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Are You Open to Evolving Your Beliefs on Relationships?

May 21, 2010 //
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Today we continue looking at some examples of beliefs that people hold that it might be time to reconsider.  Again, no judgment but simply offered as food for thought.  This time the focus is on relationships.

Do You See Yourself in Any of These Beliefs?

I love my spouse but they’ve got some habits that really get on my nerves.  I really love them but there are these few things I would really like to change about them. 

I spent all this time raising these kids, now they’re adults and they won’t listen to what I say.  They’ve got their own thoughts and beliefs about everything — raising kids, religion, what they think is the best job for them, where to live and so on.  I’ve tried everything to get them to change their minds and see things my way.  Sometimes it’s like I’m talking to a brick wall.  I know they must know how disappointed I am in them. 

I love my parents but I wish they would not meddle in all of my affairs.  I’m grown now and I have my own thoughts about how to do things.  If I try to tell them how I want to handle stuff, they either don’t listen or get mad. If I do what they say, then I’m unhappy.  I don’t do what they say, they get mad at me and I’m unhappy.   I can’t win.  

My boss is driving me crazy.  He makes impossible demands, giving me assignments where I have to change what I’m working on.  He’s never happy with the work product.  He shows favoritism to other employees.  I can’t seem to please him. 

I really want to be in a committed relationship with a loving partner.  Every time I find somebody that I think is the right one, things just don’t work out.  I know it’s not me because I showered them with my love, gave them everything they wanted, but they left. 

I just don’t seem to have any close friends in my life.  The people around me, I just don’t seem to have anything in common with.  I don’t feel like getting close to them.  I can’t seem to attract into my life friends who have the same interests as me.

If You Think the Problem Is Out There, That Thought Is the Real Problem

If you see yourself in any of the above scenarios, then here are some thoughts for you to consider… but they will only resonate with you if you are open to evolving your beliefs on relationships….

You can’t control other people, you can only control yourself.  Don’t try to control them. 

Other people have lived their own lives which have led them to their own beliefs.  It’s unrealistic to think that they are going to believe and act just as you do. 

Whenever you find yourself pointing at another person as the source of your problems, stop and consider what role your thoughts and beliefs may be playing in creating the situation.  Consider how you might change your thoughts about the relationship. 

If you want to attract love into your life, then love people — all people.  Be love. 

Avoid smothering people with your love.  If you truly love someone, then you allow them the freedom to be who they are called to be.  This includes loving them even if they choose not to be with you. 

Be who you need to be even if there are others in your life who want you to be different.  Understand where they’re coming from and love them even if they’re trying to control you.  If you let them, you will resent it and be unhappy and it will impact your relationship.  If you follow your heart and do what you’re called to do, although you may have to deal with their displeasure, you will ultimately be happier. 

If you want to attract friendships into your life, be a friend to everyone.  Be open to friendships that present themselves to you.

Be a connector.  When appropriate, introduce people you know who have something in common to each other.  Help others to make new friends. 

Look for ways to give and serve other people in all areas of your life. 

Be the love you want to see in the world.

Are there any of these suggestions that you agree with?  Disagree?  Do you have any other suggestions?  I’d love to hear!

Mark

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Categories Consciousness, Culture, Featured Article, Positive Evolution

Rand Paul: Pandering to Fear for Political Purposes?

May 20, 2010 //
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Regretfully, there’s a strong undercurrent of fear percolating in a vocal minority of Americans.  I don’t want to feed it, the media is already doing a good job of that, but I do want to acknowledge it so we can consciously make a higher choice.

The latest incident: Kentucky Senatorial candidate Rand Paul states that the Civil Right Act of 1964 was flawed in that it made it illegal for private businesses to discriminate on the basis of race.  When questioned yesterday on the Rachel Maddow show about his position, he tried to walk the line between saying he’s against discrimination but believing that a private business has the right to discriminate based on race.  He equated a restaurant owner having the freedom to choose to prevent guns in his restaurant with a restaurant owner denying service based on race.

Unlike the media pundits, I’m not going to claim I know what Rand Paul’s true beliefs are on this issue or his intent with his statements.  However, we’ve all seen that a politician who wants to get elected frequently tries to read the political tea leaves so as to position himself to appear favorable to the mood of the populace.  It certainly appears that Paul is doing this and it just might get him elected.

