Mid-Year Resolutions

The year 2014 is exactly half over. So we are precisely half a year away from 2015 New Year's resolutions. But I just came upon these suggested resolutions in one of the Seth Books. And I don't want to wait six month to put them into practice.

One of Seth's main messages is that we, right here and now, have the power to make any changes that we want in our lives. No matter where we currently find ourselves, we have the full ability to creatively implement solutions for whatever conditions we face.

Seth teaches that events in our lives, before they become real in our physical world, are first formed in an inner, highly creative reality he calls "Framework 2".

He describes a process in which no random occurrences happen to us. The days of our lives are the direct results of what we first create in our "Framework 2" dimension. If we focus on fear, failure, joy, success, health, illness or whatever in our daily thoughts, our "Framework 2" energy will make these thoughts become real in our physical experience sooner or later.

Seth suggests that we focus on the following four "resolutions" often and make them a daily, constant habit in order to create a life experience that we want.

One: I will approve of myself, my characteristics, my abilities, my likes and dislikes, my inclinations and disinclinations, realizing that these form my unique individuality. They are given me for a reason.

Two: I will approve of and rejoice in my accomplishments and I will be as vigorous in listing these -- as rigorous in remembering them -- as I have ever been in remembering and enumerating my failures or lacks of accomplishment.

Three: I will remember the creative framework of existence, in which I have my being. Therefore the possibilities, potentials, seeming miracles, and joyful spontaneity of Framework 2 will be in my mind, so the doors to creative living are open.

Four: I will realize that the future is a probability. In terms of ordinary experience, nothing exists there yet. It is virgin territory, planted by my feelings and thoughts in the present. Therefore I will plant accomplishments and successes, and I will do this by remembering that nothing can exist in the future that I do not want to be there.

The Jesus Story

It is difficult to know what actually happened historically at the time of the birth of Christianity.

But my interpretation of the lessons that we were intended to take away are different from mainstream beliefs, these 2000 years later.

My understanding of the main teaching of Christianity today is that God the Father sent his Son Jesus Christ to earth to die so our sins could be forgiven.

My version of the lessons from the Jesus story is much different. I believe that the intended lessons are that there is no death and there are no sins.

The point of the story of Jesus' death is that he did not die. He came back.

And I believe that he did not die to save us from our sins. I believe that the lesson for us is that there were no sins to begin with.

The ideas that death is final and that man is basically flawed were invented by us.

The concepts of good and evil were invented by us.

Any guilt we are carrying around from sins we may have committed is pointless. The ones who have not forgiven us for our failures are ourselves.

It appears to me that as a culture, we are slowly and subconsciously releasing our fear of death. When I was young, I remember that funerals were awful events. The mourners dressed in black and wept bitterly. But now it often happens that the family and friends hold services that are more like celebrations of the loved one's life. They remember the fun and happy times together.

We have far to go to understand that death is just a changing of seasons. But it appears that we have taken the first few steps.

I do not see the same movement toward releasing our rigid concepts of good and evil. We still have terrible fears of evil and try to contain it in prisons and control it in our own behaviors.

Evil cannot touch us because it is an illusion. Death is an illusion.

We are like children who fear the monsters in the closet. They are imaginary.

We are safe.

The Story of Adam and Eve

I am not a student of the Bible but I don't see why that should stand in the way of me expressing my beliefs about its stories.

This is my understanding of the story as believed by many Christians: God forbad Adam and Eve to eat of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. But Satan, as the serpent, tricked them into eating. Thus, Adam and Eve gained the Knowledge of Good and Evil and their God, being angry that they disobeyed, evicted them from the Garden of Eden as punishment.

This is the Cosmic Grandpa interpretation of the story: As primitive man, we found ourselves in a world where no value judgements existed. We accepted our world as we found it. There was no concept of good and evil. Our intuitive nature connected us to the vast cosmos and we knew we were an eternal part of the infinite multi-dimensional universe.

