THE HOLIDAYS

 

We received some real Winter snow on Saturday. It is beautiful, but I wasn't one of those complaining of a Christmas with sparse snow. I don't like it when it gets really cold without snow. It is hard on some perennials and shrubs. We lost some shrubs, several years ago, when it got below zero with no snow cover. As long as the temperature stays above 10F, I can live without snow, for awhile at least. We certainly need the moisture.

I hope everyone had a great Holiday! Celebration raises the vibration of the planet and several religions have Holidays at this time. Let us keep up the good cheer, long after New Years.

The Great Awakening is in progress. It won't be stopped. More and more, we are getting a glimpse of who we really are, and we are no longer willing, to be pawns of those who lust for power.

For eons we have had the choice of love or fear laid before us. In our separated state, fear was very seductive. Those who would bend our minds to their will, had little trouble manipulating us. We are waking up to the realization that we are all equal parts of Source and equal parts of all Creation. We live on the Earth, which itself is a living being, only capable of love. All of Nature is Love.

We realize, all we need, is to choose love at every turn to see Paradise. It is here under our feet already.

It is sometimes difficult to resist the seduction of fear. We haven't had enough experience choosing love to make it a firm habit. The dark has been defeated, but they have not given up completely. Soon, I think, the danger of false flag operations, and other attempts to create war and chaos, will be over.

I don't like to bring this up, because knowing that we are creators and, also, still susceptible to fear, I don't want to say anything that could raise the fear level. As long as the dark has control of the media, and certain rogue members of government, they may cause trouble.

However, they can do nothing without our cooperation. They cannot do anything as long as we refuse to fear. It is very important now, to make all our choices, loving ones. We will get through this time of uncertainty, and before the next year is over, we will walk out into the Light.

Let us look for the Love around us. Basque in the love and light from people we know. It is there. Sometimes dim, but look for it, it will grow.

I am not sure I will get back to my usual Monday, Wednesday, Friday blogging until after the New Years. I may write something on Thursday or Friday.

Love and Peace,  Gregg

MERRY CHRISTMAS

When I was growing up, my family didn't put up the Christmas tree until Christmas Eve, then we kept it up for the twelve days of Christmas. Over the years, with pressure from people with different traditions, I have relented to putting up the tree earlier. This year we broke the record for early and put it up at Thanksgiving time. It has been a gloomy month, weather-wise, and the tree and other trimmings have lightened up our days. However, time has flown by so fast, that it seems like we could have put it up yesterday.

As I mentioned earlier, we had a Yorkie/Poodle cross for about 15 years. She went on, to the happy hunting grounds, August last year. We were more than a year without a dog. We adopted a four year old Yorkie/Poodle cross, around the beginning of November, this year. She was the pet of an elderly couple, he died, and she went to a nursing home. It has been a very successful adoption. Her name was Tina. We wanted to rename her. Tina was okay but...................... not quite right. We thought it would be wise to pick a name with a similar ring that she would respond to. Xena [the warrior princess] gets the most votes. Jamie thinks we could name her Rosina, then we can call her Xena or Zena, they sound the same.

I forgot what it is like, living with a dog. We have had big dogs and little dogs. Once big dogs are potty trained, they pretty much take care of themselves. They ask to go out when they need to, and at night before bed, one might ask their spouse, “Has the dog been out lately?” If they have been out in the last couple hours, one can go off to bed. We certainly don't want them to wake us up in the wee hours because they need to go out. Little dogs are different. Perhaps it is just the training. But little dogs want you go out with them to do their business. Both Rosie and Xena could be out by themselves for several moments and wouldn't pee until I went out. Little dogs are closer and involve you more in their routine.

Rosie didn't, and Xena doesn't, pester me at meals. However, neither think it is okay for me to have a snack between meals without sharing. I think it is a little undignified when I find myself palming the odd bit of cheese or sausage when I go in to the living room and then eat it behind the newspaper. It is embarrassing to be intimidated by the appetite of a little dog. We once had a little poodle that slept with Naomi when she was very young. I swear this dog [Daisy] could hear a salt shaker, administering to a piece of left over chicken. She would come roaring down stairs before I could get a biteful of anything.

Some people in my family are so ungenerous, as to say, it is all my fault, because I spoil the little creatures. Perhaps, it is not a mistake I made with the Labradors, Golden Retrievers, or Setters that graced our household. But these little dogs, they sit on your lap and gaze into your eyes. Who can resist sharing an ort or two with these wistful animals. {An ort is a bit of leftover food. I'll save you the trouble of looking it up. Only the crossword puzzle addicts are likely to have run across the word}.

This blog was going to be about Christmas Time. It is indeed a time for celebration! Long before the Christian Era, the ancients celebrated this time of the year as the return of the light; especially in temperate regions of the Northern hemisphere. It is very appropriate, as celebration, lights up the darkest part of the year, as it heralds in, the returning Sun.

This year, it is especially appropriate to celebrate. We are coming out of a long period of darkness. For eons we couldn't remember our origins. We forgot we were an integral part of Source. We tried an experiment, living separately without Unconditional Love, the experiment is over. We don't want to do it anymore. It is time to celebrate our Oneness and our Oneness with all creation. All is Love. We know that.

Let us celebrate our awakening at this glorious time.

Merry Christmas every one!

Love and Peace, Gregg

GETTING THROUGH TROUBLED TIMES

 

Another Friday. Wow! Time is flying. It has been gloomy, weather-wise, we have only had about five minutes of Sun in the last five days. I have been a little gloomy, too. More on that later.

I apologize, to those, who looked for my blog Wednesday, and found none. We had a change in schedule. We have a marvelous person, come and clean our house, every other Thursday. She needed to change to Wednesday this week. I knew about it, of course, but I had forgotten about it until Tuesday. I meant to write a short note...........but........one thing and another.........I didn't.

I have little episodes of gloominess ever since the Paris attacks, and the events in California, make it worse. I was fully aware of what the main stream media was going to do with the events. The war propaganda and the demonizing of Muslims was predictable. Despite my awareness, and my avoidance of the MSM, I experience a gloom hanging over the world. I have no doubt, that both events were false flags, orchestrated by those, who benefit from perpetual war.

I don't know how many of my fellow citizens get sucked in, it is disheartening that anybody does. The good news is, it appears that most people are resisting the propaganda. I come to that conclusion from the people I know, and a scan of the internet; but with the MSM blaring the horror it is hard to know.

I don't like to think about myself. Lately, I have been more aware of myself, and have had a propensity to run my shortcomings through my mind. I know this is crazy, and it helps no one; especially myself. I read recently, that folks were in a hurry, to get rid of their old programs. The idea is that there is pull to raise our consciousness, and we are eager to rid ourselves, of what is not functional in the world to come. The old idea of karma. Karma can be seen as an opportunity to grow; not a debt or obligation.

The MSM is going to torture us for a while longer. We need to do our best to ignore it and live our lives, in the loving way, we know how. We put our Christmas decorations up early this year and that helps dispel the gloom from both the weather and the news.

We have to remind ourselves, of how powerful we are, in bringing light into the world. Every moment, we either lighten things up, or not. We shine light, in the hearts of everyone, when we laugh. We have no idea, how life giving, our smile can be to a stranger [or friend or family member]. We are all little [or huge] light generators wherever we go. Shining our light is as easy as throwing a switch. Most of us do it automatically whenever we go out. We shine our light in the grocery and everywhere else we go. Let us remember to keep shining our light when we go home. Many times, we retreat into ourselves, when we go home, and those closest to us, miss out on how magnificent our light can be.

I don't know how long these troubled times will last. I know it doesn't help to indulge ourselves in how we feel about them. I know it doesn't help to think of ourselves. We can focus on those around us and lighten their life. We are capable of bringing paradise into our own lives.

The Sun just came out! Ah! It is great!

Monday I have a teeth cleaning appointment at 10AM, right in the middle of my blog time. It is probable there will be no blog. I will probably write Wednesday, but it will be a busy time; then Friday is Christmas. It will be hit or miss but I hope to get at least one blog in, at least, to wish a Merry Christmas.

Love and Peace, Gregg

LIGHT UP THE WORLD

 

The wind was blowing all night and it is still blowing. It is not cold, about 33F, balmy for this time of year. However, it seems threatening, as if there is a big change coming, which could mean more snow and cold. Well, we have escaped any real Winter so far; it's time.

The weather doesn't reflect my mood, although, I had a little downer last night. I have been pretty good through most of the late craziness, but last night I suddenly saw the bleakness of the world. For a moment, I experienced the hopelessness many must feel. Then it was followed by a period of self-criticism. I didn't like that.