This event coupled with Arizona’s new immigration law and the so-called tea party people certainly points towards a lot of fear in parts of America.  Why is there so much fear?  Reasons put forth by others include: racial pushback against a black president, shifting demographics as whites move into the minority, the economic problems of the past few years, jobs moving to other countries, the never-ending wars, gay marriage and ecological disasters such as the ongoing oil spill in the Gulf.

I think we can all agree that Americans and all of humanity are in the midst of massive change.  Although change brings growth, it also brings fear.  One basic need we all have is for safety and security.  Meeting that need is threatened psychologically when we are moving from the known into the unknown.  A common response in facing the unknown is to retreat into clinging on to the old.

Much of the “take back my country” chants are driven by a psychological drive to retreat into the known of the past.  The political posturing of folks such as Paul are recognizing the motivations behind these chants and are using them for political advantage.

The question facing America is this: during this time of momentous change will our ultimate motivation be based on fear or on a higher purpose?  

As we look to the future of humanity, what is it that we really really want to see?

Do we want to retreat into the past where we felt safe?  A past where whites were the majority, Spanish wasn’t spoken here, businesses could discriminate on race, gas was cheap, legitimate relationships were only between a man and a woman, we could continue to use natural resources up faster than the rest of the world and so on?  If we are truly being honest, then we know that this past wasn’t truly that great for many segments of humanity.  Is going back to the past really in our collective best interest?

I don’t know about you, but I know that rather than retreating into the past, I would rather move forward into a better future where everyone is treated with dignity and respect.  I wish to live in a world where people are motivated by love rather than fear.  I wish to live in a world where we look beyond skin color and ethnicity and only see our common humanity.  I wish to live in a world where there is no need to build barriers between us because everyone everywhere has the opportunity to succeed.  I wish to live in a world where politicians no longer pander to our fears but rather inspire us to our highest possibilities.

Mark

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Categories Culture, Featured Article, Politics, Uniting U.S.

Your Opinion of the Health Care Bill-Coming from Love or Fear?

March 22, 2010 //
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What is the emotion behind your belief?

The healthcare bill continues to be big news having passed the House and now heading into reconciliation with the Senate.  Seems like everybody I talk to, most people I read on the Internet, and just about every TV commentator, all have some opinion about the legislation.  I suspect you do too.

I’m not going to debate the merits of the bill the House passed.  I’m sure most of us would agree, it’s not perfect.  Of course, I’m sure that each of us would also have our own idea of what the “perfect” bill might be.  But let’s be honest, all legislation that works its way through our process of checks and balances would have a hard time meeting that standard.

What I want ask you is this — setting aside specifics of the bill and whether you’re in favor of it or not, what is the underlying emotion that drives your opinion?

Love or Fear?

Now, I suspect I know what you might be thinking… you may be thinking “emotions have nothing to do with this… my opinion of this legislation is based on fact, logic and reason”.  I agree that we all have specific logical reasons that we can point at as the justification for our position.  What I want us to consider is that behind our rational thought is an underlying emotion that serves to direct our conscious belief.

What is that emotion?  You might come up with lots of words for it… happy, disgust, relief, anger, etc. It is my opinion that we could take all these emotions and plot them on a continuum with fear on one end and love on the other.  I recognize that you might not immediately agree, but I’m asking you to consider for a moment that underlying all our opinions on the healthcare bill are the two emotions of either love and fear.

The other night on television I saw a clip of some protesters of the healthcare bill shouting at a person with Parkinson’s disease who was there in favor of the legislation.  The display of anger (screaming, throwing dollar bills at him, etc.) directed at this fellow human being simply because he held a different opinion shocked me.  I sat there wondering what could lead a person to be so disrespectful towards another person simply for holding a different political belief?  Of course, I’m not naïve, I know this goes on all the time… I’ve written about this level of disrespect before… about radio and TV commentators who seem to stir up angry confrontation.  Yet still I wondered, what drives people to such rude behavior.  Then it struck me — these protesters were afraid.

How We Look at Life

Now I recognize that I am about to oversimplify this, but for the sake of brevity and posing the question about our underlying emotion, I want us to consider that there are two general ways that we look out at life and other people.

