Tag Archives: meditate

Gabriel’s Messages – available to all souls!

“Gabriel’s Messages” opened my heart to so many truths not only about life but of the transition of death, and I hope that others can read this wonderful book by my friend, Cyndi Smith, a fellow member of the Center for Contemporary Mysticism of Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia.

It offers hope to a world that seems so weary about bad news for it predicts a new order of things 25 years from now. For instance, a “food tax” will be developed and help to send food to all corners of the world to end hunger; fossil fuels will no longer be used and be replaced by battery power or renewable energy. and medicine will become universal – we will be able to see any doctor in any part of the world.

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Awakening to sounds of the outdoors again

I got a new pair of hearing aids, and a new world of sounds has opened for me!

I wore ‘em outdoors during a walk on my 10,000-steps-a-day journey, and the first thing I noticed was the sound of birds chirping merrily in the trees I walked under. They had to have been communicating with each other because as soon as one stopped chirping, another one seemed to follow up in response.

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Guided meditation calms Covid concerns

Mindfulness meditation has awakened within me.

I am once again being guided by my good friend and co-founder of the Center for Contemporary Mysticism, Joe Irwin a former church pastor.

———— Continue reading →

Veterans Day Tribute from Conshohocken!

I have been honored this Veterans Day through a recorded interview about my book on the Vietnam War for a program called “Good Morning Conshy” where I share the broadcast with two companion pet managers for what is known as PACT. Many of the animals had assisted veterans who could no longer care for their pets and needed help for animals they viewed as their children.

We all had contacts with Conshohocken, a small borough just outside of Philadelphia, and learned that the interview would be recorded and made available on U-Tube. Watching it, I noticed how white-faced I look after recovering from a stomach illness. I am glad I wore my “boonie hat” that I had saved from the Vietnam War. It shows one silver bar that was subdued to prevent the enemy from spotting an officer. I wore it only once before and that was at Omega Institute at a five-day meditation retreat for veterans with PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.)

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Korea calling me to seek answers within

Korea awaits me next week as I travel more than a thousand miles to find myself and discover reasons why I am still here on planet earth.

Yes, I’m joining a group from Philadelphia, New York and Chicago that will fly to Seoul, South Korea, to take part in the centennial celebration of the WON Buddhism founding by its master on April 28th, 1916. Continue reading →

Weight loss found in lightening myself & I

One doesn’t have to go on a diet to lose the excess weight of a lifetime of living. All you need do is to lighten your mind, get rid of burdens carried from childhood when the trauma of difficulties and missteps caused you to stumble and lose faith in your God-given direction.

“Lighten up,” is what someone told me once, and that is exactly what I have tried to do after experiencing Holotropic BreathWork  and listening to the new “Weight Loss” meditation offered by Oprah Winfrey and Deepak Chopra today. My struggle has ended and from now on, I will be harmony with me, myself and I. Continue reading →

Calm the wandering mind & feel happiness

A wandering mind is an unhappy mind.

Don’t take my word for it. Scientific research has discovered that the active conditions of anxiety and agitation causes unhappiness. Becoming quiet and stilling the mind lowers blood pressure and relieves the stress that’s produced in our busy lives. Continue reading →

Journey into self opens possibilities for me

I manifested as an African American riding a horse as a cowboy in the old American West.

Next, I felt the chains on my legs as I rowed in a galley ship as a Greek slave in a land governed by the Romans in some year BC.

Sand. Lots of sand with its rich mixture of roughness and tan properties became my next existence.

That was followed by my essence being made up as a piece of glass. A clear glass with a tint of green like the old-fashioned Coca Cola bottles.

Finally I envisioned myself turning into a Soldier of Love with healing powers I never knew existed. Continue reading →

Nothing has helped my back pains now

I felt nothing this morning.

For the past five days, nothing greeted me when I got out of bed.

There was no ache, no pain, no reminder of how bad my back has become after so many years of walking, running and standing on this earth. Not to mention, jumping out of an airplane five times, landing badly my first parachute jump and hiding it from the military instructor who would have kicked me out of jump school had he suspected I injured myself. Continue reading →

Peace shared throughout the world today

“What am I doing here?” I asked myself as I sat in a cushioned chair with some 50 other people early this morning on the last day of 2015. I was here at the invitation of a woman I hardly knew, a minister, that enticed me to join the world in a planet-wide prayer for peace. Continue reading →

Meditation reflections help heal the worst

Reflections opened a new world of understanding today. Years after a traumatic event, I can look back and see things in a totally different and healing fashion.

