Casey Anthony case: Did a psychic predict where Caylee would be found? – CSMonitor.com.

We are so sad about this entire case here in Orlando,  but we did find this interesting . . .

By Warren Richey, Staff writer / June 27, 2011

A private investigator testified on Monday at the Casey Anthony murder trial that a psychic directed him to the wooded area where the remains of Ms. Anthony’s two-year-old daughter were found a month later.

But he said he saw nothing that looked like the remains of the toddler, Caylee.

Dominic Casey said he was working for Ms. Anthony’s parents, George and Cindy, in November 2008, trying to track down leads about the possible whereabouts of Caylee. He had also done prior work as an investigator for Ms. Anthony’s defense attorney, Jose Baez.

Mr. Casey told the jury that he went to the wooded area not far from the Anthony home after being contacted by a psychic who advised him that Caylee’s remains were in the vicinity of three white paving stones.

He went three times to the area on Nov. 15 and 16 and appears to have walked directly over the place the body was later found on Dec. 11.

Earlier on Monday, James Hoover, an investigator who worked with Mr. Casey, narrated a video he took of the private investigator walking through the woods and using a metal probe to search for buried remains. No remains were found.

At one point, defense attorney Baez asked Mr. Hoover: “Did you just see that fallen tree that was there?”

“I see the paver that we were looking for,” he answered, watching the video. Then he added: “Oh yeah, it is right there on the video.”

It is unclear whether the video recorded the same fallen tree that Orange County Sheriff’s Office crime scene investigators have repeatedly mentioned – and at one point moved – to gain better access to some of Caylee’s remains in mid-December.

The video and related testimony is potentially significant to the defense case because it seems to support a defense theory that Caylee’s remains were placed in the wooded area much later than prosecutors have said.

In November 2008, Casey Anthony was already in jail having been charged with the murder of her daughter. Mr. Baez is hoping Monday’s testimony raises questions in the minds of the jurors. If Caylee’s remains were not in the wooded area in mid-November, where were they? More important, if they were moved, who moved them to the woods where they were discovered in mid-December?

Baez has suggested that Roy Kronk, the man who directed police to the wooded area on Dec. 11, may have moved or hidden the body. Mr. Kronk had initially called police about the body in August, but investigators ignored the tip because the area had already been searched by a deputy with a cadaver dog.

The developments came on the 10th day of the defense case and the 29th day of the trial underway in an Orlando courtroom.

Casey Anthony is charged with first-degree murder in the disappearance and death of her daughter. If convicted she faces a possible death sentence.

Also on Monday, Chief Judge Belvin Perry revealed the cause of Saturday’s abrupt and mysterious recess in the trial. He said defense attorneys had moved to have Ms. Anthony declared mentally incompetent.

Judge Perry appointed three psychologists to conduct independent evaluations of Ms. Anthony on Saturday and Sunday. After reviewing their reports, the judge declared the defendant competent to stand trial.

The trial is set to continue on Tuesday morning.

Zodiac Bundle Pocketbac® Sanitizing Hand Gel 12-Pack – Anti-Bacterial – Bath & Body Works.

An example of product cuteness!  Love this!! – Renee

Let astrology help bring summer into your home! – Manage Your Life on Shine.

Summer’s here, and although you may want to spend a fair amount of your time outdoors throughout the next few months, you’ll still be inside more often than you think. So why not make your home a summertime haven?

If you draw inspiration from the four elements (Air, Fire, Water and Earth) to guide your decorating choices, you’re certain to come up with several new and fun ways to honor the summer season inside your home. Find the element that matches your Sun sign, or simply choose from your favorite decorating tips below!

AIR SIGNS: Gemini, Libra, Aquarius
Breezes feel best when the temperature rises, so enhance your home’s circulation with airy fabrics and aromatherapy oils such as lemon, grapefruit or rose geranium. Consider updating your living environment with new paint or slipcovers — white, beige and other light-colored shades appeal best to Air signs. Representations of birds, butterflies and other beautiful flying creatures are a terrific way to a bring nature indoors; alternately, if you’re fortunate enough to have a porch or patio, accentuate it to where you’ll want to pass your summer days there admiring nature.

FIRE SIGNS: Aries, Leo, Sagittarius
The heat of summer is all the inspiration you’ll need to make changes to your home. Update your decor with images of the Sun and other fiery symbols — gold, red, orange and yellow will be the ideal accents to make you feel most comfortable. You’ll also be active and eager to take advantage of the warmer weather outside, so be sure to get all your exercise and travel gear organized. And of course, as summer is a delightful season for entertaining, set up an outdoor space to accommodate your guests. Given your Fire sign, barbecuing is naturally one of your favorite ways to socialize, so make sure your grill is ready to go!

