Perfection
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on January 24, 2012
Perfection is in the practice. ~ Alice the Canine Messiah
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Lay Around the Shanty Momma…
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on January 13, 2012
“The funny thing about enlightenment is that when it is authentic, there is no one to claim it.” ~ Adyashanti
No one, including followers. ~ Alice the Canine Messiah
Days and Numbers
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on January 13, 2012
Everyone’s days are numbered Gregory. The lesson in this, again, is not to compare stories so that you dwell upon whose story is worse. The Opportunity is to live as though This Here Now is what your Time is for; to demonstrate your ideas of Humanity, of morality and Love, of how it might go if Heaven really is a place.” ~ Alice the Canine Messiah
Finding God in the Runoff
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on January 11, 2012
Makes you wonder doesn’t it? If thoughts can do that to water, imagine what our thoughts can do to… *
Recently an online friend posted a few more links in a rather turbulent stream of information about our world that alarms and angers her. It’s a fairly endless list, for it seems to some that at life’s every turn we are faced with bad things. There are bad people and companies putting bad things into our products, and even if we don’t use these products the bad ingredients are still getting into our water supply, thus jeopardizing us all. Besides wringing our hands, losing sleep, getting angry and demanding that other people change their ways, what are we to do in our modern world?
The day before these links were posted I had co-presented Looking Again at Unity as guest speaker at a Unitarian Universalist service. The essence is simply to Look Again at one’s world for a dozen weeks or so thru a chosen lens of Unifying Vision, wherein one sees One Thing at every turn – One infinitely, mysteriously, diverse Thing. The One Exercise™ advocates for nearly everyone’s spirituality or professed lack thereof, for all of our stories begin with one thing, being or event, and they all indicate a return to some sense of this original one. Further, every story I am aware of indicates that we currently are ‘all one’ in some fashion. The scientists are in cahoots on all of this as well.
Our exercise in Unifying Vision can be seen as putting down the mythological fruit that affords one the knowledge of good and evil. Thus The One Exercise is about pretending a vision of faith in the relentless presence of God, for when we pre-tend things with sincerity we eventually find ourselves tending to them. Gardens are a wonderful example of this, where we pre-tend in the planning, the prep, the planting and nurturing. In time we find ourselves tending to the envisioned patch of flowers, or perhaps vegetables.
As I contemplated my friend’s links in the wake of our presentation it occurred to me that it could easily have been titled Finding God in the Ingredients, or perhaps …in the Runoff. For if one puts down the mythological fruit one cannot possibly be aware of a duality such as ‘bad vs good’ ingredients. And once the fruit is relinquished we are allowed a most profound choice: If it is all One Thing, then what One Thing is it? Is it all good, or all bad? All God or all Devil; all Heaven or all Hell?
And so my comment to the call for alarm, anger and action was this: “I just figure those little particles are angels, instead of devils. Perspective can be creative y’know, and the Universe works in mysterious ways…”
And I was pleased when someone followed my comment with a direct reference to Dr. Masaru Emoto’s work with the effects of thought/intent on water. For indeed it is worthy of wonder that if our thoughts and intentions can so immediately and profoundly affect water, what might thought and intent do to all of the things in our world, to the things that we put on and in our bodies, and the things that find their way into our water?
And we need not rely solely on Dr. Emoto for a suggestion, for it has long been known that What We See is What We Get. Vision is creative. Indeed it is the foundation of creation for nothing begins without a vision, nor does anything maintain creative momentum in the absence of vision. This fact is echoed by quantum physicists of both the practical and theoretical persuasion, and Dr. Norman Vincent Peale went on for years about the creative power of positive thinking. Artists, leaders, and visionaries of all sorts know and demonstrate this. And so on.
The point is not one of right or wrong. It is rather that life at every turn presents an opportunity for either Absoulute Faith or Relative Faith. Absoulute Faith is faith underscored by faith, whereas Relative Faith is faith underscored by doubt. What sort of Faith do I have in the creative ability of my vision? …in the vision of the Grand Creator, the One source in which I find myself always Now immersed? Really, is God worthy of all this doubt and suspicion?
