Grace in a tempest

Grace like rain

This song is one of my favorites.  I've loved it in rainstorms, blizzards and on tranquil sunny days.  It has spoken to me in grief, fear and in joy and celebration.  God's love graces us in all our ways, washing over us on all our paths - stormy or placid, through upheavals and in the sweet comfort of familiarity.  

Today, as the southeast holds its breath, hoping the 25 million souls in the path of Hurricane Florence will be safe, with no loss of life - human or animal, my heart returns to this beautiful song which reminds us that God's grace is like rain.

I pray that everyone in the path of the storm or even indirectly affected by it, feels God's grace in every drop of rain that falls and God's Holy Spirit in every winded breath of that great and fierce category 4 hurricane.

Today, be safe.  Remember you are not alone.  All of heaven is holding your hand, guiding you to safety.  May love guide and protect you throughout this terrifying event.

I am LOVE (and so are you)

As we emerge from centuries of darkness, we are rediscovering what previous civilizations may have known. Yet, tragically, what they might have known did not save them.  They perished about 12,800 B.C. in a global deluge, caused by three meteors splashing down in northern Canada. The meteors burst through a slowly melting ice age, flooding the planet to the tops of the Himalayan mountains, the Great Western Rockies and sinking ancient Indian temples, whole cities, pyramids erasing almost all traces of an enlightened global civilization.  

Yet, ancient messages lingered on pyramid walls, in cryptic Sanskrit, Hindu legends and in the well known ancient myths of a global flood retold in the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh, Noah's Ark and other indigenous cultural legends throughout the planet.  Almost every culture has a flood story.  Today, it's well documented through scientific testing there actually was a global flood.  

As we continue to find ancient civilizations sleeping underwater off the coast of India, the Philippines, even pyramids in Antarctica and so much more, we're realizing our ancient ancestors knew something we've lost and are just now rediscovering. (See Graham Hancock's Underworld for the awesome details about this.) But, the question is, "What did they know that we don't and could it help us?"

Rather than dive into a long discussion about what went wrong as we began to recover a thousand years after the deluge that drowned most of the planet, how we were misled by the dark control of abusive power throughout these long centuries since, I'd like to share a simple awareness that dawned in a conversation recently, which is clearly only the tip of the iceberg on this whole subject. 

There are so many more questions than answers about our prediluvian ancestral civilization, but we know some things that are both startling and illuminating. We know it was a global civilization, much as we are becoming now technologically.  We know there was a common language. Shattered remnants of that one language are hinted at in all our current world languages which share tiers from a common root language.  Most interesting is there is strong evidence this ancestral civilization was enlightened.  

Obviously, there is so much we may never know, but we are realizing they were enlightened and highly spiritual who used another means of communicating. Some of their legends did survive the great flood and are found in the ancient legends of India and many others.  We've attempted to trace the origins of those religions and there simply isn't one.  Today scholars realize their origins pre-exist the flood.  This is evident in the ancient Vedas, Yugas,  Sufi legends, Sumerian myths, Incan and Mayan South American myths and is even traced into Judaism which originated long later but still contains former oral traditions.  What these people were able to do is barely understandable today, yet we're starting to get it. It is reported that they lived exceedingly long lives.  How was that possible, and can we trust that information to be accurate?

Apparently, they communicated without technology through telepathy, ascended into other dimensions and seemed to have been peaceful, creative, compassionate and egalitarian.  There is every indication we honored our racial roots without prejudice, and those individual cultures flourished in radiant splendor.  There is evidence of an ancient religion in Africa which may have survived the great flood as the ancient Egyptian religion, which ended due to internal corruption.  

So, what is the big mystery they knew and we didn't for thousands of years since the demise of that ancestral civilization?

It's hidden in our DNA.  Apparently, we really have 48 chromosomes, pairs of 24, rather than the 23 that are "visible" to geneticists.  The 24th is invisible because it's multidimensional.  It's light vibrating at too high a speed for our 3-D vision to detect.  It's our "divine" gene, fully connected to, or part of, the higher order of timeless divinity.  Since every cell in our body is comprised of our DNA, apparently this invisible, yet illuminated 24th DNA molecule is also in every cell of our body.  It connects with all the other DNA creating an individual body of light, which is known as our "light body."  It is also believed to be able to connect through light resonance to all the other DNA on the planet! Also, our light body does NOT perish when we die.  Apparently, it continues to move into the higher dimensions, perhaps reaching "heaven," but let's not mix metaphors.

Scientists now know that material substance is condensed light which vibrates at a level our vision is unable to detect. So, we simply cannot see the light that is in everything.  

