August B Issue
...Of Science and
Spiritual Practice
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CONTENTS • OMTIMES
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Rupert Sheldrake Of Science and Spiritual Practice by Sandra Sedgbeer
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Menopause From a Holistic perspective
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10 Ways To Get Exercise in Your Life
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Waiting for Jesus
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20 Paths to A More Peaceful Mind
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By Stefanie Arend
By Andrew Pacholyk, MS L.Ac
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By Arthur Telling
By Andrew Pacholyk, MS L.Ac
August 2019 B EDITION
CONTENTS • OMTIMES
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9 Ways to Feng Shui your Life and Improve your Destiny
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Yoga Studio at Home- How to Update and Zen it Out
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The Mysterious Beauty of a Synchronicity
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3 Ways to Cook Tofu that Doesn't Suck
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Compost, Compost Piles, and Bins, Oh My Love, Relationships and Other Decisions Why Do So Many Adults Join Cults? Are You a Clairaudient? The Annunaki Rx Give and Glow Love Without Labels Being Fearlessly Authentic Why Do We Ignore the Suffering of Animals How to Start Your Own Little Free Library in 6 Easy Steps Zen with Alan Watts
OMTIMES | AUG A
FEATURE
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
Science & Spiritual Practice Dr. Rupert Sheldrake is a biologist and author, best known for his hypothesis of morphic resonance.
Interview By Sandra Sedgbeer
GEARS
He was the director of the Perrott-Warrick Project for research on unexplained human and animal abilities funded by Trinity College Cambridge. He's world-renowned books include Morphic Resonance and New Science of Life. Dogs that Know When Their Owners are Coming Home, The Presence of the Past, Seven Experiments that Could Change the World, and The Science Delusion, and many more. Rupert Sheldrake joins me to discuss the things that religion, atheism, spirituality, rituals, and ceremony covered in his two latest books, science, and spiritual practices reconnect in through direct experience. And his soon-to-be-published sequel, Ways to Go Beyond and Why They Work: Seven Spiritual Practices in a Scientific Age. OMTIMES| AUGUST B EDITION
Sandie Sedgbeer: Thank you and welcome Rupert Sheldrake. In the preface to Science and Spiritual Practices, you share that you had a fairly conventional Christian upbringing. Your family was Methodist, and you went to an Anglican boarding school for boys. But later on, you became an atheist. What prompted you to make that transition? Rupert Sheldrake: Well, it just seems to happen naturally at the time. The message I got from my science teachers was that science and reason are all about progress and the future. And religion is all about superstition and credulity, and Dogma and I wanted to be on the side of progress. So it wasn't really a kind of agonizing decision. It was just smoothly going with the flow of scientific education in the secular worldview. Sandie Sedgbeer: So, over the last 35 years or more, you've been doing experimental research on plant growth, morphic resonance, homing pigeons, dogs that know when their owners are coming home, the sense of being stared at, telephone telepathy, and a range of other subjects. What attracted you to those areas, and how have they changed your ideas about religion and atheism? Rupert Sheldrake: Well, I began to doubt the mechanistic materialist theory of life when I was an undergraduate at Cambridge. I began to feel that I loved animals and plants, that's why I did biology, and that's why I was studying it. And I noticed the first thing we did was kill whatever we were studying. So I felt something had gone wrong. It wasn't really a science of life. It was a science of parts of living organisms when they're dead. So, I began to think in terms of finding a more holistic alternative.
OMTIMES| AUGUST B EDITION
That was part of my quest. After being an undergraduate, I went to Harvard, where I studied history and philosophy of science to try and get a bigger picture. I really came to the view by about 10 years after I graduated. I was doing research at Cambridge at the time that biology is not best explained in terms of mechanisms, but there are organizing principles,
BOOK FEATURE
MENOPAUSE FROM A HOLISTIC PERSPECTIVE
During menopause, a woman’s hormones adjust, and her body changes gradually. Most women notice these changes between the ages of forty and fifty-five. They are often accompanied by unpleasant symptoms such as hot flushes, irritability, aggression, lethargy, feeling faint, gaining weight, or hair loss. The inner attitude of the woman also has a major effect on how the menopause progresses. If she is positive about this phase of life, the typical menopause complaints are much less severe or may not even be perceived as such. You can see this in cultures that celebrate this transition instead of meeting it critically.