WATER SIGNS: Cancer, Scorpio, Pisces
If you can’t spend part of your summer at a beach, lake, river or similar setting, bring the water to you! Find yourself a beautiful fountain — or at the very least, perhaps a soaking pool — and decorate it with seashells and other aquatic symbols while incorporating blue-green shades into your home decor. With the season’s hot air upon you, you’ll want a refreshing refuge from time to time, so set up a cool spot inside your home where you can surround yourself with peaceful and soothing images, textures and sounds.

EARTH SIGNS: Taurus, Virgo, Capricorn
Keep it down to earth this summer by sharing your love of nature inside your home. If you’re a gardener, decorate with flowers and other natural elements from your garden by filling beautiful vases with snippets of anything you’ve grown. Share your vegetable harvests through abundant feasts that your guests will appreciate even more when served amid beautiful surroundings; amp up your dining area by investing in new dishware and other alluring accessories.

Morgan Freeman Talks Afterlife, The Universe, Aliens On ‘Through The Wormhole’.

“I’m not what you’d call a deep thinker,” Morgan Freeman insists, as he posits a question about the limits of the universe. One glance at his big screen resume, with its slew of major awards for a career filled with jarring and affecting performances, would be enough to render his comment as mere self-deprecation, but a few minutes spent pondering the cosmos with Freeman leaves no question that he is just being humble.

It’s not often that you’ll find an Oscar winner (and five time nominee) and AFI Life Achievement Award recipient in the back reaches of cable, hosting a show about science, but as his trophy case would indicate, Freeman is a rarity. While many Hollywood players are content to live within their own stars, Freeman spends his time pondering about the ones galaxies away.

As host of “Through The Wormhole,” in its second season on Science, a channel from the Discovery Networks, Freeman tackles the lofty questions in life that generally crop up in laboratories and late night chats amongst heady college freshmen. For Freeman, exploring the questions of space and existence has been a longtime love, borne of his interest in science fiction. It was that fiction that opened his eyes to the possibilities of reality — or, whatever version of it we live in.

“[I started] thinking about possibilities and the fact that it wasn’t too long ago that the world was flat, and that was a ‘fact,’” Freeman recalls in a conversation with The Huffington Post. “It wasn’t too long ago the universe revolved around the earth, the earth was the center of it all: ‘fact.’ So we’re now this far along, we know a lot more about things, but they are still ‘facts’: nothing can travel as fast as the speed of light: ‘fact.’ It would take millions of years to travel to a distant star: ‘fact.’ Are they facts?”

It’s a jarring series of questions to hear coming from a man who has played God on multiple occasions; but if Freeman doesn’t have all the answers, his voice provides the air of authority that fills each thought with gravity.

In each episode of “Wormhole,” Freeman tackles from all angles, with opinions and models from researchers, scientists and philosophers, a question whose answers may yet be unknown, or, perhaps, unprovable. In one episode this season, he looks into the idea of a sixth sense, or, the ability to know something before you know it.

“I think we do,” have a sixth sense, he says. “I think it’s been proven a number of times that, you know, you’re in a crowded room and you look around and you’re looking into someone’s eye and [you know what they're thinking]. We know that thoughts are energy, they create an energy and they can be directed. You go off into an empty house, you can tell it’s empty before you get there.”

Taking the question of intangible human energy a few steps further, another episode takes on the after life.

“We ask a question about — is there such thing as a soul? Is there some part of you, an energy that goes on after the rest of you cease to be? And there are a lot of different beliefs in it,” he teases. In the episode, the case is argued by one scientist that, indeed, human energy does leave the body when that vessel expires, though Freeman wouldn’t say what he believed to be the truth.

To hear him tell it, everything we think we know is really not known for sure; and as for what we think about the things we don’t know, those theories stand on even flimsier ground.

“We’ve seen different manifestations of others’ imaginations of aliens. Aliens could look like anything; it just depends a lot on their environment. [We portray them as having] two arms, two legs, a head, two eyes, a head, a nose, two years, and that’s not necessarily [true] at all. They could look more lizardly, they could look like anything,” Freeman says. “There’s just no way of knowing… If you look at some of the aliens on earth, ants for instance, they communicate chemically, other aliens communicate with different bells, whistles. Crickets, what do they do? They rub their wings and make this noise. So do cicadas and other insects. And they communicate.”

