If you’re like me then you probably have a bookshelf or two full of new-age and self-help books all telling you to live in the moment. But when life comes crashing down (presents you with an opportunity) and you find out your boyfriend or girlfriend has been unfaithful or you lose your purse or wallet with all your credit cards, info and cash… what the heck does being in the moment mean then?

Being present is a lot easier to talk about or philosophize than it is to actually do, wouldn’t you agree? Although it is seemingly difficult I think we can all agree that actually being present can make life a joy and blessed movement.

In my experience what gets in the way the most of me being present is the past. The past is such a sneaky little devil, he is insidious, clever and very persuasive. The past acts like he’s your best friend, someone you can depend on, he’s always there ready to listen and give suggestions about what to do in the moment and the future but if you examine closely you’ll discover that the past is a false prophet and truly epitomizes the definition of a pharisee (a sanctimonious, self-righteous, or hypocritical person).

Trippin over the past

Let me paint a picture for you. Imagine your walking down the street in your neighborhood heading to a friends house, in order to make it to your friends house safely and unharmed you need to look forward eyes ahead and moving forward. Imagine if you were to walk down this busy street walking forward but your head was turned in the opposite direction. Also imagine that there’s someone you don’t know walking behind you holding a mirror so you can see whats ahead but as you know everything reflected in a mirror is distorted and backwards… an illusion.

To add to the confusion the person holding the mirror is telling you to turn left, turn right, stop, slow down… your right is his left, your left is his right. As you can see this whole scenario is mind boggling and confusing. Wouldn’t it be much simpler and efficient to just turn your head around and walk forward?

The same can be said for living your daily life. Life is so much more enjoyable and easy if you shift your attention from the past to the present moment.

Lessons from the past

Let us not throw the baby out with the bath water… the past does in fact have valuable lessons for us to learn from but let us not cling to the past or let our past mistakes and judgments color the choices we make today. As I have learned from spiritual teacher
J. Krishnamurti the past is full of knowledge and it is quite reasonable to access that past knowledge to drive a car, cook dinner or solve a math problem but it is quite a different thing when you access the past when meeting a new friend for the second or third time or when you meet a new person from a certain nationality or religion. The past has nothing to do with who your friend “actually is”… and your past experiences with someone from a particular religion, culture or nationality shouldn’t distract you from the person standing in front of you. The sad truth however is that all to often it does.

“Learning about yourself is not like learning a language or technology or a science, then you obviously have to accumulate and remember; it would be absurd to begin all over again, but in the psychological field learning about yourself is always in the present and knowledge is always in the past, and as most of us live in the past and are satisfied with the past knowledge becomes extraordinarily important to us. That is why we worship the erudite, the clever, the cunning. But if you are learning all the time, learning every minute, learning by watching and listening, learning by seeing and doing, then you will find that learning is a constant movement without the past.”

~J. Krishnamurti “Freedom From The Known”

When you walk into your place of work and you see the people you work with everyday… do you see them as they are or do you see them through the filter of your past experiences with them? I can tell you with 100% certainty if people I was acquainted with just a few years ago knew me today they would have know idea who I am. In the past I’ve been a partying, clubbing pill popping, irresponsible and immature raving machine but that person isn’t who I am today… as a matter of fact the two people are as different as day and night.

What I can appreciate however is who I am today. If it were not for my past who would I be? In that respect I give my past the reverence it deserves but I also realize that any emotions or feelings that arise from my past are false and only are relevant to my life if I choose to let them have my attention.

I was listening to a podcast of “A Course in Miracles” and they were speaking on this very subject, I found it quite interesting. The topic of discussion was the past and our emotions that are tied to the past. If you think about it, whenever you are feeling guilty, ashamed, envious or anger all of those emotions only have relevance if you access the past. So for example if you’re feeling guilty about some hateful things you said to a friend in drunkenness or just because you got in a fight… the guilt you’re feeling is arising only because you have chosen to give your attention to the past; if your attention were in the present moment there would be no guilt.

Now lets not blow things out of proportion and assume that just not thinking about your past will lead you to live a happy and joyous life. While it is certainly true life will become clearer and you will find manifesting what you really want in life is a million times easier you still have to be able to look at your past… only you must find the ability to not cling to it. The key to doing this is to have your roots in the present moment.