Many women question themselves and their own lives intensively during this period, and may also concentrate more on themselves again, as they have reached a very stable phase of life and no longer have to—or want to—subject themselves to the pressures of society as they might have in the past. Mothers, in particular, will have done an amazing and brilliant job for many years (and given a considerable amount of themselves, through pregnancy and the raising of children), and they should really enjoy having more time to themselves once their children are independent.
In this phase, plans and wishes that women have kept on the back burner for some time should now be implemented and enjoyed before possible physical limitations might start to become apparent and these opportunities would no longer be possible.
FROM A HOLISTIC PERSPECTIVE, MENOPAUSE IS A TIME WHEN A WOMAN QUESTIONS HERSELF AGAIN
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As the Yin energy should be nurtured during menopause, Yin Yoga is naturally ideal here. It also has a cooling effect, which can have a very favorable influence on hot flushes. Many women intuitively gravitate to calmer styles of yoga in these years, as they no longer have the strength or willingness for active types of yoga. However, many use it consciously as a form of balance to neutralize the excessive Yang, which has often built up in the first half of life. From a holistic perspective, menopause is a time when a woman questions herself again. She is starting the second half of her life and losing her fertility at a physical level, which can also give her new freedom. Although it is frequently devalued in the West, the midlife crisis, which men may also experience, should not be viewed negatively. This upheaval should really be a welcome opportunity to set new objectives or venture into a change of direction—to be able to look back on a fulfilled life and to have no regrets about not having lived life to the fullest. Vegetarians and vegans usually have fewer menopausal complaints than omnivores. If you suffer badly from hot flushes, etc., then you should avoid animal products as far as possible for a while. Some women are also helped by phytoestrogens, secondary plant substances with a hormonal effect.
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10 Ways To Get Exercise in Your Life
By increasing lifestyle activities each day, try doing four 10-minute increases at least five days a week. The idea is just to do more of what you are already doing. Here are some great ideas on getting motivated: 1. Aerobics: The word aerobic means “with oxygen” or “in the presence of oxygen.” Aerobic exercise is any activity that uses large muscle Omtimes.com
groups, can be maintained continuously for a long period, and is rhythmic. Aerobic activity trains the heart, lungs, and cardiovascular system to process and deliver oxygen more quickly and efficiently to every part of the body. As the heart muscle becomes stronger and more efficient, a larger amount of blood can be pumped with each stroke. Fewer strokes are then required to transport
oxygen to all parts of the body rapidly. An aerobically fit individual can work longer, more vigorously, and achieve a quicker recovery at the end of the aerobic session. 2. Mind Quieting: A disciplined mind is a free mind. Gain control over your thoughts and you maintain control over your life. Retrain your mind, and you regain your freedom. Calming the mind is a behavioral technique used to interrupt, minimize, and eliminate “psychological noise.” Obsessive, repetitive thoughts, anxiety, and fears are all apart of negative, selfdestructive patterns that can benefit from the power of music and mind quieting. 3. Breathing: Breath is life! Exchange of electrons. The flow of energy. Air is the primary nutrient. Survival without it is measured in minutes. It is so important that you do it without thinking. Your breathing is the voice of your spirit. It’s depth, smoothness, sound, and rate reflect your mood. If you become aware of your breath and breathe the way you
do when you are calm, you will become calm. Practicing regular, mindful breathing can be calming and energizing. With the addition of music and its rhythm, the “musical breath” can even help stressrelated health problems ranging from panic attacks to digestive disorders. Fall into the rhythm of the music and breathe. Focus on your breathing and music. 4. Weight Bearing: exercise stimulates tissue growth in bone and muscles, strengthening the body’s structure. A stronger skeleton reduces the risk of osteoporosis, arthritic joint pain, and other bone conditions. Also known as resistance training, weightbearing exercise can be any activity that involves carrying, lifting, or pushing a heavy object. Walking is considered to be weight-bearing, as muscles and the skeleton support body weight. You do not need to “pump iron” to benefit from this form of exercise. 5. Yoga: Many different types of yoga workouts exist. But Omtimes.com