I couldn’t do it when the shit was happening. It hurt too much.

Even five or ten years after the trauma, I’d get sweaty palms and a sped-up heartbeat when thinking about the worst day of my life. I couldn’t dwell for too long without having to relive the God-awful experience. Continue reading →

What I Believe Makes Me Who I Am

Who am I? What do I believe? And, can I name a few of my beliefs?

Let me name a few things I believe about myself. They’re in no particular order. Continue reading →

What I believe will enhance my life forever

I believe that all of us are placed on this earth for a purpose, and the aim for us in life is to find out what that purpose is!

We don’t usually seek the answer right away. Most put it off until some calamity forces us to find answers to life’s most important questions. Why am I here? Why am I in this body? Who am I, really? Continue reading →

Taps by my Emotional Freedom Technique

If you haven’t tried it, you ought to Google “EFT” and see if such a technique could help with whatever might ail you today!

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Opening myself through group awareness

I grew when meeting four people Monday who helped me expand my consciousness in ways I had never knew existed before. Someone introduced me to the Fifth Dimension, while another invited me to a New Age exhibition in Bucks County where light-workers of all shapes and sizes would introduce newbies like me to new and exciting pathways to Nirvana. Continue reading →

The ‘Wisdom I was Born With” is in you

When I write, I try to tap into the child within. I try to “feel” something that I can share with another, be it humorous, educational or shocking. I have stories to tell from my past that brought me to this point, and I think they may help another to feel what I feel and to take action even if that action is simply to refrain from acting or even thinking.

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Open yourself to hear the Universe speak

Listen to what the Universe is saying. It may speak to you in ways you might not understand unless you’re open to all means of communication. Continue reading →

All senses call out to me when meditating

Meditate mind

Closing my eyes, I open all my senses to group meditation!

The smell of lavender and a hint of myrrh greet me as I walk into the meditation room. I had not expected my sense of smell to be the first one to experience such a warm and inviting welcome. I should not have been surprised. The olfactory system is the first sensory organ I usually use, and I’m not too proud to state I am usually lead by the nose. Continue reading →

Calling all ‘Spiritual Soldiers of Fortune’

I believe that I have become a “spiritual soldier of fortune” and would travel anywhere my heart beckons me to learn, to pray, and to find answers about the universe.

I got an inkling of this calling when I was a teenager. It came about when I was 18, just out of high school, and experimenting with grass and LSD. Timothy Leary enticed me with his message in the 1960s, advising all to “turn on, tune in and drop out.” I turned on and tuned into the message, but couldn’t afford to drop out because I was from a working-class family that saw work as a way out of poverty and into the middle class. Continue reading →

Touched by an Angel to Help Guide Others

Angels can perform magic if we open ourselves to ’em! Continue reading →

Science Supports the Law of Attraction

If you didn’t know it by now, science supports the claims made by Abraham about the Law of Attraction and how it could help revitalize your life from this moment on.

That’s the word I got attending a workshop when a physicist met with Esther Hicks and explained how aligning with the Source, rather than resisting it, is based on the law of physics. “We knew that,” Abraham said speaking through Esther Hicks. Undaunted, the young man of science said that he realized it only after studying what the Law prescribes for all mankind. Align yourself with what you truly want in life and keep positive thoughts on achieving your heart’s desire. If you can imagine that happiness your achievement will provide, start with feeling that happiness now. Don’t wait for a result. Feel it in your gut, yor marrow, your very soul. Continue reading →

Meditation helps the Law of Attraction

“You don’t need to work when you are meditating,” Abraham told a young woman who was called to the stage to question the spirits about issues she was facing Saturday. She was among some 15 persons who shared the “hot seat” at the Renaissance Hotel near Philadelphia’s International Airport for a workshop.

The message resonated with me and I hope everyone of the more than 500 in attendance took it in and will try the 15-minute exercise once a day to see how easier it can be to get in touch with the Source energy within. Continue reading →

Gifts from within that we all might share

Ever wonder what you can do to be more like the person you always aspired to be? You know, the one you hoped you would grow up to be, but didn’t get the chance because life seemed to hit you upside your head and throw you off course? Continue reading →

Love is the only gift I can bestow on you!