In the first way, we see ourselves as this distinct individual who has needs to meet.  We look out at the world and see limited resources available to meet those needs.  We see other people who are separate from us and in competition with us for those limited resources.  Therefore we are fearful that if we don’t grab what’s “ours”, others will grab it.  Our basic motivation is fear.

In the second way, we see ourselves as individuals who are part of a greater whole.  Yes, we have needs that need to be met.  But we also see our interconnectedness to other people and recognize they have needs as well.  Our level of care and concern has expanded beyond ourselves.  We want to meet our needs, but not in such a competitive way that we win and others lose.  Our basic motivation is love.

Which way do you look at life?  You may see a little bit of yourself in both descriptions.  Which one is prominent in your thinking?  Which one is important for humanity’s continued survival and further evolution?  I hope you agree that ultimately humanity needs to be acting more out of love.

What Would Love Do?

This is always a good question to ask when faced with a dilemma, so it seems like the proper question to ask as we consider our opinion on the healthcare issue.

We could take all of the pros and all the cons and all our concerns and all our questions about the bill Congress is considering and weigh them all against the question “what would love do?”

As I have considered it, the motivation of love would move us beyond the fear that we would lose while others win.  Love would pull us to finding a solution that allows everyone to have access to affordable health care.  Love would take us outside of any selfish concerns (don’t raise my taxes, don’t mess with my healthcare, my political party needs to win, my opinion needs to prevail, etc.) and move us to solutions that work for everyone.

So as the debate continues and you find yourself discussing healthcare with others, I am suggesting that you stop and ask yourself “how would love respond in this moment?” That is, how can you honor people and their variety of opinions in this moment?  How can you shift the social discourse from negativity and fear towards the direction of what’s best for everyone?  What suggestion can you offer that comes from the heart of love?

In this moment and every moment, the choice is yours: are you choosing fear or are you choosing love?

Mark

PS in case you’re interested, recently I have written a couple of other articles about the healthcare bill.  In one, “Heathcare Deals and Our Greatest Ideals” I expressed my concern over how Congress was making certain deals which I felt were not in our collective best interest in order to get enough votes to pass the bill.  In another, “Killing Time with President Obama” I pointed out, how I felt that the effort made by President Obama to reach across the aisle and move us beyond this overly partisan environment in which we are mired was worth the time and effort even though it caused a delay in the passage of the legislation.

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Categories Culture, Politics, Uniting U.S.

I Love Humanity, Its People That Challenge Me

March 16, 2010 //
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I love you, now move on please...

I love you, now move on please....

 

The other day, I was in a very beautiful place.  I started my day with my usual meditation, got into my writing, felt the flow of oneness moving through my words.  I truly felt connected to Spirit.  Then I went out in “the real world.” 

I got my chocolate lab, Harmony, and I drove over to the library.  After parking and then approaching the entrance, a man came up to me and asked me to sign a petition to get a proposition on our state ballot.  The few words he told me about the initiative let me know immediately I was not in favor of it….really not in favor of it.   I said something to the effect that the initiative was unnecessary and went on in the library.  Then, my mind started racing.  I knew I would have to go out the same door and pass the same man.  Should I engage him in  a political discussion, or simply walk on by? 

He must’ve been having similar thoughts, as I could tell he was looking for me when I left the library.  Mustering up all the heart centered lovingkindness that I could, I listened to his position.  I politely read his ballot initiative.  I asked him one clarifying question which let me know I was adamantly against his political position.  I told him kindly I disagreed, wished him well, and went on my way. 

Back in the car, Harmony got an earful on how I hoped the man’s initiative was unsuccessful.  I could feel the energy of negative emotion within me.  Then I thought, what a contrast!  One minute I’m all blissed out, the next I’m all pissed off. 

I Love the Idea of You 

How easy it is to sit in silence and contemplate oneness.  How easy it is to be alone and feel a sense of love for everyone.  How easy it is to intellectualize valuing all beliefs and worldviews when they’re not in your face.  It’s easy to say we love people, when sometimes I wonder if it’s the idea of people we really love. 

I share this story because I’ve had so many people tell me they have the same experience.  They truly feel a sense of love for all people everywhere, but then get their buttons pushed sometimes when they interact with real live breathing people.  Has this ever happened to you? 

What to Do? 