Upon waiting 2000 years for Apostle Paul’s promise of Jesus’ impending return, it is time to consider other possibilities. The problem for all religions and disciplines is not obtaining eternal life, but rather of
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accepting and coming to terms with the notion of living in eternity. We’ve been given the tools; we must learn to use them. A Promise that Never Came The Apostle Paul wrote his letter to the Thessalonians: Jesus will return he assured them, it is taking longer than believed because more Pagans need to hear the Word and be saved. The year was about 50 AD. Jesus will come. But Jesus didn’t come, and none in that generation witnessed the promised second coming. And Paul’s churches -- in today’s Turkey and Syria – were eventually overrun and conquered by 7h century Muslim invaders. But Paul’s promise still gives hope to Christians today two-thousand years later. It is time that the Church take a second look at this longstanding promise that has yet to arrive. Everything’s been tried, but no one has succeeded. From the “new age” until now, and from earlier times of enlightenment and human advancement,
Western man has sought to know and understand the mechanics behind life and death and our reason and purpose for being alive. And, despite considerable evidence of activity happening in parallel realities glimpsed in dreams, intuition, and inner forms of communication, we continue to be born and die having none to little knowledge of what we will become, or where we’ll go, or even whether we’ll still exist. It should not be the case. Eternal Life an Elusive Dream Those willing to skirt the outside boundaries of acceptable conventional knowledge find a wealth of information answering some of the difficult and mystifying questions. It usually involves communication with beings who reside outside of our physical reality of whom better see the makeup of our world, which seems so solid and real to us. Ample books are there in the metaphysical section of bookstores, also found in Eastern religions, mysticism, new-age spiritualism and developing sciences like Omtimes.com
20 Paths to A More Peaceful Mind by Andrew Pacholyk, MS L.Ac
Peace. That place you wish to go to when all the world around you is in turmoil. Peace is the desired goal of most of us, the world over. For without peace, we are in constant conflict. It is often
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the situations that we put ourselves in, which create the greatest amount of stress or discomfort. Of course, peace is a two-sided coin. For if we did not know strife, pain, or imbalance, we would not find the motivation, drive, or desire to want peace of mind in the first place. What is the choice for yourself? Peace is something you want to choose. I see some people who strive to create drama in their life and others. It has a deep psychological connection to their insecurities and unhappiness. It is a choice they wish for themselves. It is their choice. It does not affect your choice. No one affects your choice, but you. You must find peace and happiness in your life. It is your decision. Not anyone else’s. 1. Peace is a practice. Peace is a desired effect we should strive for every day. It is an intention that we must work to manifest. It is a mental attitude we must choose to follow. Anything you wish to get better at, you work
on. You want to get better at doing handstands, you practice. You want to hit the ball into the outfield, you practice. Working on bringing peace into your life is no different. 2. Motivate yourself with compassion, not anger. Rage is usually misdirected. Who does rage affect most? Ourselves. For the person or situation, we are enraged with, usually does not affect It person or situation at all. They are oblivious to it, or they don’t care. So why get angry about it? You hurt only yourself. Practice selfkindness. 3. Drive yourself consciously. You are made aware of your “lack of peace,” due to whatever circumstance is causing the conflict. When you choose to be consciously aware of It situation, you can then choose to react differently. You can choose not to let It interfere with your path to peace. When you are not conscious about your feelings, you blindly react without thought. Choose Omtimes.com
9 Ways to Feng Shui your Life and Improve your Destiny by Janet Li Hoi Yan