What if we bring into this equation the metaphysical knowledge that the highest level of enlightenment is the power in this light, which is part of and connected to the Divine source of creation and life which is right here in our human bodies? Then, we wonder what is this divine light within us?

I believe it is the power of "God" within us, woven into a beautiful radiant light body which is part of us and actually perfect, pristine and untouched by our less than loving, fearful and ultimately selfishly destructive egos. What if we could consciously tap the power of our light bodies?  Would we be more powerful, more creative, more loving?  I think the answer is yes, definitely!  But, how do we tap into it, how do we build a bridge to it?  

It seems we already are doing it but don't know it.  The clue is in Moses encounter with "God."  When Moses is told by God to implore Pharaoh to free the enslaved Hebrew people, Moses asks God who should he say sent him.  God replies, "Tell him 'I am' has sent you." Moses does as God says, and the world remembers the long legacy of the liberation of the Hebrews every year in Passover.

It is in that "I am" statement that connects the human being with their divine power, which is God within, the creative life force within, who is knowable, relational, ultimate Being and ultimate Self.

So, again, I thought about all the "I am" statements we hear every day, absolutely everywhere, and realized in our innocent ignorance we were damning ourselves.  How many times do we hear people say, "I'm broke.  I'm sick.  I don't feel well.  I'm unemployed, etc. ?"

If we know that our Creator is ultimate love who has poured creative light power into us right down to our mitochondria, who has also warned us not to create using empty words ( aka "speaking falsely, bearing false witness, or worshipping idols - which are empty powerless wordages")  then, we need to be mindful of our intentions and use of words.  

I also wondered further how we could connect with our inner power, our light body, and help it glow brighter, powerfully illuminating our bodies, our lives, our families, communities, our world,  transforming everything and lifting us into a place of power and a creative ability we have never known this side of the great flood.

If it's through "I am" statements that Moses could defeat Pharaoh, then the answer is in the "I am" statements.  Suddenly, it was obvious, staring me right in the face.  What if we became conscious of what we said?  I realized if we spoke a silent mantra to ourselves of "I am LOVE"  (realizing everyone else is also) holding that awareness mindfully, vigilantly, constantly, maybe we could change and that change would be felt around the world.  Would our bodies heal, would our broken hearts heal, would we become more creative, healthy, powerful, more telekinetic?  

Absolutely!  We are love, all of us, right down to our DNA, and that love is distilled in us as light, a light so highly vibrational our 3-D eyes can't see it, but our DNA can.  And, further, we can control the quality of that light, turn it up or dim it, increase our creative power or diminish it.  We have that ability if we choose it, if we intend and will it.  The key is in our will.  

I think this was one of the great mysteries of our ancient ancestors,  There's more, so much more, but this starts us on our path to enlightenment and healing our world. It's what the ancients would want us to grasp to survive our own miscreations.

Gratitude!

Christ in US

I stood outside the old city church I'd attended for most of my life. I'd been schooled in the teachings of the Church there, including all the nuances of its party line.

Yet, over the years and further study, I discovered it didn't really teach the whole story. In fact, it left out some of the most important parts of the story. Those parts would change the world in a way we never saw before. The message had to be seen through a new lens, expanded to a much wider globally-inclusive worldview, one that would set us all free of our blind obedience to an obsolete, enslaving and circular paradigm some call reality. It isn't real at all. We just think it is. It's a hard shell to crack, but we need to awaken from the collective illusion driving our separate and selfish agendas. There is very little out there we need. Its all within us, all of it.

Christ is calling us to awaken to a new way of being and living. He holds the truth out to us like a lantern, a beacon from somewhere else, and in that beacon, in the very substance of the light that is in the presence in that beacon is life. It's a strange thought, I admit. It's hard to get our heads around it and took me a lot of wrong turns to realize this. Thank God, Christ was patient with me.

Through my journey, I'd heard the sweet whisper of the Spirit, often surfacing in my writing, sometimes in dreams, and more powerfully in some of my mistakes and wrong turns in life. But, oddly, it was in the mistakes and wrong turns when I heard Christ the loudest, the strongest. Maybe Christ was thinking, "Let me know when you're ready to stop trying to do it your way. Then, I'll show you the only way that will ever work."

Who knows why I finally heard Christ. Maybe it was because I was finally really listening rather than being caught up in trying to please a parent, an employer, a husband or just about anyone who showed up in my life demanding my attention. Strangely, it was those external iconic personalities who seemed to have snuck up onto the throne of my heart, along with their agendas, insisting, even mandating my complete allegiance. I thought I was right to allow that, because I thought the Church had taught that. I was wrong. Being a servant does not mean being a slave.