It’s so much easier said than done… I know, but like everything else practice makes perfect (practice helps you see that everything is already perfect). My practice is a daily movement that is tied together moment by moment, opportunity by opportunity. I’m no saint (yet), I still lose my cool when someone says something to upset me or someone cuts me off in traffic or steps on my shoe but nowadays I’m finding that more and more as soon as I get upset or am shook out of the present moment I’m finding my way back faster and faster.

Sometimes it’s not until I go to sleep late at night and I reflect on what my day was like. Lying there in bed looking over my day I can say to myself I could have handled that better or perhaps I didn’t need to raise my voice of give such an attitude about something so small and impermanent. The blessing here is being able to reflect but not judge yourself, cling or dwell on it. See it for what it is, make a mental note and move on; tomorrow is a new day or better yet the next moment is a new moment.

In conclusion

So moving forward, not looking back let us remember who we truly are. Who we truly are is who we are right now, not who we were ten seconds ago or ten years ago but infinitely right now. Like I said before this is so much easier said than done but I have a suggestion that might assist with the revolution (not evolution) of your mind. Evolution implies something to work toward but once you see love and truth there’s no evolution (nothing to work toward) rather instantly you revolutionize the way you think and act… instantly!

We all know up to now we’ve been slaves to our past, letting our past actions filter our decisions and choices in the present moment.

Who’s to say we can’t use this ability to our advantage?

Accessing the past doesn’t have to always be about the negative or bad, as a matter of fact if you make a shift in your perception you can use this conditioned ability to access the positive moments from your past. If you find that you’re “in the dumps”, depressed, angry or otherwise remember that you’re living in the past and you need to be present. One helpful way to get back to the present moment is to build a mental bridge, a bridge of positivity and love.

For example if you find that you’re dwelling on something that and ex-lover said to you that was hateful choose to remember a loving moment you shared rather than the negative. Doing this is to be used as a tool to get back to the present moment, to bring a smile to your face and love back into your immediate frame of mind.

It is important however to realize even when you do build your bridge back to the present moment, when you’re finally back to the moment you will need to let go of the past even though its a loving feeling, a joyous memory we want to be careful not to cling to it otherwise eventually you’ll want to cross back over the bridge to access the past and as we’ve discussed… life is in the moment. Remember, like Ram Dass says… “be here now”.

Yes the image above is actually real, I didn’t make this up and it’s not from some movie set. Did you know that God is against drunkenness, sodomy and fornication? Well apparently these folks are in direct communication with the big guy up stairs. Oh and lets make no mistake about it… God is a man and he hates drunks, homosexuals and people who have sex before going to church or city hall to sign a piece of paper!

As you can probably tell I’m trying to make light of the above ignorance with humor. Sadly the fact of the matter is there isn’t really anything funny about kids in the middle of New York streets brainwashed repeating what their ignorant parents program them to say.

Instead of me feeding into the frenzy of hate, ignorance and fear lets examine what it is we think fornication is. I’ll start by checking out what the dictionary says.

So that’s what the dictionary says, basically sex between two unmarried people is what is called fornication. It’s too bad the definition for fornication in reality means much more than a sentence in the dictionary.

If an Alien came here from another planet looked up fornication in the dictionary it would probably seem like any other explanation for any given word. You and I both know (in the real world) fornication implies much more than a person who had sex with another person out of wedlock.

In the real world if you have sex with someone out of wedlock not only are you a fornicator but you are a sinner, deviant, lost soul and you’re going straight to hell. Let us not forget if you are a gay man or lesbian… you’ve struck sinner gold! You’re going to the really hot version of hell that’s even worse than the regular hell full of non-believers, abortion doctors, AIDS victims and Osama Bin Laden.

It’s mind blowing to think that there are people in the world who absolutely believe without a doubt, a couple who has a one night stand or lovers who have been together for years out of wedlock are going to the same fiery hell (assuming there is a hell) that Osama Bin Laden and Hitler reside.

What do you believe?

I don’t know what you believe but here’s what I know. I know my beliefs have nothing to do with fornication because I don’t have any beliefs about fornication to begin with, unless you’re a parent why should anyone?