If you want to improve your destiny, the basic thing you should do is to be a someone with highest-level moral integrity. However, there is some secondary way, such as non-moral good behavior
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(the behavior that can improve the living of the people). Only combining these two methods, one can substantially improve its destiny. The suggested methods you can employ to improve your destiny are as follows: Reinforce the training in various kind of thinking method, such as language analysis, logic thinking, creative thinking, etc. to cultivate the possibility to have clear ways of clear expression. The above point is the “scientific goodness�; it is also the part of non-moral goodness. Watch more humorous programs and shows; joke, comedy, be open to ludic experiences. Smile more, avoid trouble face and stern attitudes. Cultivate the artistic appreciation for life. The ability to be creative and to cultivate an artistic feeling would greatly improve your outlook in life. You are not limited to appreciate those
arts in a narrow sense, such as painting, sculpture, and music, but in a broader sense encompassing all aspects of life itself. Improve the Feng Shui of your home. The design of your home can be finished according to the aesthetic standards, yet harmonizing directly with the feelings from your heart. When rearranging your living space, chose simplicity as a standard style of living over-complicated beauty. Apart from that, the energy of travel and change of workplaces are also methods of temporarily changing the Feng Shui of your existence. Change the outward beauty of yourself. Change your appearance; Your fashion style, your appearance, your hairstyle, etc. The point is to improve your body’s Feng Shui. Excercise. To make the body and the heart remain at a happy and healthy state. If so, you can remove much bad luck. Omtimes.com
Love, Relationships and Other Decisions
It may strike you as a, particularly unromantic thought that I should classify such themes as love and relationships within decision-making. After all, shouldn’t love just to happen, rather than being a matter of choice? Shakespeare understood the intricate and deeper layers of love when he wrote in Romeo and Juliet (Act I, scene 1): “Love is heavy and light, bright Omtimes.com
and dark, hot and cold, sick and healthy, asleep and awake – it’s everything except what it is!” If love creates such exacerbated and passionate feelings (from pathos, the Greek word for ‘suffering’), it may be precisely because it is never simply ‘bright’ or ‘dark,’ never so clear cut. Love and relationships may be exciting precisely because they are the locus of a permanent question, of a permanent tension between opposites.
Aristotle, back in the 4th Century B.C., defined virtue as “a disposition to behave like a mean between extremes of deficiency and excess.” The mean for Aristotle is the opposite of both extremes, and we reach excellence through the habit of seeking and finding this mean between all the extremes in our lives. Love and relationships are therefore soul-enhancing parts of our lives as they pose this permanent question (Heavy or light? Bright or dark? Etc) and require our ongoing positioning between both extremes. Love is a permanent decision. We all know that love and relationships can also be areas of “stuckness” in our lives. We may end up either paralyzed by the lack of connection (as evidenced by the proliferation of dating apps), or by the strong feeling of inadequacy in a relationship from which we find it hard to extricate ourselves. Sometimes, this feeling is rendered more complex when we cannot even identify what we truly want. In Stephen Sondheim’s musical “Into the
Woods,” one of the characters asks: “Are you sure that what you wish is also what you want?” In relationships and many other areas of decision-making, different parts of us may want different things. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if there were a simple formula, an easy-to-use algorithm that would solve all our decisions, in particular, those relating to relationships? This is what Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, had to say on the subject: “When deciding minor importance, I have always found it advantageous to consider all the pros and cons. In vital matters, however, such as the choice of a mate or profession, the decision should come from the unconscious, from somewhere within ourselves. In the important decisions of personal life, we should be governed, I think, by the deep inner needs of our nature.” In this context, it is essential to think of what drives us towards relationships. According to the Jungian Omtimes.com
Why Do So Many Adults Join Cults by Marcia Sirota, MD.