What gifts can I offer the world today? What insight, wisdom, or thought could I bestow on others seeking the healing we need for our mutual pain and suffering?

I am no psychic. I’ve never seen an angel or felt the tingling sensation from a spirit wanting to use me to provide a message or a sign. I’m no medium. Continue reading →

Please take me back my love; I need you so!

I miss you. My God, how I have missed you!

It feels like forever since we’ve been together.

I’m sorry. Please forgive me. I know that it’s my fault. I walked out on you believing I could get along without you, without your guidance without your help. Without your love . . . Continue reading →

Do no harm and happiness will flow freely

First, do no harm.

This quote from a famous Greek of antiquity could be the basis for a new Golden Rule for the Road. Continue reading →

State of Our Spiritual Union is Flourishing

The State of Our Spiritual Union is flourishing.

Seeds planted in the 1960s have flowered, and the Age of Aquarius has finally dawned on the world, awakening many of us to a new way of living, a new way of forgiving. The first signs of this new enlightenment began in the 1990s as the Berlin Wall fell, God revealed secrets in the Celestial Prophecy and the mystical Wisdom of Kabbalah was made known to non-Jews and all women, regardless of age or religious backgrounds. Continue reading →

What is awakening my senses now-a-days?

I got hit upside the head today.

Next, the sweet fragrance of roses mixed with just a slight tinge of oranges enticed my senses while meditating.

This followed the experience yesterday of missing keys mysteriously reappearing as I puzzled through my new life journey of “unnatural” awareness.

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Mystery key opens door to new adventure

A spirit touched me today. Or, rather, the spirit touched the pair of jeans I had worn the day before and left on a chair after removing them before going to sleep. When I awoke and put the jeans back on, I got the surprise of my life. Continue reading →

Healing others starts first with healing self

The guru then made the following announcement, quoting the feminine deity: Moor Jani:

We all have the capacity to heal ourselves as well as facilitate the healing of others. When we get in touch with that infinite place within us where we are Whole, then illness can’t remain in the body. And because we’re all connected, there’s no reason why one person’s state of wellness can’t touch others. Elevating them and triggering their recovery. And when we heal others, we also heal ourselves and our planet.

 There is no separation except in our own minds.

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Ithaca Mystical Insights — by Contoveros

An Odyssey begins and ends with a mystical adventure that finally takes you back to the home within. Follow the path to Ithaca for insights!

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As stress keeps arising, meditation caps it

Someday I may just get my stress under control.

And like Buddy Holly once said: “That’ll be the day . . . that I die.” Continue reading →

At least, no one is shooting at me this time

(See Part One, “Cancer strikes . . .)

The train ride from home to the hospital was one of the longest trips of my life. I just knew I was going to die. I figured that the surgeon could not remove all the cancer during my operation 10 days earlier, and it finally struck me: I am a cancer victim!

The doctor never called me with the results from the operation in the Veterans Hospital of Philadelphia. I spent five days and four nights there, mostly recuperating from the surgery. When I left, I had hoped to hear from the physician, but  she didn’t call. I believed she was afraid to give me the bad news over the phone. Continue reading →

Riding high on the back of an amazon.com

Simply knowing that I wrote a book is one helluva experience.

Seeing it on amazon.com is breath-taking! Continue reading →

Ups & downs of life provide me lessons

When you’re down and feel like nothing, God is usually up to something just for you.

That’s a saying on a church sign outside of Philadelphia hat I edited and slightly changed and can safely say is now mine. Continue reading →

Ithaca Insights serve up peace & calm

How may I serve you?

 That’s the key to a happy life, you know. Learning to serve others selflessly with no expectation of a reward other than the knowledge you are doing unto others something you’d want them to do . . . unto everyone else.

Continue reading →

Meditate first and foremost each day!

What a surprise!

I expected to try to get through the day today without my morning cup of meditation-offering from Deepak & Oprah. I figured the 21-day journey had ended yesterday, August 31st. Yet today, the American holiday called “Labor Day,” they gave us a gift — an extra day. And boy, did I need it. Continue reading →

Francis of Assisi; awakening him by a novel

I am about to be an author!

Well, a “published” author, that is . . .

