The Power of Intention

This article was first posted at Soulseeds in the Grapevine blog.

What is the difference between a prayer and an intention? Depending on how you think about prayer, probably nothing. They are both proactive and powerful. If you take a passive approach to prayer, however, it has less in common with the power of intention. Take for example the Day of Prayer planned by Texan Governor Rick Perry. His website claims that they are unable to fix many of the problems in America and so they are looking to Jesus to fix them. The event is called The Response which is ironic because they appear to be abrogating all responsibility. Their view of prayer follows the old country song, “Let Jesus take the wheel.” The website says, “There is hope for America. It lies in heaven and we will find it on our knees.”

There are many solutions to the problems in America and Jesus won’t be solving any of them. It is the responsibility of every one of us to be an active part of the solution. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. I can only imagine that if Jesus was around today he wouldn’t be running prayer meetings. He would be at the frontline addressing peoples’ needs in tangible and practical ways.

So what is the role of prayer in America’s problems? Even mainline views of prayer are more balanced than Rick Perry’s apparently passive Day of Prayer event. Take for example the conservative televangelist Oral Roberts who died in 2009. When you fly in to Tulsa Oklahoma you can see the entrance of Oral Roberts University from the plane. At the gates there is a massive sculpture known as The Praying Hands, standing 60 feet tall and weighing 30 tons, the largest bronze monument in the world. At first glance, it appears to be a straightforward image of two hands in prayer pose. But when you look closer, you see that they are not two identical hands. You have to dig a little to find the reason for this, but Oral Roberts himself said, “The Hands represent the hand of a physician using the natural forces of God’s earth and the hand of the prayer partner offering the prayer of faith.” One hand represents prayer and the other hand represents human expertise.

Oral Robert’s view of prayer is closer to the mainstream. It keeps the sense of personal responsibility. Prayer is not an excuse for inaction. Each of us has a responsibility to use our hands, and brains and skills to serve the whole. So what is the purpose of the other hand, the prayer hand?

There is a partial truth in Rick Perry’s Day of Prayer initiative. He says there are some problems we can’t solve. This is true, but the problems in America are not among the unsolvable problems. The problems in American are very solvable if we have the will to do so and work together. There are other things we can’t control. The role of prayer, and this is true across many different views of prayer, is to acknowledge that we can’t control everything in life. Prayer is an act of surrender, humility and intention. Prayer is a way of releasing the burden of control over circumstances such as natural disasters, other peoples’ choices and evolutionary forces. It includes an element of gratitude for forces that hold the universe in place beyond our efforts, and it includes a surrender of outcomes beyond our control.

It’s not so much about “ask and you shall receive.” It’s more about, “express your deepest questions and doubts and at the right time the answer will become clear.” In the meantime, get comfortable with uncertainty, stop expecting that two and two will not equal four and give up what your ego has convinced you that you need to receive. The initiative and the power lie within you to discern between things you can control and things you need to surrender. If you can’t control or fix or change something, then change your attitude to the situation. Surrender to the flow of life, and all that you truly need will find you because it is WITHIN you. You just need to peel away some of the protective layers and pride. Prayer is one way to do this.

My own view of prayer has evolved a LOT over the years. I used to think of prayer as communication with a supernatural being external and apart from myself. Now I think of prayer as communication with the part of myself that is larger than me but still deep within me, my higher power by any name. God is no longer a mysterious OTHER, and is now the mysterious MORE that fills life with meaning and powerful possibilities beyond my small concerns. This mysterious more includes the untapped power of mind, the limitless strength of character, the collective power of shared vision, the wisdom of nature and so much more. There is more possibility in life than our small perspective usually allows us to see. Prayer is one way to tap into this power.

Prayer and Intention

Prayer is less about asking and more about imagining. This is where prayer merges with intention. With intentions, you have the power to imagine the future of your wildest dreams, a future that serves you and others in powerful ways. The power of intention is the ability to think from the end and work backwards. Imagination is your memory of the future.

Michelangelo once said about his masterpiece Statue of David: "I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free." It existed first in his imagination, as if he was carving it out of his memory. It began in his unconscious mind, and then came to birth in the marble.

Some people argue that the unconscious, or most ancient, parts of the brain have no way of distinguishing between what is real and what is imagined. There seems to at least be some truth to this statement. Anyone who screamed out loud in Spielberg’s new movie Super 8 knows what I’m talking about. Our brains have the ability to feel fear about things that are not real and may never be real. We also have the ability to imagine futures that are incredibly exciting. To the extent that this is true, you could say that if you focus on imagined fear your brain will think this is real. If you focus on an exciting future, also imagined, your brain will think this is real. Either way it’s a choice.

This is how intentions work. You look out to an imagined end point and work backwards. You train your brain to believe that your future is a reality and begin to take steps to live this reality. There is an awesome example of this from Shell Oil Company. Oil companies need to project a long way into the future, including the price of commodities, global forces and unrest in the Middle East, to name a few. In the early 1990s, when they were projecting an oil price of $20 to $30 per barrel let alone the $120 a barrel we now have, they contracted a surprising support person. Betty Sue Flowers is a PhD in English, and worked closely with Joseph Campbell on the Power of Myth. She was contracted to write stories for Shell. She participated in meetings with strategists and economists and crafted their numbers and strategies into story form. Every day she revised the stories and circulated them to the team.

Eventually they created a series of scenarios about how the future might play out. The scenarios were based on scientific predictions but included some wiggle room for uncertain forces. The team was then able to choose their preferred scenario. In an interview, Flowers said this, “when you tell stories about the future, even if you're not claiming to forecast, there's some sense...that actually the future is the story you choose. Now that is very un-economic in its basis. It's not the "invisible hand" working out invisibly, like a machine. Its human beings coming in and saying "I choose Scenario A, not Scenario B." It's a different emphasis--it puts the human being more in the center, in very nuanced ways, instead of these huge impersonal forces. It's very subtle. But it makes a big difference.”

They learnt some important things that relate to intentions.

1. You don't know the future- but you can create scenarios that make sense and CHOOSE one.

2. The scenarios don’t necessarily have straight lines and fixed outcomes. You can rewrite them as you learn and experience more of life.

3. Use your preferred vision of the future to create the present that you want.

Visualizations

Visualization is one way of practicing the power of intention. You can actually visualize the future you want and begin to make it a reality. Try it out. Choose something that comes from your deepest sense of purpose.