I came to realize, after a long journey out of the dark shadow they cast over my life, they were wrong. I had to walk my own path, and my one and only companion on that path, was also my pilot, and best friend.

As I stood in the small courtyard of the church where my parents raised us and where we said goodbye to them tearfully at their funerals, I noticed an enormous maple tree on the other side of the street in front of the chancery. I'd never noticed it before. Now, in the fall, its leaves were radiantly gold and red. I thought of the burning bush in Exodus, and marveled that I'd never noticed it before, maybe like so many things I'd never noticed before, but now are glowing right before my eyes.

It was beginning to rain through the late afternoon sunshine, backlighting the amber leaves. The rain drops sparkled on the leaves like diamonds from heaven. I felt as if Christ was showing me a vision so beautiful, so true and meaningful.

I had come to realize that Christ is all I need, all any of us need. Christ stands taller than any Church, any faith, any government, any political party, any tradition, any dogma or universal teaching - ancient or modern. Christ is the Living Spirit of the Universal One, the ALL, the Alaha, the very life breath of the universe which is the life force itself.

I had sensed for awhile now that Christ is not exclusively a Christian. Christ doesn't want our worship. Christ wants our full immersion into Christ's life. Christ is so much bigger than any of the little boxes in which we try to contain the sacred source of life. Christ cannot be controlled or bound or limited. No religion contains Christ, yet all attempt to.

I continued down the street as the rain grew more intense. As I walked in the downpour, I sensed a new baptism, an authentic baptism of Christ's own making.

Today, whenever, I feel tempted to resort to my own planning and designing of my life, I take my plans into prayer, ask for Christ to be present, in wisdom, love, intelligence, and direct guidance.

This morning was another morning like that. I was being challenged by someone's request. I was feeling pulled in another direction, one that seemed right at the time. But, as I looked at it, I realized it wasn't. I am here in this small town with all the small townisms you'd expect. Part of me wants to flee back to civilization, to DC or NY or somewhere else - anywhere else. But, no, Christ has me here.

Then, I remembered for the billionth time, that nothing other than Christ will ever do. Christ is the solution to every problem because as I stand in His light, there are no problems. Christ in me is everything I need. I would add that in this contentious election season, Christ in US is all we need. Christ is larger than the election, the government, the plans that our divided nation, albeit being crafted by a terribly uninformed populus, have devised. If we - regardless of any religion - would all step into the light of Christ we would find all our plans dissolve like kool aid in the polluted water of our insanity leaving only the crystal clarity of ultimate wisdom which is not a plan or a doing at all, but rather a beinghood, a magnificent, loving Being.

Seeing the big picture, working the details

 Interior view from the International Space Station's Cupola module.
                                                                                                            Image Credit: NASA

It is abundantly clear to me that as much as the Divine is imprinted in nature, from the farthest galaxy to the tiniest most imperceptible particle of matter, it is equally present in our very lives.  It seems to so many of us that the Divine imprint, which scientists and theologians alike are realizing is evident everywhere - from our DNA to the way the Milky Way spirals outward and the million other ways it presents itself, are all based on an original single symbol of sacred geometry.  When I see it, whenever and where ever I see it, I just stand back in awe.  I see it often now, but earlier it showed up in a simple conversation.

Today, a friend and I were talking about a brainstorm we had about an awesome virtual multi-discipline project we wanted to launch. As our excitement grew, I immediately went "big picture," realizing the global significance of the idea and its ability to be a huge service to many people. 

As I reached for a weekend for one of our many meetings to explore our idea further with a group of other people who share our enthusiasm and vision, my friend said, "I'm game for this, but only as long as it's not in the morning that Saturday because I would have to ask for time off of work." I was still flying around the big picture, thinking of the awesomeness of the idea and nowhere near Earth, which meant pretty far away from times and what kinds of repercussions might impinge on the idea.  

I laughed and said, "Oh, I'm still on the space station," but realized another dimension of the picture that was emerging before me.  I assured my friend no meeting would ever be on a Saturday morning. I was a night owl and that afternoons were my morning, especially on the weekend. Even after our conversation, I continued to reflect on her quick trip to practical measures while I was still lingering on the idea. I thought how smart she was to be so practical, yet I still wanted to fly with the ideas. It felt good, like really flying.

As I thought more about her comment, I realized how wonderful that there are two kinds of people - those who focus on the details and those who are drawn into the big picture. 