Indeed this is the big question of faith, and so I will close today as we closed out an hour of Looking Again at Unity on Sunday, with some fresh Now lyrics to the song Swing Low Sweet Chariot. We prefer to sing
I look over Jordan and what do I see? Comin’ for to carry me home…
A band of angels all around me. Comin’ for to carry me home
I did not look in the past, and I did not long ago see a group of alien angels who I hope will one day soon arrive to rescue me from this mess of people, products and place. Because personally I don’t wonder anymore what becomes of a world wherein one walks in Absoulute Faith. I find angels at every turn as I find God in the ingredients – in every fellow being, every tree and twig, every car and catamaran, and yes even in the runoff from the activities within the Garden…
____
* From the movie What the Bleep Do We Know? Copyright © 2004 Lord of the Wind Films, LLC; all rights reserved
Happy Now Year
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on December 31, 2011
2012.
You have longed for it. You have wished for it, and you have wishes for it.
Here it is.
May you find that it is precisely what you have wished for, and may you find yourself always speaking kindly of the Present, the Gift of a Lifetime, with gratitude.
At least around Alice and I.
And remember, we have cookies…
Best of Now, always,
Alice and I
Cheer, Beer and the Holiday News
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on December 17, 2011
SAD, or seasonal affective disorder, refers to episodes of depression that occur at certain times of the year. Although the condition is not strictly confined to winter, the darker months are most commonly associated with SAD, with symptoms beginning in autumn. There seems to be general medical consensus that people facing long winter nights are at greater risk for SAD. Treatment suggestions include light therapy, long walks during daylight hours, exercise, and maintaining social activity.
I’ve known about SAD for awhile and never given it much thought. This year though, after a few journeys into the energy of the American holiday landscape, Alice and I began to reflect on some of our annual autumn cultural choices. That’s how SAD got into the conversation. As always Alice brings unique new insights regarding simple proactive choices we can make to keep the holidays genuinely cheerful, and SAD a non-issue in the lives of those so inclined.
* * *
“Alice, I’ve been wondering about this behavioral shift I see in people at this time of year on the roads and in the parking lots. Especially in the parking lots! People seem to lose whatever sense of courtesy and consideration they have otherwise. It’s counterintuitive considering the fact that we’re heading into the Holiday season, theoretically infused with good will and cheer. Yet the very opposite is this persistent annual phenomena.”
It is not entirely a surprise Gregory. As we move into autumn the darkness becomes more prevalent. This natural reduction in daylight exposure is known to affect many humans in the form of depression.
“Yup. They call it SAD. Seasonal affective disorder.”
Yes. And for some reason your culture chooses to aggravate the effect by moving your clocks back one hour in the fall, plunging yourselves into the darkness of evening that much earlier than you’ve been accustomed to.
“You know I’d been thinking that might somehow have something to do with it. It does seem rather backwards to bring the darkness on so early in the day. Makes sense that it would further magnify the depression.”
Indeed. And then your culture piles on more depression.
“More depression? How so?”
Do you listen to the news much, Gregory?
She knows I don’t. “You know I don’t.”
Precisely. It’s primarily depressing. And right now it’s all about the economy and joblessness and fear and fear and fear. It’s a relentless, depressing soundtrack that accompanies a persistent insinuation that you must buy, buy, buy to be happy. This impossible but clearly perceived social expectation piles on the fear and attendant depression for many of you precisely because of the economy and joblessness. Your media is fascinated with miserable, depressing news and if anything exhibit a tendency to ratchet up the flow at this time of year. And it’s all brought to you by the folks with the products that can make you happy. It’s interesting, to say the least.
“It’s kind of stinky, really. But I suppose they’re doing the best they know how to. And someone must be paying attention, fueling the supply.”
