CHILDREN ARE FUNNY

What's funny about children?  Everything is funny about children. They play, they laugh, they hug, they kiss, they play more, and they cry when their bodies demand it.  They communicate with people, dogs, cats, butterflies, bees, stuffed toys, pillows and all so-called inanimate objects. 

They see things that we once saw but now tend to dismiss as not there.  They feel and sense things that we would feel too, if we slowed down and agreed to feel everything that was within and around us. 

The children, without being taught, care about everyone.  Until taught differently, they see no separation between others and themselves.  They own nothing.  It is not mine, it is ours.  They have no need to own stuff.  Only play with it, study it, or hug it

Children really are funny, in the most positive way.  They can laugh and cry, always coming from the same internal source of expression.  Simple expression.   Children really are us externalized.   Children are a constant example of what we really look like inside,, whether we call them our own, or they’re free range children running through our lives……. having no need for adult identities, a public self, desire to look good, impress anyone or have need to be right. 

Children are us, someone once told me.  Actually it was me that told me that. 

BEYOND DIAGNOSIS

If I diagnose you something, you come to believe something is wrong with you, and you need my help to be like me:....normal.   What is normal?  Was Christ normal?  Gandhi?  All the medicine women and men that live in jungles, reservations and cities?  Or Shamans?  Are Shamans normal?  What is normal?  A diagnosis labels you something that makes it easier for me to deal with you, 'cause you see things different than me.  And I can prescribe pills and medicines for you, so you stop sensing and hearing things that I do not sense or hear. 

Labeling children is a way to make them wrong.  That is what the educational system does around the world.  The expectation is that you will sit still, be quiet, raise your hand to go potty, and respect the authority...anyone but yourself.  If you want to move around, dance, sing, go outside, speak up, you are labeled.  That label sticks, and goes on your record, and you come to believe you are wrong.  You come to believe that others know better than you.  You grow up, become an adult person, and question yourself all the time, especially when "friends" find fault or judge you.  If you defend yourself, you are "in denial."  You are too defensive.  You are something other than wonderful 

The mental health systems generally needs to label you something.  Schools need to label you smart, dumb. need to improve, talk too much, or never quite good enough.  We learn this way of seeing people.  There are some people, that simply see people in a creative way, without  need to categorize or find a label for that person.

A diagnoses is a convenient way to make me feel comfortable around you....cause you see things differently or see more than I do.  We name call all the time.   Labeling, naming and diagnosing allow me to write you off based on the words, "She must be .....or he must be......or ...."
But, if I am aware I am doing this...I can release all my judgments, and labeling and then I can SEE you...who you are inside beyond your personality and behaviors.  If you kill someone, well, that is not good.  You may need to be put away somewhere.  But then, governments constantly send their armies to kill and bomb people they do not know or see.  
 
Who are those people that judge others to be crazy?   Does a uniform worn by an uniformed person justify destroying people and cities?   Who creates these labels for others?   Who is this human teacher sitting in a classroom making the children compete against each other, and deciding who is good and who is bad?  So, for now, what happens for me, if I decide to notice how I am judging people, and instead release them without my needing to box them in?  

The people most influential in my life, have been those who see who I am inside, despite my personality or weird behaviors?   No naming, labeling or diagnosing, allows me to simply be with you without having to neatly place you in some category. 

Part II of this lecture will come later.  But for now, I must take my wondrous self outside and harass people different from me...which is most of them.  I don't know why God created people so different from me.  Must have been a gross error on her part.  

A personal message to people of any age, gender, color, religion, political belief, or body type:   If you share your personal life with me in voice or written word, I assume you can share it because you know I hear you, your words are safe and respected.  There is a sacredness in the air.  It is not for me to agree or disagree with what you say.  It is for me to simply hear you, and speak only when invited.

If I share my personal life with you, I feel safe with you, meaning I know you will hold dear the stories or words I tell you, and what I might reveal could be spontaneous.  If I felt I was expected to, or should tell you things, or it is the social thing to do, I would keep my words silently sacred. 