A lot has been written about the kinds of people who choose to lead a cult. Like Charles Manson, Jim Jones or Sun Myung Moon, these are power-crazed narcissists and sociopaths, highly invested in manipulating and controlling
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others to do their bidding. It’s not enough for these individuals to have personal power; they’re compelled to have others bend to their will. But what causes a seemingly normal person to cast aside their autonomy and allow a charismatic stranger to tell them what to think and what to do? Cult followers give up their money and personal possessions to the leader; they abandon their family and friends; they willingly offer their bodies to the leader, allowing themselves to be married off, impregnated, or literally, to “drink the Kool-ade.” Cult followers – whether religious, political or survivalist – are so in the thrall of their leaders that tragically, the news often contains stories of how these followers are willing to die if that’s what their leader directs them to do. It seems incomprehensible when you take a step back and look at it; especially when you consider that these were once people
with spouses, houses, careers and full, active lives. In totalitarian states, people fight tooth and nail to free themselves from the bonds of oppression, but adult cult members join up willingly and gladly give away their voice and their freedom of choice. Adult cult members want to be parented I’ve concluded that there’s one main psychological reason that could explain why people are so willing to give up their power and autonomy and allow some authoritarian bully to do their thinking for them. It all comes down to wanting to be parented. The adult cult follower could be any age, but if they carry deep emotional wounds or unmet needs for love and care from a hurtful or neglectful childhood, they might harbor an unconscious but powerful desire to be parented today. If a child grows up without receiving all the love, nurturing, protection, and
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Are You Clairaudient? by John Holland
In a previous article, I have mentioned the three most popular psychic abilities: clairvoyance (“clear seeing”), clairaudience (“clear hearing”), and clairsentience (“clear feeling”) and how you can develop your inner sensing.
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In this issue, I’d like to talk about clairaudience, your inner sense of hearing. It’s the ability to hear names, dates, certain sayings, and yes, even songs and melodies. Some people hear objectively, which is outside themselves. When you hear subjectively (in your mind), you’ll become aware of sounds as though they’re words spoken in your own voice. Have you ever heard your name called out only to find out that no one was there? It may be from a loved one in Spirit, or it can be someone here who’s thinking of you. If you feel it’s the latter, try calling that person on the phone. Most likely, they’ll tell you that they were just thinking of you. Another good example of clairaudience is when you hear a song playing in your head. Stop for a minute and make a mental note of the song. Listen to the lyrics; often, there is a message of encouragement or advice for you within the words, or for someone close to you who needs a lift or a helping hand. The next time you’re on the
phone with someone, close your eyes and really listen to their voice on the other end of the line. Let the person’s tone and words completely enter your space so that your intuition takes over from your conscious reaction. You may notice colors, images, or even feelings that have nothing to do with the conversation. Don’t just listen with your ears — listen with your intuition. Are you a clairaudient? Take time to carefully answer the following 5 questions. Each yes is a strong indicator of your clairaudience: Do you always think inside your head instead of out loud? Can you tell when someone’s not telling the truth? Does a high-pitched sound ever suddenly come into your ear? Do you ever hear music or a particular song playing in your head? Do you ever hear what others are thinking?
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THE ANUNNAKI by Judy Carroll
The Anunnaki are major players in the history of Earth, with many different claims being made about them, so who are they and where did they come from? Human life on Earth did not evolve naturally, as Darwin’s theory of evolution suggests. Nor has it occurred suddenly and miraculously out of clay by the hand of God, as described in the Book of Genesis in the Old Testament. It is actually a combination of both natural evolution and intelligent design by more highly evolved off-planet human-type beings who are widely acknowlOmtimes.com