Fortunately I know how to get out of that negative space. I know, that when we have those experiences, we are doing them to ourselves. We are hanging on to some negative thought and emerging ourselves in some self-created negative program. The first step to getting out of a bad mood, is accepting the fact, that it is something only we are responsible for; we will always get plenty of help from those close to us, but it is our thing. Pointing fingers just delays our getting out of it.

It helps to remind ourselves that we are One and One with Source. We can't have a negative experience, at the same time, we feel our Oneness with Source. However, we can get ourselves pretty isolated from everything in the universe. We are masters, at creating the illusion of separation, and we have been doing it for a very long time. Knowing it is our responsibility, is freeing. It gives us a pathway out. We know whatever experience, we are having, it is not truth. The truth is, we are always pure immortal energy. We are always part of Source.

When we calm our minds, we can feel the loving energy of the universe, surrounding us. We can let ourselves rejoin Oneness. We can let go, the recent and older, past; whatever it is that is haunting us. We need to stop dragging the past into the now and terrifying ourselves about the future. When we are convinced that Now is Love, there will be no more discussion.

Someday, we will go through this exercise, of getting out of a bad space, for the last time. It gets easier and easier. The light is growing. Every time we lift ourselves up, we help everybody rise. Our every smile, our every laugh, lightens everyone!

Let's light up the world!

Love and Peace, Gregg

UNLEARNING

We don't know what we know. We don't know what we don't know. We live in bubbles within a large bubble. The large bubble is comprised of our culture and traditions. The smaller bubbles are our religions, political parties, our clans, our families, professions, etc. We are defined by the matrix of beliefs that make up our perception of reality.

From the minute we are born we are shaped to see reality in the way; first our parents, then our teachers [includes religious teachers], then other authority figures, see the world. Stepping out of the bubble and seeing freely is always punished, in one way or another. We are tribal beings. We want to belong. We want to be accepted. We want to be loved. Ostracism is painful.

It is fearful to be out on a limb, by ourselves, seeing outside the bubble. We want companionship. We want to share and have support for what we see. How can we awaken if we are afraid to think for ourselves? How can we awaken if we are conditioned to be slavish to authority figures?

I have been a proponent of learning centers to help people live on the Earth in a sane manner. I imagined the centers, as a collection of healers, teachers, artist, craft people etc. who would provide the impetus for a new way of living on the planet.

Perhaps they would be better labeled unlearning centers, as their main function, would need to be divesting ourselves of all the nonsense we now think of as knowledge.

How can we learn, not to do to the next generation, what was done to us? We don't want our children to accept the beliefs of authority figures like we did. No real progress can be made if we walk in lock step with each other.

Can we create schools that encourage children to think for themselves? Can we resist indoctrinating the next generation the way we were taught?

This certainly is not an original idea. For centuries philosophers and educators have been concerned about this dilemma. Schools have arisen and then died out, or became corrupted, by the larger culture. Perhaps our consciousness has improved enough to make real education main stream. We still need pilot projects. We need people, appreciative of the problem, to come together with ideas. There are folks all over the world doing that right now. I have read of some especially interesting experiments in Russia.

Somewhere deep in our hearts we recognize truth. It is time to find our way out of the matrix. Freedom beckons. Love nourishes our search.

Some readers may not realize how deeply entrenched we have become in our blindness. I may expand on that later.

I would appreciate any information folks might have on how to help parents raise children without unnecessary indoctrination and how schools could be shaped.

Love and Peace,   Gregg

CREATE PARADISE AROUND YOU

It is an absolutely gorgeous day on Planet Earth. The Sun is brilliant and not a cloud in the sky.

The troubled world is very far away from me. Paradise surrounds me.

However, I am not going to be able to wax eloquently about this beautiful world, because I need to accompany Jamie to a dentist appointment. She had an appointment to get a tooth extracted, our regular dentist studied the x-ray and decided it was too complex. We are going to a specialist this Morning. I need to go with her because we don't know if it would be wise for her to drive after the procedure.

I don't know if I will have time to blog this afternoon. I need to see how things unravel, in the world, any way.

Create paradise around you!

I should be here Friday.

Love and Peace, Gregg

A COLLAPSING WORLD?

 

It has been cloudy the last few days. I would like to see some Sunshine. It is warm for this time of year. It has been getting into the high thirties and low forties fahrenheit. There are a few patches of ground appearing, but the snow is stubborn. Without the Sun, the snow stays on, despite the above freezing temperatures. The chickens have been coming out for the last couple days, It is nice to see them roaming around the yard.

If you are looking for help about what is going on in the world, you are not likely to find it here. I am amazed at how incomprehensible things have become. I used to be able to understand the swings of the stock market; now I have no idea what is really driving it. I know it is not the economy. The economy is dreadful and getting worse. Corporations have gone on a buying spree, buying back their own stock; this temporarily drives up their stock and makes them look good to the disadvantage of investment in their future.

But that is small potatoes, when looking at the whole market. It has obviously become a gambling casino for some investors. What keeps all the small investors with retirement accounts etc, in the game? They must think it will go on like this forever, or at least, for the time being. Maybe it will. I don't know how.

I know we are coming to some fruition. The forces of darkness are losing their grip. You might think this is wishful thinking. I would not blame you, if you did. The main stream media is full of the horror of the collapsing world. There is very, little about the possibilities, of love and peace.

The dark has had but one goal and that is to control everything. There is no amount of mayhem, that is too much for them, in order to get their way. They have succeeded so far by pitting one group against another in an endless battle for dominance. They are experts at using our egos against us. Religion, nationality, race and political philosophy have been, their favorite things to play on, to create decisiveness and chaos. But you know all that.

When I first realized what sheep we have been, how easy it was to use the media to talk us into war and all manner of horror, I asked myself “What is their goal?” They have had us under their thumb for years, What did they want? It would seem that having happy slaves would be much nicer than having unhappy ones. Wouldn't they rather rule over a happy contented people?

I guess if you worship both money and power; money is not enough. One would have to have power over others, and absolute power would be the goal. I have had a hard time getting my mind around that. If you exert power over someone, can you trust that they like you? Love you? Are these people, into the darkness, folks that have abandoned all hope of being loved? It would seem so. When they quit trying to dominate us, perhaps we will see the need to offer them compassion.

I think we are about to evolve out of this craziness. Leaders and politicians who flirt with divisiveness, and other forms of darkness, are looking more and more ridiculous. Folks who are waking up can see through their silliness and know, also, not to make fun of them. We really have to end divisiveness. That means not ridiculing those who do it.

Folks all over the world, have come to the conclusion, that the only antidote, is to love each other. We need to not look at the craziness and decide we are going to love ourselves, and the person next to us, and decide to be happy. We are weary of chaos and conflict and we know love is the solution. We need to start with ourselves and go outward. We are all worthy of love.

I always end up saying the same thing. I can't see any other solution, but to see what loving beings we really are, and put the craziness behind us. As we learn to give up the past, and be in the present moment, we will see who we really are. When I say the past, I mean our individual past; all; the programming we absorbed, that had to do with our incompetence and unworthiness. When we unlearn our limitation we will see our magnificence.

Love and Peace, Gregg

LIFE EVENTS

It is a beautiful Winter Morning on Laughing Water Farm. I am sitting here with a cup of coffee at my elbow. I was outside to give the sheep water and let the chickens out. The chickens don't mind the cold but they don't like the snow. Later in the Winter they will be used to it and they will go out; for now they are cowering in the coop.

Jamie and Noah have been loudly discussing art, artist, narcissism, and the creative process, in the living room. They are just far enough away that I can't hear every word, but close enough that it is hard for me to pay attention to what I am trying to do.

I don't know what I am going to write anyway. It seems like I say, the same things, over and over. I thought of taking a vacation from blogging; but then, I like to do it even if I some times struggle to have something to say.

I had a shocking event happen yesterday. Last Tuesday, I took my car into the garage [that is when they found the problem that caused me to bring it in on Wednesday]. Anyway, they related a terrible event that happened the day before. A car stopped on the highway, to turn into their place of business, was rear ended and the occupant killed. I asked who it was and I didn't recognize the name.

Yesterday, when I was reading the obituaries in our local paper, I recognized a picture. It was the person killed in the accident, and I have known him for at least fifteen years. He managed the feed store I patronized, and so I knew him quite well. I enjoyed my visits with him. He was great fun to joke with. We liked each other very much. We were on the opposite sides of many political issues, but still, had essential agreement on the craziness of the world. I knew a great deal about him, his wife, his family, his relationships, yet his last name, was not etched enough in my consciousness, for me to recognize it when I was at the garage.