Then over earth time, our intellects developed and became dominent and we separated from our intuitive understanding of our cosmic connection. Our intuitive nature withered. We intellectually began to assign values to various aspects of our world. To each other. To everything we encountered.

No diety forbad us to develop in this direction and no satan tempted us. It was a direction we decided to explore as a race.

But it is a direction that has separated us from the understanding of who we really are.

In the bible story, we were instructed not to go there. But we chose to go anyway. So now we find ourselves in a world where fear, anxiety, anger and revenge all invade our lives eventhough they are illusions. Our justice system that assigns blame and guilt is an illusion. Good and evil are illusions. We created them ourselves. Yet we see them as universal values.

We no longer live in the beautiful garden.

But all we have to do to return there is to realize that the Knowledge of Good and Evil was created by us. It will decay along with the rest of our physical world in time.

We are. We are who we are. We will be who we are forever. There is no good or evil. We have no value. We just are.

The understanding of this reality will return us to the garden.

Let us meet up there now.

Gravity

Gravity is a scientific phenomenon that we all understand. The concept gets a little heavy when applied to solar systems and Einstein's description of the curvature of spacetime. But it is perfectly clear to us all who walk on the earth, regardless of our religious or non-religious faiths. We are confident that we will not suddenly float into the air.

I believe that there is another natural force like gravity, or possibly it is another aspect of gravity itself, so far untested by science. This other gravity operates daily in our lives and it is as natural to us as walking down a road.

This other force works to attract certain people, events, thoughts and emotions into our lives as naturally and reliably as our known scientific gravity.

Without an awareness of this force, we seem to be at the mercy of random good or bad luck as we move through our lives. If a frightening event happens near us, like a robbery or a shooting or an auto accident, we become anxious that it could have been we or our family who were the victims.

In fact, we did not attract that specific event into our lives, no matter how near to us or far away from us it happened. Others attracted it. For their own private reasons.

Without an awareness of this force, we think we need to put certain protections in place to keep us safe. Gun control for example. We make laws and attempt to control events. But I believe these efforts are as ineffective as if we passed laws to control gravity.

Without an awareness of this force, we seem to encounter other people in a random fashion. It seems that those who grow to be significant to us, like spouses, close friends, or even difficult, antagonistic people, come into our lives by chance. But I believe that this same force attracts them so powerfully that nothing can get in the way of it happening.

In fact, many of us can remember the exact moment when a certain significant person entered our lives. There was a spark of awareness. A sudden surprising familiarity.

This force keeps us safe. No random danger can come to us. Nothing happens in our lives that we are not somehow responsible for.

We create our reality. If we see something in our world that we don't want, we have the power to change it.

Our daily thoughts and feelings electromagnetically activate this force.

We have the power to attract anything we want.

Life is a big learning lab for us to experiment with this concept.

Let's see what we can attract.

Christmas 2013

Choose Peace.

Each of our worlds is what we each make it to be.

It can be a world of war or a world of peace. Both exist. And many others as well. We can choose which one we each want to live in.

I choose to live in a world of peace. So, now. With this choice comes a myriad of additional choices.

If I am committed to my choice, I need to be mindful of it throughout my day and use it as my guide for every other decision I make. I need to choose not to become angry and hostile at drivers who block my way. I need to choose not to become impatient with others who appear to frustrate my plans. I need to choose to be openminded with others who do not share my political views or my opinions or beliefs.

I need to choose to create peace instead of picking fights. I need to understand that eventhough our culture appears to be focused on themes like “the war on drugs” or “the war on AIDS” or “the war on terror” … that declaring war on anything simply enflames the energies of both factions and does not focus on the resolution of the conflict. It fans the flames of the conflict.

So instead of mentally and emotionally waging war on AIDS, I will focus instead on creating a world for myself filled with health and strength. Instead of battling a world of greed and hunger and inequality, I will make a world for myself of sharing and prosperity and acceptance of all.

This world exists. All manners of worlds exist. I get to choose which one I want to live in.

The world we find ourselves in is a direct result of choices we have made. If we enjoy the drama of conflict and upset, then that will show up in our world. If we believe that we need to fight for what we want, then that struggle will exist for us.