edged by the indigenous people of Earth as Creator Beings, Sky Fathers, Star Elder, etc. Illustrations of some of these beings, known as Wandjinas, can be found in Australian Aboriginal rock paintings. Only the most recent genesis event, the creation of “Adam” and “Eve,” is acknowledged in the Old Testament, but what is not generally known is that there was an earlier human genesis event on Earth during the time of the dinosaurs, long before mammalian homo sapiens
came onto the scene. It involved the creation of a reptoid-human species out of a bipedal dinosaur species, and was carried out by a group of off-planet creator beings known as the Draconians. In my book, Extraterrestrial Presence on Earth: Lessons in History, I refer to this earlier Earth human culture as “Repterrans,” to denote that they are an Earth (Terra) human species, but derived out of reptilians rather than mammals. These Repterrans were the founders of the Sumerian and Babylonian civilizations that were carried over from Atlantis. In the Sumerian language, the Repterrans were known as the Anunnaki. They were the gods and demigods of Greek legend, as well as the Roman, Egyptian and Norse pantheons. In fact, nearly every country on Earth makes mention of these more-than-human beings in their folkloric traditions. Their ultimate role in the pre-history of the West is that of the “God” of the Old Testament. The Anunnaki had acquired a very high level of technology from their Draconian forebears, and they established an advanced society on Earth that is referred
to as “Atlantis.” In Atlantean society, gold was highly valued, as it is today. The Anunnaki established gold mines in Africa, and bio-engineered a species of mammalian primates in that country to a point where these creatures were able to carry out menial tasks. These half-human/ half-animal beings were known as “Mixtures,” and were used as slaves to work the mines for the Anunnaki. Earth was a very violent place, with the various Anunnaki groups fighting among themselves for ownership of the planet, and all of them exploiting the Mixtures. Off-planet intervention arrived in the form of creator beings (mainly Pleiadians), who stepped in to assist the Mixtures through a program of genetic enhancement, to fully humanize and hopefully free them from exploitation by the Anunnaki. This is the real story behind the “Adam and Eve” parable. The Anunnaki saw what was happening, and they felt threatened by this development of a more upgraded Homo sapiens species, with a stronger infusion of off-planet genetics in their make-up. This prompted them Omtimes.com
Love without Labels
When one of my coaching clients complained to her doctor that she was depressed, he diagnosed her as having a personality disorder and referred her to a psychiatrist. The Omtimes.com
psychiatrist told her she did not at all have a personality disorder; she was just depressed. She talked through her feelings and walked out of the session, feeling liberated from the burden of a label. The medical world is highly invested in labels. While it is certainly practical to be able to identify and categorize diseases, it becomes attractive for practitioners to jump to a trendy diagnosis. While lots of people have ADHD, Bipolar, and Personality Disorder, lots of other people suffer under misapplied labels that box them into stifling identities. Naming things gives us power over them. It also gives them power over us. A coaching client told me, “I am a sex addict.” “Who told you that?” I asked him. “My girlfriend,” he replied. As we discussed his relationship, it turned out that he simply wanted to have sex more than his girlfriend did. So, she called him a sex addict.
It’s easy to project our fear, pain, and judgments onto others. If they accept our projection, we both suffer. When a friend of mine fought with his roommate, the roommate blurted out, “You are psychotic. I took a psychology course in college, so I know what I am talking about.” A few days later, my friend did a favor for his roommate. “I was wrong about you are psychotic,” she said. “You just have a personality disorder.” When the roommate was angry at my friend, her weapon was to lay a harsh diagnosis on him. When she liked him again, she downgraded the diagnosis? Funny creatures, we humans. I heard a lecture by a famous gynecologist. He humorously confessed, “Women who just had a baby would ask me, ‘How long until I can have sex with my husband again?’ If I liked the woman, I would tell her, ‘A few days.’ If I didn’t like her, I would tell
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Being Fearlessly Authentic by Dagny Grant and Beth Donnelly
Today, with all of the technical software available to make us look better, sound better, appear happier than we are‌where is the real you?
