CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: A BETTER WORLD, ONE PERSON AT A TIME

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: A BETTER WORLD, ONE PERSON AT A TIME: I don't know about others but I at times in my life have struggled greatly with feeling that I am supported by others in life. What I...

A BETTER WORLD, ONE PERSON AT A TIME

I don't know about others but I at times in my life have struggled greatly with feeling that I am supported by others in life. What I mean by supported by others is pretty much that I am appreciated by them enough for them to reach out to me when I'm down or to cheer me on when I'm working to improve myself, my life or simply just to accomplish something that is important to me.

I grew up feeling alone. I grew up feeling as if nothing I was or did was important enough to be recognized by others or to be supported by others. It wasn't intentional on the part of my parents but that is how it was and as a result of that I have suffered greatly throughout my childhood, young adult years and even into my mid-adult years with feeling valued, important to others, supported by others and basically worthy of their attention and/or their love.

But that was then and this is now and today I couldn't feel more blessed, more important to others, more passionate about life than I do today. I have many, many wonderful and caring people to thank for helping me see my way through it all and to arrive at where I am today. So THANK YOU ALL for your love and your support.

However, along with that love and support I grew inside of my head and my heart. I let go of a lot of resentments, I forgave everyone who I felt had caused me to feel this way about myself and I worked very hard on introspection as well on as being much more empathetic to others. I am a changed person and those who know me today would not recognize the person I was even fifteen years ago. It took a lot of hard work on my part, a lot of insight and a lot of support from those closest to me. Again I am so grateful.

One of the most incredible things that I have found that shores up my self-esteem and that helps me 'know' that I am valued and supported has been to value and support others. I find it odd but comforting to realize that when I felt unloved, unwanted, unsupported all of those years my first plan of self-protection was to not love others freely, to not be true friends with others and to not support anyone else. I protected my 'self' and my feelings by shutting off every possible way to truly connect with other human beings. I had friends I didn't trust and who really didn't treat me like a real friend would. I was in the self-protection mode and it only led me down a path that made me feel even more like I needed to protect myself. It was a downward spiral that I was unable to see that I could change. I felt it was everyone else's duty to love me first, want me in their lives first and to support me first. Man oh man was I wrong about that.

Here's the thing that I found and I hope that others might give it a try if they aren't already aware of the power of 'giving to others'. That thing is that it truly is far better to give than it is to receive. Since I have chosen to become a 'cheerleader' for others in my life and through social media I have been lifted up beyond any expectations I'd ever had my entire life to be at. I have never felt more loved, more wanted, more supported than I do today and I truly feel that it can be attributed in a very large part to my support for and showing love to others. It's really not about if I give I get or it being in equal increments, tit for tat. That is NOT what it's about, although I once thought that was how it worked. What it truly is about is simply feeling good about loving others and showing/telling them, caring about the woes of others, being there for others and most of all cheering others on when they need it or just to be a caring supportive friend.

It really is so very true that in order to have a friend we must be a friend. I have found out the hard way how this works and how we need to apply it in our lives but the most important thing is that I figured it out.

BUT this doesn't only apply to people who are our friends, whether face to face or social media friends, but it applies to everyone around us. Today more than ever we ALL need to feel supported by others. These for some are desperate times and for others are uncertain and anxiety producing times today but if we don't reach out to EVERYONE around us with our kindness, our concern, our empathy, our compassion, our help and our support we are most certainly all doomed to fail at surviving whatever lies ahead. We can be a victim or we can be a survivor and in order to survive ourselves we must begin to accept that what can ensure our survival is NOT simply just taking care of ourselves but is also taking care of others. Together we rise or together we fall.

WE CAN DO THIS!!!

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: THE SAFE ZONE

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: THE SAFE ZONE: Everyone wants to feel safe.  In fact if the truth be known everyone 'needs' to feel safe.  Today in the world as it is, as present...

THE SAFE ZONE

Everyone wants to feel safe.  In fact if the truth be known everyone 'needs' to feel safe.  Today in the world as it is, as presented to us through the eyes and the lens of news media, it's difficult to feel safe.  So many threats coming from so many directions and really not many real solutions to keep us safe from them.  To some it may feel like a crap shoot when one walks out one's door every day as to whether or not one will return in one piece or return at all.  In parts of the world today there is truly a high risk of being injured or killed by complete strangers who may be trying to take over the society in which one lives so that they can control what people think, what people say and what people do.

It would be very easy to go on and on and on listing all of the risks that come with living in today's world, no matter where one lives, however that is extremely counterproductive for any awake and aware human being to do.  We can forego that part of it and instead move on to what we can DO to help ourselves feel safer if we but choose to and that is why I'm writing this.  

Many of us are anxious and afraid.  We don't know what crazy thing is going to happen from one moment to the next today but we can all choose not to fall victim to the fear, the anxiety and the stress that fear and anxiety causes us.  After all in this life it is not what happens to us but it is how we view it and how we weather it that truly matters in the end.  There's going to be bumps in the road and there's going to be truly frightening events that may cause us to return to a place of feelings of insecurity, anxiety and outright fear about the future.  What is really important is that we live in that for as short a time as possible and then go about the business of living without fear and anxiety.

Everyone has their own path to travel in this and what works for one may not work for another.  However it's possible that there are common and simple things to do that will help almost everyone.