Visualize a powerful intention for your life or for the world. Let it come from your highest purpose where what you want, what others need and who you are, are one and the same thing. Picture it in your mind with as much detail and clarity as you can. Feel it in your body. Be it with all your might. Frame it in a scene that is full of blue sky and light. See yourself in the vision, looking strong and fulfilled.

Now let it become part of your present reality. Let your intention loose. Let it unfold. Let it be a path on which your dreams can travel.

Consider adding an affirmation to your visualization. Something like this-

A vibrant and exciting future is unfolding in perfect order.

Unlike the view of prayer where you let Jesus have the wheel, this view of prayer is empowering and full of personal responsibility. You have everything you need, right within you, to both create the reality you desire and surrender the parts of life that you can’t control. It’s all within you, waiting to be liberated like Michelangelo’s angel in marble. Carve the life of your wildest dreams out of the raw material of your humanity; your memory which has more knowledge of past, present and future than you could imagine, your strength that is shaped by life’s challenges, your skill that is honed by years of practice and your wisdom that knows what to change and what to surrender.

You are connected to the source and power of intentions, your own and others. It is a power that no single religion possesses. It can't be possessed. Religions can hint at this power with stories and metaphors, but this is far bigger than any religion. This is a global awakening. Imagine the revolution when people unite their loving intentions for the good of all. There is no limit to what can be achieved.

Are Your Truths True?

This article is linked from Soulseeds where I post more of my writing. Please sign up for the weekly Soulseeds newsletter.

When we arrive home after a few days or weeks away, someone in the family will inevitably say “AJ” as they walk in the door. There is a particular odor that we all associate with the previous owner and even though we’ve lived here for 8 years, the distinctive smell remains. We only notice it after we’ve been away. Otherwise we don’t notice it because we’ve become so used to it. I guess that’s why it’s sometimes easy to miss your own body odor. You’re used to it, and it’s impossible to get away from yourself for a few days even if others wish you would…get away.

Some of the thoughts in your mind are like a lingering odor. You are so used to them that you don’t even notice that you are living as if they are absolutely true. You take them for granted without question, unless you arrive back after a mental getaway, sniff at the edge of your consciousness and see your thoughts in a new light.

There are many ways to look at your thoughts in a new light, and most personal growth systems offer techniques to challenge unquestioned beliefs. Both personal development leader Byron Katie and the philosopher Michael Foucault who died in 1984, devised a series of questions to do just that. They are an odd couple, with no obvious connection to each other except that their questions share a strange synergy. Katie’s questions are coming from a personal perspective, and Foucault’s questions are coming from a social perspective.

Here are the questions they each ask

Katie
What is the truth?
Can you absolutely know it’s true?
What self belief does the truth lead to?
Who would you be without the truth?

FoucaultWho can tell the truth?
What is the truth about?
What are the consequences of the truth?
What is the relationship between the truth and social authority?



The Personal Dimensions of Truth

Katie calls her work The Work. It goes something like this.

What is your truth? X doesn’t care about me because he doesn’t listen.

Can you absolutely know it’s true? It feels true, but then again he did hear me last week when I told him about my fear and he seemed to care then. There could be many reasons why he seems distant, and they might have very little to do with me. I get mixed messages from him, but I really don’t and can’t know what’s going on inside his head or in his life. I don’t know for sure that he doesn’t care.

What self belief does the truth lead to? Thinking that X doesn’t care about me makes me feel rotten. The less I feel his care, the more I strive to earn it. It makes me feel unworthy of care from anyone. Ultimately it reminds me of my own self loathing.

Who would you be without the truth? I would be liberated without the thought that X doesn’t care about me. I would spend less time second guessing his thoughts and feelings, and more time healing my relationship with myself.

With this approach, you can change the story, and turn around some of the painful thoughts. The turn around here is that I care about myself, I listen to my feelings and if X listens to me it’s a bonus. I can enjoy the moments where I feel cared about, and I’m not devastated when I don’t feel cared for because I don’t expect my self worth to be filled by other people.

I appreciate the simplicity of Katie’s approach and use versions of it often in my own life. However it’s not always as simple as that. Sometimes there are related issues.

The Social Dimension of Truth
Some of the truths you tell yourself grow out of your relationships; with parents, children, teachers, the media, the government or social norms accepted without question. In Foucault’s case, he wrote a lot about sanity, prisons and sexuality. As a prisoner, your view of the world is formed by your relationship with the penal system. Prison is not just punishment. It also creates a belief that you are constantly being watched. Mental health and sexuality are defined according to the categories given to you by society, eg gay, straight, insane, schizophrenic etc. If your truths don’t match the categories, you feel pressured to conform your truth to match society.

Who can tell the truth? All truth is formed in a context. When you claim your power as a fearless truth teller, you realize that you don’t have to be or do what other people expect of you. You tell your own truth AND it can change over time and in different circumstances. You tell your truth in the context of your various roles in society, which create your unique insight.

What is the truth about? Truth always has a trajectory. Society usually decides the direction of truth- for example women are this way and men are that way. Decide on your own story. Claim your gender, sexuality and personality without apology and without society’s biases.

What are the consequences of the truth? Foucault famously said, “People know what they do; frequently they know why they do what they do; but what they don't know is what what they do does." Your truths have consequences in the world beyond your mind. They affect other people’s truths and the systems that we are all related to. Live mindfully. Are your truths nurturing the sort of environment where diversity and authenticity can flourish for you and all others?

What is the relationship between the truth and social authority? The 1990s song from the Disposable Heroes of Hypopricy said, “Television- is it the reflector or the director? Do we imitate it, or does it imitate us?” Is society the way it is because of our collective truths, or are our truths formed by society? Likely a complex mixture of both. Choose to focus on self determination. If they give you lined paper to write on, write sideways. Be the best version of yourself, a perspective that includes the good of others.

Nothing But the Truth

Katie keeps the process grounded in personal responsibility and reality as it is rather than the stories that aren’t serving you or those around you. Foucault also focuses on personal responsibility but offers some broader perspective to the personal dimensions of Katie’s work. Together they offer some key questions for checking in with your assumptions and habitual thoughts.

A concluding quote from Katie-

“A thought is harmless unless we believe it. It’s not our thoughts, but our attachment to our thoughts, that causes suffering. Attaching to a thought means believing that it’s true, without inquiring. A belief is a thought that we’ve been attaching to, often for years."

