Getting involved and making a difference.

If you want to make a shift in consciousness, you can do it simply by working on shifting from within. If you want to change the world, you can do it by changing your own world living in love and integrity within your own sphere of personal relationships.

If you want to get involved in a direct way in your community then start there: in your community. You can begin at your children’s school, or get involved with a local volunteer group, or get involved with local politics. You can also get involved with politics on a larger scale through the internet, writing letters to the editor of your local newspaper, signing or beginning petitions, emailing, writing letters, or telephoning your local and state representatives, or start your own campaign and run for office.

There are many ways to get involved now that there are so many connections through the internet, but I implore you, if you decide you want to get directly involved, above anything, please get yourself informed and educated about our system of government. History, ethics, and economics are also good areas in which to hone your skills and develop your knowledge. Most importantly though is to have your facts straight.

We have enough attractive charismatic celebrities in our culture mucking things up, what we really need are those who have a sincere desire to contribute in meaningful ways. As I stated, this can be accomplished simply by attending to your own consciousness and your own personal relationships. It really does all begin with a single individual.

But there are plenty of areas you can get yourself informed with all of the technology we have and research material available at the stroke of the key or the click of the mouse. Be discerning in your quest to do your research; there are fact checking sites like Snopes.com and factcheck.org that are impartial sites that offer up the facts and dispel myths.

One group that has sprung up, calling themselves The Coffee Party, I have been following with interest. I’m not directly associated with them, though I have joined their Facebook group and I am following their activity, so far I am impressed that they are at least committed to being civil in their discourse and they are committed to informing and educating themselves. This I think is a great start and quite refreshing.

I have been following the political landscape over the past couple of years with keen interest because I felt I was seeing an energy in the people of this country signaling that we are ready for change and ready to do what it takes to create a greater shift than we have seen for a long time. I’m not sure how true this is but I am willing to share here my observations and what I have gleaned from my research just in case.

On Monday, I am going to share some differing philosophies.

365 Lessons-Lesson 102: Live your Life with the Purpose of Doing Good for Yourself and Others

The more you focus on helping others, the more you will succeed in reaching your own goals. Helping others is the most direct and effective way to reach your goals in your personal relationships, at work, and in your community. There is no better or more rewarding purpose you can find each day, and no more practical tool for getting where you want to go.
-Peter S. Temes

My husband likes to get movies and books from the library. They are free, so why not? He rides his bike down to a branch of the Seattle Public Library near our house and loads up. The other day he brought home the book The Power of Purpose: Living Well by Doing Good by Peter S. Temes.

I haven't read the entire book, but it's one of those books you can pick up and flip to a particular chapter of interest and get so much out of it. In the preface, the writer talks about landing a job at Harvard University as a junior professor. He was so happy to be working there. The prestige of it all! But his salary as a junior professor at the time barely covered what was needed for his family.

He started thinking about all the things he wouldn't get to do with his daughters. It was hard to make ends meet. He decided to give up his prestigious title and do business consulting. He set a goal to make one million dollars in three years. This may seem a bit lofty to most people, but he was determined. He put all his business skills to use and started consulting businesses like Goldman Sachs, Citicorp and Ernest and Young.

Within three years, he had well over a million dollars, just like he said he would. He then put his next plan into action. He got rid of all his clients.

Now you might be saying, "What?" or "Why did he do that?"

Because all along he only wanted to make money for two reasons: to help his family and to help other people.

He devoted the rest of his time to teaching, writing and nonprofit work.

I'm am amazed by this book. It agrees so much with what I have always thought. That we are all connected and when we help each other, we help ourselves. Of course, if we are not good ourselves, it will be very difficult to help others.

First we have to make ourselves very strong. We have to devote all our time to building up a healthy body, mind and spirit. Once we are strong, there is no end to what we can do for this world.

Step by step, if you are committed to first taking care of yourself, you will eventually build up enough strength to expand the energy you have outward.

If you find yourself right now in an unhealthy situation, what are the steps you can take to make yourself strong? They don't have to be big steps, just steps. It's helpful if you can make these steps each day.

If you understand that by making yourself happy and healthy, others will see this and see a change in you and will want to be good too. You are setting a great example for others. Just by helping yourself, you are helping all those around you.

Once you are strong enough and you feel happy where you are in your body, mind, spirit, work and relationships, you can start by generating this energy outward to all those around you. You will start to find opportunities to help others without even looking for them. If your reasons behind your goals are to help yourself and help others in a positive way, than you will be successful.