Indeed. Someone’s listening alright. The day humans walk away from it; the day you actually choose what you claim to want… well, that’ll be a fun day to be around.
“I reckon.”
There’s more.
“There is?”
Do you drink much, Gregory?
Every now and then. “You know I don’t, Alice.”
Of course you don’t. It’s depressing. Alcohol is a depressant. And yet alcohol is the accepted – even encouraged – complement to what your culture calls holiday ‘cheer’. You toast each other’s cheer with a depressant! Think about it.
And this is year round really, this human tendency to associate enhanced enjoyment with the consumption of depressants. This is strange enough, but perhaps an even more questionable custom for entering the darkest time of year.
Interesting, as always. And, as always, Alice brings light to the subject for with Alice there is no duality of Problem needing Solution. In Unity there is only Opportunity.
I tell you these things Gregory to point to the Opportunity. The seasonal variation in daylight is something you’ll always be subjected to in your part of the world. And as long as your culture chooses to manipulate the clock as it does you will be bound to keep appointments according to common time.
But humans are free to choose, Gregory, as always. The change of the clocks need not change one’s habits with respect to sleeping and arising, except by choice. In this sense time belongs to each of you.
And one can choose – as you already do – to keep the culture’s warped idea of useful information in its proper place.
She’s right, as usual. It always comes down to choice, and the most productive choices are made in the light of increased awareness of the consumed. It makes no difference if it’s news, alcohol, daylight or whatever – to a huge degree I am gifted the ability to choose how I will avail myself of these and all things. I can go to bed when I choose and get up when I choose. I can listen to whatever I choose.
“And I can toast with ginger ale, huh Alice?”
Yup. You can toast with ginger ale, Gregory.
Alice-isms…
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on December 17, 2011
When you finally come to understand that it is you, Gregory, taking yourself on this ride that is a LifeTime - that every fellow player joins in only at your scripting, no matter the kindness or severity of their character and role – then you are free.
Alice the Canine Messiah
What About the 99?
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on November 19, 2011
I must say that I am both amused by and rather tired of the position of the so-called “Occupy” movement. First of all I wonder about the motives of any sort of thought process that implies that since I am not one of the wealthiest One Percent in my country then I must have some sort of problem with Them and how They are conducting themselves. It is further implied that I am one of the 99% and that I am not safe, nor should I be happy about my current condition or my future prospects.
But I have to ask a question. Let’s imagine that 100 people come together and supposedly dedicate themselves to a supposedly common goal. Many decades go by and one day a small handful of the members sit down in protest. They begin to claim that the effort is going poorly in that the outcome is favoring a very small number of the group’s members. In fact, they say, only 1 member of the group is truly realizing the common goal.
This small group also claims that this 1 member out of 100 is responsible for the entire group of 100 having gone astray. This 1 member absolutely must change their ways, or the remaining 99 are doomed.
Alice and I were chatting about this the other day and she observed, in her usual wry manner…
I am well aware, Gregory, what these ‘Occupy’ folks think that this sort of analysis says about the 1 percent of your United States. What I wonder though is if they have ever considered what exactly they are saying about the remaining 99.
**
No, Alice, I don’t believe that 1 person can lead 99 against their will. I don’t believe that 1 person can dupe the other 99 into believing that one thing is happening when really something else is. I suppose I give more credit than that to my 98 brothers and sisters.
I believe that the only ones who need to evolve their ideas, goals, behavior, etc are the small group who keep telling us that we are miserable; the small group who keep telling us that if someone else will only do thus and such our lives will be better, later.
You know who you are, and it just doesn’t jive…
Greg Allen Morgoglione
Albemarle County, VA
11-19-11
Listen Local Challenge 2011
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on November 10, 2011
The world is collapsing around our ears.
I turned up the radio but I can’t hear it…
R.E.M.
