PEACE

We don't realize the importance of peace. I mean peace in our minds. It took me a long time to accept how important it is. Intellectually I accepted its importance many years ago; but I didn't make a commitment to watch my mind and not permit myself to dwell on peace disturbing thoughts. I am sure I thought I was making some commitment but I always slid back into the old ways. I think, perhaps, the problem is the idea of commitment itself. The idea has too much of a forceful attitude. If peace is what we want, we need to cherish it.

One of the great advantages I had in my life was being a psychotherapist. I could observe how people created their experiences in life by how they thought. I learned more from my clients than they ever learned from me. Every day I learned something I could apply to my own life. I loved the work.

So, it was clear to me for a long time that, if I want Peace, Love and Joy, I need to start in  my own mind. For years I gave lip service to this belief; yet I would watch the news with the belief that I was immune to the disturbance, the chaos, the horrible pain of the world. What was I thinking? I was so exceptional that I could observe these things without disturbing my peace? It is true, I do have a greater tolerance than many people. I take my own advice and view it as a history that happened years ago. Lately, I have opened up to a new level of honesty about myself and have seen how I let ideas, thoughtforms,  whatever you want to call them, into my mind and allow them fester.

If we want paradise for ourselves and our fellow beings, we must start with our own minds. Recognize that you create your perception of the world with your thoughts and contribute to the groups creation. A peaceful mind is a very powerful thing that will bring peace to many minds around. Love can only come out of Peace.


We all can create our own Paradise and extend it to those around us.

Love and Peace, Gregg

LIFE ON PLANET EARTH

There really is such a thing as International Procrastination Day? I would be an honored member; maybe even win a medal or two. However, my tardiness in blogging did not have as much to do with procrastination as it did with our inability to plan anything. We never do take planning very seriously. We think of the future in probabilities. Normally, things work out more or less as we anticipated them. Which brings me to the spaghetti sauce. Jamie had successfully canned about 28 quarts { 4 canner loads}. She had another, same size, batch to do. The jar lids began popping in the pressure cooker. The jar lids were bulged and some even buckled up. It looked like there was too much pressure inside the jars. We went over ever aspect of the procedure, closely examined the pressure cooker; nothing plugged, proper weight etc. Yet every canner load had three or four popped jars. This slowed us down so much that we didn't get all the jars canned; we held some over to the next day and they fermented in the jars and had to be tossed out. [The chickens thought that was great.] On opening the jars, a geyser of fermented sauce splashed over the kitchen. I soon learned to open them in a bucket. There must have been about twelve of them.

I have been canning for about fifty years; Jamie over forty years and we couldn't come up with a reason for the problem, with any certainty. The first batch was canned without incident. What was the difference? The only possibility is that the second batch was more dense. My perusal of the canning book would lead me to that conclusion. If any of you folks have a suggestion; please comment.

It was a learning experience and even though Jamie called it the "spaghetti sauce from hell" when it was all over we didn't have any regrets. More and more, both of us are able to maintain peace through life's little conundrums. Perhaps, one more than the other.

Well, so I didn't commence with my chicken butchering until yesterday. We got seven more ready for the freezer. I have about five more to do.

Lately, time has been flying by. Almost anybody over fifty will acknowledge this phenomenon. But I am talking about something even faster; in the last few months the weeks seem like days. Sundays come up every other day! If I was afraid of dying it would be unsettling; but for me it is exciting. I feel so much change and I am eager to see the future. On the other hand, back to earth, I realize how much I have to do before snow flies. The way time has been going that will be real soon. There are things I had planned for the Spring that are still undone, procrastination hmmmmmmmmm.  

Keep the Peace, love everything and lets watch a beautiful future unfold.