I just learned that my book about Francis of Assisi, a historic novel, will be available at Amazon sometime in the next two months, September and October (2014). Writing it was a true labor of love. I mixed in Catholicism with Sufism and lots of Buddhism. I also introduced Francis, aka Giovanni di Bernadone, his real name by the way, to the Wisdom of Kabbalah and a belief in what I call “angel therapy.” Continue reading →

‘Do’s’ and ‘Don’t’s’ of Radiating Wisdom

 Today’s meditation showed us that we all have a profound and innate wisdom. How have you experienced this in your life? Write about a time that you spontaneously said the right thing at the right time to someone. What did that communication feel like for you? — Deepak & Oprah 21-day Meditation Experience.

As I struggle to come up with a satisfactory answer for this question, let me focus instead on what Deepak had quoted William Blake as saying in reference to wisdom. Wisdom is “organized innocence.” What a concept! In order to have or to cultivate wisdom, I know that I must be in awe of something; I must see that thing with wonder, with the eyes of an innocent child. Continue reading →

The Enlightenment of a Dharma Listener

I’m down to just two more days now . . . Two more days in which to become enlightened through the 21-Day Meditation Experience of Deepak & Oprah. Today is the 20th Day. Tomorrow, I’m afraid, it will end for me and you.

No matter what happens though, I’ve been exposed to what Buddhists called the Dharma. That is, the “teachings” of meditation by Siddhartha Gotama, the person most of us call the “Buddha.”

It reminds me of a story I heard recently. It’s about a frog. Continue reading →

Writing heats up; twice blesses me & you

I am hot. I feel like I have a fever . . . A fever that pulses through me for the past several weeks. It seems this fever entered my bloodstream just about the same time as I started doing twice-a-day meditations with Deepak and Oprah for a 21-day Meditation Experience. Writing in the journal has added to the mix. Continue reading →

Journey Propels Me to the Lower World

I couldn’t wait for the instructor to finish her directions for my latest journey to the lower world. As soon as I closed my eyes, I felt a presence come into my awareness. I could hear my Reiki teacher, Angie, talking in her special “guide”s” voice, and I knew that my good friend Melanie was as attentive as I was the first time this Shamanic guide talked me into seeing a new reality, a new world.

Melanie sat on the couch to my right. We had already shared our brief journeys into the Middle World, the one that exists now on this plane. We were joyous to discover we both pictured the bright, bold red Cardinal as our favorite animal. Continue reading →

Hope fills your presence and your future

We introduced a new understanding of hope today. We want to build a sense of hope that is a force of change that comes from a feeling of certainty and well-being within, rather than an anxious kind of hope that vaguely wishes for things to turn out well. Write about an experience you may have had with this stronger kind of hope. – Deepak Chopra (Day 6 — Feeling Hope) 

I don’t think you can have a future or any type of “end product” without hope. I see hope more as a process, a living force that flows from day-to-day, hour by hour, and minute by minute. We hope for something that will come into existence in some future time. Yet the feeling we get through the act of hope occurs in the present.

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Getting a good last laugh is so laudable

Despite always having a smile on my lips and a laugh at my tongue, I found it hard to think of anything to write about for the latest meditation round for Oprah and Deepak. That is, until I picked up my son at work this evening and we joked and laughed until I almost did you know what in my pants. It hurt so much that I started crying, that’s how good it was and how great it felt to just let it all come out in front of one of his 22-year-old buddies and our 25-year-old female traveling companion.

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Fuzzy needs Kabbalah Group to grow by

(Unpublished Kabbalah story from Feb. 18, 2011)

Fuzzy needs Group to glow bright

Fuzzy was a Fuzz Ball that wanted to give love to whom ever he met. It all started when he felt a point in the heart materialize, and a wish to bestow came over him.

He’d give love here, there, just about everywhere, every day to every body he came into contact with. After all, he had thousands of tiny fuzz balls to give away. He’d pluck ‘em from his round little body and pass them on trying to ease pain here, create a smile there. Continue reading →

NaNoWriMo done in 30 days, thank God

Just finished 73,000 words about Francesco, the young man from Assisi who overcame post traumatic stress from battles as well as a year-long imprisonment before being ransomed by his rich mercantile father. Continue reading →

Don’t eat all the hummus, Michael J

To      Michael J
From Melanie K
I had such a nice night. My favorite part was sitting outside talking on the bench. Who knew we would be together in such a situation?
    • the lovely garden beside a Thai Buddhist Temple 
    • the freshness of post-meditation
    • the purity of post-meditation
    • the high of talking dharma with a new friend Luke 
    • surrounded by Bonsai trees Continue reading →

You’ve been Called; now Choose up Sides

Am I among the “Chosen?” Will I be one of those who make the “cutoff” at the end when the proverbial bill finally gets to be paid?