Just this very thought is success in itself. You are well on your way!!!!

Mystery Island

Somehow, in the middle of this wide, landlocked plain, we have made our way to a tropical island.
An Italian volunteer named David is visiting the Thai village where I teach English, and he has come with Pen, Kanjana and I in search of this strange little island. I’m on the back of Pen’s motorcycle and David is riding with Kanjana. We’re tearing along back roads, surrounded by acres of rice paddies. We’re like ants struggling to cross vast, green tracts of earth. Pen and Kanjana have both been trying to explain the significance of the island to me, and I am struggling to understand their Issan-laced Thai as they shout over the sound of motorcycle engines and wind. David, meanwhile, is shouting to me in his Italian-accented English. I’m shouting back to him, in American-accented English, passing along whatever spotty information I can glean about this elusive island we are racing toward.
Kanjana and Pen shout a mile a minute over the wind and flood me with tantalizing, incomprehensible details about the mysterious island. David says to me, “What did they say?”
I reply thoughtfully: “I have no idea. Something about an island.”
Pen steers her motorcycle off the road and we putt-putt to a stop. Ahead of us is a small wooden bridge, which we’ll cross on foot. And I see that all that they have been shouting about is true: In the midst of this barren plain sits an oasis, floating like a dream. We dismount the motorcycles at the edge of a serene green lake. In the middle of the lake is tethered a compact little island, every square inch of it bristling with towering palm trees. The palm trees that cloak the island are unique, Pen and Kanjana explain. They grow only here, on this small island, in the middle of this desert, in the middle of nowhere.
“This is the only place these trees can be found,” Pen insists. “They won’t grow anywhere else. They have tried to transplant them elsewhere, but they failed.”
The impossibly tall trees look thick and ancient and strange, nothing like the youthful, slender coconut trees I am used to seeing scattered gracefully across the rice paddies. What they are trying to tell me, I realize, is that this island is a mystery. These trees are a miracle. Why does this thicket of trees grow only here and nowhere else on earth? Of course, I have no way of verifying the fact that the trees grow nowhere else. It seems a little suspect, but I cheerfully agree with them and enter the realm of the mystical.We leave the motorcycles in the parking lot. We cross the footbridge whose handrails on both sides, I notice, are a long, unfurled serpent complete with scales. But serpent handrails are not an uncommon sight in Thailand when leading to temples. The naga (which I believe was a 7-headed cobra) is widely revered for sheltering the Buddha while he meditated on his way to enlightenment.
Pen lowers her voice and passes on another mysterious bit: A story about a Thai man who was hired to show outdoor movies on the island all night long. The crowd who gathered to watch the movie was silent and odd. The man showing the movies had to be out by 4 a.m., he was warned, or he might never leave the island. When the man went to leave the island, he had trouble finding his way out. He eventually made it off the island, and the strangely silent movie fans, he learned afterward, were ghosts. I’ve heard many American versions of the encounter with the stranger who turns out to be a ghost, but I like this Thai twist on it.
We step onto the island and instantly sink into hushed, dense forest. The light above us filters weakly down. A Buddhist monk slips silently past us, and Pen, the lone Buddhist among us Christians, leads us reverently along a twisting path deep into the trees. At the heart of the island pulses a silent spring. Here is the heart of the mystery. The four of us lean over the deep, green pool and peer in. The water is murky, and the well is, perhaps, bottomless. I can’t be sure, but I am looking for the giant snake that dwells therein. In Buddhism, of course, snakes don’t have the sullied reputation that they have in Christianity. In fact, they often represent the sacred. A giant, sacred snake dwells in this pool, and there is a whole, elaborate story about how it got here. Pen is unraveling the tale and I’m struggling desperately to understand her Thai. I hate the way the details escape me. Who knows what I’m missing?
But I understand this much: This is why the miraculous trees thrive in this arid plain. And this is why the water in this well contains curative powers. Because of the special, sacred snake coiled down below. Pen leans forward and cups some of the water in her hands. She drinks it deeply, and anoints her own head as well. She urges us to do the same. But I can’t help it: I’m not afraid of the snake—I’m afraid of the murky water. Pen’s immune system is up to the challenge of local water, but mine is not. Maybe the waters really are mystical. But I am not Buddhist or even Thai. So will these opaque waters heal me or afflict me? One part of me is intrigued by this spooky spring, and the strange story, and the unsettling possibilities that this whispering island contains. But I am also feeling intensely practical, so I decline to drink.
Long after leaving the tiny island and the village, I learn (or confirm) the details. We had visited Wat Kham Chanot วัดคำชะโนด. It’s considered an “entrance to the water world”, or maybe the underworld--the dwelling place of a sacred serpent. The monks inhabiting the island are devoted to revering the special serpent, and the locals do indeed consider the area sacred. My memory of that day is that almost no one else was around except a stray monk or two. The flat rice paddies surrounding the island were also empty. There was indeed something otherworldly in the air, although maybe the moody atmosphere was due to the dense forest and deep well.
Some say the serpent has a “hiding place” on the island. On that day, Pen and Kanjana clearly believed the snake was hiding at the bottom of the well. Or was the well the entrance to the underworld? No matter—I comprehended their Thai well enough to get the picture, and the eerie locale is still with me to this day. This post also appears on my blog Strange Islands.