I need to go to the feed store this week to get some chicken feed. I was looking forward to it. There is always a group of men, sitting around a table, drinking coffee, and solving the world's problems. I always enjoyed a bit of repartee with them. It won't be the same.

I am eighty years old and have experienced unexpected death before. Yet, this disturbed me more than I would have expected. All of a sudden, something is taken from my life. A touch stone. An important part of my routine. That kind of change is not something we like.

It didn't disturb me because of my own inevitable death. I long since made peace with that. Perhaps, I would have, not been as disturbed, if I had made the connection right away.

Well, life comes to us one moment, one day, at a time. It unfolds and gives us what it gives us. Everything is a teaching moment. Death is not the end of being. I think everybody chooses their moment. I don't know why he chose his moment. I don't need to understand. I thank him for the moments he had with us. He enriched us and our existence on this planet.

The forecast is for temps to be well above freezings for the next few days. Most of the snow should melt. I underestimated how much snow we received. I thought we got about 8 inches. It must have been more than that. We still have more than four inches on the ground, after three days of high temps well above freezing. The chickens will enjoy patches of open ground. The snow has shrunk enough that there are patches of brown grass sticking out. I noticed the sheep were taking advantage of that. It is interesting that they would choose tufts of dry grass over hay.

Have a great Friday and don't let the main stream media beat you down. Things are not as bad as they make it seem. The dark is lashing its tail for the last time. They are no longer in control of the world. Folks of good heart are rising to ascendency. We will experience breakthroughs, of light, soon.

Love and Peace, Gregg

HANG ON TO ALL THAT IS LOVE

Winter is with us. I had to take the van to the garage and leave it for repairs. The front wheel drive van had no trouble negotiating the driveway. My little truck was another experience. Rear wheel drive and not enough of a load in the back; I was on the verge of being stuck several times.

At least, the little problems Winter brings, keeps my mind from focusing on the crazy world. I am pretty good at focusing on peaceful subjects; but, ever since the tragedy in Paris, the war hawks have been cranking up their propaganda. They are just drooling to start a war. I don't think they will succeed, but I don't like to be witness to the insanity. I think people see, that the very people who are shouting the war cry, are the folks who created the problem by pushing for the invasion of Iraq. ISS would not exist if it wasn't for our aggression.

Then there is, more and more, coming out, that was hidden. It makes for a dreadful picture of the world that is passing.

Sometimes living in this world is like being in a big ball of yarn with many colored threads, we need to find the colors that represent love and sanity and hang on to them. We can. There is much good in the world and love is growing; but, we can get twisted up in all kinds of craziness.

The best thing we can do, for ourselves and the world, is to make the decision to be happy. When life hands us some pretty ugly colored threads it is difficult to see anything else. But we can. Within our minds, is always a place of peace. We can make the decision to see the threads of sanity.

We will get through this individually and as a group. We will walk out into the Sunshine.

I don't have much to say this Morning except, keep loving yourself, and let your love shine on the world. The world needs all our love.

Love and Peace, Gregg

DIVISIVENESS

The snow was coming down hard about 8AM, but it didn't last long and there is not much on the ground. My chickens are out and the sheep are still able to graze. But, more snow is forecast for this afternoon and tonight, and we could end up with several inches. I am ready- I guess.

The chaos in the world is distressing. There seems to be much individual pain. Also, in my extended family, there has been a tragedy, and there has been unexpected illness, of a serious nature, in a close relative. Many of my friends are dealing with illnesses. It is a stressful time for many folk. Yet, people are not letting these events get them down. They are dealing with their pain head on, and moving on.

It seems that no matter how bad the chaos gets, individually or globally, folks are beginning to see the growing light. We want to grow. We want to love. We want to experience oneness.

I am impressed and somewhat disturbed by the polarization that is occurring politically. Individuals and whole countries are demonized in the main stream press. People are catching on, but we cannot help but be influenced by the barrage of misinformation that engulfs us.

It is difficult to avoid divisiveness. I have to admit, I am amused by the ridicule, one of the political parties is experiencing. Their clown car of candidates makes for amusing reading. Yet, I live in a neighborhood fairly evenly divided between the parties; I don't think, any of my neighbors, support the extreme views of these candidates. Some of these folks are the most loving, kind, people I know. Belief systems vary between people, of the same and different, parties; the people are essentially the same.

I don't want to contribute to divisiveness. I want to see through the superficiality of peoples temporary beliefs, to the person they really are. Ridicule creates defensiveness and forces people to retreat to the worst aspects of their egos. We don't want that.

We have a highly competitive culture that likes to see things in black and white terms. People have to be right or wrong, higher or lower, good or bad. This current polarization can't last. When people get caught up in fear, they can manifest the worst aspects of their egos. Political parties like to play on fear, it is a powerful tool for manipulating people. To make it worse, the main stream media is controlled by people who benefit by chaos and divisiveness.

We can rise above it. We can know, truth has to exist, separate from the conflict. We don't have to take sides.

All we can really do is work on ourselves. As we learn to love ourselves, we will quit seeing our own egos projected on the world. We cannot see what 'is', until we get out of the mire of our own egos. We don't have to try to teach our neighbor. We don't have to correct the person next to us. It is only ourselves we need to work on. What the world needs is our love. The more we love ourselves, the more love will flow out of us. We are one, we help everyone, by loving ourselves.

Working on ourselves doesn't mean learning anything. It means unlearning. It means we are as perfect and innocent and loving as the day we were born. We can be who we really are, beings of love. It is difficult to accept, but deep down, I think we know it. When we meditate, we can find that place of quiet, that is LOVE.

More and more people, are realizing, the only solution to any problem is LOVE.

Love and Peace, Gregg

THE CLEANUP AND RECOVERY

We had the greatest Thanksgiving. I believe everybody had a good time. Some people might have thought I had too good a time. I was really into celebrating.

We had sixteen people for dinner and a couple more came for desert. Our six children came, all but one of the spouses [had to stay home with an aged dog] and six grand sons and a grand daughter. We had a wonderful raucous, noisy, good time and excellent food. We had a deboned turkey rolled around the dressing, and our usual Thanksgiving menu of creamed onions, yams, mashed potatoes, gravy and rutabagas. Jamie made apple pie, pumpkin pie and key lime pie.

Now is the time for the big cleanup. Jamie is doing most of it. I am mildly disabled. Well, I had better pitch in.

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! I will remember this one for years.

Love and Peace, Gregg

NATURE AND THANKSGIVING

The subject of Monday's blog was on self-acceptance; that Evening I went outside and stood on the deck. The Sun had just gone down and the Moon had just broke over the horizon. The mixture of twilight and moonlight caused the naked trees and the rail fence to glow as if they had their own radiance. It was awesome. It was amazing. It was enriching, yet there was some loneliness. The loneliness is that I don't feel that I can share the experience, I am not enough of a poet.

The thing that came to me as I was standing there, was that I wrote on self-acceptance, without mentioning one word, about accepting our place in Nature. How can it be that we walk on the Earth, without knowing, more than a smattering, of our bodies connection with Nature? And what do we know of our Spirits connection with trees, flowers, lakes, birds and beast of all kinds? We get to know our pets, and are continually amazed at how some of them, e.g cats, dogs and horses, can read our minds. How about plants? How about rocks? We are in such denial, concerning our place in Nature, that it is like a whole new study. I know that many scientist have studied these things, for example Emoto's studies of how our mind effects water. Several people have looked at how our thoughts and feelings effect plant growth, but these studies seem to remain outside our common consciousness.

There was a time several years ago, that we cooked most of our food outside in the Summer. We had a kitchen wood range and we didn't want to heat up the house just for everyday cooking. We had a well pump outside and an outhouse, so we could spend much of our Summer outside. When we modernized, I hoped to spend at least one week every Summer living in a tent and camping in the backyard. I didn't.

I don't know how many thousands of years ago, we were encouraged, even enforced, to turn our backs on Nature. I imagine it coincided with the rise of male dominance and the suppression of women and the feminine principal. The major religions demonized Nature and the feminine principal. We desperately need to put logic back to service of the heart. We need to sink back into Natures arms. Our Mother will welcome us. Let us put an end to male dominance and the function of the mind separate from the wisdom of our heart.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving! It is a wonderful time to appreciate Nature's bounty. Let us be thankful to our Mother. Thankfulness is a powerful state. Have you ever tried it as a mantra? It brings peace and love to the soul. When we connect with what we are thankful for our concerns drop away. I have been making a practice of reminding myself of what I am thankful for, it makes a difference. It is easy to switch your mind to what we are grateful for, whenever worry, or feelings of lack, try to enter.