Still Small Voice of Peace

Our kids have pretty much grown out of singing the road trip blues-“Are we there yet? When are we going to get there? I’m hungry. I’m thirsty. I’m bored. I need to go to the bathroom.” Masters of catastrophe, kids are! One of the kids will say, “I’m starving.” I will reply, “Kids in Africa who haven’t eaten in days are starving. You on the other hand, had a sandwich fifteen minutes ago. You are not starving.” Or else, a kid will say, “I’m dying of thirst.” And I reply, “That is highly unlikely but don’t tempt me.” One of our kids, who shall remain nameless, hit the jackpot with the most woeful statement and had us all laughing. After several rounds of complaints, this one said, “I’m dying to death back here.” Dying to death! That could be the mantra for catastrophizing.

We’ve tried banning the expression “I’m starving.” A little mindfulness about the power of language can’t go astray. Of course it’s not just kids who excel at catastrophizing. I found a small lump on my body recently and within minutes I had imagined myself in months of chemo and radiation. I pictured myself bald. Then I day dreamed my death bed scene telling the kids how much I love them and kissing Meg for the last time, wondering if she will remarry. All of this anxiety was created over what turned out to be a boil. It seems it is easier to lance a boil than it is to dissect the workings of the human ego.

Catastrophizing does not serve you well. At best, it leaves you depressed and anxious. At worst it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. If the worst never arrives, you worried for nothing. If it does happen, you endure it twice. Catastrophizing tells the stories that pessimism wants to hear to justify its perspective. Catastrophizing is sitting in traffic and imagining that the meeting you are missing is the beginning of the end of your career. Catastrophizing is looking at your child’s report card and imagining that he will never get a college degree. Catastrophizing creates stories with very little basis in reality, feeds the stories with evidence from unrelated situations, spirals in negativity and eventually becomes irrational and closed to all reasonable conversation.

We’re pretty good at it as a society as well. Every time I hear people talking about America sliding down the slippery slope to socialism, my mind goes back to the kids in the back seat telling me that “they’re starving.” Do you remember the hyped up drama about “death panels” a few years back? Some people seemed to think that President Obama would personally be visiting nursing homes with a pillow tucked under his arm. When public conversations become irrational like this, not much is achieved.

We’ve seen this many times before, on both sides of issues. The passage of the Civil Rights Bill in the 1960s had its own controversial path. Many people became convinced that whites would be enslaved in this new world order. Now, 40 years later, we take the Civil Rights Bill for granted and very few people are worried about a black takeover of the country. I can’t help wondering if in 10 or 40 years time, there will be a universal health care system in America and we will all look back and say “what was all the fuss about?” That’s often the way with catastrophizing. As the predicted dates for the end of the world come and go, and as all the anticipated anxiety fails to materialize, we look back and smile at our over active imaginations.

Catastrophizing is often built around pre existing conditions like fear of change or self doubt. It’s another cunning ploy from your ego to play small and hide behind fear.

There is a fascinating story told in the Bible about the Israelites floundering in the wilderness, and they are imagining the worst. They shout to Moses, “We’re dying to death out here.”

Here is the actual text-

They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!” Exodus 14:10-12

You can’t really blame them for thinking they are dying to death. They couldn’t flick ahead a few pages to see how it turned out like we can, or watch Charlton Heston save the day in the movie The Ten Commandments.

In the face of their catastrophizing, here is Moses answer to them.

Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the LORD will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still.” Exodus 14:13-18

Now this is interesting. Was Moses being optimistic? Because we know the story, we know that it took 40 years, rather than one day, for the Israelites to find freedom. Maybe Moses was not talking about their physical deliverance, but an inner freedom that was theirs to claim that very day.

Moses offers three antidotes to catastrophizing, all based on negating fear.

1. See alternatives. Your imagination is powerful. So use it to conjure up multiple scenarios. Then remind yourself that any of them is possible. Even your most positive predictions may fall short of reality.

2. Stand firm. Be patient and allow the situation to unfold. Don’t be too quick to form conclusions about good and bad. Bad can very quickly seem better once worse happens. Good can easily be forgotten once better happens. There is always more to come. Sometimes good things change so that better things can emerge. Stay open because everything that happens makes you wiser and stronger.

3. Be still. In other words, stop swirling in fantasy about unknowns and dwell in this moment where everything is as it is.

For the most part, it’s a mind game and it’s a game you can win.Your mind functions like a committee. The committee is constantly bombarding you with different voices and opinions. One of the members of the committee is catastrophe, the pessimist who wants to remind you to expect the worst. Maybe the voice of catastrophe is simply echoing the voices of people who haunt your life with their negativity; a teacher, an ex or a business nemesis. They all have their perspective, and they all bring something worthwhile to the table. But none of them holds all the truth of your life.

There is a still small voice that stands firm in the midst of all the other voices. This is the voice of your true essence, your highest self that transcends and includes all other perspectives and roles. It’s a small voice, not because it lacks power. On the contrary, this is your most powerful voice. It’s small because it has no need to raise its voice in anger, or shout irrational obscenities in meetings. It’s small because it waits to hear the answers to its questions and keeps an open mind. It has no predetermined ideas as to how the future will play out; preferring to urge you to be all you can be in each moment, a work in progress.

It’s a still voice, not because it lacks conviction. On the contrary, this is your most powerful voice. It’s still because it doesn’t fight reality. It’s small because it has nothing to prove and compels you forward with gentle persuasion. It states its case calmly and respectfully, and genuinely looks for win/win solutions.

The intent of spiritual practices such as meditation, yoga, contemplation and so many other practices is awareness so that you know which committee member is ruling your life at a given moment. With this awareness, you can choose to appoint the still small voice as the chair of your mind’s committee. As chair, it can affirm and embrace each voice for what it is, but not be ruled by any one voice. Spiritual practice helps you to tune into the still small voice and live your life with contentment and skilful means.

In this moment, stand firm and be still, all is well and all will be well no matter what the circumstance.

Please visit Soulseeds for inner peace resources.

Harvesting Memories

Two very elderly ladies were enjoying the sunshine on a park bench. They had been meeting at that park every sunny day for over 12 years… chatting, and enjoying each other’s company.

One day, the younger of the two ladies, turns to the other and says, “Please don’t be angry with me, but I am embarrassed, after all these years, my memory is not what it used to be. . .What is your name? I just can’t remember.”

The older friend stares at her, looking very confused, says nothing for two full minutes, and finally says, “How soon do you need to know?”

I’m speaking about memory today. I’m sure there’s a good reason for that, but I can’t remember it right now. As Meg says I have a photographic selective memory. When it comes to household chores, I run out of film.