Freeman doesn’t pretend to know the answers, but finds it massively important to pass on whatever knowledge exists, and continue the push for more.

“Here’s a question you can contemplate,” he proposes. “Is there a difference between space and the universe?… they say that the universe is expanding, so if it’s expanding, what is it expanding in to?”

Tune into “Through The Wormhole” at 10 pm EST/PST on Science to find out.

Derek Rydall: The One-Minute Mystic: Simple Things You Can Do to Stay Connected.

Jean Fain, L.I.C.S.W., M.S.W.: Elizabeth Gilbert’s Teacher on How to Eat, Pray and Love.

It’s easy to like Sally Kempton, a meditation inspiration to “Eat Pray Love” author Elizabeth Gilbert. Not because Kempton listens carefully or laughs easily, though I’m partial to anyone who can do either in this crazy-busy world. Certainly, her likability has nothing to do with the fact that Gilbert counts herself as one of Kempton’s followers. If anything, claims to fame only raise expectations, making the subject of such claims harder, not easier to like.

No, what makes the beloved meditation teacher so likable is the same thing that makes Gilbert a best-selling author — her special ability to translate subtle life truths into simple, practical and compassion-enhancing lessons.

To be clear, Gilbert has learned from Kempton as I have — from a distance. We’ve both been inspired by Kempton’s written meditations on meditation, but Gilbert has taken that inspiration further. The truth is a little confusing, but to be precise: The ashram Gilbert described in “Eat Pray Love” was founded by Kempton’s original meditation inspiration, Swami Muktananda.

Me, I’ve yet to give Kempton’s new book, “Meditation for the Love of It,” sufficient time. I’m intrigued by what the dust jacket promises: “Practical secrets to help us turn meditation into an unconditional embrace of the fullness of our experience — on and off the meditation cushion.” No surprise, that promise was not fulfilled on first reading. With more time, I’m hoping fulfillment will come.

If you’re reluctant to take my word for Kempton’s likability, consider taking Gilbert’s: “She [Kempton] is not only one of the best meditation teachers in the world; she is also one of us,” Gilbert writes. “She manages to fearlessly explore the outer reaches of the universe without ever losing the warm voice of your dear friend from just around the block.”

Speaking of books, Kempton and I share the same publisher. Because of that, we got to talking about our shared interests: eating, meditating and loving. Before I share select questions and answers from our recent phone conversation, I must say that while we resonate with that old Beatles’ song, “All You Need Is Love,” and we appreciate a heart-opening meditation and a mouth-watering dessert, we don’t see eye to eye on everything. Rather than simply agreeing to disagree, you’ll see that our unspoken agreement is to the open, honest and playful exchange of ideas.

Q. What drew you to meditation?

A. In my late 20s, I realized I didn’t really know who I was. I was following the path of success in NY, and doing pretty well — writing for magazines, dating, known in my circle for being cool — but there was a pervasive feeling of not being satisfied by any of it. It was literally as though my heart wasn’t in it. Even though I was doing everything I was ‘supposed’ to do in life, I found myself asking: “Is this all there is?”

Q. OK, so you were dissatisfied. But you were following in the footsteps of your dad [the late Newsday columnist Murray Kempton.] Why did you trade journalism for meditation?

A. I didn’t exactly trade journalism for meditation. Once a writer always a writer! My writing simply morphed as my priorities morphed… What changed my trajectory was a spontaneous and very radical awakening of my heart, which arrived out of nowhere and shifted my priorities in an instant. The problem was, I couldn’t hold onto the open-heart space because my mind was so unruly. So I started looking for ways to tame my mind, and meditation seemed to be it.

Q. Your story sounds a lot like Elizabeth Gilbert’s. You both went through, how do you put it, a “moderate life crisis”?

A. Yes, she and I have a lot in common. We’re both social observers — we’re both interested in the way society works, love works, relationships work. We’re both radically independent. We were both operating in a male-dominated publishing world – she wrote for GQ; I wrote for Esquire. And we were both drawn to the same kind of [heart-based] spirituality.

Q. Elizabeth Gilbert says your writings have been “life-saving.” Do you know what she means by that?

A. People often tell me that the book inspires them to want to meditate. This is probably what she meant. In the book, I suggest a path of playfulness and experimentation that helps people get past barriers and deeper into the exquisite spaciousness of their inner world. There’s this enormous treasure house inside of us. Most of us get to the door, catch a glimpse, but can’t go further. There was a time in my practice when I reached this same limit in how deep I could go. By experimenting with different ways of meditating, I learned how to go much deeper. What I share in the book is the approach that let me do that along with a lot of practices, some classical, some fairly original.