Or we can bypass the struggle and choose to eliminate conflict. We can withdraw from any wars and fights and choose peace.

Our world is not forced upon us by a chaotic and random universe. We choose it, consciously or UN-consciously.

I consciously choose peace.

Want to join me?

Tomorrow Never Comes

The future exists only in our present concept of it.

Future events do not exist. Our plans, hopes, fears, dreams, expectations and worries exist today as possibilities and probabilities. But they are thoughts and ideas. Not events. The future is purely theoretical. All we really have is now, today, the vast, spacious, spontaneous present.

Therefore, worrying about and fearing future events is a nonconstructive use of energy.

In the present we can see paths, directions, trajectories. And we can mentally follow them into their possible futures to see where they might lead. If they seem headed where we do not want to go, today we have the power to implement course corrections.

We are taught that planning, devising strategies for accomplishing goals, saving money, insuring our lives, homes, cars, health, are responsible actions.

Most of us are not taught to trust life spontaneously to lead us to our growth and evolution and fulfillment. We are not taught to abandon all worries and know we are safe and protected always.

We are well aware, however, that our best laid plans can be undone by a single unexpected event that changes everything.

We fear these unexpected events. But we can instead accept them as life's course corrections that lead us to deeper levels of fulfillment than our own planning would have. We can see these events as spontaneous adventures that take us to places we've never been.

Warning: Our beliefs create our reality. So we cannot stop planning and saving and insuring and behaving responsibly until we first unquestionably know that life always will support us and carry us onward to expansive, new adventures and experiences. Doing so can cause great discomfort and fear.

We are buoyant upon the river of life and we cannot sink and be drowned. But until we are certain of this, it is much less fearful to act responsibly within our beliefs. That is until that unforeseen event visits us.

When that happens, whether we feel ready or not, our belief in our buoyancy is given a full test.

I have taken this leap into trusting the safety of this deep river of life. Prematurely. Before I knew I was fully safe. And yet I survived. However full of fear and uncertainty I found myself.

A second time I took the leap. This time I was a wee bit more assured of my basic safety. I survived with a wee bit less fear.

It was the third time that I came to know I was buoyant and would stay afloat no matter where the rapids tossed me.

We are safe now. And now is all there is.

Worrying about the future is worrying about something that does not exist.

Tomorrow isn't coming.

We have today to do whatever we want. To change whatever we want.

Today we can abandon our worries and expectations and accept the spontaneous curves in the road that come our way.

Tomorrow is imaginary.

Today is real.

Today we have the power to do most anything.

      -----Cosmic Grandpa

Ascend into Heaven

Just as Jesus did in the Bible, we each can ascend into heaven.

Not physically. Mentally. We can mentally rise above situations where we find ourselves getting upset, argumentative, defensive, angry.

Heaven is not a physical place in the sky but a state of mind. A state of peace.

Like the song says, “From a distance, there is harmony.”

We can train ourselves to elevate our perspective and distance ourselves from the immediate situation when we feel like arguing or fighting. We can remove ourselves to a higher frame of mind, to a neutral position where it's easier to see the other side of an issue.

When we feel that we are being attacked, we can move to a place where we need not fight back. We can rise above the urge to defend ourselves and go to a mental place of safety and security. We can go to a place of peace. We can ascend to heaven.

When we feel that we are being bullied or threatened or terrorized, we can remember that we are safe and strong. We can rise above the response of being fearful and protective.

Terrorism only works when both parties participate in the game. It takes both the terrorist and the victim to make it work. If the intended victim does not respond with fear and defensiveness, then the terrorist attack does not work.

We can imagine that the ones attempting to attack us are young children acting out, throwing tantrums. We see that they have lost control of their emotions and are behaving in immature ways because they have not yet learned how to channel their emotional surges in constructive directions. Our reactions to them could be to stop, say nothing, and consider what response might be most helpful. By attempting to use force against them, verbal or physical, we just feed energy to the conflict. Imagine that we are third parties, some distance away from the attack, with no personal interest in the situation. Take as much time as needed to ascend to heaven, then respond.