On a recent drive I phoned a request for a friend’s music to an NPR station’s acoustic show. The announcer introduced the song with “We don’t get enough requests for local music”. She then mispronounced the artist’s hometown. And it occurred to me, as it has time and again, that they don’t get enough requests because they demonstrate embarrassingly little interest in local music. They know precious little about and don’t seem terribly bothered to explore or promote local to the degree that they do traditional trucked-in fare. It’s why I haven’t been a supporter for awhile.
“Trucked-in fare.” I like the parallel. Writing from New York in a 2007 Time magazine article Eating Better Than Organic John Cloud wondered “How much Middle Eastern oil did it take to get that California apple to me?” I wonder the same thing about the endless stream of non-local musicians that our local stations and venues foist upon us – “How much oil does it take to bring them to our venues?” And “What sort of ‘oil’ lubricates their way to our airwaves at the expense of local producers?”
Cloud wonders “Which farmer should I support–the one who rejected pesticides in California or the one who was, in some romantic sense, a neighbor?” And I wonder about the fashion in which we might balance support for artists both local and not.
“Most important”, Cloud writes, “didn’t the apple’s taste suffer after the fruit was crated and refrigerated and jostled for thousands of miles?” Hmmm…
“Local” has been a point of wonder for me for quite some time now with respect to self-proclaimed community radio. In our area there are a host of stations – several NPR and a few that are not – all of which routinely solicit community funding. To the best of my knowledge they each obtain more than 50% of their operating funds locally. I’ve heard the NPR stations claim close to 60%.
”Why then,” I wonder, “is such a small percentage of the focus local?” I don’t know what it is, but I’m pretty certain it’s far less than 60%.
It’s not just local radio. Traditional and restaurant related music venues do it too, and the latter really got me to thinking about opportunity and wondering why the status quo is so routinely supported. I have been a regular customer at a new local establishment since I first learned of them this past spring. They bill themselves as “a local eatery”, an indicator of their commitment to buying locally produced food. But they bring in musicians from other areas, thus minimizing locally produced music. They bring in musicians that have to drive further; musicians that aren’t their neighbors; musicians that rarely if ever patronize their restaurant or any of their local clients’ local businesses. Hmmm… so that’s how this ‘local’ thing works, huh?
Some would argue that our area could claim a special wealth of musical talent and thus deserves a special consideration of local art. But I won’t because I don’t know about any special wealth. I’d venture a guess that in every area that has a “local” NPR station there are fine musicians producing fine cd’s that are barely if ever being played alongside the ‘imports’ that mostly originate in the corporate halls of the music business, indie or otherwise. And I’d bet that every area with live music venues of any sort has quite a bit of local musical talent being excluded in favor of those from afar.
Clarify: I’m not trying to exclude music from “out there”. I enjoy traveling “out there” with my music. I don’t think 60% of NPR programming should be local. I enjoy a nice mix. I’m wondering aloud about balance; about growth and evolution as an inclusive society. Perhaps I am alone in finding importance here, but the Nation in National Public Radio is made up of small communities, and I wonder why community stations keep foisting all things “out there” upon us as being somehow worthy of greater attention, promotion, and support.
Talk of the Nation recently posed a question about where listeners would focus NPR resources if they were appointed Foreign Bureau Chief. I would suggest refreshed focus on the communities that comprise this great nation, for this seems truly foreign to NPR. I’d suggest they explore apparent philosophical disconnects between funding and focus; income and interest.
I see a clear opportunity for financially challenged community supported stations by exploring the possible relationship between funding and focus. I see a parallel for the music venues as well, especially those restaurants that are capitalizing on music on the menu. It’s a “Listen Local Challenge” in the fashion of 2005’s “Eat Local Challenge”[1].
In a larger sense I’m wondering about the music system. John Cloud talks about the food system in his article, quoting ethnobotanist Gary Paul Nabhan’s 2002 memoir, Coming Home to Eat: The Pleasures and Politics of Local Foods. ”If you send it halfway around the world before it is eaten,” (Nabhan) mused, “an organic food still may be ‘good’ for the consumer, but is it ‘good’ for the food system?” I wonder about the music system’s recent years of implosive struggle and the relationship to this tenacious clinging to the status quo.