Q. You prescribe a variety of love-enhancing meditations in your book. What’s love got to do with it?

A. Love is what makes meditation juicy, enjoyable, deep. When love is lacking, I’ve learned in my many years of teaching, meditation can start to feel dry, dutiful, unconnected to our emotional life, and then eventually we don’t want to do it anymore. But if you kindle love in your meditation, it not only makes your practice juicy, it begins to spill out into your actions and interactions with other people. It starts to change the way you are in the world.

Q. Do you have a favorite love-kindling meditation?

A. My favorite is to let the breath draw your attention to the upper chest, behind the breast bone, right to the physical heart. On the inhalation, feel the breath caressing your heart. On the exhalation, feel the breath softening or expanding the heart. As you do this, a tender, loving energy arises.

Q. Living with an open, loving heart in this sometimes cold, cruel world sounds scary and difficult, if not impossible. But you clearly recommend it. Why?

A. When your heart is open, you have infinitely more power. Many students tell me when they make this practice a part of their life, they’re better able to navigate difficult situations. The can speak from the heart; their words have more impact. It helps them deal with an unruly teenager, an out-of-control manager, a lot of situations in which they’d ordinarily be reactive.

Q. You encourage readers to meditate a daunting one-and-a-half to three hours a day? Seriously?

A. That’s only for people interested in a radical experience of depth in meditation. For everyone else, I recommend starting with 20 minutes day. If it’s hard to sit still, start with five minutes, and add a minute a day.

Q. What’s your daily meditation practice like?

A. I sit for one hour in the morning, and 20 minutes to an hour in the late afternoon. I do a lot of stopping in the middle of the workday, closing my eyes for a minute, or doing a breathing practice for two minutes. I practice a lot with affirmative thoughts, like “Grace is everywhere” or “Is there a different way of looking at this situation?” I’m a strong believer in working with transformative thoughts throughout the day.

Q. How about eating for the love of it? What do you recommend?

A. I believe in eating as a celebration. I love to eat. I love sweets, but sugar’s not that good for you. What I’ve learned to do is eat sweets as a “blessed food,” satisfy desires and cravings by savoring small portions.

Q. I don’t agree with your recommendation to chew every bite 50 times. If you’re eating chocolate cake, is that what you do?

A. No, I’ve never tried that with dessert.

Q. Chewing anything 50 times doesn’t sound mindful or loving. Why 50 chews?

A. I’m not attached to that number. What I’m attached to is chewing food as a general principle. It helps with digestion. When you’re creating a discipline, concrete steps help, like counting breaths or counting chews. After a while, you don’t have to count because you’ve established a natural protocol and rhythm. In the early stages, it’s really helpful to set limits, to time things… But I agree, it does stop being loving at a certain point.

Q. You look thin, if not underweight in the book photo. Are you someone who has to work to gain weight?

A. I have a naturally thin frame, though I’m not as skinny as I was in that photo. Because I eat small portions and I don’t instantly gain weight, it allows for recreational eating.

Q. “Eat, Pray, Love” was a great advertisement for eating, meditating and loving, and yet I imagine it inspired many an unrealistic expectation. What can you say about setting realistic expectations and achievable goals?

A. Intention is very important; it directs your meditation practice and just about anything you do. But expectation narrows your options, sets you up for disappointment. So set a positive intention, a step-by-step goal, but don’t expect to climb Mount Everest the first afternoon.

Q. If your life story makes it to the big screen, who would you want to play you?

A. Julie Delpy.

Q. I know her name, but I can’t picture her face.

A. She starred in two Richard Linklater movies: “Before Sunrise” and “Before Sunset,” and she’s also a director. I love her!

Jean Fain is a Harvard Medical School-affiliated psychotherapist specializing in eating issues, and the author of “The Self-Compassion Diet.” For more information, see www.jeanfain.com. Interested in sharing your two cents?? Please share in the comments section.

David Katz, M.D.: 6 Habits That Can Add Years To Your Life.

Steven Spielberg has recently made his case for “Super 8.” In the spirit of less-is-more, I make mine for Super 6: the list of six factors most likely to add years to our lives, and life to our years.

What prompts me to focus now on my ‘Super 6′ list is a patient I saw in clinic recently who had experienced a potentially life-threatening cancer a year or so ago, and is now living in the aftermath of a surgical “cure.” He came to my clinic looking for ways to reduce the likelihood of that cancer ever recurring, or any other ever occurring in the first place.