Love and Peace, Gregg

A SOGGY MORNING

It has drizzled off and on for the last few days; but no rain in the rain gauge. This morning we had 1/2 inch in the rain gauge. I was aware of it raining gently during the night, but I was surprised at the amount. We need it. It has been dry for a couple of weeks and digging those potatoes won't be much fun if it is too dry. Tomorrow, we are planning on butchering ten more chickens; it will be nice to get that chore over.

Jamie has been working like a fiend. She feels she is chained to kitchen. She canned 24 quarts of spaghetti sauce yesterday and has about 25 to do today. This time of year the canning seems endless. Jamie does the work; I kibbutz with helpful advice. Sometimes she accuses me of being less than helpful. How could that be?

I don't feel like talking about world affairs today. Maybe, a little; I have been observing the collapse of the American Empire. Most Americans don't realize we have one, as unlike the Roman and British Empires, we don't "own" vast lands which fly our flag. Our Empire is controlled through multinational corporations backed up the Banking System.

We have controlled countries by controlling trade, natural resources and especially the monetary system. We have ruled the world because we have the Reserve Currency and in order for any other country to buy oil they had to have dollars. In order to maintain their dollar supply they had to invest in our treasury notes. This little scam has started to unravel. Oil rich countries have begun{or threaten} to sell oil for other currencies, in defiance of U.S. wishes. Our only strong alliance left is NATO and they are giving us only tentative support. They went along with us in Libya only because they thirsted for Libya's oil. Despite the media coverage there are signs that this bit of fakery is not going to work. Libya will not kowtow to NATO.

Of course, we still have numerous Army and Air Force bases all over the world to reinforce our banking and corporate decisions; but even the ruled need to give some acquiescence in the process. Even the conquered cannot be controlled without some willingness; witness Afghanistan. The world is no longer going along. Many countries are considering dumping the dollar as their reserve currency. They are aligning themselves anew, against the dictates of American policy. We are greatly weakened by our diminished status, as the greatest financial powerhouse, partly because of our huge debt to China and Japan. The rest of the world is waking up to the fact that they don't need to be afraid of us. This is a big, big change and a welcomed one.

Perhaps that is enough for today. I need to wash the dishes and hopefully get some things done outside. I will probably not blog tomorrow as I will be up to my neck in chickens but who knows?

Love and Peace,  Gregg

A Beautiful Fall Day

It is a perfect day! Cool and Sunny; a perfect day to do all the outside work I have been procrastinating about all Summer. I still have several chickens to butcher. Our yard is full of blown down branches from numerous storms this Summer. Some were outside the mowed area and some I just mowed around. This is work I would like to get finished before the snow flies.   

These next few months will be very chaotic. Keep your peace by being aware of your thoughts and dismissing those that lead to negative scenarios. Perception is everything. What you perceive is what you will experience. See the Love and Light behind everything; difficult sometime but possible. Think of this world as an illusion that we create both separately and collectively. See the most loving scenarios you can imagine.

Many people will fall victim to the superficial negativity in the coming months. They will need our reassurance that it won't last long and help in seeing differently. There will be periods of time that will seem hopeless to many. Know that it is only the dark before the dawn. There is a glorious future.

  Life on Earth will be different. People will know they are sovereign beings. Everyone with a different function but none better than another. Cooperation, not competition, will be the rule. Village life will be the rule, rather than huge cities. Food raising and manufacture will be local. Our surpluses will be  will be shared with others; thus we will have goods from other climates. Energy sources will be completely different. We have been slaves to oil and coal because money could be made from them and people could be easily controlled because of their dependence on them. Over the last century there have been many saner ways of producing energy that were proposed then scuttled because it did not create a cash cow for the monied few. When our minds are free to look for new sources of energy that are affordable and nurturing to ourselves and our environment we will easily find them.

The folks in power are desperate to hang on. They will create more chaos as they are losing their grip. There may be more "false flag" operations as an excuse to continue the endless war. Know that they are becoming more and more powerless as every day goes by. Ignore what you hear and see on television and be skeptical about what you read. If it is scary- don't believe it. If it disturbs your peace-ignore it.

