift from hunter-gatherer diets. For instance, agricultural populations tend to have more copies of a gene for salivary amylase, which helps them digest starch."
A New Magazine EdgeScience - Is the Global Mind Real
This is a new magazine EdgeScience! And it’s coming out from the Society for Scientific Exploration. You can download the first issue for free.
You can cut and past the link below into your browser for a free copy or click on the title link above.
http://www.scientificexploration.org/edgescience/edgescience_01.pdf
There’s an article about the Global Consciousness Project by Roger D. Nelson. The article has a great Pierre Teilhard de Chardin pull quote. “It is our duty—as men and women—to behave as though limits to our ability do not exist. We are collaborators in creation of the Universe.”
Meditation cuts risk of heart attack by half
Patients with heart disease who practised Transcendental Meditation cut their chances of a heart attack, stroke and death by half, compared with non-meditating patients, the first study of its kind has found.
Stress is a major factor in heart disease and meditation experts say the technique can help control it.
Transcendental Meditation, practised by the Beatles and based on an ancient tradition of enlightenment in India, involves sitting quietly and concentrating to focus the mind inwards by silently repeating a mantra. The practice is said to induce inner peace by allowing thoughts to flow in and out of the mind.
The results of the research are being presented at the American Heart Association scientific meeting in Orlando, Florida.
Over nine years, 201 African American people with an average age of 59 and who had all been diagnosed with heart disease were randomly assigned to either Transcendental Meditation or health education classes about diet and exercise.
Both groups continued with their normal medication.
The researchers from the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee in collaboration with the Institute for Natural Medicine and Prevention at Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Iowa, calculated heart attacks, strokes and deaths as one result and found a 47 per cent reduction in meditating patients.
They also had lower blood pressure and significant reductions in their stress levels, the researchers said.
Dr Robert Schneider, lead author and director of the Center for Natural Medicine and Prevention, said: "Previous research on Transcendental Meditation has shown reductions in blood pressure, psychological stress, and other risk factors for heart disease, irrespective of ethnicity.
"But this is the first controlled clinical trial to show that long-term practice of this particular stress reduction program reduces the incidence of clinical cardiovascular events, that is heart attacks, strokes and mortality."
Dr Theodore Kotchen, co-author of the study, professor of medicine, and associate dean for clinical research at the Medical College, said: "This study is an example of the contribution of a lifestyle intervention—stress management—to the prevention of cardiovascular disease in high-risk patients."
Dr Schneider said that the effect of Transcendental Meditation in the trial was like a newly discovered medicine for the prevention of heart disease.
"In this case, the new medications are derived from the body's own internal pharmacy stimulated by the Transcendental Meditation practice," he said.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Why A System Approach to Individual Spiritual Awakening and Conscious Evolution
I have developed the RippleFX system it consists of seven modules. I Know systems may seem very mechanical but I have found it a great process to facilitate the learning needed to assist individuals on their journey of spiritual awakening and conscious evolution.
I use a systems approach for several reasons of which I will go into later but to start, I just want to give you a little bit of background about me in order to put things into perspective.
I been on a journey of self exploration and healing for 12 intense years and during this time I have had a full career in business in the areas of sales, marketing, business development and international trade However in the past 3 years I have focused my attention on adult learning, authoring and facilitating workshops in both professional and personal formats.
Because I have a passion for developing and facilitating learning processes for individuals in order assist them during this time of transformation taking place in our world I am really excited about the RippleFX System. Why? Because I believe it is an awesome tool to assist people live from their heart rather then their mind which is very critical at this time in human history. I will explain more in future writings and audio’s.
Now the RippleFX system is dear to my heart as it is a system that I have developed based on my personal spiritual awakening experiences over the years.
I believe that one can only teach from the their own experience so what I teach comes my personal experience and what I know to be the truth up until this point on my journey. A number of people tell me that what I want to teach is two advanced for the average person, but I believe that those I am to teach will come and they will be ready to learn what it is I have to teach them I truly believe that as a divine principle.
And to finish up this point as a facilitator I am always learning and growing and changing, ones spiritual journey never stops as long as long as you stay open awakening is an organic process ever changing ever evolving being a facilitator allows me with an opportunity for learning as well.
So Let me give you a little information about The RippleFX System, it is like a guide or a manual to spiritual awakening and it consists of seven modules.
It is a facilitated learning process that provides individuals with knowledge base and tools to live from the real world system of wholeness from which we come from.
I refer to it as the non- physical realms, for example our dreams, emotions and our thoughts come from the non-physical realm. In the RippleFX system we have a whole module that focuses on thoughts it is called thought awareness. I recently uploaded an audio which briefly describes thought awareness from my perspective on this blog and my youtube channel.
In the Change your thoughts, Change your Life audio I explain briefly how it is our negative thoughts that cause a lot of the psychological pain and suffering in our lives. However, I believe that is because we have not learned how to use our thought process or thought awareness as a catalyst for positive change in our lives.
On another note when I developed the curriculum I felt it was most important to give people an overview on spiritual awakening from a physical world system and a real world system perspective. I have found in my learning and research and looking back it retrospect that many of the spiritual teachings while are great nuggets of wisdom are fragmented and this can be totally understood as the physical world system in which we live in is a world system based on fragmentation and separation so you can begin to see why this would be the case.
Anyway,the RippleFX system acts as a manual or guide a catalyst bridge between our physical world based on seperation and fragmentation and the real world which is based on wholeness,love, oneness and allignment with God or Source of which we come from.