Almost there!

Social media, as I've written about quite a lot lately, is an incredible tool to connect with people around the globe. Occasionally, we get really lucky and connect with someone via social media that happens to be in your own home town. This very thing happened to me a couple of months ago, with me connecting with a new girlfriend. We discovered many fun little details and experiences in common and chatted here and there via Facebook for many weeks before we got around to talking on the phone. Once that occurred, it was that happy spontaneous combustion where both hearts recognize one another and friendship is remembered in a blaze of excitement, common interests and resonating energy.


Fast forward to a recent networking event that was being held at a downtown Knoxville location and we were afforded the opportunity to drive to this event together. It was during the last few weeks of the truly vicious winter the whole country was dealing with and I have a bad habit of not using a proper winter coat when I really should. When we left the event late that evening, of course it was dark and the temperature had dropped considerably. As is common in most downtown areas, the higher buildings create a wind tunnel effect that whips the cold air into a rapier sharp weapon that steals your breath and stiffens your legs to the point that you can barely bend your knees as you hurry along.

That night, this new friendship was solidified by just such a sharp, winter wind. We were leaving the restaurant we had chosen for dinner after the networking event, and as we walked across Market Square in Knoxville, the wind tore down and slapped into us with enough force to make us both stagger. The primary objective was to get through the Square and behind some high enough building that might block the wind long enough for us to reach the parking garage. The photo to the left is of Market Square in the snow.

Me being my southern belle type of self, rather than swearing as viciously as the merciless wind deserved, I was breathlessly uttering my own litany and version of profanity. "Oh my word above!" "Holy conniptions!" "Sweet merciful petunias!" My girlfriend was laughing breathlessly at the novel form of swearing, informing me what an absolute rebel I was. We continued to hurry along, leaving the Square behind, but unfortunately we stepped into an even more brutal wind tunnel effect as we got close to the parking garage.

My girlfriend rushed ahead of me, exclaiming all the way, "Almost there, Dawn! Almost there!" This dissolved me into helpless giggles, as we were nowhere near "almost there" by any stretch of the imagination. Yet she kept declaring this positive statement as she bustled forward, continuing to spark absolute hilarity in her wake. The wind was tossing her winter scarf over her shoulder to dance and fly up in the air, entertaining me even more. This resulting laughter had the typical effect of making my knees weak and me even more breathless. "Almost there, Dawn!" kept trailing behind her, the cheerful words being snatched gleefully by the whipping winds as she outdistanced me, unhampered by helpless laughter as I was.

In that moment of absolute absurdity, my mind split in two, as it often does, and recognized the sheer power of her statement. "Almost there!" Yes, we were approaching the parking garage with varying degrees of success, one of us leading the charge, uttering encouragement and determination, the other straggling behind, giggling and stumbling, yet equally determined and enjoying the journey in a slightly different manner. It struck me that this moment of silliness and laughter between two girlfriends was a beautiful analogy. We are all always on the verge of becoming. Always on the verge of discovering. Always on the verge of achieving. Always on the verge of blossoming, lifting our faces to the warm sun. Always on the verge of breaking through. Always on the verge of conquering. Always doing all of the above in our own individual, unique fashion.

