I began a major endeavor this month to re-edit all of the Blog Posts that I had written over the years, and it has re-opened many of the hopes and dreams that I once shared while writing and sharing messages at Contoveros.Wordpress.com.
It all started with a dream I had about Socrates and Plato which connected with my “active imagination” that the eminent psychologist Carl G. Yung had wrote about in his Psychology of the Unconscious.
Continue readingI believe that is what the Universe is telling me as I have gotten older and time has caught up with this aging body that – for the life of me – can’t physically handle everyday chores and activities I routinely completed some six months ago.
Slow down. Yes, you are getting tired when you ascend the steps to get into your Conshohocken home and then many more steps to get to your second-floor bathroom and/or main bedroom. So, take a break. You have nothing to prove or to “Carry-On” as us veterans used to say while serving in the military.
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Continue readingI will be participating this Sunday in a gathering sponsored by a group presenting a woman I have followed for more than 10 years on a spiritual journey. Lorna Byrne is a woman from Ireland who has been seeing and speaking with angels since she was two years old and written several books on how we can open ourselves to the angelic realm that exists for our benefit.
Continue readingReflections 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
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. 
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
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!
I grew when meeting four people on Monday who helped me expand my consciousness in ways I had never known 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
Much of what I know about War was what I learned while playing as a kid. You know, using a stick or a broken branch from a tree, I’d pretend it was a rifle to shoot the bad guys who were out to get me and the rest of the good guys in my old neighborhood. 
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. 
Today, while in what I call the “Post-Meditative State,” I wondered if something spiritual might have occurred when I was much younger. I then thought of a time when I was in first grade at a Roman Catholic Church School. Sister Saint Leonard had chosen me to be one of the so-called angels. The duty of an “Angel” was to guide the second graders to the front of the church where they were to receive their first Holy Communion from a priest.
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 advice that Abraham offered to a young woman who was called to the stage to question the Spirits about issues she was facing on Saturday. She was among some 15 people 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.
Ever wonder what you can do to be more like the person you have 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? 
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. 
This quote from the famous Greek of antiquity, Hippocrates, could be the basis for a new Golden Rule for the Road.  Continue reading
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. 
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.
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.
I felt a lot of healing when I read the following quote from 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.
I am looking for the type of cover for my latest book, my son. It tells of a Mystical Journey I embarked upon several months ago, arriving in Ithaca, New York, for a three-day retreat. There, I met a teacher who explained how I could understand my life and its meaning.
Simply knowing that I wrote a book is one helluva experience.
Seeing it on Amazon.com is breathtaking Continue reading
“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 that I edited and slightly changed, and can safely say is now mine Continue reading
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.
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
As I stand on the precipice of my literary journey, the dream of writing a book feels closer than ever. The countless hours spent brainstorming ideas, developing characters, and crafting intricate plots have finally begun to take shape. I can see the pages of my story unfolding before me, each chapter brimming with potential and passion.
Continue readingAs 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.
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 call the Dharma. That is, the “teachings” of meditation by Siddhartha Gotama, the person most of us call the “Buddha.”
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.
Our Shamanic Journey 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.
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.
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.
I took off from Planet Earth this morning. It all happened when Deepak Chopra pushed a button inside of me, using the words “transcend” and “Higher Levels of Consciousness. Continue reading
Fuzzy was a Fuzz Ball that wanted to give love to whoever 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 everybody 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
I just finished writing 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
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.
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.
I am a shapeshifter. 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. 
You see, there are two of “me” inside of this shell of a body. There’s the “me” created by my ego, also known as “my mind,” and there’s also the “non-me,” the one that surfaces when the mind is gone. It is this entity, one that is pure consciousness, that takes over when the mind stops all of its thought processes.
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.
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? 
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 people speak of in hushed tones as if their trip from one place to another meant everything in the world.
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
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
On February 5th, 2012, a friend who calls herself, the Frugal Xpat, commented:
I didn’t respond to the comment until now, but I 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
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.
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.
My heart goes out to you who have observed the speed limit, inching no more than seven miles an hour over a 55-mph limit when someone in a pickup truck rides your tail even though the driver can simply pull into the open right lane and pass your car on the left.
I used to curse out those I believed were inconsiderate drivers. You know the aggressive types that always seemed to have more important business to attend to than you did. Too often, I’d let anger push me to the extreme, and I’d speed up to show ’em what a speedster they had met on the road. It was road rage, pure and simple. The more I focused on how I’d been insulted, the more the rage would become inflamed, causing me to see red and not care about the defensive driving skills I swore I would practice just a few minutes earlier when I was feeling more level-headed.
Then it dawned on me. I could feel compassion for the so-called reckless driver. I know what it is like to be in such a hurry. I’ve been there. I’d feel the world would come to an end should I miss an appointment, be late for a job, or fail in the impression I wanted to make by arriving early enough to greet someone.
I always had a reason to speed. There were so many important things I had to do, to finish, to check off that “to-do” list to feel my life was worthwhile, that I was accomplished, that I am accomplishing . . . something.
I try to understand how the person traveling in the car trapped himself or herself by his or her own expectations, the desires and attachments to concepts and ideas that were no more real than the make-believe “deadline” they have imposed on themselves. No, there has never been a line that we needed to reach to prevent someone from falling down dead.
We’ve created this illusion. We’ve invested much of our lives into reaching certain milestones, destinations, and goals. That is all well and good, until we enslave ourselves to becoming totally “outcome-focused.” How you get there doesn’t matter, just as long as you carry out that task wherever it might be. Too often, it doesn’t matter who we hurt or cut off on the road we have traveled.
The process itself, I have learned, is just as important as, if not more important than, crossing the finish line. We spend the greatest part of our lives in some sort of “process” to get something.
We are squandering away that time if we focus on nothing but the ending. Why not learn to enjoy the road while we’re riding? Enjoy the lay of the land, the smooth macadam where the tires roll on following a bumpy part of the highway. Breathe in the air, the scented smell of that green-tree air-freshener of mint or the dark brown one that smells like brand new leather seats.
Sip from your cup of hot coffee or cool water. Listen to music or the beautiful sounds of silence that help you to still the mind so that you can live through your senses now, not at the end of the road. It is in the moment that you can find true compassion. Seek it inside, and, if you’re lucky, you can pick it up as a hitch-hiker on a road less traveled.
I’ve done what I have done and everyone can be satisfied with my efforts, including — and most importantly — me. Continue reading
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
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
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
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
I get such a high while exercising that I can’t imagine why I haven’t done this more often in life. Continue reading
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
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
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
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.
Reality shifted on me the other day, and it helped me realize that I have more control than my “resifted” thoughts allowed me to see. Now, with a “time-control outlook,” I can try to change my world for the better.  Continue reading
But only those who 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
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
I can think of many ways to stop a bad habit without having to suffer a stroke that goes untreated for years and years.  Continue reading
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.
But please don’t judge me. Don’t look upon me as weak or needy. I have tried so hard to be the strong, silent type who could weather any storm alone: self-reliant and dependent on no one except myself to get through the most difficult of life’s situations. Yet, each time I overcame what felt like one disaster after another, I knew deep inside I could not succeed on my own. I needed help from a Source I’d subconsciously tapped into to get me through each ordeal.
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
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
Thank God for Buddhism.
What’s that you say?
I can’t have one in, and of, the other?
Are you telling this red-blooded American veteran that I cannot follow the teachings of the Buddha and still believe in the God of Abraham? Continue reading
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
It’s so wonderful to welcome you to 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.”
Contoveros 