Seeking peace currently is not a popular position for many of our fellow citizens. They feel we must fight to get what we want. They feel that seeking peaceful solutions is a weak and passive option. However, it is peace that is constructive. And war that is destructive.

Peace is an absence of conflict, not an absence of activity. So heaven can be a highly productive state. Conflict impedes any movement forward because it diverts and wastes energy. Cooperation directs energy and movement toward solutions, toward creativity, toward discovery.

Like the nice lady sings:

From a distance
There is harmony
And it echoes through the land.
And it's the hope of hopes,
It's the love of loves,
It's the heart of every man.

Rise above.

Peace out.

     -----Cosmic Grandpa

Yesterday's Gone

Today is all we have. The present.

We have influences from our past, wonderful memories, regrets, baggage. However, the events that we remember from the past do not exist, except in our present memories.

And memories are fluid. They change. People who were involved together in a past event each remember it differently. And as time passes, each individual memory of the single event continues to change and grow even more different from the others.

Even though we may have records of these events: photos, diary entries, newspaper clippings... the emotional influence, the sense of “what really happened here,” still changes.

And our present version of the memory is all we have. All past versions are gone.

Influences from the past are powerful. They have shaped us into who we are. And they evolve as we evolve. As we grow older and wiser, we can revisit our memories and see past events from new, more understanding perspectives and be more forgiving toward ourselves and others.

If we carry feelings of guilt, shame, resentment, blame, hurt, we can change them today. We can revisit the past, reinterpret what happened and reshape how the events influence us today.

The past does not exist in the past. It exists in the present. And we have the power to change the present.

We can free ourselves from influences we don't want any longer. We can erase the past as we remember it and redraw it with generosity and compassion.

Today is wide open. The present time is vast and spacious.

We have the power today to change most anything.

     ----- Cosmic Grandpa

Life is a Learning Lab

Life is not a test of our morality. Life is not a dangerous path of temptations where we prove our purity.

Life is an experience. Life is an experiment. Life is a learning lab where we are free to try strange, new things to see what happens.

Life is for creating that which did not exist before. Life is for blazing new trails.

Life is for being adventurous and bold and eager to find out what is over the next hill. Life is for taking leaps.

Our universe contains an infinite number of dimensions that remain unexplored. Life is for exploring the rivers and paths and caves that no one has experienced yet.

We are safe in our learning lab. Fear has no place here. Stretch your belief in yourself and try something that is calling out to you. Even if it may seem reckless and irresponsible.

Answer the call of the wild. Explore. Experiment. Do something different. Trust that you are safe as you travel new routes. Unexplored caves. Foreign lands.

Depart from the safe road. Go where you really want to be, regardless of society's approval.

Try it. Try it. Try it.

It's why we're here.

     -----Cosmic Grandpa

Creating Reality

We each create reality. We create our own individual worlds.

We create what is true in our lives... and all truth is specific to each of us individually.

We create reality by what we believe and what we think.

The good news is that if our lives are not satisfactory, we can change them by changing what we believe.

Once we get the hang of it, we can change our beliefs as we change the furniture in a room in our home.

The challenge is to discover what our beliefs are. They generally are so much a part of our daily thoughts, that they are invisible to us. We see them as obvious truths about life. As real true facts.

The things we know are true... are true solely because we believe them. Other people don't believe they are true at all. They are specific to us. To our reality. They are not present in everyone's realities.

What is great about life? What is difficult? What things are working smoothly in our life? What things are awful?

They are all because of what we think and what we believe.

So experiment with this. Pick a facet of reality, a truth that you'd like to turn into a false. See it as an idea that exists independently, separately from you. See it as an uncomfortable chair in a room that you want to replace with another.

See it as an object that you can move around and discard at will. Think of another idea, a reality that you'd prefer to believe... to replace the one you're discarding. Think of it as a new object that you've selected to be a part of your new, remodeled reality.