So what are you going to do about this?  Are you going to avoid people altogether?  Are you going to just make sure you only get around people who think like you do?  Are you going to live, believing one thing (we are all one and deserving of love and respect) and acting another way entirely?  How can we move around in the real world, bumping into people with whom we may have disagreements, and still remain centered in love and oneness? 

Here’s a few quick suggestions… I’d love to hear how you deal with it… 

Prepare yourself before you go out– yes, do your meditation and spiritual practices, but also visualize seeing yourself interacting with people in a loving way.  If necessary, visualize putting on some spiritual armor which deflects negativity….both the perceived negativity coming from outside you….and the real negativity that comes from your judgment and own thoughts.   Anchor yourself in loving energy as you head out for the day….with an intention that nothing will shake you from that spot. 

Practice seeing Spirit everywhere in “training” situations — don’t wait for those emotional moments to arise.  Take moments to practice now in minimal interactive situations when you’re out in public seeing everyone as a spiritual being.  Silently bless people as you walk by them by saying something like “I see and honor your divinity”.   Make this a routine practice.  Then if your button gets pushed, you might stand a better chance of seeing Spirit in the other person. 

Have some tools ready just in case — recognize that you could unexpectedly be in an emotionally charged situation so script some standard ways of potentially responding.  One way is to train yourself that if you feel your emotions rising that you know you will automatically smile and be quiet or some similar strategy.  Excuse yourself from situations and physically move to another location.  The old “count to 10″ could work here too. 

Forgive yourself if you don’t live up to your expectations — no matter how much we try to live from love and kindness, we all get our buttons pushed and we react from time to time.  If it happens to you, forgive yourself….move on….see the gift in the experience….see the other person and the situation as your teacher….and let it go! 

So how do you handle it?  I’d love to hear your thoughts.  The positive evolution of the planet depends upon our standing firm on our personal beliefs, while honoring and respecting the beliefs of others.  This must be our practice.  We have to walk this talk.  I know I try.  And, as this story illustrates, sometimes I don’t succeed.  But I now see the gift the person gave me, the learning that occured, my personal evolution moved another step forward. 

By the way, after a left the library, I went to Whole Foods and ate lunch.  I had to laugh when I realized that I had to regroup at someplace where I knew people would think like me.  It’s time to get back out in the real world again….this time a little wiser! 

Blessings. 

Mark

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Categories Bridge Building, Consciousness, Positive Evolution

Seven Simple Ways to Bring Love and Kindness into the World

February 24, 2010 //
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Bring Love Everywhere You Go!

Here are seven simple ways you can be the change you want to see in the world.  Seek to practice as many of these as you can each day.  You will be making a difference in your life and the planet.

1   Make Eye Contact

It’s so easy to get locked in our own internal world that we forget that we are walking among fellow spiritual beings.  Look up.  See the other person.  Look in their eyes.  Don’t get discouraged if they look away.  Keep looking, you will connect with many beautiful souls.  Affirm: today I look in the eyes of everyone I see.

2   Smile

Now that you’re looking at people, smile.  Think of all the expressions you’ve ever seen in other people’s faces.  What would you rather see?  Give the smile you want to receive.  Affirm: today, I smile at everyone.

3  Be Consciously Polite

Look for ways to display good manners.  Say please and thank you.  Hold doors.  Let people in to your lane on the highway.  Affirm: today, I am consciously polite in every possible situation.

4  Listen

There is no greater gift we can give to a person than to listen when they are speaking. When someone speaks to you, give them your undivided attention.  If you were doing something else, let go of it for a moment.  Focus on what they’re saying, not on what you were doing previously or what you’re going to say in response. Affirm: today, I listen deeply to every person who speaks to me.

5  Give Your Energy to Goodness

Recognize that whatever you give your attention and focus to grows in your life.  When those around you are being negative, be polite, but don’t buy in to their negativity.  Avoid rumors, talking about others negatively behind their back, and the like.  Turn off negative media.  On the other hand, consciously look for positive actions and positive statements out in the world and reinforce it.  When someone exhibits kindness or makes a positive comment, acknowledge it.  Seek out affirmative media.  Affirm: today, I see and give my energy to goodness in the world.