* *
I tried to sing along but damn that radio song.
Hey, hey, hey. Hey. Hey. Hey.
R.E.M.
The announcer that night knew little about my friend Tom, but I knew that she knows gobs about familiar foreign artists such as Richard Shindell. I guessed correctly that she was unaware that Richard was singing behind Tom on the song I’d requested. She was surprised – and grateful – to hear this when I called her back, and made a point to announce it at set’s end. She also corrected her mispronunciation of Schuyler, which someone else phoned in. I felt uncomfortable for her.
I have only a little bit of volunteer experience as an acoustic radio show host. I’m not pretending to know what it’s like to do it professionally. But I do know what it’s like to be a local musician who has worked long and hard at my craft, established relationships with talented musicians near and far, recorded high quality cd’s that include these musical friends, built local awareness, and performed over 1,000 gratis shows for community audiences unable to attend traditional venues. I know what it’s like to support ‘community’ radio financially and with volunteer hours. I know many local musicians who have done the same, and I know that until someone at these stations takes a genuinely inclusive interest in local music, we are doomed to exclusion by – and ignorance on the part of – local radio. And lest we forget, local radio is really all there is to national radio.
[1] Originally introduced in 2005 by Ecotrust, the Portland Farmers Market, Portland Chapter of the Chef’s Collaborative, Sauvie Island Organics, Celilo Groups Media, People’s Farmers Market and Plate & Pitchfork.
A Perspective of One in the Shadow of Twin Towers
Posted By Alice the Canine Messiah on September 11, 2011
“I appreciate you coming by and I’ll be sure to pass along your information. But don’t get your hopes up.” The nice silver-haired lady smiled nervously and continued. “We don’t usually invite anyone from outside of Unity to speak to our congregation.”
Outside of Unity… Out-side of Unity?!! I wanted to reflect on that for at least a split second but the words weren’t waiting for me. As I blurted out my observation I wondered if she had heard herself; if she had said this before. It seemed rather rehearsed.
“Well thank you,” I began. I was pleased to hear myself begin so graciously considering the degree to which I was stunned. I smiled warmly into my voice. “I sure hope you don’t mind me pointing out how funny that sounded. I am not personally aware of Unity having an outside. In fact that’s what the book and our presentation speak to: how to recognize this basic Gospel truth and live both from and into it in one’s day to day.”
Suffice it to say they never called.
**
Outside of Unity…
Those words have not left me in the year or so since this nice lady added them to the arsenal of ways in which to exclude the voice of an “outsider” from the discussion of effective religious actualization. I’m an outsider I suppose in the sense that I feel as though I am always in church.
Those three words also evoke the essence of a nagging question I formulated in childhood for the religious leaders as I knew them then: How can there be an outside to the pervasive Unity of which your most basic story speaks? How can there be an outside – an other – to Unity with God? Once I’d left the church and began to become familiar with ways other than Episcopalian the question evolved into a variety of forms based on the underlying theme: Why do professed non-dualists want to dual??
The answer, interestingly, is twofold. It is simply and inescapably true that there is nothing outside of Unity. It cannot be “over there”, nor “later”. There cannot be anything outside of Unity. Nothing. Period. Except whatever we choose to envision and declare. Once we envision and declare something outside of Unity in which we are trapped, we reason out a strategy to get back to Unity. Mythologically this belief and the resultant call to action are akin to the illusory sense of empowerment derived from eating the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. We have been gifted the Garden with no inherent knowledge of opposites struggling to overcome one another. That sort of divisive perspective is both available and avoidable.
And so for those who choose to ignore the caution and include the fruit as a dietary staple this divine Unity begins to look like non-Unity. Dualists begin to label ‘evil’ and ‘bad’, and begin to fear and imagine a need to overcome them The only way there can be an outside to Unity is to recognize and thus call into being the duality of opposites; the multiplicity of division. It is an option we were gifted while being cautioned against its engagement.