Such collisions with our mortality tend to sharpen the focus of patient and clinician alike. Whereas any given patient might like to know how to promote their health, this patient approached the topic as a veritable quest. And whereas I might rattle off a number of suggestions to my healthy patient looking to stay healthy, this patient was a goad for me to rack my brain, and re-scour the relevant literature.

As you might expect, discussion with this patient was far-ranging. He wanted to know about everything he could do to bend fate and probability in his favor. So, naturally, we discussed both conventional medical therapies such as drugs (there is no clear role for them in his case), and nutrient/botanical supplements (these might contribute some benefit, discussed below).

But three principal considerations drove this discussion, as they should drive any discussion about intervening to prevent future disease: risk/benefit trade-offs; the magnitude of any likely effect; and the quality of underlying evidence.

Those three considerations drove our discussion inevitably in the direction of the Super 6: feet, forks, fingers, sleep, stress and love.

There are, of course, innumerable reports about supplements, but overall evidence for cancer prevention by use of any given supplement or combination of supplements is slim. There is an argument to be made for vitamin D, particular among those living in northern climes and/or disinclined to eat dairy, and thus prone to relative deficiency.

There is a case to be made for antioxidant rich foods and beverages, such as green tea (or, perhaps even better, white tea). But the evidence for benefit from any given antioxidant supplement is lacking. To the contrary, studies have hinted at potential increases in cancer risk with certain antioxidant supplements, notably beta-carotene.

My clinic is intrigued by, and makes use of, modified citrus pectin, which appears to have some potential to interfere with the spread of cancer cells, and also appears to be entirely safe. The same applies to Avemar, a product derived from fermented wheat germ with an extensive, albeit still evolving, literature supporting its use in cancer prevention.

But in general, evidence to support the use of supplements to prevent cancer is inconclusive. And there is an additional concern based on the risk/benefit trade-off. Supplements that don’t perform as hoped may exert unintended effects, potentially including an increase in cancer risk. For someone devoted to risk reduction, this is a bad chance to take.

So risk/benefit ratios, the magnitude of any potential benefit and the quality of science all militate against undue reliance on supplements. But all three weigh in favor of the Super 6. The Super 6 are the best medicine we have for preventing cancer and other chronic disease, and all are good for health anyway. The only real potential side effect of their use to prevent cancer is that you might also get healthier in ways you didn’t intend.

Regular physical activity (feet) is associated with weight control, reduced inflammation, enhanced immune function and reduced cancer risk specifically. Optimal diet (forks) exerts far-ranging effects on every aspect of physiology, and similarly stands to reduce the risk of all chronic disease. Combine eating well and being active with a commitment to never hold a cigarette (fingers), and the risk of all chronic disease declines by roughly 80 percent.

Those are my top three, but the list of health promotion priorities very reasonably extends to three more. The quality and quantity of sleep has profound effects on psychology, immunology and neurology. A linkage to cancer risk is suggested by a rudimentary connection of these dots. Much the same is true of stress, which can contribute to hormonal imbalances and inflammation that propagate cancer — or can be managed to prevent such effects.

And, finally, there is love. We are, from our earliest origins, social creatures much influenced by our relationships with others. While love may seem a “warm and fuzzy” topic, it is in fact the cold, hard scrutiny of clinical trials demonstrating that those with loving relationships are far less vulnerable to chronic disease and death than those without.

Combine all six salutary practices, and the evidence is clear that benefits reverberate all the way to our chromosomes, altering the behavior of genes in a way apt to reduce chronic disease risk in general, and cancer risk specifically.

I hasten to append to this paean for the power of lifestyle a proviso: there is never a guarantee. Think of it this way: lifestyle practices are the ship and sails, but there is still the wind and waves. The former we can control to increase the probability of a safe crossing; the latter, we cannot — and thus even a well-captained ship may founder.

But the Super 6 can assuredly put probability on your side. And these factors most likely to make a difference for a patient in the aftermath of cancer are as relevant for you and me, regardless of whether or not we have faced a similar peril.

You’ll need a little help with love, but the other factors are up to you. No need to wait for that brush with mortality — I commend the Super 6 to you right now.

-fin

Dr. David L. Katz; www.davidkatzmd.com
www.turnthetidefoundation.org

Life is more than matter. If it were just matter, there would be no need for comfort. Matter does not feel comfort or discomfort, beauty or ugliness, love or compassion, joy or sorrow. Will a chair ever feel sorry or happy? No, matter does not have these finer values. They belong to the realm of the spirit. But life is also more than spirit. If it were just spirit, there would be no need for water, food, or rest. Human life is a combination of both matter and spirit.