If you're going into surgery, you hope to God, your surgeon can see the details. But, when you're talking to your doctor about symptoms, you hope he or she can see the big picture. We need both - the night owls and the morning doves, those who actually work on a Saturday morning and those who dream late into the night, even watching stars, wondering what Orion's belt looks like from Giza.  

The whole point of all this is, together we are a reflection of the divine.  

The ancient Hebrews, and it  most likely stems so much further back even beyond an ancestral civilization that left hints of its existence in pyramids and stone sculptures now deep under water, offer the world its sign for itself which is the sign of the Divine - the Star of David, the tetrahedron, which looks like two pyramids overlapped in opposite.  

It reflects the two natures of the Divine, the feminine and masculine, held in equilibrium - the horizontal of the feminine empowering all creation, and the verticle of the masculine overseeing, protecting and controlling all creation. Both, held in balance, in equilibrium, allows life to flourish. If either one is out of balance, suppressing the power or magnetisim of the other, creation is out of balance.

If we remove the gender qualities, but see the unique positions of each, we see how an idea can grow wings and enter our hemisphere, set down and grow roots.  

We need the big picture. We need to interpret it, and while we're still viewing it, receiving it, and interpreting it; we need to implement it, figure out the details to make it happen, to bring it into creation.

We need both.  One won't do it.  Both will.  I think the world may be polarized these days, both sides are struggling and pulling away from center.  When I look at our presidential candidates, I wonder if that's what's happening. How easy it is for us to take sides, or bail out, and not vote. But what a gift when we can see the value in consensus by bringing both into that balance. As we reach for consensus through the integration of our unique differences - to see the big picture or put the pieces together - we will find that the Divine is in the details as much as in the big picture. 

I am so grateful for people like my friend, because without them, pictures of space would not be observable down here on earth.

Magic everywhere

An abounding beauty, alive on so many levels, fills this remote place where I live these days. A living canvas of hummingbirds suspended in mid air ballet, hissing summer cicada, croaking frogs in the large pond my rustic home overlooks, and families of deer grazing nearby at the break of dawn and at sunset, leave me breathless. Despite the insufficiency of any technology, I wouldn't trade this experience for anything.

The days are busy with work, but at night, without any reflected light from anywhere, the stars pierce the blackness with their sparkling radiance. The planets, Orion's belt, the dipper, and other constellations are immediately observable. But, perhaps the most awesome, is the Milky Way stretching out beyond my rooftop and peeking through the large oak tree that overshadows my large yard.

Even on a rainy night, you can can glimpse the heavenly spectacle. In June, at the first sight of the firefly dance that lasted most of the summer, one night around midnight I stood under a canopy of sparkling stars as the fireflies flickered all around me, some even landing on my shirt and shorts. I felt immersed in a substance of sparkling light. I couldn't move, and didn't want to move. I stood there for a long time taking in the beauty of what was around and above me, realizing the awesome gift this all is.

______________________

In recent posts, I've talked about perception, having eyes to see, ears to hear. Now I would include all the senses - to smell and feel - and to experience with a deeper, more profound extra sense, an intuitive sense, a spiritual perception that is less intellectual and more soulful, perhaps a kind of ineffable awe. 

We human beings are profoundly blessed with the ability to detect what is in our environment, here and beyond, an interpret it and experience it on that deeper cognitive level. Maybe, despite our awesome ability, we may be so much wrapped up in whatever is on our plate at the time, we don't stop and look, listen to life itself surging its symphony of sight and sound all around us, completely unaware if we perceive it or not. It is what it is, a most beautiful creation, whether or not we perceive it.  

Yet, aren't we designed and consequently meant to perceive it?

Standing in solidarity

Last night's news (9.8.16) said there were as many as 5,000 Native Americans gathered to oppose the pipeline that is reported to be 50% completed.  How to solve this problem is not the Indian Nations' problem. This is tribal land.  It is their natural and inalienable right to defend and protect. It is also sacred burial ground, for which the United States government, even in its worst days more than 100 years ago,  had some respect. As for me, I stand in solidarity with our Native American brothers and sisters and join their call to protect the land, all of it, everywhere.

Washington State Indian nations join pipeline opposition 

Valerie Taliman, West Coast Editor
8/31/16

Yakama Nation Chairman JoDe Goudy speaks.
(Photo: Courtesy Steven Sitting Bear/Standing Rock Sioux Tribe)

(Photo below right) Standing Rock Sioux Chairman David Archambault II welcomes eight nations from Washington State.