Nature and the Universe are loving. They want to give us, what we want. Our minds are confused, and thoughts of lack and fear, prevent the good things we want from materializing. Thankfulness clears our mind of that kind of confusion, and opens us to receive the bounty of the Universe. Like attracts like. When we are thankful, we attract more to be thankful for.

A neighbor came over to visit. Have a great Thanksgiving! I will be thankful for the gathering, of my children and their children, and the great food and the general frivolity. I wish every one a Thanksgiving full of love and good cheer.

Love and Peace, Gregg

SELF-ACCEPTANCE

We are emerging from a weeklong cold spell. It is already 36.5 F, balmy for this latitude. It was 24 degrees when I went out to let the chickens out; the ice was thin enough on the sheep's water that I could break it easily.

In the process of discovering who we are, we need to learn self-acceptance. What self do we accept? The emerging self? The ideal self? Who are we? We need to accept, who we are, every moment. It is easier to talk about who we are in the abstract e.g. beings of light, pure immortal energy, etc. etc. We have learned from our spiritual mentors, and the great ones, who we might really be, but on the pathway to that realization, we need to accept who we are now, in these bodies, with all their peculiarities and limitations.

Let us look, for a moment, without any reference to spirituality. We are bodies. We are personalities. We are members of a community. When we first ask the question, who we are, we often jump to the ethereal, and leap over, what we experience about ourselves. We are in a continuous feedback loop with the rest of the folks in this world. We constantly get messages about who we are. But the feedback is social, cultural, and personal. It says something, but it is certainly not the final arbiter, of who we are. We are certainly not a summation of the world's opinion of us.

But who are we? We do have our own opinion of ourselves. The problem is, that opinion has been shaped by a very perverse cultural and social experience. At every stage in our development, people have tried to force us into one mold or another. We have been shamed, criticized, guilted, condemned and sometimes ostracized because we didn't quite fit the mold.

How can we see ourselves free from all that programming? How can we know ourselves, when we are full of others' opinions of us? How can we know our own feelings, from those borrowed from the culture, to protect ourselves? We wanted to be safe. We wanted to belong. How far did we run from ourselves to avoid censure?

Folks talk about being an authentic being; how is that possible after the programming we have endured since our birth?

This is the place where I could throw up my hands and say, “I have no idea”. I am on this journey with you. Sometimes I feel I am close to my goal, and sometimes it seems to be, on the distant horizon.

But, I do have some ideas. I think we need to see self-acceptance as a journey. And a journey we can love. We got in this mess, because we inculcated a whole panoply of judgements and ideas about ourselves. We got confused about, who we are, because we accepted other peoples judgements, about ourselves. We get out of the mess, by backing up, and giving up the judgements.

The first step is to form, the intent, not to judge ourselves. In the beginning, we can't tell the difference between a self-evaluation and a borrowed judgement. The simple decision, not to judge ourselves, opens up new windows. Blame and guilt have never advanced human kind, individually or globally. Opening windows means letting the light in. Letting the light in means loving ourselves. The moment we decide not to judge ourselves, is the moment, we begin to love ourselves.

On our journey we will find ourselves behaving atrociously. Getting down on ourselves does not help; in fact, it insures that we will do something similar in the future. We need to accept that we haven't reached our goal. We will backslide. When we do, we can look at ourselves with love and acceptance. Yes, we erred. Error is only error, and is correctable, by lovingly accepting, who we are at this moment.

We have no understanding of how magnificent we are! We are all unique and amazing human beings. At some point in the future, we may see ourselves as great beings of light and pure immortal energy, but right now, we are in these pretty neat bodies. We might just think things are marvelous when we give up judgement.

Love and Peace, Gregg

A LITTLE ROUGH PATCH

Well Winter arrived suddenly here on Laughing Water Farm. Up until yesterday, we had a week of temperatures that didn't go below freezing, now the forecast is for a week of temperatures that won't go above freezing. The temperature dropped 30 degrees Wednesday night and we had snow flurries yesterday. We didn't get much snow, but there is snow on the ground just to the south of us.

I broke the ice on the sheep water yesterday and this Morning. The ice was quite thick this Morning [it was 21 degrees F when I got up]. Winter is official, when I have to start hauling water. The time is now.

The next few weeks may be difficult. The power of the dark may be diminished, but they are capable of causing serious trouble in their death throws. We are One. We can't insulate ourselves completely from the chaos or should we. We will need to be more alert than ever to negative thoughts and violent impulses. We need to remind ourselves continually that we are on a path of love.

If we think of humanity, as one mind, it is like we are in a final struggle, to give up our violence. The end result of separation is the turning against self. Humanity, as one mind is struggling with this; and, to some extent each individual is. If we reinforce our intent to embrace love and eschew fear and judgement we will come through this in relative ease. This will be, a period of temptation, to retreat to our egos, and see the world in terms of separation. We will need to remind ourselves of our oneness and our love for each other.

I don't think this period will last for more than a few weeks. We are learning rapidly. It would be wise not to draw any conclusions. What we think we see is probably distorted. Refrain from judgement, reject no one, everybody needs our love, regardless of how misinformed or misled they are. We will pass out of this craziness soon.

For some of us, the push to take refuge in our egos, may result in an increase of judgement of those closest to us. It would be wise to be alert to heightened tendency to be critical of spouses, children, and close friends. Again the solution is to remind ourselves to embrace love. With constant intent, we can program our minds to see love.

We, as a whole, are on the verge of great breakthroughs. New knowledge about our past, present and future is coming to light. We will soon see our history in a completely different way. Our origins will be known. It will be clear that we are not alone in the universe. We will soon give up any tendency to embrace the dark. Those who have sought and held power by embracing the dark will be held accountable. We will see that they cannot hurt us. We may not see it clearly now, but we will forgive them. We will see how desperately they need to be loved.

Yes, sometimes in can be darkest before the dawn; be of good cheer. Avoid divisiveness; embrace Oneness. Bless everyone we meet! Laugh, love, sing, dance, smile and see love everywhere.

Happy Friday!

Love and Peace, Gregg

ON DISCOVERING WHO WE ARE II

Strange weather! It didn't cool off last night. It is still 55.9 F, but the temperature is dropping. According to the forecast, it will drop all day and it supposed to snow tonight. It was Sunny when I first got up, but now it is cloudy and windy. We are coming off a three day siege of rain. I took my rain gauge in when the temps were falling below freezing, so I am not sure how much rain we got, but I think it rained at least an inch last night.

Before I go to bed, I sit at the computer for about an hour, read a few things and play solitaire. Last night as I was sitting here, I felt something on my hand, I looked, there was a mosquito biting me. I squished it with my finger, then felt kind of bad that I unceremoniously killed this [perhaps] last intruder of the season. Mosquitoes on November 17^th, that is a record in my experience. I remember seeing one in October once, when I was out in the woods.

Discovering who are, should be an exciting adventure, once we rid ourselves of all our preconceived ideas from all the isms on the planet. Certainly some of the ideas must be valid; the core of religions do contain truth. Any idea we hear, read about etc. must feel right. It must be free of fear and resonate when we contemplate it. Each one of us must to this with all the thoughts we have about 'who we are'. If we do accept something, that turns out to not be true, we will know; that is good, that is learning. We can accept an idea, knowing that our acceptance may be temporary, we can avoid belief.

In our journey of discovering who we are, we must first accept who we are. Or, at least, who we think we are. Many of us on a spiritual journey, have traveled through the phase of 'positive thinking'. I certainly promote positive thinking, as opposed to negative thinking. Yet, it can cause a war in the mind, in the beginning stages. Most writers, on the subject, have some kind of diet they propose, where one attempts to have only positive thoughts. This is an excellent exercise, as it helps us see, just how prevalent our negative thoughts are. None of my sources recommended continuing this experiment, without going into the second phase, which was discovering how/why these thoughts were being generated.

We can not stay in the first stage because it amounts to suppression and creates a war between the conscious and subconscious parts of the mind. A war which the subconscious will win. Having a thought and letting it go, is what we want to do. Having a thought, and finding it intolerable or too icky and attempting to push it out of our minds, doesn't work. It will just be submerged, to our subconscious, and come back, more powerful, with several friends. There is an art to having a negative thought, looking at it, turning it over and letting it go, without attaching feelings to it. Attaching feeling gives it power and assures that it will return.