Sharing my life with someone just because I think I am supposed to, and you will like me, or stay my friend, serves no one ever.  My job to myself and to you or the other, is to possibly feel uncomfortable, yet set an example of what it looks like to be available but not "trying" to have you like me. 

WHO ARE MY EYES?

Years ago, I sat down at my computer and learned to
leave my mind, and ask some force outside of me what
is happening, or what am I to pay attention to.  I first did this
20 years ago when I could not think of anyone outside myself
that would hear me.  So I asked some unknown force in the
universe.  I asked the question about my recent vision changes.
I thought to share the so-called dear God letter with you. 
This is it below.  I only get a response when I ask the right question. 
First time I have shared one of these letters. 

"I was wondering about my vision.  What is  my body
and my eyes, and my seeing and my vision asking?  What action can
I take to have clear vision, clear thought, clarity everywhere?
Who are my eyes?  Who is the seeing? 

May I know?  If I knew what my eyes were asking, what would
I know, see, hear, feel, sense?

Trust your senses now, more than your visual acuity.  Trust what you sense
with your body and tentacles.  Let your eyes see what they see.
You see everything beyond what you can make tangible.

all is well.  Your eyes are your "I,"  The I in you is fading in lieu of
the greater I, the world, the universal, what is outside your
contemplation and imagination.  The people around you are your eyes to the
everyday world.  Your senses are your eyes to what lies outside the everyday world, unseen, unknown, and unworldly.  Allow for all that you do not understand and sometimes fear. 

That is good.  You are good.  You are all you need to be.  You always have been.
Those who see you, see beyond the you seen by you.  Bring yourself to others and
leave you there without wandering or loss.   There is nothing to lose.
Only to feel, sense and absorb. 

This has always been true in the universe.  The universe is but a small fraction of what is to be found and discovered.  You are everything.  You are beyond love.". 

NEW WAY OF BEING

I think that we are moving toward, or have already entered into a way to shift our perception of what life is supposed to be, and how we fight it and succumb to it.  That shift comes on its own without work, struggle, outside people or forces.  That shift happens when we are ready to receive it.  Not a religion.  Not a program.  Not something we read.  That shift moves into our soul, mind, brain, body, awareness, as our ally, shadow of who we already are, and can now recognize as all of woman and mankind reminding us we are whole, complete and more than good enough, with no need to make wrong, anyone, anywhere. 

This shift is more than a thought, belief, teaching or practice.  We feel it.  We know it. We are transformed without need for identity or place in the world.  Knowing supplants
outside experts, information sources, affirmations from anyone anywhere.  We simply know, feel, sense and have no need to celebrate, as celebration is in silence and in the knowing, and consumes all our old doubts and thoughts and beliefs." 

Belief becomes who we are." 

WHAT IS SACRED?

Sacred is a big word, even a sacred word.  I used to believe that sacred things only happened  in churches, Mosques and temples, and among Native people,  usually in silence, and separate from everyday life.  The Sacred seemed to be reserved for special occasions,  and often in ceremonial fashion.

Then I wondered if sacred is a way of living each day and each hour with each relationship, every action, all the time, every moment.   Instead of "have a nice day," I could bring a sacred moment to each person I meet.  I could slow my sacred self down and make eye contact everywhere with everyone, all the time, as a way of life. 

I could intentionally "hold myself sacred enough" to slow down, notice, and "feel" when my thoughts and body are moving in a "busy-hurried" way, then switch to a calm, sacred inner silence, continuing the same action, but without the hurry, busyness and disconnect from people and life around me, including being out of my own body disengaged from myself.    

To actually practice sacred, I must make a conscious decision that being out of sacred, serves no one, perpetuates disconnect, and brings a feeling of isolation. Sacred requires awareness, a new language, and allowance for silence

I can define sacred as being totally present, or at least knowing when I am not present.  In noticing myseslf NOT being present,  I am being present.  If I didn't use the word sacred, I would simply be it.