First and foremost be aware that being an active participant in this life, in the world around us, doesn't have to mean that we must keep up on every current event.  There are those who seem to be addicted to news and the news media.  Then there are those of us who have in the past lived many years, even decades, without feeling that we need to know everything that's going on around the world or even in our local communities at all times.  As one of those people I can truly attest to the fact that I was harmed in no way by ignoring current events and that I never missed anything that was truly important or that affected myself, my family, my friends or others.  Somehow the news of the things that affect many people and may have a direct effect on us get out without our dedication to keeping up on current events.  The news media is a mixed bag of people dedicated to keeping us all apprised of the events that do truly affect us and of people who are looking for ratings; ratings that translate into profit and profit that translates into wealth.  It's tough to distinguish one from the other so perhaps vastly reducing the amount of news that we view/read and even perhaps eliminating if from our lives would be something we could do to help us feel safer.  After all today it seems that the news media is devoted to bringing us the worst, the most frightening and the most threatening information under the guise of wanting us to be informed so we can be safe.  Safety may not be so much in being informed as it is in being vigilant.  Vigilance is not fear, it is simply being aware of one's surroundings.  We can be very vigilant without feeling afraid.

The second, and perhaps the most effective, way of feeling safe is to DO something.  What we do doesn't have to be huge or even big it simply needs to be focused.  Everyone can do something to help themselves feel safer by reaching out to others and supporting them.  I daresay that anyone who has experienced the 'joy of giving' of themselves would agree that action in this area is not only grounding but is also healing in nature.  Giving can come in many forms; in nearly an infinite number of things that are available to do that helps someone else and also ourselves.  

There is charity giving of course which could be anything from donating money to a cause, to getting involved in a cause, to spearheading one's own cause.  However for some people that's not who they are and for many that's not what they can afford finance or time wise.  But there are many ways to give to others.  Support of a single person or many persons whether in person or on social networking is one option.  Gathering like minded people who have similar interests and even share the same fears and anxieties is another.  Writing, donating, volunteering...it all helps and it all matters.  

We are each individuals who have our own unique gifts to give and allowing anyone at any time to judge us or to suggest that what we have to offer isn't as good as what others do is an obstacle to finding what we can do.  I can promise you that once you find what it is that you can do, that you can contribute, that you have to give and then you do it that is when you have found your path.  Once you've found your path to giving to others you will realize that through your giving you feel safer.  Why do you feel safer?  You feel safer because you've made a connection, because you are a contributor to THE ANSWER that is becoming one humanity that helps and supports one another regardless of color, creed, religion, sexual orientation or any other aspect of our unique humanness that some deem a good reason to divide ourselves. 

We are one humanity and safety is NOT in dividing ourselves to protect ourselves, safety is in connecting ourselves one with the other until we are all connected...

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: VITAL SANCTUARY

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: VITAL SANCTUARY: This election, but most of all the election results, have left a lot of us feeling anxious, sad, hopeless, helpless and even a bit depresse...

VITAL SANCTUARY

This election, but most of all the election results, have left a lot of us feeling anxious, sad, hopeless, helpless and even a bit depressed.  We don’t have a clue what the future will bring but plenty of us (myself included even though I try really hard not to) are imagining, based on the campaign platform and the man who was elected, what might happen in the coming months and years in our homeland.  We’ve already seen some violence, on both sides, and some people now feel more emboldened than ever to express their bigotry, xenophobia, homophobia and other things that some of us are that they feel uncomfortable with.  I’m no different than anyone else and I have had days when I feel physically ill, emotionally anxious and even have had to resort to hiding in the ladies room at work to have a good cry. 

Some people are choosing to protest and while I do share their angst and their anxieties I won’t be marching; at least not yet as far as I know.  Some of us are doing our very best to encourage others who share our feelings about this to ramp up on being kind, being caring, being compassionate, being generous and just generally making our day-to-day society less frightening and a whole lot more nurturing.  No matter who chooses what method to cope with this or even to exhibit to others how we are unable to really cope with it we ALL must take care of ourselves.  Stress and anxiety are killers in a very real sense and one of those ‘senses’ is physically.  The longer we indulge in feeling stressed and anxious the less effective our immune system is so the more likely we will become ill and also the more likely it is that we will succumb to some sort of stress/anxiety related heart illness that could lead to heart attack, stroke and more…which could in the end kill us.  So it is in everyone’s best interest to figure out how to deal with this in a way that will save us from a hell of anxiety and stress. 

This last weekend, after a Friday filled with extreme anxiety and sadness and a feeling of helplessness, I made a conscious decision to spend my weekend trying to reclaim peace in my life and in my being.  I was successful for the most part and found very little anxiety and stress begin to creep into my being. So in the spirit of supporting one another I wanted to share some thoughts with the hope that others who are struggling as I have been will find a way to create and then to hold onto calm and peace in their lives.

First and what feels like the most effective thing thus far was a moratorium on news of any kind whatsoever and then pretty close to a moratorium on social media only going onto social media to post something positive in nature.  My husband and I did, out of sheer habit, discuss the ‘current events’ from time to time throughout the weekend but for the most part we tried to steer clear of discussing it in any way, shape or form. We not only needed some 'me/us' time we deserved it, as do we all.

As we dedicated ourselves to keeping negativity out of ourselves, out of our home and out of our relationship I realized what we were doing.  In effect what we were doing was shoring up the ever present but quite invisible ideal of SANCTUARY that our home is to us.  I realized as we made this concerted effort together that when we get caught up in the emotions of a thing, no matter how tragic or important, and we bring it into our homes where we have permission to be our true selves more than anywhere else we are destroying the ONLY sanctuary that most of us have ever had or will ever have. 

Why is sanctuary so important?  Oh let me count the ways…

Sanctuary is our/your one place on the entire planet where you can feel the most at peace.  It’s our/your port in the storm of life and is where we/you go to recharge our/your batteries, lick our/your wounds, find our/your way and is where if one has a significant other we/you can come together and nurture one another. 