I know this may sound a bit out there for some and I have debated whether to share this kind of information or not so it is an experiment , but I decided in all honesty that it does not support your journey or mine if I keep certain information or knowledge that I have from you.
You see I believe that without a real world knowledge of the physical world system that we live in it will not allow the full benefit of experiencing the work that I do with student who work with me in the RippleFX system or any work for that matter, that you may choose to do with someone else on your spiritual journey.
Now I will be uploading an audio shortly on the same subject and it will be the 3rd audio podcast I have done in support of the RippleFX System. So please feel free to listen to them at your convenience if you like and I will be uploading others in the future.
The first audio is “All Love the universal Language of love” which is a foundation peace on which the RippleFX system comes out of and” change your thoughts change your life” which goes into thought awareness and you can find these audios on this blog if you scroll down n.
Now please note this is a new format for me so bear with me as I grow into using this new plateform of communication.
In closing I want to again thank you for taking the time to read this post and if you find my message of interest and would like to learn more about the RipplFX System and our up coming online workshops please send me any questions comment to thecosmicheart@gmail.com
I look forward to sharing more writings audios with in the future and I also look forward to hearing from you.
Monday, November 16, 2009
How is Stillness Meditation a Key to Managing Stress?
The key to our management of stress lies in those moments when our brain runs quietly in a way that restores harmony of function.
First, there are many different forms of meditation in which the brain functions in quite different ways.
Stillness meditation is a form of meditation that is very effective in restoring the harmonious brain function while relieving stress.
In classical meditation as in yoga, in Zen Buddhist meditation, and in the meditation as practised by the early Christian mystics, the thought processes of the mind are helped by will power concentrating on some object or spiritual concept. The mind is active, striving to attain and maintain this ideal.
In the meditation that I would advise you to practise there is no striving, no activity of brain function, just quietness, a stillness of effortless tranquility.
This is not the tranquility of drowsy somnolence. The mind is clear but still.
At first, until the meditator has learned the art of letting his mind run in this way, there will be moments of stillness, but these are soon interrupted by the intrusion of thoughts.
Do not try to dispel the thoughts by actively driving them from the mind. Just let them be and they will fizzle out, cease, and stillness will come again. Then thoughts will recur. And again, if they are let alone, the stillness that we want, will become longer and longer.
At the start this process will come and go, very much like the natural rhythms that are all about us, night and day, the tides, our very heartbeat. There may be a tendency for the beginner to get cross with himself with the recurring thoughts. This, of course, brings the meditative process to a halt.
Another error, which may befall the beginner, is a tendency to examine the situation. 'How am I doing? Am I doing it properly?' Of course, any enquiry of this nature involves activity of the mind, which is exactly what we are trying to avoid. At the start it is best just to let ourselves experience a sense of being.
Just being. Not even being in the room. Not even being alive. Just being. This state of mental activity, or rather inactivity, is a step towards the real stillness of mind experienced in full meditation.... We are seeking a form of relaxation which arises in the brain itself.
In classical meditation the meditator is taught to be constantly aware of his breathing. The breath goes in and out, in and out. The awareness of it means that there is continuing activity of the mind. which means that this process produces a type of meditation quite different from that which I advocate.
There is another point. The awareness of our breathing gives the mind something to do, and so reduces the intrusion of thoughts. This makes meditation easier. So those learning to meditate easily fall into the habit of stilling their thoughts in this way.
But if we are meditating with awareness of our breathing, our brain never achieves the quiet stillness which is so effective in restoring harmonious function and so relieving stress.
These same principles apply to the technique of visualization.... The main problem that leads people into visualizing is that the inexperienced see it as something practical as opposed to the rather mystical idea of stillness.
Visualization is an easy technique as it gives the meditator something to do. This overcomes the initial difficulty of the meditator learning to let his mind run in stillness, but it leads to an inferior type of meditation.
It does not require long periods of meditation to obtain relief from stress. Ten minutes twice a day has produced dramatic relief in people.
As we learn to meditate in this way, it soon becomes a pleasant experience. It is something to which we look forward too. This comes with the ease that there is about it. There is no making ourselves relax, no making ourselves meditate. It is all very simple and natural. That is why we soon come to like doing it. Then we come to feel less stressed, and our motivation for our meditation is further increased.
Besides, there are many fringe benefits! The effects of successful meditation flow into our everyday life. Although we may initially have been meditating to control stress or some psychosomatic illness, there are many side-effects, and they are all positive, and all good.
They include inner peace, better interpersonal relationships, clearer thinking, increased work capacity - even tycoons agree on this, better sexual relationships due to less tension, absence of disturbing dreams, and smoother physical reactions often shown in better performance in sport.
How Can Stillness Release Stress?
Stillness is your essential nature.
If you don’t remember, it is only because you have simply forgotten that the inner space or awareness that resides within you is your natural state of being.
What is so magical is that true intelligence operates silently.
Because when you are still creativity and solutions to problems are found.
When you still your mind a door opens to your heart where you can create the life you are meant to live.
Stillness speaks clearly when you listen, stillness provides inner strength when you surrender. Stillness is your doorway to the unconditional love that resides within you.
When stillness speaks you know the truth of who you are so be still in this moment and bring awareness to your breath..... take three deep breaths from your belly and just allow your body to rest in stillness....... just rest a moment in stillness....just rest a moment of stillness.....just be here......breath........
Now how does that make you feel?
I work with individuals who want to learn the art of stillness. If any of this information resonates with you and you would like to learn more about how I can help you feel free to contact cosmic facilitator at: thecosmicheart@gmail.com.
Artwork By Timothy Helgeson
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