In with the new. Out with the old.

Think of this often. Remember that your life now includes a new belief. The old belief has been removed.

Do this for a time. I guarantee you will see a change. This change will reinforce your confidence that you truly are a creator. The creator of every aspect of your life.

This is a life-changing lesson. It is one of the most important lessons we can experiment with here in our learning-lab life.

Select another unsatisfactory belief. Replace. Repeat.

Create an unbelievably wonderful life.

Except that it's totally believable.

If you believe it.

If you create it.

     -----Cosmic Grandpa

Return to Innocence - The New Age of Peace

In case you don't see it, our world appears to be in a state of craziness.

I believe this unrest and unraveling is preparing the way for an era of peace.

Peace between people, countries, religions, enemies, friends, everyone.

We originated, back in our prehistoric era, in innocence. Like newborns. We did not have the concepts of good and evil. As we evolved we developed this “knowledge.” Now, thousands of years later, we are on the brink of acquiring the wisdom that will take us to a new era of “wise innocence.” We will come to understand that the good and evil were our own imaginings and realize that these value judgments no longer serve us.

We will begin to relinquish control over others. We will begin to rise above our small-minded judgments of others and realize that their paths have lead them to where they are as our paths have lead us.

No longer will we be supervisor and subordinate. No longer will we be prisoner and jailer. No longer will we be superior and inferior.

We are very close to realizing that war solves nothing. We are close to the critical mass of opinion needed to dismantle our military and defense systems. The walls have already begun to come down and soon everyone will be welcome anywhere.

Military might is no longer a deterrent. The military complex will evolve into peacetime industries of advanced robotics, transportation, space exploration, deployments of goods and services, rehabilitation of the incarcerated and education of all.

We are close to the realization that we are all one family, responsible for our own life experiences as well as for the well being of all our brothers and sisters. When we get there, peace will be inevitable.

Separations will die away. Connections will thrive. Prejudices will wither and acceptance of all will flourish.

What a glorious tomorrow lies ahead. Our technology has delivered us to a place where we can communicate directly with people in countries we are officially “enemies” with. Israeli citizens are sending messages to Irani citizens of love and peace. Check out: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/321412

Peace is so close we can taste it.

At last. What a wonderful time to be here. What a wonderful time to be anywhere.

          -----Cosmic Grandpa

Good and Evil – Age of Justice

As well as the concepts of good and evil, the concept of justice was also invented by us, I believe.

There is no God who demands justice of us. It is we who demand it.

As our intellects developed during those early ages, we forgot that we all are connected. We forgot that we are all one community. And for some reason we developed bitter rivalries with our neighbors as terrible as our fear and hatred of countries on the far side of the globe.

East Dillon High hates West Dillon High as much as they both hate Iran. Bomb them.

This separation evolved into terrible greed and terrible fear that there will not be enough for me. Today private citizens are worth more than most countries. They have more than they would need for a thousand lifetimes. And others of us go hungry.

We created a sophisticated justice system that imprisons criminals in privately owned prisons that need inmates to make profits. So the courts ensure that there are plenty of prisoners so the prisons don't go empty.

We misunderstand death and consider it a capital punishment. It is not. We live on. We struggle with mental illness and consider suicide an escape from it all. It is not. We live on.

We have developed mental illnesses unlike any time before because we have grown so separate. So alone. So fearful of our world.

We have built magnificent civilizations using slave labor. We have bought and sold our brothers and sisters.

When we are wronged, as victims we demand justice. We file lawsuits over property, boundaries, rights, wrongs, and the rest.

We have forgotten about forgiveness. We have forgotten about mercy. We have forgotten that we are all brothers and sisters. We are all one.

This terrible mess is all an illusion. Because in reality we are all one. We all will live forever.

I believe that during this century, the institutions, churches, governments who perpetuate this illusion of good and evil, of justice, of separation will fade.

And we will enter the Age of Love. The Age of Mercy and Forgiveness. The Age of Peace.

See you there.

       -----Cosmic Grandpa