You will get through these times and you will see the Dawn.

Love and Peace, Gregg

TGIF

Although, I have been retired now for 11 years I still remember the blessedness of a Friday. To have that weekend stretch out before you.............two whole days to relax and be free. You working stiffs have my love and compassion. There is nothing wrong with work. We need to work. It is an important expression of our being. I was lucky, I always did what I loved to do. Working with people, helping people, but even then the institution that provided the work could be rife with rules that contradicted the mission and caused stress in the employees. We will have a saner world.

My last two days were very busy. Wednesday we went to the flea market and bought vegetables to supplement the supply from the garden. My brother and his wife came for dinner and brought a bushel of tomatoes that they couldn't use. There was a frost forecast for the morning and they already canned all they they wanted. We much appreciated them, as our crop was piddly. We had a delicious dinner featuring our home raised chicken and ample wine.

Yesterday, Jamie worked all day putting up vegetables for the winter. She was on her feet from morning until evening. My day was much more relaxed. I did go to the feed store. I did finally get my lawn mowed and it really needed it.

These are difficult times and it is hard to see that people are really becoming more enlightened. One would not get that impression from the popular media, yet there are signs. Recent poles have indicated that more and more people describe themselves as spiritual but not religious. People are realizing that religion has not fulfilled the function of helping people make sense of the universe and understand their place in it. Regardless of the high motives religions founders may have had, the institution generally evolved into a means to control people. To be sure, their are many genuine spiritual seekers as parishioners and leaders in organized religion, but the institution as a whole has been used to control people, not enlighten them, these last two thousand years.

A core belief of most religion is that God is love and every human has equal access to him. No where in the instructions of the primary spiritual teachers is there any hint that people should create an institutional hierarchy of religion to let us know what God wants. All the teachers, I am familiar with, teach that God speaks directly to the heart of every person. We need to listen.

I am heartened that more and more people are willing to think for themselves in these matters.

Well that is enough for today. My dish water is getting cold.

Love and Peace, Gregg

TUESDAY A NEW DAY

Today we can feel the oncoming Autumnal Season. It is afternoon and it is still cool. There is frost predicted for the morning. I wasn't able to blog at my usual time because Tuesdays the morning a neighbor drops in and we spend time jawing about the universe. Some times it turns in to a rant. We talk about a great many things, often politics and current events. We have enough of a different slant on things as to make it interesting.

It is such a beautiful day it is hard to see the "old world". It appears that paradise is already surrounding us. Speaking of that, I was somewhat disturbed by my last blog. I think every thing I said was fine; but not the reason I said it. I was upset by the relenting resurrecting of  9-11. There is much to be revealed about that tragedy that is yet to come out. However, I teach that in order to create the world we want, we must give up the old world. It is a world created with fear. It no longer has value and happiness cannot be found there. I can generally view what is transpiring without reacting to it. I have said to people, who are disturbed by what is going on in the world, to look at it as if you were living a 1000 years from now. View it as if it was history, like we would view a film of the Roman Empire. There are many parallels.

In order to extract ourselves from the influence of the old world we do need to understand how we are influenced and how to give up the influence. However, criticizing, complaining, ranting about it etc. is not going to help. It only serves to disturb your own peace. We are the creators of our individual and group experience. We must own the "old world". We just don't want to do it any more.  We need to forgive ourselves for the mess we created and move on. We will create a "New World" founded on unconditional love because we are loving beings and that is what we want to do.

In future sessions I will continue to talk about how we have been taught fear, in order to be controlled, so we can free ourselves from said control. I will avoid the rants.

Love and Peace, Gregg 

CORRECTION- MONDAY MORNING

OKAY- "IT IS BETTER TO LIGHT A CANDLE IN THE WILDERNESS THAN CURSE THE DARKNESS" IT IS AN OLD MAN'S RAMBLE AFTER ALL.  GG