My topic is memory because it’s Memorial Day. What role does memory play in your life? My hope is that you can draw inspiration from the positive memories and find some healing and transformation in the difficult memories.

Memory and Gratitude

Memory is one of the basic ingredients of gratitude, which is in turn one of the basic ingredients of optimism. We’ve had two tender memorial services in the last week. Both included inspiring eulogies for the dear departed. As I listened to the eulogies on both cases, it struck me that it would be SO powerful to tell each other’s stories like this while we are still alive. Imagine the gratitude if we took every opportunity to share memories and each other’s positive attributes while we are around to hear it.

Having said that, there is something unique about memorial services. No matter what has happened in life, or what might be unresolved in a relationship, a eulogy focuses on gratitude.

There is a funny story about a minister who is leading a memorial service. He calls on people to come forward and say a few nice words about the deceased. No one comes forward. He urges them, “Surely someone present today can say something appreciative!” Eventually a man comes to the microphone and says, “His brother was worse.”

In most cases, this is not a problem. Once someone has gone, memories come to us of good times shared and admirable qualities. They comfort and inspire us. These memories often lead to forgiveness and healing. Even when it comes to wars that you may disagree with or feel conflicted about, it’s appropriate to remember the people who have lost their lives in war. They no doubt had their mixed motives, like all of us, but our lives are built on the imperfect but well intentioned platform of those who have gone before us.

Gutzon Borglum, the sculptor who created the amazing Mount Rushmore Memorial, was once asked if he considered his work perfect in detail. “Not yet,” he replied. “The nose of Washington is an inch too long. It’s better that way, though. It’ll erode to be approximately right in about 10,000 years.”

Memory tends to be like that. We erode the imperfections of the past into a coherent whole, integrate even the difficult memories, and move forward. In time, memories fall into place as they need to.

Memory and Change

We all have stories and a lineage. Our memories are built on these stories that are part fact and part fiction. It’s not so much that we retrieve memories. We reweave memories in a way that feels consistent. There is an old Jewish story that makes this point.

When the great Rabbi Israel Baal Shem-Tov felt anxious about the future for his people, it was his custom to go into a certain part of the forest to meditate. He would light the fire, say a special prayer, and sure enough his anxiety would subside. Sometimes, his people would even be miraculously protected after his forest ritual. Years later when he was gone, it fell to the next generation to deal with the same anxiety. The head Rabbi knew the story of his ancestor in the forest but didn’t know all the details. So he would go to the same place in the forest and say: “Creator of the Universe, listen! I do not know how to light the fire, but I am still able to say the prayer,” and sure enough his anxiety would subside and often a miracle would be accomplished. Another generation later, the same ritual would take place but with even less certainty around the detail. The Rabbi would go into the forest and say, “I do not know how to light the fire. I do not know the prayer, but I know the place and this must be sufficient.” It was always sufficient. The years passed. Finally the next generation brought the head Rabbi to the same point. Sitting in his armchair, his head in his hands, he said: “I am unable to light the fire, and I do not know the prayer, and I cannot even find the place in the forest. All I can do is tell the story, and this must be sufficient.” And it was always sufficient.

Ritual and memory are like that. When I was growing up, our family had a Christmas ritual that we inherited from an English custom. Christmas pudding, steamed and served with brandy butter and cream. The earlier custom was to include certain items in the pudding before cooking it; silver coins for wealth, tiny wishbones for good luck, a ring for marriage etc. Whoever found the items in their pudding on Christmas day would get what they chomped on. When I was young, my parents would put coins in the pudding that they had collected from their parents; shillings and sixpence and the like. They must have gone missing, because by the time I was about 10 the coins were current day coins. Then when people started losing teeth on their Christmas pudding and the hygiene of cooking metal in pudding was questioned, we stopped putting coins in the pudding altogether. But we still ate the pudding and brandy butter endures to this day. Just like the story of the Rabbis, eating the pudding and telling stories about the coins of Christmas past was always enough.

Tradition, ritual and memory are based on ever changing memory and culture. One of the dangers of religion is the expectation that tradition remains the same. It’s not possible. All traditions change, and there should be no guilt about allowing rituals to evolve. It’s all based on memory, and as Barbara Kingsolver wrote in Animal Dreams, “Memory is a complicated thing, a relative to truth, but not its twin.”

Memories in Nature

Nature has always been the focus of significant memories both for individuals and cultures. The ancient story is told that while the Israelites were in exile, they were particularly desperate and anxious. The rainbow was their reminder that they were part of something larger than their circumstance. Before they understood how rainbows came about, they no doubt filled it with supernatural meaning. They put the meaning on the rainbow that their God (hope) was larger than any natural disaster like a flood and larger than their exile. In non theistic language, we could say that they were comforted by the evolving reality that all things are constantly moving and changing. Despair and grief may feel like the last word, but there is always a rainbow close by the rain. Rainbows are universally loved, even now that we do understand how they occur. The meaning we place on rainbows, however, might be different.

I remember taking a wedding on a beach a few years back. Clouds were looming and the bride was getting anxious. People were constantly looking up at the sky to check for rain. A few drops of rain began to fall, smudging the marriage license. Just when we were about to turn and run for cover, the rain stopped and a massive rainbow appeared right behind us. The timing couldn’t have been more perfect. It was as if the rainbow was framing the happy couple like a gazebo. The rainbow was a reminder not to give up which was similar to the original intent of the covenant between the Israelites and their God.

There is always more to come. It’s such an important part of a covenant, whether it’s an agreement between two people or two nations or between humans and the earth. There is always more to learn, more to understand and more to come. We now know that there is nothing supernatural about a rainbow. It’s all about the refraction of light as it passes through water. There is nothing supernatural, but there is something magical about the rainbow. It’s AS IF they are coming from beyond. It’s the same with memories and ritual. There is nothing supernatural about miracles that appear to come from nowhere. They are formed in the brain. But there is something magical about the healing qualities of memory that can turn wounds into wisdom and pain into perspective.

Do you ever arrive somewhere for the first time and “feel” like you’ve been there before? Maybe it’s a smell or a sound that triggers your memory of another time or place. The memory could trigger a protective instinct or some kind of reassurance. For me, the smell of pine after rain in Duncan Woods triggers an incredible surge of optimism. A 20 minute walk in the woods takes me back to childhood hikes. The smell of the beach refuels me. There is a sign down at the beach at Grand Haven. It says, “No refueling on the beach.” I always smile at the sign because this is one of the places where I totally refuel. The beach takes me back to childhood vacations, hours lying on the sand before we knew about the dangers of sun exposure. In our blissful ignorance, we would spend hours refueling each summer.