We address the question, why do we have these recurrent negative thoughts? In our growing up, we pass through a continuing stream of negative experiences, caused by the judgements of our caretakers, and all our social systems. We were hurt, embarrassed, abused, used and exploited. Our world was very imperfect. We make it through this gauntlet, only by suppressing some of the feelings of these experiences. These suppressed feelings, if not thought about and dealt with, become encysted as thought generators.

The key is forgiveness. When we forgive our transgressors, we release ourselves from these thought generators. Forgiveness, is more than just going through the motions, it is seeing that the perpetrator was, also, trapped in their drama and there is a knowing that we cannot really be hurt any way.

We will eventually realize, that we are not our bodies and we, also, are not our minds. At least, not our minds, as the collection of thoughts, that we associate with ourselves. I am getting ahead of myself. There will be more on this in a later blog.

What I want to talk about now, is the acceptance of who we are, with all of our supposed blemishes. When we went through the first positive thinking phase, we were comparing ourselves to an ideal that we incorporated from our culture. It wasn't a real person. We are what we are. In the Eastern meditation traditions, there is a stage where we learn to view our mind from outside our mind. From a point of oneness, we see our separate selves, without judgement.

Accepting of ourselves, means giving up all judgement of ourselves. We can't love ourselves, and judge and evaluate ourselves, at the same time.

I will be writing more about this. I am on this journey, with you, and I can't get ahead of myself.

Love and Peace, Gregg

MISCHIEF MAKING

It is chilly and rainy outside. It is warm and cozy here in the North Room, where I am sitting, with a cup of coffee at my elbow. I am peaceful now, but I have been disturbed, off and on, these last few days.

I did not want to write about it. I wanted to ignore it. I wished it didn't happen. What can I say? I read, in various blogs, that the dark were not over their mischief making. They advised, that we needed to be prepared, for some attempts to get the world involved in a major conflict. They are desperate. They are losing control. They will do anything to create chaos and conflict. So I expected it, but I was still shocked to my core. I am speaking of the events in Paris.

Regardless who gets blamed, it was caused by the same group, that has been engineering false flag operations, all over the globe. It follows their pattern to a 't'. It is the same game they have been playing all along. They create an excuse to go to war; the goal is control of the oil and world domination. Look what happened after 9-11. How many millions of people were killed or displaced? How much division, chaos, poverty, destruction and pain was created? Who was the beneficiary?

This will encourage the war mongers and those who are conflict oriented. We will have to put up with some screaming and ranting. There will be an attempt to create fear in our minds and the need to take violent action. The main stream media will go along, at least, with some of the attempts to arouse people's negatively.

It will be a pain in the tush to watch this again, but, they won't succeed. Our consciousness is too high, now, for this to work. We have seen what fear does. We know that violence, only begets more violence. We won't succumb. It may be helpful to observe it, as a cartoon show, that is going on under the frame of our regular life; strange, funny sometimes, and not to be taken seriously.

Despite the MSM, there is more positive goings on, than negative. Look for them. Folks are demanding peace all over the world. Peace is gaining, I know, it might not look like that. As long as the MSM, blares every violent act designed to keep us off balance, it makes it difficult to appreciate the love growing in the world. We don't have to pay attention to it. It is all part of the cartoon.

We need to pay attention to our self-talk. It is important to avoid negativity, when talking to and about ourselves. These events are designed to incite negativity in the mind. Remember, we are co-creators. We will have the world we want. Let us keep focusing on love. What is not love, is not real.

I think this event is, already, backlashing on the dark. I think we are too aware, to fall for it this time. I think it will have the opposite effect, as the one intended.

We will go along, doing our best, to love one another and find ways of being of service. We can't fail. We have a loving Universe supporting us. Smile, laugh, sing, dance, nothing will stop the emerging world of love.

I would like to continue the discussion of, discovering 'who we are', on Wednesday.

Love and Peace, Gregg

FRIDAY

It is a bright, Sunny, Friday Morning. There is still a glow around Fridays, even though I have been retired, for fifteen years. The work week is over it is time to celebrate! Not that I wasn't able to celebrate during the week, but the necessity of getting up at 5:30, to get ready for work, would have its effect.

What would it be like in a sane society? Would workers be herded every Morning to jobs to sustain their life? I was fortunate. Once I was out of college, I always had jobs I loved. I worked as Social Worker, a Social Work Supervisor, A Family Therapist, Social Services Manager and I provided Services, to the University of Minnesota School of Social Work, as an adjunct professor. There are always parts of a job that are a pain in the tush; but for the most part I loved working.

Before I went to college I did my share of work. Work that is WORK. I worked in warehouses, on construction, as a machine oiler/mechanic, and of course, I was in the Air Force for four years. Most of the time I spent in the Air Force, I enjoyed my work. I was an electronic technician and I kept radar sets functioning.

No matter what one does it can be rewarding. The construction jobs I did, that I call WORK, were enjoyable much of the time. Testing strength and body endurance can be rewarding. I don't think, the actual nature of the work on these jobs, was the problem. It was how we are treated. The more labor oriented the job is, the more we are treated like machines and the less dignity and respect given to the occupation. I wasn't engaged in that kind of employment long enough to get the feel of it. Later I met all kinds of folks who worked in these areas, who did so, with dignity and respect. No matter how mundane a job is, it requires a set of skills, to do it well.

I might be wandering off my point, if I had a point in the first place. {The Old Man Rambles} In a sane society would we force people, into schedules, that seem to be against our nature and biology? We are very adaptable and we do pretty well; but why is Friday so great? Isn't it because we are coming off a schedule that is not really humane? For whom do we force ourselves into these schedules? It always bothered me that we expected little children to get up before dawn to go to school. Are we training them to be slaves?

Can't we get societies work done, without treating some people, like machines or slaves?

Lets imagine a world, where folks get up in the Morning, and look forward to their work. A world where everyone is appreciated, for the gift, that they have to give the rest. A world where gifts are not ranked or judged. A world where all are seen as equal contributors to society. Would that be so difficult? We didn't come to this planet Earth to be slaves. How would it be if we loved each other?

We wouldn't have to give up our Fridays. We still need a day to celebrate!

Love and Peace, Gregg

ON DISCOVERING WHO WE ARE

I am getting a late start and I won't be finishing this blog until afternoon. We had a change in schedule and I will be busy most of the Morning. Some three hours later;  is now 1:20PM. Oh well, we will see what I can come up with.

I have been thinking about discovering who we are. I could write a great deal from the literature. We can read what our spiritual mentors say, and there many people who have speculated. But, what if we want to discover for ourselves; what would it be like to function without the incessant prompting of the ego? What would it be like, to automatically see through the disguises people wear, to the pure spirit they really are? How can we see love everywhere?

I would guess that we need to embrace Oneness before we can 'see'. How can we appreciate, who we are, when we still think we are separate? If we want to experience who we are, rather than peer through a foggy glass at someone else's idea, we need to get our own act together.

We have much more invested in separation than we realize. Our separation has been reinforced continually from the time of our birth. Instead of seeing Oneness, there has always been the Other. Our minds love to evaluate and in our separated state, evaluation leads to judgement.

My conclusion is, we have to give up judgement, in order to 'see'. If you are like me, you are on this journey. One of the discoveries we make is that we have to give up judgement of ourselves, to effectively be free of judgement of others. That means we need to be, so free of judgement, of ourselves, that we see only love when we look inward. This is where, giving up the past, and being in the moment, becomes crucial. Again, if you are like me, a whole myriad of thoughts flood the mind, to remind us of what rapscallions, we have been. We can be going along, happy as a lark, when something reminds us of something we did, or didn't do, twenty years ago, and be filled with shame or guilt. Reminders of our inadequacy and unworthiness come in all shapes and sizes; but, they are always referencing the past. When we experience one of these events the temptation is to suppress it, hammer it down or hide from it. However, to get over it, we need to feel the feeling, understand it's meaning and FORGIVE, ourselves and all others involved. If you have any idea that forgiveness frees the other, give that up! Sure to some degree, the other is freed from our judgement, but the main beneficiary is the forgiver. All our judgements big our small reinforce separateness. They create a wall around us keeping us from knowing ourselves.

If we constantly remind ourselves we are ONE. It will help in navigating our daily experience. Every time we criticize ourselves we cast aspersions on the whole of human kind. Every time we judge one person, we judge all.

As long as we live in this illusion of separateness, we see the protective shell around people, that they have erected to protect them. These shells are thick and thin, cloudy or transparent, our real selves peer through the barrier to the 'other'. The more we love ourselves, the thinner and more transparent our shells become, and the better we can see through the shells of other folk.

I know I am getting better at disregarding the barriers of others. More and more I can look beneath the surface and not react to the disguise. It is true that the slings and arrows of others do not need to hurt us.