6  Take the Other’s Perspective

Let go of the need to be right and to change other people’s minds.  Hold healthy boundaries for yourself and your beliefs, but look for ways to understand how others think and why they think that way.  When someone states an opinion or exhibits a behavior with which you disagree, try to imagine how and why that could be their choice in that moment.  Briefly visualize how their life might have led them to having that worldview or opinion.  With that in mind, hold compassion for them.  You don’t have to agree with them, condone their behavior, or change their mind.  Affirm: today, I seek to understand those who believe differently.

7  Bring Acts of Love, and Kindness into the World

Consciously and deliberately look for ways to instigate loving mischief all around you.  Freely give compliments.  Pay for other people’s meals.  Notice ways others are being kind in the world and copy it.  Be the love you want to see in the world.  Set an intention every day to perform a certain number of kind acts each day and then keep increasing it.  Pass along positive e-mails such as this one.  Affirm: today, I bring acts of love and kindness everywhere I go.

What additional ways can you think of to bring love and kindness into the world?  Add your thoughts to this note and pass it on to your friends now.  Feel free to give me your ideas as well.

Namaste.

Mark

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Categories Bridge Building, Change Agent, Consciousness, Culture

Where is “love” in Wilber’s Integral Theory?

February 17, 2010 //
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Love Shines its Light in All

So, where is “love” in Ken Wilber’s AQAL model which we have been exploring the past 2 days?  On our first day (What the Heck is Integral Theory and Why Should I Care?) we looked at why I find it interesting and how it can be useful to our intentions for the highest future.  Yesterday (Integral Theory Made Simple) we looked at the nuts and bolts of the AQAL model.  Today we move beyond the intellectual aspect of integral (the ”head”) and down into the “heart”. 

This question swirled around in my mind after a recent meeting I attended. On that evening, a gentleman was giving an overview of Ken Wilber’s work and his AQAL model. In addition, he and an assistant were also attempting to cover Spiral Dynamics as a part of the presentation. Knowing a bit about both subjects and having taught them both, I listened not only to the content but the manner of their presentation to see if I could glean a new way of describing things. I also thought about each of the questions from the audience and considered  how I would respond.  Generally, I was fairly pleased with my internal answers.

It was the question on “love” in today’s title that stopped me dead in my tracks. The answer given by the instructors seemed somewhat incomplete or unclear. As for myself, although some general thoughts came to mind, I realized I was going to have to think more on the issue. So, without checking in with Wilber’s writings to see what he says, I gave it some thought and here is where I am at the moment: 

As most religions and mystics have claimed, God is love. What is love, though? Although I am sure there are lots of writings out there to define it (including a couple of my own that have discussed love in recent weeks!), I would at this moment say that love is some feeling that comes from within us that seems to percolate out of our essence and in our awareness is directed out beyond us. This feeling can seem to overwhelm us at times. It moves us to sense of connectedness for which there are no words which even seem to adequately describe what we are feeling. We do know that the feeling is positive and something within us calls us to experience it more and more. 

This feeling’s outward direction tends to lead us into focusing on certain specific things in our environment to which we attach the feeling. In early life, our feeling of love is directed to our parents and caretakers, our family, our pets, those things in our immediate environment. Later in life, we “fall in love” with one or more significant others who we hope will walk through life with us. Still later, many have children who become the objects of their love. Although most of us keep this attachment of the feeling of love to others in our lives, at some point we also expand beyond those in our lives to a broader sense of love. Yes, the description here obviously relates to the movement through the moral stages of development…..from egocentric to ethnocentric to worldcentric and beyond…but we are also talking about a sense of love that begins to transcend people and be less specifically directed. We begin to love our experiences, our life, our sense of something transcendent, and recognizing that everything out there that we are “loving” is also a part of inside us, we begin to love ourselves as a part of that Oneness.

Ultimately, we begin to realize that love is a gift from Spirit. The ability to experience love was placed within everyone of us. We were given the free will to choose in this life how to use and express this gift. We can express it in only a limited manner if we choose, although generally such choices are not totally “conscious” ones. Such limited uses may have us not express love or only express it with a few people. We may never reach a sense of feeling love for the world and everyone in it. We may never sense a love of Spirit. We may never love ourselves. However, the possibility is always there. 

What is the ultimate purpose of this gift? In a sense it relates to the old story about Spirit looking for a place to hide our Truth or Essence and then after giving up on placing it anywhere in the world “out there” ends up hiding our Essence within us. Love then becomes the “clue” Spirit gives us to guide us where to look. Love feels good and grabs our attention. We want more of it. We follow its path. It takes us to other people and things and events and ultimately to Life, to Spirit, and back to where Spirit was hiding all along, within us.