Nature, in all its beauty, is a playground for the senses and a memory emporium. It’s a place to be inspired by happy memories and heal difficult memories.

Memory and Mystery

Memory remains one of the great mysteries of consciousness. How do birds travel thousands of miles every year and apparently stop at the same points each year on their trek? How do they know? How do new generations of birds know to continue the same route? Are they taking visual cues or following their nose? No one knows. Then there is the clownfish; remember, Nemo? After clownfish hatch from their eggs, they spend 10 to 12 days in the open sea, carried out by currents. But they often miraculously find their way back to the reefs where they were born. Apparently they sniff for leaves that fall into the sea from rainforests near their coral reef homes. Memory fills their senses and brings them home.

Do you ever find yourself somewhere and sense that you have been there before but don’t know how you know? Or do you have moments of déjà vu and wonder where in your memory the experience is coming from? Do you sometimes say something and wonder where your information came from? Memory is a mystery to be mined for meaning.

Part of the beauty of imagination is when we have memories of the future, and understand with confidence what needs to be said or done. As the White Queen says to Alice in Through the Looking Glass, “It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards.” The Queen warns her that it can make you giddy at first.

Maybe the point where memories collide in both directions is dreams. Dreams appear to be the brain’s way of consolidating memories. Dreams are a complex and confusing combination of memories, maybe a clearing house, where you put unlikely people in the same situation and play out frightening and delightful scenarios.

Memories are personal, subjective and evolving. As Philip Roth wrote, “each of us remembers and forgets in a pattern whose labyrinthing windings are an identification mark no less distinctive than a fingerprint”

Dreams and memories connect you with hidden powers. Deep down you have a memory of who you are at your essence, an essence that the anxieties and traumas of life have partially robbed from your conscious mind. Explore your dreams, memories and surprising thoughts to recover some of the power of your full humanity. Once you recover some of this essence, you will feel liberated to live through floods and rainbows, love and loss without overly attaching to any of it. For there is always more to come. Namaste.

Each Life Has Its Place

With Memorial Day coming up in America next weekend, I was thinking about how much I appreciate people who blazed the trail that I now walk. Even if I never knew them, if I didn’t particularly like them, even if they died in wars that I disagreed with, they lived and loved the best they could and made a difference to the whole. As the Indigo Girls sing, “Each life has its place” and I am growing to believe that EVERYONE is my teacher. Sometimes death is the only thing that brings the significance of someone’s life into your consciousness.

Last weekend I spoke at a funeral for a woman who was a local artist. I knew her quite well, and loved her from the minute we met. She was easy to like and attracted positive people into her presence. But it was only in her death that I truly began to appreciate all she had taught me. What follows is something close to what I said at the funeral.

The Indian spiritual teacher, Krishnamurti, once said, “our souls all come from the same paper but what makes us unique is the creases formed in the paper from all the folding and unfolding of our life experience.” Today we honor the life of a uniquely beautiful and creative woman. Liz understood symmetry, appreciated colors, and resonated with fine form. When I think of Liz in the context of the Krishnamurti quote I think of Origami. In Origami, a flat piece of paper is transformed into an animal, a flower, a shape or some abstract design. The crane holds a special place of honor in the world of Origami. The incredible thing is that these forms were crafted just with folds and creases.

Liz’s life was like a piece of Origami. She went through ups and downs like all of us, and ultimately had to come to terms with her own death, the greatest challenge of all. Liz’s husband John told me that soon before her death, Liz told him that she had made peace with her death. It was a tender moment, and spoke volumes about John’s quiet reassurance. I can’t help wondering if it was partially Liz’s appreciation of form that gave her an insight into the beauty of imperfection that brought her peace with death.

Artists throughout the centuries have come to profound spiritual realizations, which often came about through disillusionment and the agony of their own creative brilliance. Rembrandt was an artist who lived his odyssey out loud through his paintings. He had a brief, 8 year, marriage to Saskia. In the early years of their marriage Rembrandt painted Saskia in the form of Flora, the goddess of Spring and fertility. He portrayed her as an exquisite beauty. When Saskia gave birth to their child, she became ill and never recovered. She lived her final years bid ridden. Rembrandt chose to portray her with stark honesty, lying in bed with sunken cheeks and a frail body. It was such a huge contrast to the early Saskia paintings. How did Rembrandt resolve his experience of the two Saskias in such a brief time?

The answer to this question may be found in one Rembrandt’s most famous works, The Three Trees. The focal point of the piece is the three large trees. Nature is active with swirling clouds hovering above and puddles of sunshine in the fields. There is a lot taking place under the shade of the trees; an artist sketching, a couple fishing and the faint impression of a couple in love. Rembrandt seems to be placing himself all over the etching, coming to terms with his own life. Nature is revealing its cycles through it all. The resolution is that life moves and changes and the only meaning is the meaning you place on experiences.

Rembrandt’s Three Trees etching seems to be an example of Wabi Sabi. Wabi Sabi is a Japanese phrase that indicates that beauty is often found in things that are old or worn or even uncomfortable. Wabi Sabi is the honest emotions and inner perspective that can see beauty in imperfection, meaning in chaos and life in death. Wabi Sabi is a single cherry blossom nestled in a pile of debris after an earthquake. Wabi Sabi is a family photo on the front lawn after a tornado. Wabi Sabi is a precious last kiss before death. Wabi Sabi, like nature, appreciates beauty without attaching to beauty because all things change and die. There is symmetry even in death.

Wabi Sabi honors the aging process. Lines and wrinkles aren’t signs of decay. They are the unique creases in the paper that map the unfolding of your life. The limps and slumped shoulders aren’t signs of weakness, but reminders of character and a lived life. The love handles in your middle are nothing but love given and received. Each body tells its own story.

The Wabi Sabi of Liz’s last days was the image of her in bed at home where she wanted to be, the curtains closed except for a thin stream of light casting shadows on her face. The bed clothes neatly made, with one of the corners folded like an envelope and one of her feet peeking out from under the sheets like an unread letter. Her face gaunt and her cheeks sunken. And a glint in her eye that spoke of peace and acceptance.