The afternoon chore time is on the horizon and I need to quit. I want to say much more about this; it is time for us to appreciate who we are.

Love and Peace, Gregg

A NEW MONDAY

Another beautiful Morning on Planet Earth. The Sun is streaming in my windows giving a promise of all good things.

I wasn't very happy about losing my blog on Friday. I was relating the story to one of my favorite daughters and she harangued, “Haven't I told you a million times that you should use a word processing app and copy and paste to your blog. That way you won't lose it. It will be in the your computer.” I may be paraphrasing, but it was something like that. I hate to admit. I don't even know how to cut and paste, something that today's ten year old appear to do. Hey! I am one of the oldsters, I didn't see my first TV until I was thirteen and we were one of the first in our town to get one. I can learn. You can teach an old dog new tricks. In fact I am using the OpenOffice app right now.

I won't try to reproduce what I wrote, and lost, on Friday. I was contemplating the age old questions, “Who are we?” and “Why are we here?” I do have my answers; but, I would like to see a gathering of folks discuss these questions without reference to any religion or philosophy.

It seems that any idea derived from religion or philosophy plugs up the reasoning process. Of course, the idea could be freeing and not limiting. However, most beliefs limit knowledge; they become stopping places. We cannot answer these questions if we borrow heavily from our preconceived ideas.

It has been postulated by our spiritual mentors, that we do know everything already and it is a matter of remembering. What if we could get people together, and meditate for awhile, and see what we come up with. No idea would be considered a truth and all ideas would be attacked. I use the word attack. I can't think of a milder sounding word to indicate an idea, turned over and and over, and thoroughly discussed.

We need to answer these questions for ourselves and not rely on old programming. I think the only belief we can hold that is not limiting, is Love.

I will bring this discussion up again. This blog is an experiment. Do I really know how to copy and paste? I don't want to take a chance on another Friday debacle. My nerdy children are at their own homes.

One note before I close. We have a new dog. Last year, August 3, 2014, our dog Rosie, who had been with us for more that fifteen years, died. It was very peaceful. She found a Sunny spot outside, curled up, and gave up her spirit. She was a poodle/yorkie mixture.

We received a call from a person who was referred to us by Rosie's groomer. This poodle/yorkie mix dog needed a new home. She belonged to an elderly couple. He had a heart attack and died and she had Alzheimers and went to a nursing home. The dog was being cared for, by a relative, who couldn't keep her. She is four years old, has all her shots, and has had good care. They were only a few miles a way; Jamie went over and picked her up yesterday. So far, she is a perfect addition to the family. Her name is Tina. We may rename her.

Okay, the great experiment begins. I will attempt a copy and paste.

Love and Peace, Gregg

NO BLOG TODAY

I wrote a blog, and was on the last line, when I accidentally hit some key and it disappeared. It was a great one, too. It was on discovering who we are. I can't figure out how to get it back. I just can't do it again. It is after One PM and I have much to do.

I am sorry, but it must be perfect, perhaps I am not ready to have that discussion.

Have a great Friday. Celebrate!

Love and Peace,  Gregg

WILL WE EVER BE ABLE TO SEE

We discussed perception before. The basic idea is that we see what we are programmed to see. How can we get out of this programming? How can we clear out minds, of all the little beliefs and ideas, so we can see what IS?

All our philosophies and religions compete for dominance, but none can contain the truth, because they ask the mind to become reprogrammed. They require the mind to see according to their invented truth. Truth is what IS. Truth is never based on agreement. We may agree about a truth; but, truth will never be an agreement.

As soon as we attach a name to a philosophy, religion, any ism, we have already lost the truth. Truth can not be locked into captured ideas. Truth is what is seen with the uncluttered mind.

How can we begin to 'see'? Is it so difficult to accept that we know nothing? Is it so difficult to start learning anew?

Let us take a look at ourselves. We all have got descriptive names. We are children, women, men. We are different colors and nationalities. We find ourselves in different 'belief groups'; religions, philosophies etc. We call ourselves different things; machinist, farmers, social workers, teachers, doctors, lawyers, nurses, scientist, etc.

Every description locks us into certain thought patterns, some imposed from outside, and some, accepted as the norm for the group. We become imprisoned in ways of thinking. If we are doctors we are in this pen, if we are teachers we are in this pen, if we are environmentalist we are in this pen, this goes on and on. We can be in several pens at once.

Each pen demands a conformity to some basic ideas about what IS. Of course, nobody can see, what 'is', if they stay locked in their pen. As long as we feel, we need to accept the ideas, that join the group in the pen, we will not 'see'.

It is quite a dilemma! From the time we are born we are programmed to see what our parents, teachers and other 'superiors' see. Then we join identity groups and further our imprisonment. We want to be accepted. We want to be beloved. We want to belong to something. We are not aware, of what we are giving up, when we accept others perception of reality.

Okay! What do we do now? If all this is true; that's scary. It means we know nothing. Yes, it is scary. All through history, when somebody stood outside a pen, and offered to open a gate, they were stoned, crucified or ostracized. It is indeed scary, accepting the idea, that all our precious ideas about reality may be wrong.

We need to look at our own situation. How have we bought into ideas, just because they were the norm of the group? What do we accept as true, without any personal verification? How has our self-interest played into the beliefs that we hold? How has status, power, authority, etc. influenced our beliefs?

Until we look honestly, at the origin of our current beliefs, we are not likely to grasp, the need, to give them up in order to 'see'.

The good news, is what is there, still IS. Nature is there in all its magnificence! Our perception, changes the reality, as we see it. Our perception doesn't change what IS. We will always think we are seeing reality. We don't recognize, we see reality, according to our beliefs.

The solutions have remained the same. We have been told to give up the past. We have been told to be in the moment. We have been told to empty our minds. We have been told to see nothing but love. There have been many, many teachers over the ages. They have all taught pretty much the same thing. Until now, not many people have been able to grasp, what they were saying; or if they could grasp it, they couldn't do it. How may people have been able to give up the past?

Something is happening! We have been flooded with teachers. There is a powerful urge to break through this barrier and 'see'. We know we can't learn, to love, as long as we are locked into our pens. We know, we will never know, who we are as long as we stay in prison. There is a powerful force propelling us towards freedom. We want to wake up! We are shaking our heads, trying to clear our minds. We are rubbing the sleep from our eyes. We desperately want to know, who we are.

We are beginning to 'see'.

Love and Peace,  Gregg

SHEEP

The Sun is out! There are a few clouds, but it promises to be a beautiful day. I am writing early today, we are having a new ram delivered sometime after 10AM.

This Spring we bought five hair sheep [adult ewes]. If you don't know about them, they are sheep that have hair instead of wool, otherwise they are the same as wool sheep. We did get some ram lambs, but they were half woolies. It became clear that the woolies were genetically dominate. The ram lambs, we got, are pretty fuzzy, and I am sure, will require shearing.

We have been raising sheep, off and on, for over forty years. We originally hoped to raise sheep that produced wool for handspinners. That kind of wool, usually long and colored, does not have a special value on the regular market. In order to make it work, we would have had to create a market. That is not our cup of tea. Still the shearer would come out, shear our sheep for free and hand us a nice check. They would come out, even if we only had three or four sheep. About twenty years ago, the price of wool dropped dramatically, and we had to pay the shearer to shear the sheep and got nothing for the wool.

We have four sheep that need shearing and Jamie likes the wool for various projects. We wanted to get more sheep but didn't want to burden ourselves with the shearing. I was hesitant to use one of these crossbred rams for breeding. It may have worked out okay, or I may have ended up with more sheep that needed shearing. The opportunity came up to get a 100% hair sheep ram. One of our neighbors got one and decided they didn't need it. 

If everything works out, we will have lambs sometime in April; perfect timing for this climate.

I took a break, did some chores; it is now overcast, but still a marvelous day. It is amazing how things work out. I couldn't find a hair sheep ram within easy driving distance. I didn't want to drive 150 miles in my little truck. I resigned myself, to using one of the crossbreed rams, for a sire. However, I kept procrastinating from getting him, from one pasture to another. It would require going out after dark and hope the sheep were in the barn and lock them up. They go in the barn at various times, but they don't do it, at ones convenience. I had November 1st as the deadline for this to occur. And what to you know, my neighbor e-mails me yesterday, and wants to know if we wanted to buy a hair sheep ram. The universe orchestrates things perfectly.