The nature of the spirit

Spirit experiences and expresses values. Values are feelings and emotions — that which cannot be captured totally by words or understood by the intellect. The goal of the spiritual path is to understand the spiritual dimension of life and live fully all the values that the spirit represents. What are those values? Peace, love, joy, beauty, unlimited knowledge, and the capacity to understand both mind and matter.

Comfort: A quality of consciousness

Whatever one does is directed towards one goal, happiness or comfort. Often people think that comfort comes in a material way, through matter alone. Comfort is a quality of consciousness. To some degree it does depend on matter, but to a greater degree it depends on attitude and understanding.

The true nature of the spirit is comprehension

You listen, you understand and you absorb. Who is understanding? Who is absorbing? It is the spirit in your body that is taking in the knowledge. And this knowledge is not coming through sight, sound, smell, taste and touch alone. It is also coming from inside as intuition.

The very nature of consciousness is knowledge

You can say that at every level of consciousness, knowledge is present. And consciousness is present! If it were nothing, it could not be present. It is something, yet it is not finite. You cannot measure consciousness, so it is present and infinite.

The nature of your consciousness is peace: You are love

Consciousness is peace. You are peace, you are truth, and you are energy, walking, moving, talking, sitting. The “self” is energy and the “self” is knowledge, the knowing and the knower. This consciousness is love, you are love. Understanding and living this is the spiritual life. Life attains its richest form through the spiritual dimension. Without it life becomes very shallow and you are unhappy, dependent, depressed and miserable.

The effects of the spiritual dimension on society

This is a great sense of belongingness, responsibility, compassion and caring for the whole of humanity. The spiritual dimension, in its true form, breaks the narrow boundaries of caste, creed, religion and nationality. Wars will be eliminated only through spiritual understanding.

The spiritual path is not an escape from life

Actually, the spiritual path makes life more difficult! In India people think the spiritual life is easy — go to an ashram where you don’t have to work hard. No! The spiritual path is not an escape from hard work or sincere action, just as social service is not an escape to a comfortable life. In both situations you have to put your heart and soul into your actions and be ready to give a hundred percent of yourself. The spiritual life will bring you enormous joy, more contentment, more peace and more energy than you can find, but it’s not an escape.

The spiritual path is not an escape from responsibility

The spiritual path means taking responsibility. If you think it is difficult to manage your children and your spouse, you will be given more people to care for. If you are ready to take responsibility for 20 people, 2,000 people, 20 million people, then you are on the path. The spiritual path is not an escape from responsibility, but taking responsibility.

The spiritual path is not an escape from hard work

Intelligent, effective work is part of the spiritual life. When you are working hard you may think you deserve compassion. I say that if you are working hard and doing it with intelligence, then you need appreciation, not compassion. If someone is taking five hours to complete something that can be done in half an hour, it doesn’t need compassion.

Knowing peace

Another aspect of spiritual life is peace — knowing that peace is your nature. At any moment, in any place, you can just sit and let go, knowing that inside you there is a pure clear space that’s vast and deep. That inner space is what you are. Feeling this is knowing your spiritual dimension. ”I have come from peace, I am in peace, I will go back to peace. Peace is my origin and my goal.” This inner affirmation or experience makes you a seeker.

A sense of sacredness

Still another aspect of spiritual life is a sense of sacredness. When you have a deep sense of thankfulness combined with regard and respect for everything that comes to you in life, it brings a sense of sacredness. In sacredness there is awareness. Your mind is fully present in fear, anger or sacredness.

Service and silence

Silence heals and rejuvenates. Silence gives you depth and stability and brings creativity. Service brings the dynamic experience of heart. It creates a sense of belongingness. Lack of service can land a person in depression. Service alone can bring contentment in life, but service without silence tires you. Service without spirituality will be shallow and cannot be sustained for a long period of time. The deeper the silence, the more dynamic the outer activity becomes. Both are essential in life.

Have confidence

Have confidence in yourself. One who does not have confidence cannot achieve anything. Confidence clears doubt. Doubt is the opposite of confidence. Once you eliminate the negative, you will see that the positive has already happened. When doubt clears, confidence appears. So to gain confidence in yourself, you must understand what doubt is.

The nature of doubt

If you observe the nature of doubt, it is always about something that is positive. You doubt the goodness of other people, never their bad qualities. You doubt your own capabilities, never your incapabilities. On the spiritual path, you learn to handle things with intuition and inner freedom. I don’t say don’t doubt. I say doubt as much as you can. That will help you get through it before progressing further.