Without sounding like I’m holier than thou, if you do judge others for their sex life perhaps you should examine more closely your feelings about your beliefs. What gives you the right or authority to judge anyone?

It’s not often that I quote the Bible but to make a point I’ll use these old (interpreted) words from history to illustrate a point.

So let us play this game and assume there is a man in the skies above and he’s keeping count of what we do, blessing us with the gift of “sin”. So assuming we can in fact sin, even so… what gives any of us the right to judge, remark or shun others for so called sinning?

I think all the Muslims, Jews, Christians and any other group who subscribe to living a life judging others… it’s high time you live your life with compassion and love rather than fear and loathing.

Are you kidding me right now? We still live in a world where people are judging each other for who they sleep with, how they sleep with them and if they did it with a signed piece of paper or not. If the end times are near, the end won’t come by the hand of god but by the mouth of modern day church goers who ignorantly and insidiously perpetuate fear and hate.

In the name of God, all those who delegate the smallest fraction of time, energy and effort to smite those who do what they will with their sex lives… please reconsider your actions.

I ask you on behalf of the whole of humanity to reconsider your beliefs and actions, whether you know it or not YOU are destroying this world with fear.

Are you in love or fear?

What is it to love your fellow man? Does love have anything to do with hate, judgment, or sin? I highly doubt it. Love is all encompassing all embracing and the end all be all of this universe.

Love is what binds us, love is what holds this world together and any personal emotion, aggression or movement away from that love is not in praise of God, Jehovah, Allah, Jah, Christ or Zues but a ignorant action that comes from a human being who’s not living a life of love and compassion.

Love is God my friends, love is what it’s all about. The next time you find yourself judging someone for living their life the way God intended them to, check yourself and remember you’re not loving.

If you want, you can even insert WWDJ, (what would Jesus do) instead of… am I being a loving person. I can assure you from what I’ve read of  Jesus, he would not judge anyone for anything and if he were alive today he’d tell you to do the same thing.

Ready to get your Zen on?

I’m not asking or calling all people to start subscribing to the school of Zen that would be redundant as all labels and religions are divisive and separate you and I from our fellow man.

What I am asking of us all is to apply some Zen to your life, a.k.a. mindfulness. If we could only observe and be mindful of ourselves completely in our daily lives then perhaps there would be more love in the world and less fear.

Knowing that God is love and love is all there truly is, is there any room in our lives to judge one another? If we can remember moment by moment in our daily lives that God has nothing to do with fear, judgment or sin then we can be godly.

So the next time you go to quote the Bible, Kuran, Old Testament, Upanishads or Bhagavad Gita remember none of that has anything to do with what is actually going on at the moment. All of those books and scriptures are of the past and we’re not living in the past, you and I are pledging to live in the moment… right here right now.

If you and I can be in the present moment when we are making breakfast, gossiping with friends, gathered around the water cooler at work or listening to the reverend at church anything that we think or any words that come out of our mouths will be from a place of love not fear.

If we can start to live our lives individually in the moment and our thoughts and words are of love not fear… think of the reality we can manifest.

Absolute peace in this world is 100% possible. I don’t care if you’ve been spoon fed whatever religion you’re currently subscribing to WE HUMAN BEINGS are ready to move beyond the fear of conditioning and child programming… we’re ready for heaven on earth.

Let’s be the change we want to see in the world. No more gossip, no more back biting, no more living in the shadow of dogma and fear.

I have tremendous faith in mankind but “my faith” in mankind is useless and meaningless. Faith, beliefs and words mean absolutely nothing but we’ve been conditioned to put a tremendous amount importance in all the above.

I’m asking you to look at what our faith, beliefs, words and thoughts have manifest in the world we live in today. Don’t take my word for it… you owe it to yourself and the rest of the world to seriously examine all of this quietly and deeply.

If we are to ever live in a world where there is peace, no wars and we all have food and shelter we must all do our part as individuals to make that world a reality. We need to move past all the ideas about peace, love and happiness and start living it.

Let us put down our holy books and scriptures. Let us stop talking about what the past says we should do in the future. Let us live in the moment where love resides and from that sacred place let our thoughts and actions manifest the revolution of universal unconditional love and peace.

What is the red donut? When I first heard of this concept I asked myself the same question. As it turns out this seemingly comical concept of a red donut is actually very intuitive and enlightening once explained.