We gathered for Liz’s funeral on May 21 just hours before the prophesied end of the world. The prophecy seemed trivial in the context of an actual ending of life. Life is beginning and ending every day, and in every moment. There is too much to experience right now, in both the ups and downs of life, to be distracted by trivia. The only possible response to end times prophecies in the light of the death of a teacher is to live each day as IF it’s the last. Then get up the next day and do it again. The incredible symmetry of life is waiting to be noticed.

May you remember that without darkness nothing comes to birth, as without light nothing flowers.
May nature teach you patience as snow covered grass.
May the earth teach you courage as the tree which stands tall and strong.
May survivors inspire optimism as the seed which rises in the spring.

Ps, please visit Soulseeds for my regular blog, as well as Meg's blog and many other resources

Change Your Life, Change Your Mind

May your mind transcend limitations.
May your consciousness expand in every direction.
May you discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be.

These words are a translation from Patanjali, the compiler of the Yoga Sutras around 200BC.

This is the essence of the spiritual journey; transcending limitations, expanding your consciousness and becoming the person you are destined to be. Sometimes this requires stepping out of your comfort zone to remind yourself that you are alive and on an evolving adventure of growth and learning. This doesn’t have to happen through extreme experiences, like sky diving or moving to an Ashram. It can happen in everyday experiences. Take it from me, Mr Everyday.

On Friday night Meg gave me an early Father’s Day surprise. We drove about an hour north to Val Du Lakes to watch an Aussie band perform; Sick Puppies, probably best known for their song in the viral Free Hugs video. Meg had been saying for weeks that I would never guess what we were doing, and she was right. I wouldn’t have guessed it in a million years. We lead busy lives that follow a fairly predictable pattern. So you can imagine that finding ourselves in a part of Michigan we have never been to, listening to an Aussie rock band, was outside of our comfort zone. Even listening to a band was outside of our comfort zone.

Before you think that this is a story about how courageous and liberated we are, you need to picture the scene. Meg and I sitting in our fold up lawn chairs, well back from the stage, with a crocheted rug over our knees, one occasionally turning to the other to say, “It’s very loud isn’t it?” and “I can’t understand a word they’re singing.” The funny thing was that when we set our chairs up it was still light. We didn’t realize that we had set up camp right in the path of the flood lights. So when the photographer from the Muskegon Chronicle took our photo we shouldn’t have been surprised. He came over and asked for our names so he could include them with the photo. We looked at each other, laughed and declined. He seemed shocked. We should have said, “Just put the names down as Satan and Mrs Lucifer. That outa kick start the comments section for you. We had a good laugh about it all.

Do you ever do things that surprise yourself? It’s important to be able to surprise yourself. When life starts to feel too predictable or routine, you can easily fall into auto pilot and miss some of the adventure of being alive. Do something today to remind yourself that life still has more to offer you. There is more of you that is waiting to come out and play. You don’t have to sell all of your possessions and move to India. You can even do it from a folding chair. Mix it up a little. Do something that reminds you that you have more capacity, and greater genius than you will usually allow yourself to believe.

Internal Conflict

What stops you from truly manifesting your genius? Internal conflicts often prevent you from living as fully as you want to live. Sometimes the internal conflict is very obvious; for example I want to take up a new hobby, but I don’t want to make any time for it. I want to meet new people but I don’t want to take any risks. I want to lose weight but I don’t want to change my lifestyle. I want to feel healthier, but I don’t want to stop eating ice cream for breakfast.

In these cases, it’s a fairly straightforward scenario. You have different voices competing for your attention, and you make a choice. Sometimes you choose to play it safe. Sometimes you choose the most immediate benefits. There is a story about an old Cherokee chief who told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, “My son, the battle is between two wolves. One is destructive–it is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority and ego.

The other is life affirming. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked, “Grandfather, which wolf wins?” The old Cherokee chief simply replied, “Whichever one you feed.”

The story presents a partial truth. Sometimes it’s about choosing between negativity and positivity. It’s certainly better to think positively than negatively. There is even something to be said for faking it till you make it. Lots of small but repeated changes in your actions make a big difference over time. Noticing your language, spending time with positive people, using will power, and removing temptation are all great things to do.

But it’s not always that straightforward. When you consider that the majority of your decisions and responses come from your unconscious mind, and your unconscious mind is neither positive nor negative, you could say that the wolf who wins is the unconscious wolf.

No amount of yelling or screaming can change the unconscious mind. You can’t change lifelong habits with will power alone. Your conscious mind holds something like 5 or 7 pieces of information at one time. For me it’s even less. That is no match for the millions of memories, reactions, instincts and environmental cues that your unconscious mind holds. Your unconscious mind is a machine running on a finely tuned program. You can edit it, but you can’t change the program…easily.

In fact, if you try to change your unconscious mind by overriding its programs, you could end up harming yourself. Do you remember the 1990s film Shine? It was the true story of Australian concert pianist David Helfgott. Helfgott’s father was a holocaust survivor and programmed into his son’s unconscious mind from an early age that he couldn’t succeed in life because that would make him vulnerable as he would stand out. In his conscious mind, Helfgott knows that he is a world class pianist. In his unconscious mind, he has decided that he can’t stand out. Helfgott tries to feed his conscious belief and chooses one of the most difficult piano compositions, a piece by Rachmaninoff, to play in a recital. During the recital, a battle takes place between his conscious belief and his unconscious doubt, between his will to succeed and his instinct to fail. After successfully playing the last note of the recital, he passes out and suffers a breakdown. His conscious will had won the battle, but lost the war. In the end, the unconscious mind always wins.

Changing Your Unconscious Beliefs

If you want true and lasting change in your life, you have to get to the unconscious beliefs and transform the ones that are not serving you. This is often not easy. There’s no point being logical. Logic can edit the unconscious script, such as when you rationalize a compromise. You decide to eat well half the week and not worry the other half, trying to convince yourself that this is a solution. You’re not dealing with a logical machine. The unconscious mind is more like a sensor that lights up when it resonates with a story, an emotion, an image or an intuition.

Thinking positively is an attempt to edit the script, but it won’t in itself change the script. Don’t you sometimes find yourself standing and staring inside an open refrigerator? Are you waiting to be seated, or for a waiter to take your order? It seems to be a universal habit. It’s as if we expect some blinding realization to leap out of the fridge into our minds. You’re standing there, not at all hungry, but scanning the contents as if your life depends on it. If you’re like me, you say to yourself, “I’m not hungry. I don’t need cheesecake. I won’t have that cheesecake. I won’t have the cheesecake…..give me that cheesecake NOW.”