Today, several weeks later, our friendship has become so solid that we both have to work at remembering when we didn't know one another. This is often one of the most precious side benefits of friendship, that the heart realizes and remembers that we have done this many times before, and the love is simply a continuation in this moment, this place, this time. Now we constantly throw out "almost there!" in relation to practically everything we're discussing or experiencing together, because it is always apropo. It always applies to every single moment. And on a purely mundane note, it makes us both laugh. To me, that is particularly beautiful.

Life is a series of cycles. Beginnings and endings. Lessons learned, lessons begun anew. Experiences achieved, and new dreams explored. Personally, being in constant pursuit of that next hilltop, that next new vista, that next achievement is what drives me. It is a personal joy of mine to constantly be growing and changing, learning, discovering and evolving. The beauty of this process is that "almost there" is the irresistible lure that beckons me forward.

Sharing this experience with this new, yet old friend is the cherry on top of the whipped cream on top of the sundae. Even better, this same premise applies to many of the friends I have reconnected with via social media. Despite the fact that many of them are in far flung geographical locations from my own home, I have a deep inner knowing that I will see many of them face to face. I have no idea how this will manifest and am not concerned with the actual mechanics of it all; I simply have that inner certainty that it will occur. And once again, I am able to smile and throw in a cheerful "almost there!" declaration and enjoy how the entertwining threads create more unique fabric between friends of the heart who will eventually lay eyes on one another for the first time.

That hopeful stage of becoming is constantly changing, adapting and adjusting when necessary, and most importantly, continually inspiring each of us to reach for more. Simply....more. That human desire to expand our minds, and more importantly, our hearts and our Spirit. Journeying forward, sometimes together, other times apart, connecting again at seemingly random moments that are actually an intricate orchestration. Experiencing. Becoming. On the verge. Almost there!
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If you enjoyed this post and would like to read more, you can find me at Healing Morning blog.

Survival

The wind whistled mercilessly as the bitter snow pelted into my face. Darkness engulfed my soul as I trudged onwards, every step more painful than the last. Only the one remaining ghost of an idea was keeping me going as my legs screamed in relentless agony. My heart pumped, forcing oxygen laden blood around my body. My head pounded in resonance with the drums of my heart, and my teeth chattered to the same tune as the freezing cold chill forced its way into my lungs and burned like fire.

How had things come to this? Why had my life taken this turn?

I had no idea.

I bellowed in desperation for relief, but no relief would come. We had to keep moving, too much depended upon it, lives would change and lives matter.Everything that I had learned over the years in the military was being tested to its limits. All that experience, all that knowledge, I needed it all right now. My survival depended on it.

I concentrated my mind back to the promise. It was only a flicker of an idea now, a ghost, but that tiniest glimmer of hope was all I had left and I needed it badly. I needed that dream now more than I’d ever needed anything – without it I would crumble, and I knew it.

One last time I shouted the dream out, it needed to be heard to make it real. If the dream had remained in my head it could have been lost forever so I shouted it out loud.

Jo turned back to me and sighed, “Ok yes, just this last shop and maybe Clarks on the high street, because they might have different shoes to the Clarks in the mall, and then we will stop and have some lunch!”

We had been shoe shopping for three hours.

Three long hours.

Three endless, repetitive, senseless decade long hours.

I’d long since lost count of how many shops we had been in, how many identical rows of shoes we had seen, Imelda Marcos would have given up and gone home an hour ago. How could we have been in so many places and seen so many shoes without one single purchase? This just cannot be natural can it?

I lowered my head; the dream of a quick rest in KFC was back, and it was no longer a ghost. It was real; this was going to happen soon, Jo had promised. Two, three maybe four more shops maximum and we would be able to have lunch. I forced my legs into action and ducked my chin into my coat to battle the cold. I could do this, I really could.

Finally, the perfect shoes were found!

On the way to the KFC, and carrying her prized treasure, which looked exactly the same as the pair of shoes that she had tried on in 6 different shops including the first, Jo casually mentioned that she could do with a hand bag to go with the shoes...


Glen Staples
Also posted on my blog – Glen’s Life

Things I Miss Most

Image by jamelah via Flickr

Things I Miss Most

Together with old age comes forgetfulness, people say. But I find myself invaded with memories - from my childhood and adolescence. I think we are more attentive to our surroundings when we are younger, we relate differently to places and people. I am glad I have so many precious memories and I'll do my best to imortalize them somehow. For now, I am writing "list poems" with all the things I had in life but I lost. It can be painful to remeber, but it is a meagre price to pay if you don't want to forget...