But what really is Spirit? Wilber tells us that the term along with “spiritual” can have up to six different meanings: (1) God, consciousness, ground of all being. (2) The conscious energy of life such as prana, qi, Holy Spirit, etc. (3) The higher levels of development in every line where we experience some transpersonal sense that we might label “spiritual”. (4) A specific “spiritual” intelligence line of development through which we grow. (5) Peak numinous experiences or states of consciousness that can be called “spiritual”. (6) Finally, “Spiritual” can refer to a special attitude involving love or compassion or wisdom. 

So where is love in AQAL? 

Love is part of this special attitude that we label spiritual. And again, God is love. At the highest level of development in each line or intelligence, we experience God. Therefore, God or Spirit is in everything. in all quadrants, lines, levels, types, and states. Hence, love is in all aspects of the AQAL model. 

Love is an evolutionary spiritual force. Love is the feeling that guides us and moves us towards our knowing of Spirit.

Blessings.

Mark

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Categories Consciousness, Science and Spirit

The Love Connection

February 13, 2010 //
1
Love Binds All

Love Binds All

Let’s get ready for Valentine’s Day by talking love today. Imagine for a moment how love shows up in your life. Bring into your awareness a situation when you feel the emotion of love come forth from within. Got it? Most of us probably picture a person whom we love…or a pet…or perhaps, an overwhelming moment in nature. Whatever it is, notice that most likely there is something external which draws you towards it.

Recently we discussed how love is an evolutionary force whose power works to draw us out from the sense of being separate and apart from the rest of life (see “What is Love, Why is Love“) and to move us into a sense of unity, returning us back to that Oneness from which we came. So that feeling of love you imagined is an evolutionary force that’s embedded in everything.

Everything? We know what it’s like to feel this love force as a human being. And, we often project how animals feel this love force. I know my dog Harmony loves me and I imagine that what she feels for me is the same emotional sense that I feel for her. Many people, such as my wife Mary, can sense the love force coming forth from plants. But what about other things? Do rocks sense love? Do other inanimate objects have the ability to sense the love force?

So here’s an experiment I would like you to try today. I want you to shift in your awareness what you consider love. Instead of simply being that emotion you feel, for today consider it both that emotion and any force that draws two or more things together and binds them.

So as we look around, everything we see is made up of atoms which are subatomic particles bound together… and then molecules which are atoms bound together… and then cells which are molecules bound together… and then organisms which are cells bound together… and on up the chain to more and more complex organisms such as humans whose bodies are the binding together of organs, tissue, fluids, and more all working together. Philosopher Ken Wilber refers to each of the levels in this chain as a holon… something that is whole and complete within itself but made up of smaller parts that are whole and complete within themselves… and is also a part of a greater whole something above it. Hence, humans are holons… we are whole and complete within ourselves… we are made up of smaller parts that are whole and complete within themselves… and above us we help make up some greater holon. The force that binds these holons together is the love force.

So in your experiment, I’d like you consider that the force you sense that holds things together is the force of love. Love is holding together your computer, your desk, yourself. But let’s also look for those other situations when two or more things are drawn together.

In the morning when I sit down with my coffee, Harmony comes up and nuzzles me and licks me. That’s the love force. When Mary comes home from work, I greet her with a hug and a kiss. That’s the love force. When my heart is open when I’m holding one of my grandchildren, that’s the love force too. When I’m in nature and feel the sense of connectedness, it’s love binding me to the world out there.

These may seem obvious… but throughout our day we experience things binding together and don’t even realize it. Whenever we learn and make a connection in our awareness, that binding together of multiple concepts and ideas allows us to see with greater clarity how things are interconnected. These can be those great a-ha moments that open us to great wisdom about life or they can be those more mundane moments as we discover how to navigate through physical life. Whether you realize it or not, learning how to use your new cell phone or how to wire a ceiling fan both serve to connect you and bind you to a greater whole. It is the love force at work connecting you. The more we look for love, the more love we see.

All of this love is serving to bind us to each other and to everything. All of this love is serving for us to know and to experience Oneness. The ultimate holon is Spirit containing all of the smaller holons bound in love.