There are so many things to be grateful for, at a personal level, being aware of our gratefulness, can make an ordinary day into a great day. Expressing our thankfulness to a loving universe, everyday, brings much light into our lives. As we learn to express our thankfulness, we see more to be thankful for. As we increase the light, in our own consciousness, we increase the light in the consciousness of human kind. We are waking up from a long sleep. We are in for some surprises. It is likely that most of what we believe to be true, is not.

I need to go. My sheep lady arrived.

Love and Peace,  Gregg

MUSINGS OF AN EIGHTY YEAR OLD

There wasn't much, if any, snow left yesterday Morning. We just had a little taste of what is to come. Winter rarely arrives much before Thanksgiving, but often enough, to create memories. The earliest it arrived in my memory was 1991. The famous Halloween Blizzard.  The official snow tally for the Twin City area was 8.2 inches. Many areas had well over a foot. We did. Usually, early snows melt quickly, regardless of the depth; however, that snow was still on the ground when the Spring melt occurred. It was the longest Winter in my memory.

When I was a child, we often had cold weather but no snow. Except for the great Armistice Day Blizzard in 1940 [I was five], we usually had snowless Novembers, and many times, snow didn't arrive until late December. We had many brown Christmases when I was growing up.

Many times, I wished I kept a log or diary, at least record the weather events. I never got around to it. Now that I blog three times a week, I may record some of that kind of data.

On an impulse, yesterday, I picked out an old blog to read. I think it was December 11, 2013. Then I read several before that date. I didn't remember that Winter came with a bang that year. We not only had snow, but the temperature was below zero F. for a week, on one  occasion, and few days on another. It was a cold December.

I hardly ever read my old blogs and I was impressed with how much that fellow knew. You would think that I would really have my act together by now. It doesn't work that way. As I have said before, a teacher teaches what he/she is trying to learn. We may be able to see the truth; but being the truth, that is a horse of a different color. I hope I am making progress.

Well, I will have completed my eightieth year in a couple months. What is it like to be over eighty? I have discovered when people get to my age, they suddenly become proud of it, and will use every opportunity to tell people. Well, not everybody, I know a couple of people who still struggle with the idea. However, I meet people in the grocery store, waiting in line at the cash register, or looking for something on the shelf, and the subject of age comes up and they are more than happy to tell you how old they are. There is certain gratification to reaching eighty and beyond; especially if we are still robust and healthy.

Robust is kind of a strong word, but I am certainly healthy. My feet keep me from walking any great distance and I can't get down on the ground and arise, without something to pull myself up. Several times, in the last several Winters, I would fall down and have to crawl over to a fence post, tree or something to get myself up. That has been going on for a long time. In fact, the worst time, I may have been still in my late sixties; I fell down and the snow was so deep I could not reach the ground with my hands. I was young enough then, I probably could have pushed myself up, if I could have reached the ground with my hands. I was home alone and I had to submerge myself in the snow and crawl to the nearest upright object to pull myself up. That was in the days when we still had to read our own electric meters and I was walking through waist high snow to reach the meter on the post. Now the company reads them electronically.

Physical limitation, with age, doesn't bother me much. I can do almost everything I really want to do. There are some things right now, I really need to do, that I am not doing. The window for digging those potatoes could close anytime. That is something that is hard for me to do by myself. I could pick the potatoes up by just bending over. It is much easier when you can get up and own. In the past Jamie has been the one on all fours and I did the digging. She has been getting better and she pronounced herself willing to give it a try. Perhaps this weekend. I, also, need to transfer some sheep from one pasture to another. I can handle that. I just haven't.

Of course, when we reach eighty, we are aware that our sojourn on the planet could come to a halt anytime. That is true, for any of us; but when we read the obituaries and see that half the people cashing in are younger than us, we can't escape the idea that time is limited. But, I am not in the least concerned about it. For other folks, I only wish to stay around until my presence is needed. For myself, I want to stay around, until I see, the real emergence, of a new civilization.

I have been dreaming of a new world for most of my life. I can easily see, how beautiful the world could be, if we only gave it the smallest chance. What if we would give up hostilities for a single generation? What if we decided to love each other? What if we would meet each others' needs, rather than be competitive? What if we put creativity and serving above making money? What if we treated our Mother Earth, as a loving being, who nurtured us and cared for us? What if we accepted we were one with Nature and one with source? How would it be if we knew we were One?

Simple questions. We have the capacity to be all of this and more. No! I can't leave this planet until I see the new world take shape. I am going to hang around, and remind people of what they're missing, until they see it themselves.

Happy Friday! Celebrate! The light is increasing!

Love and Peace,  Gregg

ANOTHER RAINY DAY

It is gloomy out. It rained most of the night and is still drizzling. My mood is good, though. But, I don't feel like blogging. I am not sure why. I was actually writing a blog, in my mind, yesterday. The alternative news media is full of information about how we a have been hornswoggled into accepting ideas that are not true. There will be outrage when the truth emerges. When things are clearer I may point to some.

There were a couple subjects running through my mind yesterday. I recently read a piece that claimed our minds are geared to finding fault. I have been alert to how I have a propensity to judge. I have the intent not to judge. Yet, before we judge, we see what there is to judge. How can we not see what is in front of our faces? I think we can look past what we see as faults, to the person. If we have a friend, who has a mole or disfiguring scar on their face, we eventually pay no attention to it. We don't see it at all or it becomes part of their charm. We look past the blemish and see them.

I realized I paused, sometimes more than momentarily, at the faults I could see. I didn't see, how that was, itself, a judgement. I didn't feel, how seeing a fault, was a judgement. It occurred to me, that if there was not some judgement, lurking around, we would not see [or at least not focus] on the fault. Perhaps, we can't help see some faults, but it is one thing to see a fault, and simultaneously, look past it, and another to pause and perhaps, catalog it.

In any case, I decided to go on a diet from fault finding. I made this decision Monday night before I went to bed. I kept the intent in my mind, since. We had a visitor, yesterday Morning, that said some things, that seemed to be the Universe testing me, to see if I was serious. And, of course, my lovely wife seemed to test my resolve. Those closest to us, will always provide the gold standard.

We are all peculiar, to some one. We are all unique. We all have, arrangements of characteristics, that another may find strange. How can we label something a fault? Especially, when it hurts no one? We can't really appreciate each other, if our minds scan another, and label some of the differences as faults.

We are One, but we are unique. Our differences need to be celebrated. Our differences bring richness to life on this planet.

Our big and little fears are tied together with our judgements. Where a fear lieth, a judgement arises. Giving up judgements makes us feel vulnerable. We have the insane idea that judgement will protect us. It is similar to the idea, that worry keeps bad things from happening.

In fact, giving up judgement and faultfinding, frees us in remarkable ways. It opens the door to peace. It allows our minds to be flooded with love. It renews our mind/heart connection. Every little bit of judgement and faultfinding we indulge in, limits ourselves. We are one, we cannot judge others, without turning it on ourselves.

I am on this faultfinding/freeing diet, one day at a time. Like freeing oneself of any addiction, one doesn't want to overwhelm themselves by looking beyond the day. I know I will succeed. How can one fail when they are inundated with love? There is nothing more reinforcing, than having love, take up the space in your mind, where judgement dwelt.

Love and Peace,  Gregg

LOVE AND FEAR

It's raining. It is rather cold and gloomy. These Fall days can be cozy and cuddly, as we sit inside looking out, or they can be dark and forbidding, depending on our mood. Either way, they are a forerunner of things to come. We have snow in our forecast for Wednesday night. I doubt that it will amount to much.

When we do have a mood, that is less than what we would like; sometimes it feels like we can't change it. It can feel like we are doomed to suffer. No matter how bad it seems; we can change it. As small a thing, as a telephone call to a friend, can pull us out of the rut. When we are deep in the rut, we cannot see over the side well enough, to see what we could do.

It is very difficult to see that we create our reality when we are up to our eyebrows in muck. We certainly don't want anybody to remind us that we may be involved in the making of the experience. Oh no!

Yet, where can we start, but with ourselves? Isn't it more comforting to know that our experience is our creation, rather than, it is handed to us by a capricious, outside force we have no control over? Sure things do happen outside our influence; our car breaks down, a storm blows a tree down on our house, our kids get sick, etc. etc. But how we react to the things that come to us- is us. Ten people will react in ten different ways; each creating a different outcome and feeling about themselves.

I don't know all the parameters that drive these ten people. I do think there is a battle going on in the mind of humankind between love and fear. It affects each individual as well as globally. I have discussed many times how fear is used globally to keep us under control. Turn on the news; fear is used in everything: weather reporting, migration, crime, world conflict; almost nothing is devoid of the inoculation of fear.