Follow Sri Sri Ravi Shankar on Twitter: www.twitter.com/SriSriOnTour

This article can be found @ http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sri-sri-ravi-shankar/spiritual-life_b_861265.html?

Peter Baksa: Surefire Steps to a Life of Happiness and Joy.

As a starting point, I think it’s safe to say everyone is seeking happiness. But what exactly will bring us lasting happiness or as I would call “joy” ? How do we go about finding it? That’s where the views start diverging.

What I find troubling about some LOA (Law of attraction) perspectives is the advice to pursue whatever “feels good.” I was re-reading my own book “The Point Of Power” and I noticed that I used a similar descriptive. I now realize how this wording can be severely misconstrued inaccurately. The wildly popular movie “The Secret” goes so far as to say anything we think will make us feel good is fair game — a million dollars, a dream house, a sexy red sports car. It goes on to imply that each of us has some sort of supernatural power to make the world do our bidding, suggesting that we each are the center of the universe. It also implies that spiritual growth is all about fun, lightness, and pleasure as we jump from one blissful experience to the next.

Let’s bring this all back down to earth. In my experience, what “feels good” is a pretty faulty indicator of what’s in our best interest. All we need to do is remember the last time we indulged in a gallon of ice cream or six shots of Don Julio Anejo tequila to know that. And I’m sure we’ve all experienced what usually happens after we get that one thing we wanted so much. The grass quickly starts looking greener on the other side.

Lau Tzu (founder of Taoism) posits that self-discipline is the back bone of self respect. I have run 3-5 miles per day followed by a swim and weight workout beginning at the age of 14 through today. There is nothing more joyful then feeling great about your body’s condition yet the path does not necessarily feel all that great some days. Having built several companies from scratch myself; I have felt the exhilaration of seeing quantifiable success from one’s effort. In music, writing my books and art (painting in oil), I have achieved a level of flow where time is no longer a part of my existence and the purest form of joy can be found. I write about flow in some detail in my book, “The Point of Power,” citing the life long research of Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.

The Buddha’s advice

So how do we go about pursuing happiness? The Buddha gave us another of his famous lists to help us with this. He advised us to look for things that are conducive to dispassion, detachment, a decrease in worldly goods, frugality, contentment, solitude, energy, and delight in good.

So let me unpack this a bit. In the context of LOA, I would very loosely interpret his criteria to mean something like this:

Dispassion and detachment: Does the thing we want fan our small-minded emotions and self-centered desires? If so, it won’t lead to happiness. This isn’t a matter of good or bad, right or wrong. It’s simply because we aren’t the center of the universe, and living with that incorrect assumption will inevitably smack the unhappy truth right into our faces.

Decrease in worldly goods and frugality: Are we expecting worldly goods and money to create happiness for us? If so, think again. As above, this isn’t so much a moral issue, but the simple truth that everything changes. What was once a source of happiness will inevitably fade away, again smacking the truth in our faces.

Contentment and solitude: Does it lead to superficiality and distraction? If so, look elsewhere. What’s implied by the advice to turn away from these genres of life experience is the truth that nothing outside ourselves is a reliable source of happiness. We need to find the courage and quietude to look within. When we abide in the stillness of the present moment, we’re at our place of greatest potential and creativity. Free of self-indulgent thoughts, free of fear or wanting. Completely aware of and open to what is. Think about it. It’s the only place from which we can move forward productively. And that open-mindedness is the most pragmatically positive frame of mind with which to do it. Our point of power is the most direct link we have with the same energy that creates worlds. The point of power is in the present moment. We have to clear all thoughts of past or future to get to our point of power and harness the same source energy that creates worlds from nothingness.

Energy and delight in good: Does it energize us and give rise to a deep sense of goodness in our innermost heart? This is really the ultimate test. Looking forward, if we put our energy and intentions into being a positive influence in the world, our positive energy will reflect back to us and snowball. We’ll know we’re on the right track because our happiness grows.

Private blog on tumblr. cut and paste:

http://peterbaksa.tumblr.com/

“The Point of Power”, available now on Amazon. He is also the author of “It’s None of My Business What You Think of Me!: If You Want to Change Your Life … Change the Way You Are Looking at It”. His website is peterbaksa.com.

Kingsley Dennis, Ph.D.: A Call to Consciousness.