Teilhard de Chardin put it this way, in his book The Phenomenon of Man: “Cosmic energy is love, the affinity of being with being. It is a universal property of all life, and embraces all forms of organized matter. Thus, the tendency to unite; the attraction of atom to atom, molecule to molecule, or cell to cell. The forces of love, drive the fragments of the universe to seek each other so that the world may come into being.”

So let’s get ready for Valentine’s Day by seeing love everywhere we look.

Blessings.

Mark

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Categories Consciousness, Positive Evolution

Let Go of the Need to be “Right”

February 12, 2010 //
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Your choice--to be right or kind?

Have you ever received one of those e-mails where you could feel your emotions rising in response to the note and then you said to yourself “that’s just not right, I’ve got to set them straight.” Your emotion might even rise in proportion to the number of recipients on the e-mail. The more people who received the misperceptions and misstatements by the author of the original note will generally lead to a greater desire in your mind to “reply to all” so everyone knows ” the truth.” So with this emotional reaction brewing in the background, you set out typing your note to prove your point.

For those of you who use e-mail to communicate a lot, you’ve probably been here. You have probably even hit the send button a few times. If you have, then like me, you’ve experienced that this often leads to disagreements, hurt feelings, and a lot of time trying to smooth things over. Working in management for many years, I’ve had to step into and help resolve quite a few staff disputes that could’ve been avoided if only the send button had not been hit.

Here’s some quick advice if you ever find yourself in the situation… don’t reply right away…. Sit on it for at least a day if you can… if you need to type your thoughts out to process your feelings, save the note in a draft and don’t send it… hopefully after the emotions subside and you get a little time and distance from the original note, you will realize that sending an emotionally charged “reply to all” note would not be the best course of action…. If you still feel any emotion around the issue coupled with a continued need to reply, then I suggest you talk to the person rather than use e-mail. Best of all is when you can see the situation in a new light and let go of the need to be right.

I had this situation come up recently… the specifics are unimportant… other than I could recognize that behind the words of the other person was a desire in their mind to be right… it was one of those backhanded compliments where they should have stopped with the complement, but felt compelled to add a few extra words which unfortunately only served to undermine the complement. I immediately felt an emotional reaction and begin typing a reply. Over the next few minutes, my reply melted from a caustic “reply to all” missile to a slightly less negative reply back only to the author to my ultimate action of canceling the note altogether. I came to see that setting this other person right was truly unimportant.

Why the change? In the back of my mind I kept hearing Wayne Dyer’s quote “when given the choice between being right and being kind, always choose being kind.” The more I could step back and witness the unfolding of these events, the more I realized that in the big scheme of things my “correcting” this other person was more about me than it was about them. It usually is.

We all battle these moments when we feel the internal desire to prove that we right and someone else is wrong. Most often this occurs in conversations. It’s harder to take a timeout when you’re talking with someone face-to-face than it is in e-mail communications. Yet it is truly helpful to recognize when any emotional reactions may be arising and to pause before replying. Try seeing if there is something inside you saying you need to “defend yourself” and “prove you are right.” If you can build a slight gap in these moments, then you stand a better chance of choosing a kind reply rather than reacting emotionally. Ultimately you may even build the skill of being able to let go of the attachment to be right in those moments.

I can hear some of you right now saying “but I am right and they are wrong, and I need to correct them.” Maybe. Sometimes. It’s been my experience that more often than not our desire to be right at the expense of another is motivated by factors such as low self-esteem. What are we afraid of if we simply let the issue go? Are we concerned about the judgments of others? Are we concerned about our judgment of ourselves? Why? What’s the worst thing that could happen if you simply let it go? These are questions worth pondering. I know it’s scary that you might discover some hidden aspect of yourself that might need healing.

To be clear, I’m not saying you need to give in on every conflict, nor to not have healthy boundaries. There are times when we do need to stand up for our position. I’m simply asking you to stop and weigh your motives. What is the real intention in your reply? In the big picture of life, how important is it in this situation to be right?

The more energy we give to conflicts, the more conflicts grow in our life. The more energy we give to love and kindness, the more love and kindness we grow in our life. Every day, each of us have a choice in our sphere of influence to decide if we want to bring more conflict or more love, to be right at the expense of another or to be kind. Every day in these choices whether we realize it or not, we are contributing to the future of the planet. When we choose love and kindness in our lives, we are growing love and kindness on the planet.