In the previous video I posted “Intro to Non-Dualism” Philip illustrated for us our higher self or god-self by using words such as peaceful, loving, joyful, truth and omnipotent. Those words represent who we truly are outside of our ego.

Our ego a.k.a. the red donut is represented by words like desire, anxiety, loneliness and regret. Philip then goes on to explain that the words highlighted in red are illusions and they all have to do with the past or the future. These illusions like shame, addiction and suffering are created by our minds via the supporting structure of the ego.

The truth of the matter is there is no such thing as pity, hurt, control or envy. All of these emotions are of the past or future, they have nothing to do with the present moment. In-all-reality… our true self resides in the present moment. In order for us to feel regret for example we have to reference the past, we have to actually choose to remember what happened in the past in order to feel the emotion of regret or jealousy.

Imagine if we could keep our minds in the moment and not think about or reference the past. If we stayed in the moment none of these illusory emotions or feelings would arise.

Our true self is unmovable, eternal and complete, we are unconditional love. Sometime you touch this god-self when you’re in extreme states of joy, a baby being born or falling in love for example. Think about the last time you felt true joy, there wasn’t any worry about the past or future, when you’re in joy (enjoy) or “with spirit” you are completely in the moment.

The red donut is all of those false illusory emotions that surround us and block us from our true god-self (love, happiness, joy). Again if you were always in the moment you wouldn’t feel regret, panic or the need to control.

The good news however is that the LOVE doesn’t go anywhere, it’s who we are and will always be. We might not always feel like it but that’s only because we’re disconnected (or so it seems). Sometimes it seem terribly real whatever it is we’re going through in life but look at it closely and examine it thoroughly.

Who do you think you are at your core?

You and I can’t possibly be any of those things like anxiety, envy, unease, guilt or apprehension… we are so much more than that. If at some point you’re feeling those emotions just remember it’s because your NOT IN THE MOMENT you’re thinking about the past or about the future.

If we want to realize our true nature (LOVE) then we must remember to not referece our past experiences because the past has NOTHING to do with our true self.

Our true self isn’t of the past or in the future we are eternally right now and always have been! I think Richard Alpert a.k.a. Ram Dass said it best with his book titled… “Be Here Now“.

Watch the video at the beginning of the post, enjoy and I’d love to hear your feedback.

I’d like to share with you a video I ran across by A Course in Miracles. This particular video is “Intro to Non-Dualism”.

I’ve heard about the Course in Miracles for a few years but have never took the time to read the book or seek more info on the course. Most of my family has read the book and they all have nothing but good things to say… so it’s about time I pick it up and see what all the fuss is about.

I watched this video last night for the first time and I have to admit the course has definitely got my attention now. This short video only 10 minutes in length covers a broad scope of topics quickly and everything makes perfect sense! It’s almost as if I’m being reminded of what I already know as opposed to learning something new.

The video admittedly is a little “vanilla” for lack of a better word but if you can get past the person talking and hear the message, I think it will peak your interest as it has mine.

Without giving away too much. One of my favorite parts of the video is when he points out that feeling defensive or shame for instance requires that you access the past… past memories. He then goes on to explain if you can remain present and not think about the past then it would be impossible to feel guilt or become defensive. In order to feel the guilt or get defensive you have to remember what happened in the past… so be in the present moment!

I’ll definitely be posting more from A Course in Miracles, I’m ecstatic to have found something else to broaden my spiritual horizons!

If anyone is currently studying A Course in Miracles please let me know what your experience has been. Also any other recommendations for books or videos are welcome.

For more information on A Course in Miracles please visit their website.

Peace and Love.

Kymatica as a film if I had to describe it in one word I would say “Amen”! I am extremely thrilled to see more films like this being created and shared in an ever growing community of conscious human beings.

The film does share similar themes as the popular award winning docu-film “The Zeitgeist Addendum” but can stand on it’s own with original and thought provoking subject matter.

One of my favorite parts begins at about 19:45 mins into the film the beginning of the “LOGOS” chapter. The narrator begins to explain how everything in existence is a relationship between vibrations and matter. He then goes on to explain further that in nature the phenomenon of “VIBRATIONS” is the masculine creative force and its opposite “MATTER” is the feminine receptive force and from these two forces begins the basic principles of duality.