I don’t know. If you would have asked me some five years ago, I’d tell you to hit the road. Jack. I’m not into any of that doomsday stuff. The so-called “Chosen People” were the Jews, Right? Look what happened to them. And don’t the Jehovah Witness folks believe that a couple hundred thousand of them will disappear from the earth at the time of the Rapture? And what about some old-fashioned Presbyterians? Didn’t Calvin or one of their leaders claim to be among the chosen few? Continue reading →

I find my true nature when not looking

When you touch that part of me that has never been touched, a dormant thing erupts.

I am observing this thing for the first time.

Did it exist inside of me or did you put it there when I wasn’t looking?

When I noticed it, it hid behind my ear. I tried to find it, put a name to it, and store it in a folder where everything is orderly and safe. It wouldn’t go.

It was quick like a fox, creeping down my left arm while I examined my right, hiding under my knee when I thought I felt it brush the side of my face.

I am barren without it, yet all the happier to have seen it, if only for such a brief time not long enough even to know what to call it.

— Melanie Kriebel 2013

Four Truths to Enoble the Strongest Mind

Sometimes the only way for me to understand something is to try to put it into my own words. Particularly, if I want to memorize or “imprint” something so that I can keep it near and dear to me like an inspirational poem or saying I still remember from my earliest days.

And so, thanks to the kindness of WordPress, I will use my meager intellect to place into words something my heart has tried to understand and permit to grow from one lifetime to another. It is the four truths that can enable those noble among us to overcome what is wrong in our lives and how we could set things right. Continue reading →

Sweat Lodge reveals many Creative Spirits

It took several hours for the effects of the Sweat Lodge ceremony to kick in, but when it did I realized the control I always thought I needed was not in my hands, but in what the Greeks called the Fates; the Christians, God; and the Buddhists, Karma.
A Divine source, referred to by some as the “Force,” the Divine Feminine,” the Creator, has dealt a hand to play with our own free will. We get to choose which cards to keep and the ones to discard. By standing pat or by seeking new ones to “change our luck” or to improve our hand, we cast our lot to the future. None of us expect to lose or to face tragedy or a financial crisis. We hope for improvement, to enrich ourselves through our card-playing skills and years of studying the game of life. Continue reading →

Living ‘mind-less-ly’ in the present moment

I am a shape-shifter. I’ve developed the ability over the past five years to shift from one form to another by simply manipulating my mind to do the bidding of my higher self. Continue reading →

Eating meditation tastes so good now

What can I teach you Little One? What will I impart to you that you can carry with you when you feel the need to touch the Source you crave so much?

You have chosen to come closer to your spirit. It resides within, but your thoughts of this world prevent you from seeing the larger world inside. Now I must take your hand and walk you to the table, sit your down and “show” you how to show yourself the easiest way to Nirvana.

Eat! Continue reading →

Truly Living May Just Be Worth Dying For

The thought of going to prison never bothered me. I’d survive and flourish behind bars where I’d have more than enough time to reflect and write which I have found is my true love in life.

No, I could kill without worrying about the consequences. It would be my first offense. I am certified as a Vietnam veteran with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and I don’t see any judge or jury putting me to death for the crime.

All of this went through my mind when I was waiting at the train platform and a rather tall, white guy walked in front of me. I was standing near the tracks. I was close enough and in line with others stranding on either side of me that I never thought someone could make their way between me and the tracks. But the man did. He walked around me. He stood directly in front of me. No one else stood that close. I recall thinking how totally inappropriate and rude his actions were.

That’s when I planned to kill him. Continue reading →

Yearning for you grows with each touch

What is a monk to do when he is lonely? When he is blue?

When you reach that low point where you feel you are the loneliest person in the world, who or what do you turn to for relieve? Continue reading →

Saying ‘I Love You’ Twice Blesses Me!