Things I miss most - I

I miss the passage between seasons,
spring creeping under winter's snow
snowdrops and crocuses
daffodils,
lily of the valley and frangrant lilac
then
the warm air
mellowing forward summer
walking into the woods
earthen, divine smells
moss and fresh leaves
a million insects buzzing
drunk on the perfumed grass
the icy water of the brook bubling
the changing colors of autumn
orange and red and soft brown
fading into the grey sky of winter
fat clouds full of snowflakes
falling on faces
frozen tears melting

But most of all
I miss the feeling of home
of familiar things
of known places

the peal of church bells
rippling the air
Easter and Christmas
full of laughter
families around dinner tables
ladden with food and crokery
that was handed down from mother to daughter

so many memories kept in tight sealed boxes
invading and painful
beloved things I miss most.

My name is Kaye, and I eat Tim Tams at midnight

In the darkness of the closed door and drawn blinds, my face glows in the warmth of the monitor. Its sweet touch tickles my chin, my nose, and my brow before sparkling off my eyes. It’s still late (although maybe now it’s early) and I’m still typing. Finally.

Ive been dying to write now for weeks. But every day the monitor growls at me and falls back to sleep – unenthused with what I offer to the mercy of the keyboard. Its not enough. Once upon a time I toyed with being a ‘writer’. I entertained the notion that I could write always, effortlessly, and continually and maybe, just maybe, make ‘a living’ from my pursuit. But perhaps I was guilty of dividing my attention elsewhere, second-guessing any talent (see what I did there?), and jumping on the merry-perfectionist bandwagon driven by dear old friend, Procrastination. Whichever way, Ive got plenty of excuses lined up as to why Monitor and I do not cooperate more often than we do. Oh but when we do its glorious! But mostly we are a bickering belligerent old couple. And I begin to resign myself to the fact that I can never create nor direct my desire to write… it happens when it happens. And that’s why my title generally reads, ‘Design student slash professional slash model’, more often than ‘Writer’.

I recently visited a life coach. That should sound empowering, but in my control freak/highly self-sufficient mind, to say that aloud is like standing up in a room of equally bedraggled and ashamed faces to say, “I ate an entire box of Tim Tams last night at 1am while everyone else slept”. Everyone has been there, but no-one wants to be brutally honest with a stranger. So as you can imagine, its a little confronting to say the least. Oh don’t get me wrong, aside from the nauseating anxiety thrashing around in the pit of my stomach, my coach is very good(!). But I had much difficulty trying to articulate in words and on paper what my ideal/dream life could have in it. Quite clearly the only thing I knew for certain when he asked me what I would attempt if I knew that everything I did would be enough and perfect was, “Something else”. But I don’t think I even told him that. I thought about how much I tried to squeeze into my life every day and thought, do I really have to write? It takes up so much of time, it doesn’t achieve anything, there are no rewards, benefits, goals or recognition (not by my measuring stick anyway). Had I made a mistake entirely with any pursuit of this vision thus far?

Intense right?

Yet, ultimately the moment I was drawn back to my slightly obsessive and yet truly sporadic jaunts through the land of language, I stopped thinking about all these things. There was only one thing I felt as I poured whatever thoughts I had onto the screen (Im a bit new-fashioned that way, I rarely use a pen). And it was joy. And the screen beckoned me into its purring embrace.

I had stopped measuring my writing by the good old joystick (and Im not talking about circa-1998 Nintendo64). I was looking at the ‘things’ I could get for my efforts, rather than taking the one thing that I knew was guaranteed… Joy. Why would I ever do something I didn’t want to? And similarly, why wouldn’t I do something I enjoyed so much?? It may be sporadic, it may be obsessive, and it may rob me of my sleep at obscure times (she says, dimming the lights on the bedside clock that grin in agreement) but it’s FUN. I work two jobs and study a degree qualification – writing is my solace, my therapist, my meditation and my medication, my joy, and my fun. And I don’t do it for anything else.

My name is Kaye Waterhouse, your newest addition to Writers Rising. I am 25, living in Melbourne, Australia. Quite possibly everything you’ll ever need to know about me, you’ll find

Here; http://www.klarityandkaos.blogspot.com/

Here; http://www.designfits.wordpress.com/

And here; http://www.inspirationunplugged.com/

And of course, subsequent entries at Writers Rising. Im thrilled to join you   :o)

xx   Kaye

<<< This is me on Easter Sunday just gone....with the most incredible creature on this planet.