So I suppose what I’m suggesting is that no matter how deeply we are getting involved in politics or even just the many discussions occurring on social media about our current situation in the land that we live or how passionately we may feel that we need to be involved that finding, creating or just going back to the place, wherever it may be, that is our sanctuary from all external issues, trials, tribulations and things that stress us where we feel the safest, the most nurtured and the calmest.  We/you surely can fight the good fight but take time for nurturing our/your selves no matter what it takes.  We are all human and we all need a break from whatever is causing us stress or negative feelings.

May peace be with you all in this time of great uncertainty and division.  If we stick together we’ll make it through, I promise, but in the meantime be good to yourselves; you deserve it.

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: THE VOTES ARE IN AND WE ARE UNSURE OF OUR FUTURE.....

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: THE VOTES ARE IN AND WE ARE UNSURE OF OUR FUTURE.....: Well the GREAT NEWS about today is that my dog Scooby crapped and had his breakfast this morning (he didn’t eat last night and we suspected...

THE VOTES ARE IN AND WE ARE UNSURE OF OUR FUTURE...

Well the GREAT NEWS about today is that my dog Scooby crapped and had his breakfast this morning (he didn’t eat last night and we suspected he was bound up or possibly had a blockage so we were concerned)!!!

Other than that the ‘NEWS’ we woke up to this morning wasn’t quite so good and has the potential to have far greater reaching negative effects on us than we may even suspect.

I've thought a lot on how best I was going to express my feelings about the fact that a majority of my fellow Americans chose a candidate for our next president that is NOT for ALL of us but only for some of us and whose ideas about American family values vastly differs from my own and that of most of my friends.  I wanted to express my feelings in as non-dramatic, calm and rational way as possible.  I also wanted to express my feelings without trying to make anyone else appear to be the ‘bad guy’.  I have a lot of very deep and troubling emotions going on inside of me today so I’ll do my best to keep to the subject and to ‘go high’ instead of ‘low’.

I must say that as a woman I have some very deep feelings and concerns about this AND IT IS NOT because the other candidate, the one I wanted, is a woman.  My support of her has never had anything to do with her gender and in fact in the primaries she was not my desired candidate.  This is about my being a female in a male dominated country that has just decided that they wanted a man to lead our country who openly, unabashedly and happily reported to another man that he physically forced himself on women that he found attractive and that he could do whatever he wanted to them because he was rich and famous.  THAT is why I have concerns as a female in this country today. 

I grew up in the late 1960’s when women at the end of that decade were just beginning to finally get some traction when it came to having ‘almost’ as much value in the eyes of the law and society as a man did.  I grew up in the ‘sexual revolution’ when birth control was finally being allowed and prescribed so we women had some semblance of control over whether or not we got pregnant.  Sadly it was still a time when if a man beat his wife the authorities were rarely called because it was considered to be his private business and the authorities really didn’t want to get involved. I was a young teenager but was still aware that at last women were afforded some small, but important, concessions by men as to our worth and our ability to make our own choices; whether or not they involved a man.  So it was one small step forward for women and a few steps back due to the resistance to our move for equality but at least it was going in the direction of us women being considered as equals to men in intelligence, ability and our basic value as a human being.

There are a LOT of women who will read this who weren’t born yet and never really knew what it was like back then.  Women had very few rights, were openly discriminated against and were basically told by the men of this country to sit down, shut up and don’t make waves.  We were told back then that our only value was as baby making machines and in our servitude to men. Money as you know is power so back then women who stayed home, raised the kids and kept the home clean for their husbands had household allowances and many were monitored and held accountable for what they spent and on what; kind of like children might be monitored and held accountable by their parents.  Most women had no means to support themselves should they choose to leave and divorce their husbands so most women stayed in emotionally, mentally and physically abusive relationships. Believe it or not back then most men were ashamed to let it be known that their wife worked because a working wife suggested that the man was unable to support his family on his income alone and therefore it was damaging to his reputation among his male peers as well as to his ego. Back then many women who wanted to get a job, usually to have their own money that they could spend as they wished, were not allowed to by their husbands. Like other minorities of that era we were asked/required by the White Christian men in charge of everything and by the men in many of our homes to be happy with whatever we got, to never complain about how we were treated and to be extremely grateful that we were even allowed to speak; and in some extreme, but not isolated, cases should be grateful we were even allowed to live. 

So yesterday my fellow Americans demonstrated very clearly to me and to all of the women in this country that how men treat us, including in a sexual sense even if they are strangers to us, is not important.  We were told only too loudly by the choice so many made for OUR president that women’s issues are not important issues and that we, as a nation, are okay with having a man in the Whitehouse who has openly and publicly denigrated women, has openly sexually assaulted women and who has gloated about it to other males bragging about what he could get away with because of his fame and fortune.  This gloating/bragging admission was just that, an admission, and it was not stated by him to say what he’d like to do or what he’d fantasized about doing but about what he HAD DONE.  His apology, much belated by several years and only because he got busted on video, was far from heartfelt and his claims that he is different now have not been supported by his actions and/or words since his admission to it.

As a female I find that to be a personal insult and very disconcerting in a very big way…BIGLY, if you will.  I feel violated in a spiritual sense because the men, and some of the women, in this country by majority made a statement that I and my life, along with my sisters and fellow females (even those who voted for him), is of little value to them.  They have very clearly stated, through their votes, that a man has a right to violate any woman any time in any way, whether physically or verbally, and it is perfectly okay with them.  I will concede that those who voted this man into office most likely didn’t give the women’s rights aspect of what it means to support this man into account.  They were likely far too busy worrying about all of the ‘scary’ things that their candidate convinced them they should be worried about to give women’s rights or the women of this country a single thought.  By their neglect in including women and our rights in their consideration for president they have spoken even though they don’t realize it.