Until you know what hunger you are truly feeding at an unconscious level, you won’t change your relationship with food. Until I understand that I am filling the hole in my life which is self doubt with cheesecake, I will keep running the fear script. If you feed your fears, they thrive. Once you feed your passion to live an integrated and healthy life, your fears will starve to death.

How do you know when you’ve made a change at the unconscious level? The sensor light of self awareness flashes in your mind like a fridge light in the middle of the night. You realize what you are doing, and it becomes a joy to change, a natural expression of who you are becoming.

Integrating the Unconscious Mind

When the sensor light of self awareness flashes in your mind, you are moving towards transformation. Your mind is transcending limitations. Your consciousness expands in every direction. You discover yourself to be a greater person BY FAR than you ever dreamed yourself to be. Replay that last sentence. You discover yourself to be a greater person by far than YOU ever dreamed YOURSELF to be. YOU surprise YOURSELF. That’s strange. Who is this you, and how is it different than yourself? Who is the YOU who makes the big discovery about YOURSELF?

If you want to communicate with your unconscious mind, bring together a united front and stop the struggle. Positive thinking, and making simple choices requires a lot of effort. It’s hard, maybe impossible, to overwrite the unconscious script. So stop trying. It’s like looking for your glasses. You can’t see them because you don’t have your glasses on. You can’t access your unconscious wisdom because it is the essence of peace and you are striving for something that can’t be found outside of you and you are looking without the benefit of the very thing that will get you there. The glasses are on your head. Just tilt your head to the sky and let them fall into place.

When you shift your habitual way of thinking, stop judging things as positive and negative, and get out of the way of your inner wisdom, you come closer to communicating with the unconscious mind. Spiritual traditions have always found ways to point to this truth, whether its parables, proverbs, stories, myth, silence, koans, music or art. They speak the language of the unconscious mind, rather than battling with it. They offer ways to subtly shift your consciousness to include more possibilities, rather than trying to overwrite the unconscious.

One example is The Ten Ox herding Pictures, originating in the Sung Dynasty in China in 12th century. Each step comes with an image and a few words that convey the usual path that we follow in search of spiritual awakening. The ox symbolizes the mind and the herder symbolizes the seeker. You look outside of yourself for the ox, think you find it, try and tame it by riding it, and then eventually realize that it is within. You stop looking, and eureka there it is in the peace.

Practical Ways to Speak to Your Unconscious Mind

Some of the internal conflicts require therapy, and there are many good professional ways to access, heal and transform your unconscious script. There are also some things you can do yourself.

I’m a big fan of affirmations. I write them every day. When I write affirmations, I’m not just writing positive thoughts, although I hope they are positive thoughts. I use images, poetry and metaphor to bypass the conscious processes and speak to the unconscious mind. I don’t say “This will be a great day” or “I will lose weight this week” or “I will become super wealthy”. I use images that point back to the peaceful essence within that knows that it has the resourcefulness, the capacity, to thrive in any situation. I say, “I have everything that I need to thrive” and “I am becoming exactly what the future demands of me” and “I have an abundance of resourcefulness.” I wrote one last week that said, “Everything that happens makes me wiser and stronger.”

Affirmations aren’t desires for the future. They are affirmations of peace and capability that you already have. This is an affirmation I wrote recently.

Don’t compare yourself to any another person, or compare this time to any another time. You and this moment are a perfect match, engaged in a fateful love affair. You are the right person in the right place at the right time. Give thanks today for who and where you are. It is PERFECT for NOW.

Say to yourself: I am who I am, and all that I need to be.

I also try to reframe unconscious beliefs through affirmations. I heard an awesome example of reframing, which is to put your situation into a new context. I heard a guy say that the upside of having to live in his car is that he wakes up in whatever neighborhood he wants to. He has choice. We all have far more choice than we usually imagine. Your attitude is a choice. This is another affirmation I wrote about reframing anxiety.

Does anxiety sometimes get you down? Think of it as part of your growth. Questions, doubts — the very things that you thought were weighing you down — are part of your growing resourcefulness. You don’t need to pretend or put on a brave face. Growth happens in the midst of struggle.

Say to yourself: Even anxiety is making me stronger and wiser.

In other words, you aren’t denying your anxiety. Denying your anxiety would fly in the face of the unconscious message. You are simply redirecting your anxiety to a new end in your life.

The unconscious mind is your friend. It holds your capacity for genius, as well as some hidden fears and insecurities. Honor it all, work with it, and let your life change from the inside out. Namate.

The End is Nigh- Look Busy!

Our family sometimes fights over who has to use the drinking glass with a picture of Jesus on it and the caption, “Jesus is coming. Look busy!” Can you blame us? It’s scary, and only occasionally moves to the front of the cupboard when other glasses are dirty. Another wave of scary end time prophecy has moved to the front of the American media cupboard in the last month. You thought you had until 2012, but it turns out that our days are literally numbered….. to 4. According to a movement of Christians convinced by their reading of the Bible, the world will end on May 21, 2011. To spread the word, they're using billboards and bus stops, RVs and pamphleteers on street corners to strike the fear of hell into passersby. Apparently, there will be earthquakes starting at 6pm on May 21 in the Pacific Rim and moving through each of the time zones. Believers will be raptured, i.e. taken to heaven and non believers taken to hell. 153 days later the entire universe will be destroyed forever.

Are beliefs like this quaint but harmless? Is this a light hearted distraction from more pressing issues, or do they take our eyes off the prize of fearless living? I will never forget the story about a Little Rock woman who was killed after leaping through her moving car's sun roof. Her husband, who was driving, described it as a mistaken rapture. It led to a 20 car pileup and 13 other injuries, as a mass of cars tried to avoid the woman who was convinced that she had seen 12 people floating up into the air at the same time as seeing a man on the side of the road she believed to be Jesus. Her husband later told the story – “She believed it was the rapture,” he said, “She was screaming 'He's back! He's back!’ And she climbed onto the roof of the car. I was slowing down but she wouldn't stop.”
As it turns out the Jesus look-alike on the side of the road was on his way to a toga party. He had stopped his truck by the side of the road, when the tarp became loose and released 12 blowup sex dolls filled with helium which floated into the air. The man who had been told by several friends that he looked like Jesus pulled his car over and lifted his arms in the air in frustration. Seeing the Jesus lookalike standing by the road reaching his arms to heaven while dolls floated up into the sky was too much for the woman. The dead woman's husband gave his statement, and finished by saying- “My wife loved Jesus more than anything. She believed that was the end. She wouldn't miss out on being with Jesus in heaven for anything.”