Peace.

Mark

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Categories Bridge Building, Consciousness, Positive Evolution

What is love? Why is love?

February 5, 2010 //
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Harmony

So much has been written about love, not to mention sung about it, we could launch into a book just trying to answer these questions. But no worries, no book here today, just a few brief paragraphs floating between the head and the heart to offer my thoughts on the topic.

So what is love? Love is one of those topics that you can point at with your words but your words are not “it”. You have to feel it. We’ve all felt it. There is this welling up inside you where you have an overwhelming sense of emotion that comes from some indescribable place (both from within you and outside of you) and fills your being with a sense of care, concern, compassion, and connectedness to something or someone beyond “you”. Just take a moment, and recall a situation in your life when you had an overwhelming sense of love. Step into that feeling for a moment…did my words come close “to pointing at” the feeling but not quite capture it?

I know for me there are those gentle, tender moments where my heart is open and there is this general sense of love for everything and everyone. And then I also have those moments where there is a specific external something that is the focus of an overwhelming outpouring of emotional love. I can still recall the overpowering sense of love that filled my very being when my children and grandchildren were born. I know that my beautiful chocolate lab, Harmony (pictured here), can invoke so easily this strong emotional response, just by her very being. This sense of love can come up at any time and any place. I know there are moments in nature where something such as a beautiful sunrise can touch me so deeply that it ignites a fire of generalized love of life in that moment. Even last night watching a television commercial for a jewelry store wherein a man was asking his girlfriend to marry him, this emotion of love was called forth at such a level within me that I had to go in the other room and hug my wife. Again, all I can do is describe the moments, I know that you truly have to feel it to know it. I know you do feel it.

So why is love? Evolutionary scientists tell us that love is an emergent property that came forth in the evolution of species, where their young were born not fully mature. The emergence of love was simply an adaptation that was favorable to such species that were growing larger and more complex. Those who developed a powerful emotional attachment to their young, took better care of them, thus allowing more of them to grow to maturity, reproduce, and pass on more of their genes. And, love served an evolutionary purpose in binding together a male and a female for long periods of time. Such love, kept them together to raise their vulnerable young, again increasing the odds of their babies reaching maturity to reproduce.

I believe that these scientists are correct in that love is an evolutionary force. However, I think they only have part of the story. Yes, the emergence of love, may have served to connect us to our young as well as our mates and served to further the propagation of the species. But then the question arises, how did this emotional feeling of love get so defused that our hearts are opened by so many people, so many things, so many moments? So much of my sense of love has no connection to my mate and babies. Materialistic scientist may explain this away as some type of emotional displacement, but I think they’re missing the mark.

The powerful feeling of love is continuing to serve the further evolution of humanity. Love is a powerful evolutionary force that calls us to feel a sense of connectedness to something beyond us. It may have started with our mates and children, but it continues to connect us to larger and larger circles outside us. Our minds and thoughts convince us that we are little pockets of consciousness walking around, independent of everyone and everything. The emotion of love calls us to remember the truth that we are connected to everyone and everything. Our heads may try to tell us we are separate, our hearts tell us we are one.

We are at a critical point in the evolution of humanity. We are shifting from seeing ourselves as separate from each other and moving into a new awareness that understands our uniqueness and how that uniqueness feeds and nourishes the whole. Much like how in our evolutionary past our cells differentiated themselves into performing unique functions while supporting in the growth and evolution of our whole body, we are shifting in our understanding of how our individual consciousness supports the growth and evolution of our collective consciousness of the one humanity.

As mystic Ernest Holmes put it, ” Evolution is the awakening of the soul to a recognition of its unity with the Whole” and frequently reminded us that “love points the way”. French philosopher, Jesuit priest and paleontologist Teilhard de Chardin put it this way, “Love is a sacred reserve of energy; it is like the blood of spiritual evolution.”

So today, let’s cultivate that sense of love within all aspects of our life….let us set an intention to call love forth in all we do…and when we feel the love coming forth through us, let us acknowledge it and revel in it and infuse it with all the energy of our being. Let us see it igniting within us a sense of care and concern for all. As de Chardin counseled us, “Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire.”

Mark

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Categories Consciousness, Positive Evolution, Spirituality
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