This is the duality we see in every day life from hot and cold, good and bad… even god and the devil. It’s briefly explained how over time the idea of duality has been perverted and distorted by ancient religions, myths, text and dogma giving the impression that one of the polarities is absolute good and the other evil.

The two forces… vibrations and matter fundamentally are what give rise to all that we know in the known universe. These two phenomenon should not be looked at as opposites, rather two forces that are one in the same and would not exist without the other.

Vibrations and matter are what come together to create everything we know, this is KYMATICA.

This part of the film really hit home with me and I watched this segment over and over again. It’s apparent that we as a species have lost our way and are disconnected. It’s obvious isn’t it? Would there be wars, fighting and children dying from not having enough food to eat if we all were truly connected?

When we live in a world that has an abundance of resources that if utilized properly could feed and supply energy to everyone on the planet… BUT WE DON’T because of greed, money and profit… the answer is clear. We are disconnected! We live our lives each monotonous day in fear and are clamoring to make sense of it all.

We disguise this fear by subscribing to one of the many soothing and promising religions but as we can see by evidence of our history… religions offer no true peace of mind. Millions of people around the globe as individuals ALL subscribing to their individual religious beliefs. We all think WE KNOW THE TRUTH and we tell our neighbors, lovers and family members who are of different faiths we love them but this is the farthest thing from the truth. We don’t love… we tolerate.

A truly religious person doesn’t subscribe or memorize scripture from books, a truly religious person doesn’t need to. Religion is so not what it should be, it’s packaged, polished and presented to the masses with cunning and masterful advocates who are slowly and insidiously programming you to not think for yourself.

Today’s religions and non-religions (Athiest) are broken “ideas” the equivalent of a toy given to a crying child. The horrifying fact is however these “ideas” or toys for the mind are only temporary and eventually we all have to embrace LIFE as it is, not someone else’s ideas about it.

We have thousands upon thousands of people in the world from Africa to China who live on less than a dollar a day, are riddled with disease and no hope in sight. What are we going to do?

For god sake… let us stop pretending that we know all the answers!

All the Athiest and Theist set aside your beliefs, your books, your gospel, your dogmas, your sin, your promises, your devil, your bigotry and WAKE UP!

You’ve been programmed and conditioned and you don’t even know it. I hate come off sounding like I know it all… I’ll be the first to admit I don’t but I can see clearly WHAT IS NOT WORKING.

This beautiful planet that we are so fortunate and blessed to live on is dying and each one of us is responsible.

Are we all that stupid?

Do we all really think as a Muslim we’re going to get 40 virgins and live in everlasting peace in paradise? Do we all really think as a Christian that when we die and go to heaven it will be “heaven”? How could it be knowing that all the other humans you loved and knew, the Muslim, the Jew, the Athiest, your brother or sister who wasn’t Christian is in hell?

If that is what heaven is like… I don’t want to be there!

How about we stop hypothesizing about what is to come and deal with what has been presented to us… LIFE! This life, better… this consciousness that you’ve been blessed with has all the power of the universe. WE ARE TRULY GODS.

Each one of us has the power to create and destroy this world. Each one of us needs to take responsibility, like Ghandi said “be the change we want to see in the world”. The problems aren’t out there somewhere and the answers aren’t in some book or church.

ALL OF US need to do some serious soul searching and find out what it is to be a HUMAN BEING, not a HUMAN FOLLOWER.

It’s time to kick yourself in the butt, it’s time to raise heaven on earth. There cannot be peace on earth with a thousand different religions, countries, states and governments.

There can only be peace once we see all of the above as divisive and separative “ideas” that have been passed down from generation to generation yielding heartache, suffering, war, fear and all the rest of it… it’s time to wake up and it’s time to live up to our true potential as human beings.

Watch this film, let me know what you thought. Also I’m interested in learning more about you and what you’re doing to improve yourself and in turn the world.

I truly believe we can save our planet and species from catastrophe but my beliefs don’t have anything to do with manifesting this reality… my actions do! With love and sincerity in my heart I ask that you like myself seek out the truth. Let the search for truth be fueled by intentions grounded in love and let that search be renewed with new energy each day.