There are people who truly believe these end time prophecies and lives are ruined when the dates come and go without incident. People give up their jobs, stop planning for the future, and become obnoxious in their evangelical zeal to save as many of us as possible. What do you make of this? How would it change your life if you knew the world was going to end at a specific time and date?
Here are some of my thoughts-

1. The World is Always Ending

The end timers have a partial truth. The urgency that comes with an expectation of a short lived future can be a healthy motivation for living fully in the present. Surely it’s a far healthier motivation to live with urgency because you don’t want to miss a moment of what life has to offer, and you want to be all that you can be in the world, than to live with urgency because you are afraid of eternal punishment.
The partial truth is that the world IS ending on May 21…and it will have ended on May 20….and it will end again on May 22….and you will get up on May 23 to a new world to do it all over again. The 1980s REM song said it well, "It's the End of the World As we Know It. And… I….. feel…. fine!" Every moment involves an ending and a beginning because the old has gone, the new has come and it’s okay. You are fine. You have changed with the moment. Your consciousness is evolving, transcending and including everything that brought you to this point. You are becoming a new creation along with each moment.

The world ends with the passing of every moment, however long that is. The past only exists as memory. It’s over. It often intrudes in your life like a thief in the night, robbing you of a full experience right now. As if the present moment is not enough on its own, we so often engage in mental time travel. We travel back in time, at least our mind’s best effort to reconstruct the past. We try to live through a rear view mirror. The problem with rear view living is that objects (and memories) appear larger than they really are. Situations that were challenging in the past might not be so challenging now that you have grown and evolved. Similar challenges may arise, but you are a new person, stronger, smarter and wiser. And this is a new moment. Just because things happened in a certain way in the past doesn’t mean they will repeat the pattern.

A great example of this danger is the story of the Swiss watch; the Swiss created it and then rejected it because it didn't fit their idea of what a watch should be, with internal moving dials. The Japanese ran with the new watch. Since they weren’t limited by preconceived notions about how a watch should work, they were able to develop this new technology. The Japanese have combined innovation, including kinetic watches that do not require batteries and have built-in cameras, with low cost and become a leader in the time industry.

Coming back to that other time industry, the religious end times industry. Sure, the world will end on May 21. Same as it does every day. This is good news. May 22 will arrive as a fresh start, with a new you ready to innovate and continue your evolving journey.

2. The Future Only Exists As Projection

Anyone who thinks they can predict the future is delusional. Do you remember the Y2K scare that computers would crash when clocks rolled over to 2000? It was amusing to be in Australia, one of the first time zones to see the New Year. January 1, 2000 arrived without incident and yet people in other parts of the world still fretted about what would happen to them. We love to worry, don’t we? As Charles Schulz (creator of Charlie Brown) said, “Don’t worry about the world coming to an end today. It is already tomorrow in Australia.”

The future is nothing but projection, often casting a shadow over life like storm clouds. You hold your breath, for fear of allowing yourself to fully embrace the moment. Just as we time travel to the past, we also travel forward in time, at least our mind’s best attempt to guess the future. It’s the same problem. You think about the future from the level of wisdom and courage you have now, forgetting that you will be different, wiser and stronger by the time the future arrives. Mental time travel leads to such a distorted sense of identity, and so much unnecessary suffering.

Take all predictions about the future, whether the end of the world or the expectation of some personal calamity, with a big pinch of salt. Cash in a reality check and bring yourself back to the present moment where life truly happens. You can bank on the present moment, but not the future.

3. The Future Is Open

Of course, it’s essential to do SOME mental time traveling. That’s how you learn from the past and anticipate the future. It’s right to reflect on the past and plan ahead. Just don’t dwell there or concretize your conclusions.

There is an alternative to reliving the past, obsessing about the future and reacting to the future in a passive way. On this point, I have been influenced by the ideas of management guru, Otto Scharmer. Basically he suggests that instead of only learning from the past we should also learn from the future. More specifically, we should learn from the emerging future. You don’t predict the future because the future is not yet decided. You pre-sense the future. You intuit your way forward and live the future by sensing it as it arises.

We’ve all had those spectacular moments when you sense the next move and don’t even know how you knew. You hold your child’s hand on the sidewalk just moments before a car speeds past. You sell stock on a whim that change is afoot. You preemptively heal a conflict before you really knew it was even flaring up. We have more intuitive wisdom that we give ourselves credit for.

It’s not that you make change happen singlehandedly. Its more that you sense what change is emerging and you help to co create it. In order to pre-sense the future, it’s helpful to suspend the many voices of judgment and fear that become small self fulfilling prophecies and respond in a new way, from your higher self that intuitively knows its connections with others. From this higher self, you can see through multiple pairs of eyes at the same time. It’s as if you’re playing both sides of a chess board, or coaching both teams on a sporting field. From this perspective, you inevitably sense the best interests of many parties. Once you have opposing perspectives working together at a higher level than competition, you are pre-sensing the patterns that hold it all together and allowing collective genius to manifest.

I put end times prophecies in the same category of small self fulfilling prophecies. They operate on a need to know basis. You need the prophecy to be true to justify a narrow interpretation of the Bible and to validate the theories of charismatic leaders. No one knows the future, but we all have intuition about the direction of the future. From an intuitive perspective, whenever the future arrives, you’re already there. Whatever the future demands, you’re already doing it. Wherever life needs you, you’re in position.
So how does this relate to May 21 prophecies? They have a partial truth. On the one hand, don’t fall for the delusion. Author Zadie Smith offers a beautiful turn of phrase when describing the passage of time in her novel White Teeth. She says; “don’t fall for ‘the myth, the wicked lie, that the past is always tense and the future, perfect’.”

Grammatically, the perfect tense has a neat relationship with the present tense. The perfect tense implies that everything that needs to be done is already done. It all collides in this moment; everything necessary for contentment comes together in this moment. The past is what it is, and what your memory makes of it. You make the future perfect by living fully in the present.

Don’t fall for the end times lie and rob yourself of a full and fulfilling present. Live your life in the perfect, present tense. You lack nothing in this moment. You need nothing in this moment. All is in perfect order right now.

At the same time, take on the partial truth of the end times. You don’t know the timing of future events. You don’t need to fear any particular day. But you can sense the future as it is emerging through you and others. This is the higher self fulfilling prophecy where the good of the widest number is included.

Ps Please visit Soulseeds where Meg and I do most of our blogging, and offer resources for all ages and stages of life.