There are MANY reasons why I am so very disappointed and hurt by how many people voted for Trump but this one is the one, the vote against women, that directly involves me and at some point may directly affect me.  Along with my concern for myself, for my sisters and fellow women in this country, I also have a very grave and real concern for people of color, people who are Muslim as well as for liberal minded people and what these now emboldened people, who clearly do not like any of us much, will do to us believing that they are now ‘in charge’. I can’t and won’t predict what bad things may to happen.  Unlike the people who voted for Trump who seem to have made up their minds what would happen if his opposition were voted in, I really don’t think that I or anyone else can accurately predict anything that may or may not happen in the future.

In the end I have to sadly admit that I had absolutely no idea that so many fellow citizens in this country truly wanted the kind of way of life in our country that they have voted for in this election.  I had no idea that so many people were so nostalgic about the middle of the last century, the 50's and 60's, to want to go back to it and relive it again.  I am truly stunned by it and by the knowledge that there are so many people out there who apparently don’t feel equality is important, be it racial or gender equality, or that staying true to what OUR country was based on by our forefathers is important.  I am deeply saddened that so many people feel so disenfranchised in this country that they would see us go backwards rather than to progress forward.  I don’t know what the next four years hold in store for us but I fear that being a liberal is going to be frowned upon, that being a person of color is going to be more dangerous than it already is, that what religion one chooses may be dangerous and that we are going to ostracize ourselves from the rest of the world believing that isolationism is the answer to all of our problems.  I deeply and sincerely hope that I'm 100% incorrect in my fears but...

I guess those of us who hoped and those who have worked so hard for a brighter future where we join the rest of the world in making life better for everyone in it will just have to keep on keepin’ on in the hope that somehow some way we can work with others to manifest positive changes in our society and our country.

Good luck to us!!!  I think we are going to need it…

Coast to Coast Bully Walk/ National Pit Bull Awareness Day - Eastern Mas...

CHOOSING A WIDER LENS

Everyone sees the world through their own lens.  In other words everyone sees the world around them from their own perspective that is based on their own culture and on their own upbringing at times but usually always according to their own personal experiences.  Few of us are ever told, taught or asked to consider the 'bigger picture' that is life on planet earth and The Universe but are typically led into seeing everything around us through the lens that is 'I', meaning perhaps from a place of our own ego.  Throughout human history it seems that for the most part we humans have become accustomed to unconsciously making ourselves the center of the universe and everything going on around us is considered on it's benefits and/or disadvantages to ourselves.  Oddly enough a 'sense of self' is rarely a part of it even though so much of the teachings as we grow up being about us, what is best for us, what isn't good for us and what serves us the best.  So we see the world only through the eyes of our experience and how everything we see in the world affects us.  

Some may call it human nature and some may not agree that it's our nature but for most of us we grow up seeing only the small little world that surrounds us where everything that happens either involves us or affects us in some way.  There are some however who choose to think beyond the small and by comparison insignificant little world that was created around us at birth and that we continue through life to live in and relate to.  Some choose to view the world with a much wider lens and thank goodness for those humans who stretch beyond themselves, their own intimate circle and who yearn to experience the world around them as if it were their own little intimate world.

The value of looking at the world through a wider lens is beyond measure because when we choose to do so we learn very quickly that first of all nearly every other human being on earth shares the same dreams, the same aspirations to succeed in life and the same desires for themselves and their progeny.  We all, whether we want to admit it or not, have the same exact 'needs' in life.  'Needs' meaning those basic things that no human being can survive without; things like shelter, water, food and relationships that nurture us and give us a soft place to fall when the rigors of life become too much for us.  Therefore we are all of the same mind, cut from the same cloth and have the same basic needs no matter our gender, our ethnic origin, our national affiliation, our religious affiliation and our sexual orientation.  When one chooses to only view life through that small, finely focused lens of 'self' and our own intimate small world we can't see how truly similar we are to every other human on earth and we may even grow to fear or be wary of those who are different than we are in skin color, in ethnic origin, in religious affiliation, in national affiliation and in sexual orientation.  

Our inability to view the world around us through a wider lens can cause us not only to fear but to hate and to seek to destroy those who are no like us, who don't look like us and who don't have a culture like we do.  But when we choose to widen that lens to encompass the human race regardless of our differences so much changes.  In fact EVERYTHING changes because we are truly thinking, feeling, reacting and living as a human being among other human beings.  With a wider lens we tend to see that the divisions that our ancestors have made and we continue to honor are only divisions created by ideas and are not real, honest and true divisions.  With a wider lens we begin to see the beauty in others and begin to embrace all of those delicious and exciting differences that so many others have based their divisions on.  As we widen our ideas about and vision of the world to encompass all of humanity we stop seeing divisions and start seeing the similarities that can bind us one to the other.  All of a sudden those state lines and country borders don't seem to mean as much to as as they once did and we begin to realize that whatever divisions that have been created over time are creations of fear, of power over others and of pride and ego that may have served us at one time but no longer serve us.

There has got to be a point in the evolution of humankind where we are going to stop being patriots of our country and start being proud citizens of the planet earth. At some point we are going to evolve enough to understand that all of those divisions that so many have held so dear and have honored for so many millennia have brought us much more pain and suffering than they ever have of peace, harmony and prosperity.  We must evolve and we will but not if some of us don't start right now.  Sure many in the world aren't ready to think in these terms and most definitely are not ready to begin to live life as one world, a whole human specie, but we can't wait for them but must make our own way.  So to that end those of us who are awake to this and aware of what needs to change in order to evolve to a new world order as one humanity must begin today and we must begin by living this every day in our own little worlds as if we are indeed in 'the world' in it's entirety.  If we don't live it it will never happen and we all know we want it to happen so we must live it today.