Our minds are trained to be afraid. There is a great difference, in being sick and knowing we will get over it and being sick and afraid we won't. When we are up to our eyebrows in muck, and we say to ourselves, "there is no way out." It is quite different from saying, "there has to be a way out."

Much in life boils down to our attitude. One attitude rejects fear and attracts love, another can do the opposite.

Is it possible for us to be so alert, that we can reject all fear thoughts? Fear thoughts are very sneaky, and they can bring their friends, and before we know it, we can be shaking in our boots. But, shaking in our boots, isn't the worst thing that can happen. When we are shaking in our boots, we know we are afraid. A worse situation, is when the fear disguises itself, as judgement, prejudice, unwarranted conclusions etc. We may go on, not realizing we are driven by fear.

Individually and globally, we are torn between the attraction of love and fear. I use the word attraction purposely. Our minds have been made very attractive to fear. We can attract fear thoughts like a magnet attracts metal filings. Consider, worry! What does our mind do, when our adolescent children, are out too late?

Love and fear have always existed on this planet. The Earth, being created by Love, is essentially love. The Earth is surrounded by love. When our egos gave up their proper function, of protecting us in our separate bodies; they took on a life of their own and attempted to dominate the spirit [our true being]. Fear was the only weapon, the ego could use, to convince us, to deny the existence of our Spirit {Oneness}. When an ego is dysfunctional, it tends to dominate other egos. Fear is always the method of choice.

We exist in Love, but we are surrounded by fear thoughts. They are like a swarm of voracious pest, that are waiting for the opportunity to bite. It doesn't take, much of an invitation, for them to attack, that is why we need to keep our minds free. So much, of what invites this swarm of pests to attack, is in the past; that is why our mentors have advised us to stay in the moment and give up the past.

Laughter, smiles, happiness, in general, keeps the swarm at bay. The more light that shines out of us, the smaller the swarm becomes. The more we love the fewer the pests will be. Outside of this fear created illusion, these pests do not exist. There is only love. We will see that, when we give up all fear.

We are powerful, creative beings, we must be aware of what occupies our minds. Don't worry! We can't lose. Fear is no match for Love.

Love and Peace,  Gregg

AUTUMN RAIN

It is raining and 46 degrees F. It looks like it will rain most of the day. We can use it. I broke down and bought a new mechanical keyboard. The key boards, I rescued by washing, continued to have have problems intermittently. Sometimes, I could unplug them and replug them and they would work for awhile, but it got too annoying. I think I am going to really like this new keyboard, but there is a learning curve. The letters on the keys are lower case and very small. This old codger depends on seeing the letters on the keys. Perhaps I will really learn to type properly. I use all my fingers, I am not a hunt and peck typist, but I am no flash, either.

Jamie is slowly emerging from the problems, associated from the bulging disc in her neck, healing will take a long time; but, she is back to normal in most ways. We acquired various traction devices and they are key to her healing. Her more general health concerns have improved, also.

This has been an ideal Summer in terms of weather. Mostly pleasant, plenty of moisture, we got by without using our air conditioning once; but there were a few days we might have. Very few mosquitoes! It was strange, in that, most of our projects were put on hold. Jamie didn't feel well most of the time, and I, well, I am eighty and lazy to boot. So our garden went back to nature fairly early. We still got quite a bit of produce from it and we still have potatoes to dig.

We have about twenty hens, and they laid very well, until the last few days. It is time for them to slow down. Up to the last week, we were still getting 7 to 10 eggs a day. Earlier in the season, we were getting 12 to 15 a day. It will drop down to 2 or 3 through November and then cease entirely until the days start to lengthen.

I need to get, two of my sheep, transferred from one pasture to the other; a young ewe and a young ram. I hope to have that accomplished by end of next week. I, also, need to get some hay delivered in the next couple weeks. Who knows when the snow will fly? I got a few small bales for emergencies.

So, that is some of the mundane, of my life, on planet Earth. What about the rest?

This is a tough time for many. People are going through lots of physical and psychological distress. Perhaps, it is part of the change in consciousness. It seems like, everybody I talk to, has some family member going through a trial. Whenever, I think I have troubles, all I need to do, is look around to realize how blessed I am.

Despite the darkness, portrayed in the main stream media, there seems to be an optimism growing in the populace. It appears the dark is retreating. I have been thinking of writing about how, we have been and are, manipulated by the MSM. It is getting more and more obvious. Those, who get their news from the internet, can attest to this. We need to be skeptical of any news, we get, internet or MSM. If it doesn't feel right; it probably isn't. We need to keep our BS detectors working.

Waiting is tough. The secret is, not to wait. The light is increasing and we are awakening; but, lets not wait for veil to be completely lifted. Let us look for how we can be of service, now. How can we shine our light in our families, our communities, how can we make things better for those around us.

But we don't have to concentrate on being a do-gooder. Be a good, at being. If we can remember two things: we don't have to judge, anybody or anything, and love everybody and everything. To repeat LOVE and NO JUDGEMENT. Time will fly by. We will soon be passed through this period of chaos and re-adjustment. Hey! Life on this planet is great! Let's embrace all, as our brothers and sisters.

Love and Peace,  Gregg

LET'S LEAVE THE DARKNESS BEHIND

I am getting an early start, today. I have an appointment to get a haircut/beard trim at 10:30. We have a neighbor who has a salon in her home. When I say neighbor, we live in the country, and I can say, neighbor, when the person lives several miles away. She is only 2 miles away, so she is a close neighbor.

I have said before, I write about, what I am trying to learn. When I talk about, living in the moment, being non judgmental, giving up the past, etc. I am sure, I am no further along, than most of you. I feel keenly the need to grow. I can imagine how beautiful life would be, if we realized our 'oneness', and lived to serve each other. I, also, think it is a logical consequence of our evolution.

Likewise, I have said I am not a seer. I can't see the future any better than anybody else. I have read a lot of stuff, from people who think they can, I am pretty skeptical. However, I do feel we, humankind, are learning to give up many crazy ideas of the past. I think we are seeing how we have suffered with ideas of separation, competition and striving to be what we are not. We have bought into, the negative of religion, and ignored the kernel of truth. We have accepted the idea of unworthiness and have, given ourselves over to folks, who control by dangling, the idea of salvation, in front of us.

We have missed the gold nugget of the teachings, that we are all one, that we are love, that all there is, is love, and that we are all part of Source. The great ones, taught us, we didn't need to do anything to be saved. The whole idea of being saved was a corrupt idea. We are okay just the way we are. We need to unlearn the craziness. We have nothing to learn, we have much to unlearn.

We have been carefully taught, to look outside ourselves, for answers, when all the time they were inside. We, always, knew that love was the answer. We, always, knew we wanted to feel loved more than anything else. In our illusionary state, we substituted many things for the feeling of love. Many, many things; we chased after all kinds of material things, accolades, pleasures, achievements etc. when all we wanted was love. Not to say, the pleasures of life, the accolades, the achievements don't have value; they have their own value. We cheat ourselves, when we think they are substitutes for love. Nothing can replace love. All is ephemeral, except love. Unfortunately, we are so immersed in the illusion, that we think love is ephemeral, when it is the one thing that is not.

I do not have an original idea and I am not a prophet. What you read here is what I have gleaned from my studies. I feel humankind is on the verge of rediscovery. I think we are about to move out of a very dark age. I believe the last couple hundred years, may have been the darkest, we have experienced for many eons. Can we imagine, the absurdities, we seemed to accept; the idea of a just war?! The idea that killing people is a solution? The idea, that it okay for one group, to lord it over another? The idea, that one group or person, is closer to truth than another? The idea that one has to believe something to be saved? And saved from what? It is okay for one country, to tyrannize others, and steal their wealth? It is okay for some to have much more than others? There is no end, to the examples, of the insanity that we seem to accept.

But, perhaps, we have not accepted these absurdities. Perhaps, we felt helpless. Perhaps, we were waiting for the right time to make our opinion heard. Perhaps, all along, we were waiting for the time, when we could express ourselves without ridicule. Most people, I know, agree with these concepts. I think we are waking up, to the idea, we don't have to live in the darkness anymore. We were controlled by division and fear. We can see through that. We don't want to do it anymore.

We are just discovering how powerful our minds are. We are just discovering our minds are linked, and we can give up the old group consciousness, and trust a consciousness based on Love. What would our world be like if we really truly loved each other?

The time to give up the insanity; is now. NOW! Let us bless ourselves and our neighbor. Let us serve each other.

I got to get a haircut and do some chores. Shine your light brightly! Let's leave the ugly past behind.

Love and Peace,  Gregg