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Living within a living, loving planet
Gaia Consciousness
Time to Speak out
Apr 23rd
Time to Speak Out
“During those same 50 years, populations of vertebrates (animals with backbones) declined by 60 percent on average. It’s been estimated that humans—along with our cattle, pigs, and other domesticates—now make up 96 percent of all terrestrial vertebrate biomass. The other four percent include all the songbirds, deer, foxes, elephants and on and on—all the world’s remaining wild land animals. We inherited a planet of astounding beauty, which we share with millions of amazing creatures—and, one by one, we’re crowding them out.” Richard Heinberg Post Carbon Institute
<newsletter@postcarbon.org> 22 April, 2020
We don’t actually have a resource shortage. We have a population problem. With other living things, when they eat out their environment, many die until balance is achieved. But no, not homo sapiens sapiens. We have become the most voracious and dangerous predator Earth has ever encountered. We maintain our over population by enslaving other animals, penning them up in miserable conditions and chopping them up for Sunday lunch.
Who gave us the right to breed in such an out-of-control manner? I cannot imagine a deity that would condone our actions. Certainly not a God of love such as many of us have been taught.
For those of us who don’t do sky Gods, we realize that we don’t have the wisdom to manage a planet so must watch, study and learn to work in cooperation with Nature. Why?
Because the Earth is not out there; we ARE the Earth. We live in an Earth provided body. It is not OUR body to do as we choose with which goes for every other living body large or small.
Our hubris has dropped us presently into a cultural and economic decline, albiet one of many in our short history on the planet.
Now, every day must be an Earth day for our days are numbered.
We must “ring the bell that still can ring” and look for the “crack in everything.”
Recognizing Reality
Nov 25th
Question Beliefs
“We live in a culture that is embedded in unquestioned beliefs passing as truth. These beliefs are the source of our current crisis. We attempt to solve the problems of degradation of our environment and climate disruption, but we do not look at these core beliefs. We hold on to the idea that capitalism is the only right way to organize an economy, that democracy is essential to our freedom, that freedom itself is a core ingredient to our happiness. We believe corporate slogans such as “Progress is our most important product” (General Electric), and subscribe to the belief that technology will solve whatever problems we have, even the ones caused by technology.”
The Need for a Greater Vision: Recognizing Reality
By Norton Smith, originally published by Resilience.org
November 19, 2019
https://www.resilience.org/stories/2019-11-19/the-need-for-a-greater-vision-recognizing-reality/
Beliefs can go stale. A belief that one incorporates at one stage of intellectual/spiritual development may not serve a person as they grow older and perhaps wiser. That’s why beliefs should be reviewed from time to time. No need for a schedule, just practice staying in the present and one may find an uncomfortable feeling with a particular behavior. That’s the trigger to question the belief structure behind the action. We are creatures of habit and may find that we have become a slave to a few unquestioned behaviors that do not serve us any longer. No good blaming the devil!
Spirit-Based Change
Aug 8th
From Sacred Instructions: Indigenous Wisdom for Living Spirit-Based Change
Sherri Mitchell
“Our goal is to become a tuning fork for an elevated consciousness and a more equitable reality.
We do this by investing in higher emotional currency: supporting one another’s gifts offered to us by the Earth.”
https://nativenewsonline.net/currents/from-sacred-instructions-the-cultivation-of-warriors/
I’m in the process of reviewing this book. I’ll post it on here in the near future.
We ARE the Planet
Aug 8th
“Professor Johan Rockström, a co-author of the new paper from the Stockholm Resilience Centre, told BBC News. ‘What we are saying is that when we reach 2C of warming, we may be at a point where we hand over the control mechanism to Planet Earth herself.’”
Carbon Brief Daily | 07/08/2018
I don’t seem to be on the same page here. When did anyone ever dare to think that (1) That we were ever “in control” of Earth’s survival mechanisms and (2) That we have anything to “hand over” to “Planet Earth.” We and all our brethren are first and foremost “Earthlings.” We are not “on” this planet, we ARE the planet – inseparable.
We have not “lost” our connection. That’s impossible. We have either lost consciousness of it or perhaps never were conscious of being part of the, so to speak, eyes, ears, nose and throat of our greater beingness, the marvellous planet Earth.
Incarnational Opportunity and Creativity
Sep 27th
Incarnational Opportunity and Creativity
27 September, 2016
Sky McCain
“It is the testimony of the wisdom bearers that we come here from the realm of the unconditional in order to experience the conditional. Our original spirit nature is unconditional love, but apparently we set that aside temporarily in order to fully participate in the human experience. We are typically attracted to such an incarnational opportunity because it represents something so different than our actual state as light being souls, and hence is intriguing to us in our natural curiosity and trajectory towards infinitely expanding Self-awareness.”