The world we all live in today is experiencing a period of monumental change. Yet this is not a time for fear. With preparation and certitude the times ahead can be navigated. The keys to growth and renewal have been planted within each person. Much will be expected from people in the coming years as they face increased fears and challenges; challenges for which history holds few guidelines. Such challenges, whilst resonating within the heart of each person, need to be grounded within a very real physical context. The spirit does not live in isolation, but walks in life. As Native American “grandfather” says:

“Trying to live a spiritual life in modern society is the most difficult path one can walk. It is a path of pain, of isolation and of shaken faith, but that is the only way that our Vision can become reality. Thus the true Quest in life is to live the philosophy of the Earth within the confines of man.. we must walk within society or our Vision dies, for a man not living his Vision is living death.. It is very easy to live a spiritual life away from man, but the truth of Vision in spiritual life can only be tested and become a reality when lived near society.”¹

The human species is, after all, a social species (as anthropologists keenly like to remind us). It is easy to behave “spiritually” when one is confined to the hermit’s cave; then our only struggles are with our ceaseless thoughts. Whilst the realm of the spirit may appear to exist “not of this world,” it very definitely is an important component “of the world.” Without the material playground, the spirit becomes ephemeral to us; unable to manifest tangibly within our everyday lives. So the life of the spirit needs to become very real for us, and well-lived. By living it, the presence of spirit can have greater effect. As “grandfather” again reminds us:

“If a man could make the right choices, then he could significantly alter the course of the possible future. No man, then, should feel insignificant, for it only takes one man to alter the consciousness of mankind through the spirit-that-moves-in-all-things. In essence, one thought influences another, then another, until the thought is made manifest throughout all of creation.”²

Any spiritual revitalization requires that each individual feel the worth of their participation; of their presence with friends, family and within the community. Progress will come through action; and knowledge, understanding and growth can also be achieved through right actions and intentions. The window of opportunity being presented to us now through the changes we are experiencing on all levels around us provides the opportunity for growth along new values, emotions and intellectual reasoning. To miss this opportunity and crave for the security of old perceptions and status quo material gains will be a sore transitory pleasure. This is neither a conspiracy nor a fairytale — it is a narrative of resilience, renewal and regeneration. As a global community of individuals we are being pushed towards developing and supporting a co-creative consciousness. This is our “new mind” for a “new world.” Yet this call for a new way of thinking is neither new nor unique. Each generation has supplied its spokespeople who have argued for a more elevated and illuminated way of thought and life. In recent decades this call has come increasingly from tribal elders and indigenous traditions.

In 1977 the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois Indians) penned a paper to an agency of the UN titled “Basic Call to Consciousness” in which they stated: “Today the species of Man is facing a question of the very survival of the species. The way of life known as Western Civilization is on a death path.. Our essential message to the world is a basic call to consciousness.. The technologies and social systems which have destroyed the animal and plant life are also destroying the native people.” As a collective “sentient” species we are being called into consciousness; as a necessity rather than a luxury of choice. My understanding is that the way forward will involve harmonizing inner intuitions with physical well-being and humanistic development. By humanistic, I mean a conception of the human within community, ecological, global and universal contexts. Part of our own species maturity is likely to be the dawning that we are currently living out-of-sync with our natural functioning and that we, as a species, are letting the side down. As living, sentient beings, we are often veiled from the knowledge of our own creative capacities for resilience and renewal. Some individuals may get the “wow factor’” one day when they realize that their life has been ignoring these truths for so long. Other realizations will come as material systems increasingly reveal the transparency of their corrupt and inept natures.

Through a combination of physical changes on the social, cultural, and political levels, people worldwide will begin to awaken to the audacity of our situation. From this there may be further “awakenings” as the ironic, incredulous, and absurd factors of many of our lifestyles are brazenly shown in the shocking light they deserve. However, there is great need to work. We are being asked — or compelled — to renew our selves and communities: to regenerate our relationship with the world we live in. This is not a time to fear for loss, but rather a time to aspire to new possibilities. A renewal and regeneration brings in new air, new potentialities, and new gains. There should be less clinging to the old when there is much vigorous work that needs to be done. Any spiritual endeavor cannot — or should not — be separated from the physical. The human is a physical creature that is nourished from a physical world.

Whilst we sojourn on this planet, and whilst our home remains physical, we have a responsibility to manifest our spirit within the physical domain. This is what is required of us, and deep within we all inherently know this. We are here to work together.

1. Brown, T. (1991) The Quest. New York: G P Putnam’s Sons.
2. Brown, T. (1991) The Quest. New York: G P Putnam’s Sons.