“I Love.”

It’s an affirmation I can live with over and over, day in and day out, from one lifetime to another, without ever getting tired of saying it.

It is in the giving of love that I’m twice blessed. I got so much of it when I come into your presence that I can’t keep it in and I must share or I know that I could die. And so, I tell you that “I Love You,” and hope that you never stop listening to me. Even if you blush and say that I’m only kidding and scold me, saying “Stop that, Michael. Quit playing around.” Continue reading →

God needs no out-of-body experience

Too often I hear someone talk about an “out-of-body” experience as if it was the greatest thing since, I don’t know, the invention of peanut butter. Astral projection is another feat persons speak of  in hushed tones as if their trip from one place to another meant everything in the world.

Well, I’m here to tell you there ain’t nothing like the good old fashioned “In-Body” experience to get the blood rushing and the ecstasy flowing. “It’s your body now, stupid.” You don’t have to go chasing some Holy Grail to find the answer “out there.” It’s here and it’s now. Continue reading →

Don’t let me believe in all my thoughts

I’m so scared because I don’t know what to do, nor who to turn to. Flashes of insights, intuition, and a “knowing” that borders on the psychic have arisen in me and I don’t know if it’s a blessing or a curse. Continue reading →

Doors are Opening for All Doing Good!

There’s a passage in Mark’s Gospel in which Jesus’ disciples complain that someone — one who is not one of them — is casting out demons in Jesus’ name. It seems that fundamentalists of all ages have held a belief that there was only one way to get to the kingdom; only one way, and that was through Jesus. Continue reading →

I wish all compassion found in meditation

On February 5th, 2012, a friend who calls herself, the Frugal Xpat, commented: “I always wanted to meditate . . . ”

I didn’t respond to the comment until now but want to share how everyone could enjoy this exercise the frugal expat spoke of in Daily Meditation Desperately Needed. As she describes her life’s quest, she is on “An expat’s journey in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.” Continue reading →

Let the superfluous go, cruise a freeway

Shifting into cruise control, I let myself glide through many of life’s activities nowadays. I relax, take several deep breaths and seek a place inside where there are no thoughts, no worries, and no frets. Continue reading →

Where is the boy I left home for the war?

I knew a boy

Who went to war

And left his home

Behind him.

I knew him well,

That boy was me

And now I cannot

Find him.

— A Vietnam veteran’s tweak of a World War II sailor’s song about war
(Photo of this young World War I “Doughboy” courtesy of greatwar.nl/oldsoldiers/lloydcleme… )

Greet your road with love and compassion

I’ve taken compassion on the road. Literally!

I send affection to motorists cut off by a speeding car that winds in and out of lanes. I feel for the driver who was never told by the operator of a car in front that that operator was going to turn, despite what appears to be working lights that turn on and off when you press the turn signal lever up or down. Continue reading →

Abide in the moment you just completed

I am complete.

I am finished.

I’ve done what I have done and everyone can be satisfied with my efforts, including — and most importantly — me. Continue reading →

Grounding & aspirations help us fly higher

I remembered how to fly this morning. The first thing I needed for liftoff, I recalled, was good, solid grounding. Everything must be secured and brought to a complete stand-still before I could ever dream of taking off into the air. Continue reading →

Omega opens doors to lost PTSD veterans

I didn’t want to go back to Omega Institute this year. Each time I travelled to this land of Sleepy Hollow and Rip Van Winkle, I’d get high from the holistic experience. But then I’d change into an Ichabod Crane feeling chased by the Headless Horseman who’d tell true life stories that caused so much pain I couldn’t hold it inside. Continue reading →

Mindfully cleaning pot helps cleanse mind

Cleaning a pot can be very meaningful, particularly if you block out all thoughts and concentrate on nothing but you and the instrument that has helped provide you with so much nourishment. Continue reading →

Only the Pure in Heart Will See their Goal

Purity. There’s something in it that resonates with me. In my private moments, I try my best to connect with it, but once I start to analyze it, it vanishes. Continue reading →

Exercise Gets Me Higher, Step by Step

I get such a high while exercising that I can’t imagine why I haven’t done this more often in life. Continue reading →

Mammy, can you hear? It’s your little boy

There is a tradition in Eastern philosophies where you’re taught to view each person and other sentient being as if he, she – or it – is your mother. I never knew how nurturing this could be until I allowed the child in me to reciprocate and bask in the most secure and loving place. Continue reading →

How many times must we say “I’m sorry”?