From Bob O’Hearn “Self and Other”
The clarity of the description above has stimulated me to inflate my ego enough to offer an idea that has resided within me for many years. Firstly, I suggest that we are, among many other attributes, “reality structurers.” Reading Seth from Jane Roberts and in later years Vadim Zeland about Transurfing has supported my view that we not only in great part “make” our reality but actually can “choose” our reality in the sense of the life-path we are following. From Lynn Margolis I learned about the symbiotic theory of evolution that points to a basis of love and cooperation rather than random chance and deadly competition. From here, sprinkled with other bits and pieces of pertinent information my vision manifested as follows:
Creative development is a fundamental attribute of Consciousness. All of what we call “things” shine with some amount of this Consciousness and all things express Consciousness to the extent of their abilities. Parallel to the realm of what modern science calls aliveness has come a renewal of the Panpsychism or minds in a world of mind. I can now proceed to my hypothesis. Large organisms, such as a planet, contain almost unlimited potential and are largely limited by the level of consciousness they are expressed through. Lower order levels of consciousness strive, through what we call creativity, to expand their awareness and consciousness channels. To cut to the chase, we may desire to be a planet, our next higher holon in the holarchy of our known existence. Our experience must be immense and our ability to channel love greatly deepened. Our power is in the present, the dance, and it is dance all the way up and down.
The Best and Beautiful of Nisargadata
May 12th
“Your love of others is the result of self-knowledge, not its cause.”
“Q: If I am free, why am I in a body?
M: You are not in the body, the body is in you! The mind is in you. They are there because you find them interesting. Your very nature has the infinite capacity to enjoy. It is full of zest and affection. It sheds its radiance on all that comes within its focus and awareness and nothing is excluded. It does not know evil or ugliness, it hopes, it trusts, it loves. You people do not know how much miss by not knowing your own true self. You are neither the body nor the mind, neither the fuel nor the fire. They appear and disappear according to their own laws.
That which you are, your true self, you love it and know it, and whatever you do, you do for your own happiness. To find it, to know it, to cherish it is your basic urge. Since time immemorial you loved yourself, but never wisely. Use your body and mind wisely in the service of the self, that is all. Be true to your own self, love yourself absolutely. Do not pretend that you love others as yourself. Unless you have realized them as one with yourself, you cannot love them. Don’t pretend to be what you are not. Don’t refuse to be what you are. Your love of others is the result of self-knowledge, not its cause. Without self-realization, no virtue is genuine. When you know beyond all doubting that the same life flows through all that is and you are that life, you will love all naturally and spontaneously. When you realize the depth and fullness of the love of yourself, you know that every living being and the entire universe are included in your affection. But when you look at anything as separate from you, you cannot love it for you are afraid of it. Alienation causes fear and fear deepens alienation. It is a vicious circle. Only self-realization can break it. Go for it resolutely.”
I Am That
Nisargadata Page 212
third edition revised and re-edited
There can be no peace nor cessation of planetary destruction until this is understood.
This lovely Being
Aug 2nd
“The life of a warrior cannot possibly be cold and lonely and without feelings, because it is based on his affection, his devotion, his dedication to his beloved… The Earth knows that he loves it, and it bestows on him its care. That’s why his life is filled to the brim and his state, wherever he’ll be, will be plentiful. He roams on the paths of his love… This Earth… Only if one loves this Earth with unbending passion, can one release one’s sadness. A warrior is always joyful, because his love is unalterable and his beloved, the Earth, embraces him and bestows upon him inconceivable gifts. The sadness belongs only to those who hate the very thing that gives shelter to their beings. This lovely Being, which is alive to its last recesses and understands every feeling, soothed me, it cured me of my pains, and finally when I had fully understood my love for it, it taught me freedom. Only the love for this splendorous Being can give freedom to a warrior’s spirit; and freedom is joy, efficiency, and abandon in the face of any odds.”
Tales of Power Carlos Castenada
This is the fourth book in the series and was published in 1974. Carlos Castaneda was a mystic and the content and style of his descriptions of Don Juan’s teachings in no way detract from the value of his ideas. We tend to like those ideas that fall in line with our present beliefs. His stories about Don Juan and the experiences he describes hold great value to me. After all, who decides what truth
I also think it is safe to say that Carlos was not influenced by Lovelock and Margulis. At the time of Castaneda’s 4th book preparation, the Gaia Hypothesis had not been published. Even if it had, Lovelock and Margulis did not describe Gaia as “a living Being” They spoke of the Earth as, I paraphrase, acting as if it was a living organism. I suspect they were not game to venture that far from mainstream science. I do respect their desire to publish within the confines of what would be interpreted as “sound science”.
Earth Flag
Jul 1st
The International Flag of the Planet Earth
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_the_Earth
Oskar Pernefeldt’s proposal
In May 2015 a Swedish artist, Oskar Pernefeldt,[12] formally proposed the International Flag of the Planet Earth.[13] It was conceived to be used in space expeditions and it has two main purposes:
- To be used while representing planet Earth.
- To remind the people of Earth that we share this planet, no matter of national boundaries. That we should take care of each other and the planet we live on.
The creators predict that it will be eventually used in Mars landing in 2025 or in a future colony on that planet. The design of the flag consists of seven rings intersecting each other and a deep-blue-sea in the background. The rings are centered on the flag forming a flower in the middle, representing life on Earth. The intersection of the rings represent that all things on Earth are linked directly or indirectly. The rings are organized in a Borromean rings–like fashion,[citation needed] representing how no part of Earth can be removed without the whole structure collapsing. Finally, the deep-blue represents the ocean and the importance of water for life on Earth.
Internatiional flag of the Earth