The deeper one travels along the path of meditation and mindfulness, the more one becomes aware of the workings of the mind.  The mind is responsible for how we relate to reality.  It is the home of our perceptions, the interpreter of our senses and sensations, the vehicle of our memories, and the tool we use to solve problems.  It is also the engine of our awareness, but paradoxically,...

  One of the great benefits of the isolation brought on by the COVID pandemic was more time spent at home.  A year or so ago when the shelter-in-place order was given in our state, I decided to use the confinement to finish my basement. We had moved into a wreck of a house which we had rehabbed over the course of the previous summer, not moving in until early fall.  The basement was an even...

  Although originally credited to George Santayana and later popularized by Winston Churchill, the admonition “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it” is as timely now as ever. As we take the first baby steps into this new Aquarian age of change and rebirth, I can’t help but notice how desperately we humans want to cling to the past.  The entire narrative surrounding...

  About a year or so ago, I enlisted in the worldwide movement to avoid contracting and/or spreading the Corona Virus (affectionately known as COVID-19).  A big fan of medical thriller author, Robin Cook, I had read Outbreak, Pandemic, The Andromeda Strain, and others, so I knew to take this sh-t seriously. As a self-anointed lay expert in the spread of disease, I adhered to every known CDC...

  Mid-November marks the advent of the holiday season in the US and many western cultures.  In the US, the third Thursday in November is our celebration of Thanksgiving, a holiday rooted in our Native American heritage and dedicated to giving thanks to the Great Spirit for the bounty of the harvest which will sustain us through the long, harsh winter. This year, we had planned to host the...

  What is reality, exactly?  Some common definitions might include “the truth,” “the everyday,” or “actuality.”  Most people consider reality an absolute.  We assume that every human who bears witness to the same event or circumstance will interpret said situation identically and have a reaction equal to the reaction of everyone else.  Of course, this could not be further from the truth. ...

  I was listening to a meditation the other day which featured the affirmation “I trust what the future holds for me,” and it occurred that I didn’t necessarily believe what I was repeating. Western society has taught us that adopting a reactive posture to life is a bad thing.  We are urged to be proactive, to get ahead of problems and issues, to flatten the curve, to ride out in front of...

  If it were possible to set a DVR and record all the thoughts one thinks during the day, then sit down that evening and playback the video, I believe all would be surprised by the negativity we’d witness. During those idle moments when our thoughts are allowed free reign to wander, the first-place attention wants to drift is toward our problems and all we perceive to be wrong in our...

  While listening to the Shaltazar message It Just Doesn’t Matter, it occurred to me the great cosmic purpose behind COVID-19 and the global interruption to all that we know and have grown accustomed to as “normality” might well be by design as the cosmos works to realign our priorities. We have become a planet beholden to economics where finances, money, profit, and greed are the driving...

  Given the circumstances of recent times, it seems quite apparent the universe is focusing our attention on our collective divisiveness, accentuating the many differences that exist between the humans currently sharing this planet.  But to what end? It seems possible what we are witnessing is another Divine paradox – that by shining a light on our disparities we might learn to recognize...