Saying you’re sorry can be downright scary. Particularly, if you’re not sure if the other party will accept your mea culpa even though it’s from the bottom of your heart. Continue reading →

IN HOT WATER AT THE GYM

I never knew the hot water I’d get in at a local gym until I waded into a hot tub and saw one of the gym staffers assault a fellow bather when he paid more attention to the person he was speaking to via headphones than the operations manager, who yanked at his headset, telling him to get the hell out. Continue reading →

Enlightening chant charms meditation

After chanting a non-English mantra for some time, I finally learned its definition and discovered a gem of wisdom while contemplating its meaning. Meditating will never be the same, and I want to share with others a little of the enlightenment it’s provided me.

Om Mani Padme Hung. Continue reading →

A change in time helps change my reality

Reality shifted on me the other day, and it helped me realize that I have more control than my “preshifted” thoughts allowed me to see. Now, with a “time-control outlook,” I can try to change my world for the better. Continue reading →

Creativity shines when pure self emerges

Creativity exists in all of us. But, only those that nurture it can fully appreciate its magical transformation.

I liken it to a mineral or rock that resides within, undisturbed by the daily thoughts and busy lives of quiet desperation. It can be uncovered only when one stills the mind and releases preconceived notions of what creation is all about. Continue reading →

Daily Meditation Desperately Needed

It’s time for my disappearing act to begin. I close my eyes, wave an imaginary magic wand, and slowly begin to vanish from existence here. All thoughts and fears come to an end as I find protection beneath a cloak of invisibility, safe from the savages outside and the demons within. Continue reading →

Resolve to stop anger from feeding on me

Anger. It hits like a poison arrow causing me to drop what I’m doing and focus on the pain it inflicts. Continue reading →

Recalling childhood angels with dirty faces

I can think of no worse place to be than in a church, a temple or a synagogue when an unbidden and involuntary giggle would invade my psyche and take control of me. A “giggle,” is too mild a word: uncontrollable laughter would rise to the level of guffaws and downright knee-slappers’ right at the most somber parts of a religious service. Continue reading →

Getting High With A Little Help From . . .

I got high again. I didn’t know how much I needed a “fix” until my head slumped on my chest and I “awoke” to a restful, calm, and peaceful world I had been away from for what seemed a lifetime. I felt refreshed, clean, and somehow right despite what others might say. Continue reading →

Indulgences for Purgatory from Past Lives

(Caution: Exposure to this post could be hazardous to your health, particularly if you were raised Catholic with a taste of Buddhist and Kabalistic ingredients thrown in the mix.)

Indulgences are some things I never thought I’d think about once I finished with my Catholic upbringing and moved onto Eastern Studies and the spiritual advice from the Kabbalah. But, there I was reading how someone could limit their time in purgatory by performing certain acts and saying prayers. Continue reading →

Counting to ONE the ‘thought-less’ way

No matter how hard I try, I can never count to 20 before an unbidden thought arises from inside of me. I get to three or four while meditating and images pop up on an internal screen capturing my attention. I dare not try this counting method until my body and mind are both well-settled and I can “Let go.” Continue reading →

Breathing mindfully helps to unclog me

I never thought I’d be thankful for a stuffy nose, but it helped me to meditate without really trying. It all started on a day I was off from work and I stayed in bed as ten thousand thoughts ran through my mind. I noticed a clogged nostril and focused all of my attention on trying to reopen it. Continue reading →

Advice to a Wall Street operative

“We all dream of a kinder, happier world. But if we wish to make it a reality, we have to ensure that compassion inspires all our actions. This is especially true with regard to our political and economic policies. Given that probably half the world’s population lacks the basic necessities of adequate food, shelter, medical care and education, I believe we need to question whether we are really pursuing the wisest course in this regard. Continue reading →

Bliss arises when I still my self in side

Ah, bliss! It’s so wonderful to welcome your visit. You return when I least expect you, embracing me and bringing peace and calm just when I still myself and end needless thoughts.

Are any thoughts actually needed when I go within? I need but seek a quiet moment with no thought save the intent to be free of the past and the future, thus ensuring I will rest “in the now.” Continue reading →