Let us begin to see ourselves as the astronauts see us from the International Space Station and that is as ONE world and ONE people moving through The Universe throughout the infinite that IS...

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: THE POWER OF HATE

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: THE POWER OF HATE: Was talking to someone yesterday, a friend, who stated that they 'hated' someone. Without a single thought I immediately responde...

THE POWER OF HATE

Was talking to someone yesterday, a friend, who stated that they 'hated' someone. Without a single thought I immediately responded with, "I don't hate anyone, no matter who they are or what they've done," and the moment I spoke this I realized just how true it is. I truly do not hate anyone, not even people who the majority of others believe deserve to be hated.

I can remember back when I used to 'hate' a lot of people. I hated pretty girls/women, I hated rich people, I hated hateful people, I hated people who exert their power over the helpless, I hated most politicians, I hated so many people from different walks of life and I even hated my childhood. I just hated at random believing all the while that somehow my hate of them would affect them in some way so that they would know they were hated and would feel badly as a result or would somehow be punished by it. I can't honestly say exactly when I made the conscious decision to stop hating people, hating situations, hating things I could not control; maybe it just happened when I stopped viewing myself as a powerless, helpless victim in life and stopped shirking responsibility for my own thoughts, feelings, words and actions. Maybe it was when I stopped blaming the people and the things around me for how I felt about them.

About ten years ago or so I truly grasped what a powerful emotion hatred is as well as how damaging it can be, most especially to the person harboring that hatred, and I made a conscious decision to stop using the word 'hate' in my vocabulary. I realized just how easily and how often I made the comment about just about everything whether important or trivial that I hated it. I hated the weather, I hated the bills I owed, I hated a movie, I hated what someone was wearing, I hated how someone looked, I hated the traffic...mainly I 'hated' just about everything and verbally confirmed that hatred so many times in a single day that I really couldn't count all the times I said that I 'hated' something. Maybe I felt as if hate wasn't that bad and it's okay to feel hatred for things, for people, for situations, etc. because it's just a part of being human, right? OR maybe it was that I realized that it was a 'learned' response to things that I wasn't comfortable with from growing up in a society, and maybe even a home, where hating was accepted and flowed through life as if hating things was a normal part of life for everyone everywhere.

We've all seen hatred and many of us have experienced the power of hatred in our lives. We've been hated or maybe we've hated someone else and always it seems to the detriment of our own selves. When we are the victim of hatred of course it's detrimental to us. Sometimes we don't even understand 'why' we are hated by someone else or what we may have possibly done to earn their hatred and sometimes we know exactly why someone hates us. Regardless, many of us have felt the pain of being hated or even disliked by another human being. I guess then that would beg the question why any of us who have felt the weight and the pain of being hated by someone else would ever choose to inflict that same thing on another living human being. What a conundrum that is but apparently not one that many people consider in their lifetimes considering how many decent, loving, caring and seemingly aware and awake people express hatred toward things or people almost on a daily basis.

So is it inherently 'wrong' to hate? I'm sure that many people, especially those who express hatred for other people and things in their lives, would say that it's not inherently wrong and that in fact it's just a natural human emotion that everyone experiences. But perhaps what those who feel hatred is natural and is acceptable to harbor within ourselves are neglecting to admit is the power of hatred to destroy us; to destroy the people we or others hate, to support systematic hatred on an institutional level, to drive peoples to wage war on the other groups of people who are objects of their hatred, to limit how successful certain people can be in life, to drive some people with extreme hatred for others to subjugate them and even kill them as if their lives are not of any value simply because those hated are the object of the haters hatred (as if the victims are the sole cause of the hate waged against them). When one reflects, if one chooses to do so honestly, one can very quickly and easily see the weight of hatred on our world throughout history and today. One also must admit, if they choose to be honest with themselves, that as a emotion hatred carries quite a bit of 'energy' with it and that when we ourselves choose to feel and experience the emotion of hatred that we are adding to the weight and the force of the cumulative hatred being felt and expressed in the world today.

So, there's a 'payoff' for everything that we human beings do. There's no feeling we feel, no thoughts or words we choose to have and express, there's no action that we take or thing that we do that doesn't give us some sort of payoff on an emotional level. The payoff for everyone is going to be different based on who we are but still there's some sort of payoff, be it self-satisfaction or validation or to prove something to someone or to just make us feel superior or good in some way. Maybe my payoff for hating in the past was to help myself feel superior and just a bit maybe because back then I felt powerless in a way and felt that hating those or that which I felt powerless about was a great defense against them or it. But when I got honest with myself and really took a look at the kind of human being that I wanted to be in this life I realized that hate just wasn't a part of it; hate couldn't make me stronger, hate couldn't destroy my enemies, hate couldn't change a single thing and hate couldn't comfort me. That is why I stopped hating and saying I hate things; even if I really didn't hate something but just used that word out of habit and because so many other people use it.

In the end hate is not just a 'word' people use to express their discomfort or disgust with something or someone. Hate is an emotion and ALL emotions carry weight and power in them adding to the collective energy that flows through everything that happens in the world. What kind of contribution do we want to make to the energy of the world? What kind of energy do we want to add to the energy of the rest of life on planet earth? Do we 'really' hate all the things that we say we hate or do we just use the word because it's easy, it's there, everyone else uses it and it's a habit? Then IF we really DO hate even half of the things that we say we hate how does it affect the object of our hatred, if at all, and how does it make us feel about our place in the world or our own personal security, our own happiness?