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We can come into our power when we are our authentic self. Finding a tribe who values our authenticity can be an interesting challenge these days. There are many avenues one can take to find like-minded people. Between social media platforms, clubs, church groups, political activities, hobbies, and meet up events, there are numerous ways people can connect. The key for being “fearlessly authentic” is our ability to walk-in to those connections being unafraid to present ourselves honestly. To be confident in who we truly are, we need to be “okay” with who we are! We might even say that being authentic is honoring our connection to our creator. Is it selfish to be authentic? Yes, but that is good. It may be seen as self-serving to focus on anything that causes us to feel good when there is suffering in the world. However, allowing ourselves to be honest, results in sharing vulnerable and kind energy that people are drawn to. It invites others
to trust us and be their authentic selves in return. Being inauthentic constricts our energy and can cause illness. The Continual putting forth a false impression of who we are reaffirming our belief that we are not enough, which is a literal toxin in our cells. Dr. Bruce Lipton speaks about this in his work “The Biology of Belief.” Below is a thoughtprovoking quote from him regarding the power of our thought focus. “The function of the mind is to create coherence between our beliefs and the reality we experience. What that means is that your mind will adjust the body’s biology and behavior to fit with your beliefs. If you’ve been told you’ll die in six months and your mind believes it, you most likely will die in six months. That’s called the nocebo effect, the result of a negative thought, which is the opposite of the placebo effect, where a positive thought mediates healing.” –Dr. Bruce Lipton Omtimes.com
Why Do We Ignore the Suffering of Animals? by Cathedral of the Soul
Because we are methodically programmed to ignore their misery, anguish, and pain. We arrived in this world already being deceived. Our modern way of life created a vast scope of absurd conditioning that we end up absorbing passively as truths and part of our reality. We are induced not to question, but to accept and finally to be part of this great worldly Omtimes.com
theater of blood, pain, and constant suffering. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages. –Thomas Jefferson We cannot wake up from this immense nightmare that we promote, for our protectionism only towards certain species is there to deliver us from guilt. Some religious perspectives strengthen our belief that we are the only one among millions of species chosen by a “God,” and the ones able to have the gift of consciousness. Besides this, we are also indoctrinated that we have received the divine command and power over the other beings on this planet, and therefore they would be our property and belong to us as inanimate things for our disposal and inventory. Yet there are some animals that are treated differently from others, despite of their intelligence and abilities to show emotions and love. This Ideological doctrine is called Carnism. Carnism is a concept used
in discussions of humanity’s relation to other animals, defined as a prevailing ideology in which people support the use and consumption of animal products, especially meat. Carnism is presented as a dominant belief system supported by a variety of defense mechanisms and mostly unchallenged assumptions. The term carnism was coined by social psychologist and author Melanie Joy in 2001 and popularized by her book Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows. Jeff Mannes writes that carnism is rooted in a paradox between most people’s values and actions: they oppose harming animals, and yet eat them. He argues that this conflict leads to cognitive dissonance, which people attempt to attenuate through psychic numbing. Using a new modern language of power, the various levels of human society, from governments to civil societies institutionalized the human supremacy; and transformed a shared world into to an exclusively human world governed by self-protection laws. The rest is the rest. Omtimes.com
How to Start Your Own Little Free Library in 6 Easy Steps
Little Free Libraries are simply brilliant. They create a sense of place and connect people while supporting literacy. As Margret Aldrich, author of the Little Free Library Book told Shareable; neighbors started coming over to visit as soon as she put a Little Free Library in her yard.
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“When we placed the Little Free Library in front of our house, it was instant,” she says. “The minute we had it in the ground, we had neighbors crossing the street and coming from down the block to stop by and tell us how great it was. People who I had never spoken to came over to chat with us.” To help people create a Little Free Library in their neighborhood, the International Literacy Association and Little Free Library created Service Project Kit: Build a Little Free Library. The guide is full of tips for choosing a location, getting started, spreading the word about your library, and more. It also provides tips for teachers interested in putting a Little Free Library in their classroom. Here are the six main steps on how to create a little free library from the guide: 1. Find a Great Location: When choosing a location for your library, look for a visible place with lots of foot traffic. Keep in mind
that people of all ages and abilities will be using your library, so make it as easy as possible to access. 2. Build Your Little Free Library: When building your library, you can either design your own or order a kit from Little Free Library. When deciding which route to take, consider whether your library will have a theme, what you want it to look like, what materials you have access to, the budget you have for materials, and who will be doing the building. Some Little Free Libraries are very simple, and some are out of this world. 3. Create a Community of Support: When building your library, ask for support from people in your immediate circle and consider reaching out to local organizations and businesses to donate supplies, plans, or building time. This creates a community-building spirit before you’ve even Omtimes.com
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