A delegation of eight Indian nations from Washington State  joined the growing opposition to the Dakota Access Pipeline that threatens the tribe’s water supply and sacred places on Oceti Sakowin Treaty lands.

The Yakama Nation, Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, Lummi Nation, Puyallup Tribe, Nisqually Indian Tribe, Suquamish Tribe, Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe and Hoh Tribe traveled with a large delegation from the Pacific Northwest with a sacred totem pole to demonstrate spiritual support. After a blessing at the         

camp near the river, the totem pole will be permanently raised at the Turtle Lodge on the Sagkeeng First Nation in Manitoba next week.

“Yakama is humbled and honored to stand beside our brothers and sisters of the Standing Rock Sioux. We’re observing a peaceful and prayerful gathering to move an entire country. We stand united in solidarity with the natural laws of this land, advocating for responsible decision making and honorable communications,” said Yakama Chairman JoDe Goudy.

“Together, we express to the U.S. government that now, more than ever, is the time to fulfill the trust obligations laid out within the treaties and historical interactions with the Native peoples of this land. Until such things come to pass, the spirit and voice of all peoples shall unite with Standing Rock. One voice, one heart, and one spirit to speak for those things that cannot speak for themselves.”

Carver Jewell James of the Lummi Nation said this is the fourth totem pole he has carved to unite people standing to protect the earth.

“This is about little people against billionaire corporations,” he said. “Standing Rock is clearly opposed to the pipeline, and I’m here to celebrate their clarity and their willingness to stand up.”

The tribes urged the United States District Court to rule in favor of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe's request to issue an injunction that stops construction of the pipeline until the Tribe’s waters and cultural resources are protected.

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe is arguing in court that the Dakota Access Pipeline was fast-tracked by the federal government, which is a direct violation of the Tribe's rights as a sovereign nation because it will hurt the Tribe’s safe drinking water and historic and cultural resources. The Tribe has asked the United States government to conduct a more stringent environmental review to ensure the protection of the Tribe's treaty rights and sacred places.

Swinomish Chairman Brian Cladoosby, who also serves as NCAI president, said, “We are a placed-based society. We live where our ancestors are buried. Our culture, laws, and values are tied to all that surrounds us, the place where our children’s future will be for years to come. We cannot ruin where our ancestors are buried and where our children will call home, uproot ourselves and move to another place. We cannot keep taking for granted the clean water, the salmon and buffalo, the roots and berries, and all that makes up the places that our First People have inhabited since time immemorial. Our futures are bound together.”

More than 150 tribes so far have sent resolutions and letters of support to show solidarity with the Standing Rock Sioux and the Seven Council Fires of the Lakota’s efforts to stop the pipeline.

“Words can’t express how thankful we are for all of the prayers, support, letters and donations we have received,” said Archambault. “It inspires us every day on our mission to protect this area for future generations and all who use it.

“We’ve seen the success our friends from Washington state have had in their battles to protect treaty rights against the transport of fossil fuels,” Archambault continued. “Their support is crucial in the protection of our land, water, and cultural resources, as well as all of our sovereign rights that we are asking Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works Jo-Ellen Darcy to honor.”

As they gathered on the banks of the Cannonball River to pray for water, several leaders spoke of similar challenges to their treaty rights, lands and ways of life. Some tribes in attendance won recent battles against proposed oil and coal export terminals that violate treaty rights, endangered fish and shellfish, and threatened the tribes’ very existence.

“I am here to stand with the Standing Rock people because my people are facing the same threats to bear the risk of development for the Puyallup Tribe,” said Councilman David Bean. “It’s an LNG terminal that will be built in the middle of our reservation and threaten our treaty protected resources.”

The peaceful camp near the river is the first time since 1875 that all the Lakota tribes have gathered at the Cannonball River. Their efforts to save their water have inspired hundreds of tribes, celebrities and activists from across the country to show their support. More than 180 tribes have written letters to President Obama and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers asking them to fulfill their trust obligation to tribes and reconsider the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline.

“Everyone has heard that this pipeline would be more than 1,100 miles long and would transport more than half a million barrels of crude oil every day across our lands,” said Cedric Good House, a traditional leader for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

“What they don’t know are the irreplaceable sacred places across the landscape and the deep cultural and spiritual knowledge that is tied to them,” he said. “These are the places and the knowledge that make us who we are today as a tribe. I plan on telling my grandchildren about the time when tribes across the country stood up and fought for treaty, culture, and the future. And we fought for the future of safe drinking water for all Americans. No longer is the world watching us, the world is with us.”

http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2016/08/31/indian-nations-washington-state-join-opposition-dapl-pipeline-165641

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