In closing I'd just like to share a thought about hate. Carrie Fisher, the actress (Princess Leia of Star Wars), expressed her thoughts about resentment many years ago that still hangs around today and is embraced by many as the rock solid truth. Although her reference was 'resentment' we all have to acknowledge that hatred is truly a form of resentment toward another person or a thing so I think her sentiment holds true and applies to hate. The sentiment goes like this:

“Resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.”

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: FINDING HUMANITY

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: FINDING HUMANITY: Most, if not all of us, understand what and who humanity is.  At least we understand the meaning of the word. Humanity according to the Mir...

FINDING HUMANITY

Most, if not all of us, understand what and who humanity is.  At least we understand the meaning of the word. Humanity according to the Mirriam-Webster dictionary is by definition:

‘the quality or state of being human; the quality of being kind to other people or to animals and/or all people.’

Not wanting to focus on the negative for long we still need to mention that today, based on what most of us believe is going on in the world around us, it feels a whole lot like very few grasp the meaning of humanity or want to be a part of humanity that contributes in a positive way.  There is war, poverty, human slavery, terrorism, tyranny, oppression, racism and truly hateful people in the world today plus more.  Yet if we choose to look away from what is presented to us by the news media and look away from the actuality of some of the isolated, but still quite devastating, events happening in the world today we can if we choose see something bigger and much more positive than today’s most common world view.  To look away doesn’t mean that we deny negative things are happening or that we don’t care but looking away, even if for a brief time, helps us get a better grasp on what really is going on in the majority of the world and can serve to renew our commitment to being a positive force in the world.  The weight of the negativity, the struggle, the hatred, the battle over power and wealth can get to some people and it can poison their soul.  We’ve all seen it in others and have known others who are unable to step back and see the entire world and not just the bits of it that are in turmoil where life is suffering and suffering is life. We’ve seen how cynical, how shut off from others and how hopeless they can get and most of us don’t want to be ‘that way’ so we keep on keeping on trying to keep it all in perspective.

Perhaps the answer is for those of us who are awake, aware and who truly do want to make a positive impact on the world, on humanity, to come together as ONE adding our own individual gifts and power to something bigger than ourselves.  It may not require ‘official’ organizations or groups to assemble those of us who want the world to be a better place for all but it does require us to act locally while we are thinking globally.  It requires us each to support everyone around us, even strangers, with our kindness and our compassion; even if it’s only shown to others through a smile, a nod of the head and/or a kind word.  Giving that which we all seek, being treated with kindness and compassion by others, isn’t difficult. In fact it’s really as easy as falling off of a log because it truly comes naturally to every living being; even those human beings who are filled with hatred, a lust for power and wealth and who defend themselves by hating and harming others before they can be mistreated or harmed. 

It is within us ALL to be kind and compassionate whether we want to acknowledge it or not.  But if we don’t believe it’s there or if we believe that it is either beyond our capability or will be difficult to cultivate within ourselves then we can’t access that most human part of ourselves.  You’ll find a lot of people, some professional, who say that it’s ‘human nature’ to be cruel, to be ultra-competitive, to exert our will over others and more but I will never believe that to be true.  I refuse to accept that ‘excuse’ for behaving in negative ways because once we get in touch with our true inner selves we can easily access our ‘humanity’.  The layers we build over our lifetimes are often protective in nature and we feel that they serve us, and serve us well, because they protect us from being hurt by others. But the ‘worst’ thing that could ever happen to any of us is NOT to get our feelings hurt by another person or persons. The ‘worst’ thing that can happen to us is to deny ourselves the experience of being a caring, compassionate, empathetic and giving person to our fellow humans, because to deny that all of this exists within ourselves is to deny our own humanity.  When we lose our humanity we lose the ability to connect to others in ways that bring us much more blessings than trials.  When we lose our humanity we are adrift in a cold, dark Universe that brings us nothing but pain anyhow so why not choose to be that which we know this world needs a whole lot more of? 

In this Infinite Universe that we live in and were created by there is infinite possibility for every one of us and if we choose to join together to explore those possibilities, against all odds, then we can build a world where many fewer humans suffer at the hands of other humans.  I truly believe that it IS possible to love our way out of the dark and into the light; not just for ourselves but for all.  We are currently existing according to a certain paradigm and the paradigm will continue as it is until the pendulum is swung and TOGETHER we cause a paradigm shift. 

There are, I believe, infinitely more decent human beings who are aware and awake, if not open to being aware and awake, that we share our planet with than many of us believe there are. Thus I have great hope that if we begin to join together, support one another and love one another as the brothers and sisters that we truly are (by virtue of our shared DNA) we can affect a paradigm shift that will change everything.  We may never live in a world where there is zero poverty or zero racism or zero hostility or zero subjugation of one group of people by another but we most certainly can, I believe, create a world together where there is more peace and love and kindness and generosity and compassion and mutual support than there is all of those negative things we want to put an end to in our lifetimes.

We can do this but we must come together with others who feel the same as we do so we can begin to shift that paradigm away from all the pain and suffering to a world where there is true equality for all along with the ability to pursue life and liberty for ourselves.  A world where love is the norm and hatred is extremely rare...

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: FEAR PROFITS A MAN NOTHING

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: FEAR PROFITS A MAN NOTHING: While the quote I used for this blog is a quote from a film, '13th Warrior' released in 1999 based on Michael Crichton's book ...

FEAR PROFITS A MAN NOTHING

While the quote I used for this blog is a quote from a film, '13th Warrior' released in 1999 based on Michael Crichton's book 'The Eaters of the Dead', it still echoes in my mind frequently as I go through this life. It resonated with me the first moment I heard it spoken to Anthony Banderas who played the role of the Arab emissary, Ahmed Ibn Fahdlan, by his Viking buddy when they were about to be attacked by a horde of bloodthirsty seemingly supernatural and indefeatable killers who were cannibals predating on the Viking people.  I immediately grasped the meaning of 'fear profits a man nothing' and it has stuck with me all these years.