And for some interesting reason the divisive power of the fruit is a power relentlessly engaged by leaders of all persuasions. From parents, bosses, coaches and friends to civic, spiritual and religious leaders the starting point and maintained emphasis is so often on difference and division. And it’s a power that seems particularly invoked when we remember events such as 9/11/2001. Unity – or whatever the Good Thing is – is always a truth of the distant past, an immediate need, and a distant goal, for Unity has an outside and we are it. Divided we fall, and look at the mess we are mired in.
But the simple truth – of both science and the New Testament – is that we’re not falling, for we are neither Division nor Divided. We are Unity Diversified – the mysteriously interdependent community of a Universe of countless unique presentations of Being.
And while it is indeed mysterious and will always remain so, there is good news: this Unified Diversity can be just as easily observed as the currently defended division! It’s rather like choosing to see one World Trade Center instead of twin towers or a collection of many buildings. But in the larger context it goes beyond choice to encompass Faith. I learned today that an age-old word for the choice is repent, which simply means to turn around. As Alice the Canine Messiah says it the choice is simply to Look Again at one’s world; to adopt a fresh perspective. The Faith required is simple also, for it is Faith in the most basic aspect of every religious, spiritual and cultural story alive today: Unity. One Thing. Every story proceeds from One Thing, be it Allah, God, the Void or the Big Bang. They also return to One and all have embedded in them the mystical statement of Unity as current fact. In science it’s not considered mystical though.
And so one chooses to Look Again and engage a world of One. One proclaims and adopts Unifying Vision, just as for millennia we have agreed to Divisive Vision. The religious Look Again and see evidence of God everywhere, and their leaders point to it everywhere. And most importantly one maintains an attitude of Faith when the eyes appear to present anything but the presence of God. One begins to live the question “Where does God go in the horrific moments of our lives?” by learning to detect the inescapable presence. One imposes the peace that passes all understanding upon one’s doubtful little mind. This might also be seen as the Faith that requires no understanding…
For the most basic suggestion of God is “Trust me. Have Faith. Put down the fruit. I’ve got it covered. Even now in an hour that appears so inescapably dark. Even now. And again now…” And forevermore.
The most basic message of the cultural stories is Unity Here Now. Existence in Time, Here Now, is the Gift of the Garden. It is both the seat in the row, row, row your unique boat and the journey down the stream, and they are at once a Unity of dream and destination.
Likewise in the moment that we love an enemy or forgive a sinner recognition of this real-time sort of Unity is possible – but only if we allow such labels for people and gestures to dissolve into the Unifying Vision. In the presence of labels any sense of relief from loving or forgiving is short-lived for it is based upon a false sense of inequality wherein the ‘sinned against’ perceives himself as ‘rising above’ to forgive the ‘sinner’. Good and bad. Conflict and triumph. Duality. In the absence of labels a dual perspective does not arise and thus cannot be subtly validated.
Much as the founding principle of Unity has become a distant religious goal, here in America Equality has somehow become a distant social goal in spite of the fact that our most basic founding document proclaims immediate recognition of it. Theoretically this recognition and proclamation both set us apart from the world and united us as a nation, but practically we have ignored it. The recognition and declaration of inequality at every turn has ruled the vision of this country, and even our civil rights conversations today focus upon inequality at every turn. This is not necessarily surprising of course, for religion played a grand role in the founding of this country and Unity has been dangled like a carrot from a collar-stick for millennia. Equality has some catching up to do…
Most interestingly for me though is the persistent sense that our leaders simply do not want to hear from anyone promoting a Unifying Vision. The accepted societal basis for progressive discourse towards inclusion has something to do with exclusion, something to do with this idea of keeping some fellow beings outside of a very narrow sense of Unity. We can come in of course. But we have to eat a certain fruit first…