The full line in the film verbatim is, "Go and hide in a hole if you wish, but you won't live one instant longer. Your fate is fixed. Fear profits a man nothing," and it says a LOT in my personal opinion.  When we think about all of the times that fear of failure, fear of what may lie ahead, fear of what we may lose and fear of defeat has dictated our next step in life we need to be cognizant of the power of our fears and how they may have limited or saved us. Of course whenever we chose a new or different path or choose to play it safe on our path in this life we can only ever know the outcome from that specific choice and can never know what outcome may have been had we chosen differently.  But we can at least acknowledge when fear has dictated our choices and how we may have ended up in a different place with a different outcome had we chosen to face our fear rather than be ruled by it.

Facing our fears.  For some, and perhaps many, facing our fears is tantamount to jumping off a hundred story building knowing that certain death is the only possible outcome.  Fear is a very powerful emotion.  We all have instinctual fear that has evolved over the millennia of our evolution as human beings that has kept us safe and has ensured the continuation of our specie.  Those fears such as fear of fire, fear of heights, fear of wild animals and maybe even fear of the unknown all are there for a reason and should always be heeded to a point but not allowed to overcome our common sense of what is truly dangerous to us or what is a real and present threat to our very lives. If humankind had allowed all of these instinctual fears to govern us exploration would never happen, innovation would never happen; there would be no airplanes, no rockets, no tall buildings and we would have killed off all the wild animals that we live among long ago and all completely out of fear.  Fear is a powerful emotion that can drive us or can simply guide us through this life.  

Sadly some among us have learned to be driven by our fears and not all of those fears are reasonable in nature but are fears encouraged in us by those who would profit from our fear and by those who seek to control us through our fear.  Unfortunately around the world today, but most especially here in the United States, fear is being used as a control mechanism for the masses. Just turn on the television and watch a few minutes of any news report or watch a political candidate's speech or see a commercial for some drug that will help us avoid any pain and/or suffering or see a commercial telling us we should be afraid not to fit in/not to be accepted based on our appearance or watch a sermon instilling the fear of eternal damnation in us if we do not worship a certain deity and you will see how the attempt to instill fear in us is being used to make a profit for those at the top by controlling how we view the world around us and what fears we 'should' have about the present and/or our future.  

Today there is an entire political campaign being run for the highest office in the land based on people's fears; not all of which are reasonable fears or are fears of things that are likely to ever happen.  But for some among us just the idea that there is something, that we can't control, that may happen or that there are people, that we can't control, that may want to harm us is enough to cause us to put our trust in someone who is literally controlling us through our fears and often enough is instructing us on exactly what we should be afraid of. I don't believe however, because I have a basic faith in humanity, that enough of these easily influenced fearful people among us exist to elect this candidate into office but that doesn't mean that we can't look at how this candidate's supporters are being controlled and the power of suggestion that controls them.  Therefore it is incumbent upon all of us who are aware and awake not to allow ourselves to become fearful ourselves of what these fearful masses might help someone accomplish in our country, which also has an effect on what happens in the world.  We must adhere to the belief that common sense will prevail.

I have found in my personal life that had been controlled by truly limiting and daunting phobias since childhood that the ONLY way to overcome the intense fears that fueled my phobias was to force myself to face them.  I suppose one could say that courage is involved and I suppose it is, but I would never view myself as any more courageous of a human than the rest of humanity.  When one holds a fear deep within themselves the fear itself seems to be the driving force.  I realized long ago that the object(s) of our fears isn't what causes the fear but it is our chosen way of seeing that object and the danger we attribute to it that is the true basis of our fears.  In other words it's really all in our heads, those fears that drive our phobias.  Our interpretation of what 'might' happen or 'might' be true in association with the object of our fear is what keeps us from dealing with it.  The fear itself is the phobia while the object of our fear is innocuous and although it may actually be dangerous in some ways isn't what really truly drives that phobia.  So in the end as former president Franklin D. Roosevelt said so long ago, "The only thing to fear, is fear itself," which seems to turn out to be quite true and quite relevant to everyone.

How I overcame the phobias I'd had since childhood was to force myself to gather up the courage to face each fear.  It started with my phobia of snakes when I decided when my son was born that I didn't want to limit him as my mother had limited us kids due to her snake phobia so I started to learn about them.  Funny thing was that the more I learned about snakes, the role they play in the environment and their nature as creatures the less I feared them and the more I admired them.  It took a while but after forcing myself to learn about these amazing reptiles I found them to incredibly beautiful, useful and truly amazing creatures.  To date I have overcome my fear, a fear that in my younger years wouldn't even allow me to 'look' at a photo of a snake on the printed page or watch one on television, to the point where earlier this year on a vacation in Mexico I held my very first snake.  The feeling of accomplishment and of being free from this lifelong phobia was transformative.  I don't recall feeling more proud of myself before nor of feeling better about being alive than the moment I held that beautiful creature in my hand and embraced the beauty of this animal that years ago I would quite literally have left the area to avoid being near. 

My phobia of the dark I also overcame by forcing myself to be in the dark and reminding myself that there is nothing in the dark that wasn't there in the light.  Today I walk through the darkened halls and rooms in our home smiling to myself as the pride of what I have overcome, on my own, wells up inside of me.

I don't share to brag but only to demonstrate that as powerful as our fears can be and as much as they can control our lives and the decisions we make in life that we have the power to overcome those fears.  All it takes is a bit of courage and the determination to do it; to overcome that which instilled extreme fear within ourselves but that which does not bring us joy or success or pleasure or evolution of our own selves as human beings.  

As with all other things it begins with an idea, an idea in our head that we no longer want to be controlled by fear but that we want to explore the world around us and our inner selves beyond the limits that our fears create for us.  So coming around full circle perhaps it is necessary for us all to learn the ease with which we can overcome our fears and that when we allow our fears to govern our thoughts, our emotions, our decisions and our actions we are not meeting our full potential as human beings. In essence we need to accept and embrace that 'fear profits a man, or a woman, nothing'! 

While those who now blindly choose fear to govern their emotions, their prejudices, their hatreds, who they associate with and their daily lives may live among us it is absolutely our responsibility to NOT allow our fears to govern us in similar ways.  It's up to us to be stronger than that and to come together in an agreement that we will NOT allow fear to govern us but will go forth together in exploration of this world, and The Universe, we live in so that humanity can grow and evolve into what we who are awake and aware faithfully  and passionately believe it can be; a place of equality for all, justice for all, prosperity for all and freedom for all.

Namaste and remember to face your fears; we all have the courage to do so, we simply must trust ourselves because we are all much stronger than we believe we are.

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: GETTING TO KNOW YOU

CITIZENS OF PLANET EARTH UNITE: GETTING TO KNOW YOU: This is my first entry into this new blog titled 'Citizens of the Planet Earth Unite'.  I am starting this blog at the urging of ...

GETTING TO KNOW YOU

This is my first entry into this new blog titled 'Citizens of the Planet Earth Unite'.  I am starting this blog at the urging of a Facebook friend to write and to share some of my ideas with the world.  He did not mean to say that 'I' have something to share but that how I choose to view the world, humanity, is shared by many others and it's incumbent upon me to verbalize it.

And so here we go.  

In today's social-political climate in the United States it feels difficult to maintain any faith that all will end well.  The current presidential election has shown how divided this country really is in a very public and real way.  There appears to be a lot of anger, a lot of angst, a lot of fear and a lot of unfettered emotions raging between us Americans that is being aired for the entire world to see on social media and in the news media.  The amount of fear fueled hatred that is being expressed by many as they heatedly discuss the candidate of their personal choice is very disheartening and is also a bit daunting. 

In so many ways the people of this country have evolved when compared to the past where racism, sexism, xenophobia and white male dominance ruled our country without question and without being challenged.  It has historically been a Caucasian, Christian man's world and in some ways it still is but things have improved for some segments of society in some ways.  In spite of the 'little' improvement that has taken place there is much work to be done if we are to ever become the world leader and magnificent country that so many of us passionately claim that we are.  To be clear this country, America, is a great country BUT not the greatest because if this world is to evolve into a place where all can thrive and live in peace we have got to stop quantifying how great one country is compared to others.  This unrelenting need to prove to the rest of the world that we here in America are the best of the best of all people's on planet earth has run it's course.  Today we are viewed, no doubt, as being arrogant, feeling that we are above common courtesy and/or morality, greedy and unable to come together as one country that truly believes in liberty and justice for all. Some may take these words as 'America bashing' however anyone with any intelligence or common sense can tell you that you can't change what you don't acknowledge; so to me acknowledging our arrogance, our greed, our propensity for xenophobia and racist driven views is the first step to coming together in a more productive, accepting, inviting and leader-like way.

There is much wisdom in the world, both past and present, that all citizens of the world can embrace and embody in our everyday lives.  One of the wisest and most change inspiring quotes comes from Mahatma Gandhi a great leader who literally helped free his fellow Indian people from British subjugation and rule; who accomplished such a great and daunting task through peaceful protest but mostly through UNITY.  Gandhi gave us many wise, wonderful and very useful words that today still carry power and grace in them.  One of the most quoted phrases from Gandhi, 'Be the change that you wish to see in the world', is claimed by some to have been paraphrased from this actual statement attributed to him, "If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. ... We need not wait to see what others do.”  In my mind it really doesn't matter what the actual words were but what the overall sentiment behind them is.  When I read both statements they make equal sense and bear equal weight in value and worthiness of adopting as a way of being oneself.

In a nutshell when it all comes down to it, in my personal opinion, it is incumbent upon every single one of us to 'be the change' that we want to see in our world, in our country, in our community, in our social circle and in our family.  The understandable angst and trepidation that we may each feel when faced with some of the heinous, horrific and completely nonsensical events that have occurred around the world cannot force us to feel as if we are surrounded by hateful, racist, sexist, xenophobic and dangerous people.  We must come to terms with the fact that what we see, or even what we experience, in the world today is not all that is happening in the world today and therefore we can't allow ourselves to be overwhelmed or lose our faith in humanity.

We are ALL human beings.  We ALL share the same DNA.  We ALL share the same origin.

We who are 'aware' and who are 'awake' cannot be dragged down into a cesspool of hatred, mistrust and xenophobia.  We who are aware and awake have a responsibility to the rest of the world.  We must live as loudly and as unwaveringly as we possibly can in that we MUST be 'more' accepting of others, we MUST be 'more' loving of others, we MUST be 'more' compassionate, we MUST be 'more' tolerant of the beliefs of others, we Must be 'more' accepting of those who are different than ourselves and perhaps most of all we MUST be 'MORE' willing to ignore the hatred, the racism and the xenophobia that now exists in the world because the more we give it our attention the more power we are giving it.

WE can out-love, out-trust and out-unite those who choose isolationism over unity of humankind.  So please in your daily lives remember to not be drawn into hatred or disharmony but instead love and treat thy neighbor as you would have your neighbor love and treat you and your family.  Peace is possible; but it will never exist in actuality if we don't believe it and live it.

Namaste my fellow citizens of planet earth may your day be as wonderful and as loving as you are.