Be Still: MEDITATE

MEDITATION: Meditation has been a Spiritual practice used for many many thousands of years, well before the time of Christ. I find it so fascinating that even the Bible uses the command and word: MEDITATE, over 20 times in the old Testament and many in the new. Yet, meditation is hardly ever taught within traditional, fundamental Christian practices. Rather, meditation is usually a word used to encourage people to ‘think about’ or ‘ponder on’.. This is a Catholic twist on meditation. Over 1,900 years ago the Catholic church, well before the Protestant Reformation, decided that meditation was too “empowering” for the people. To encourage people to be ’silent’ or ‘open their heart or mind’ to Spirit would usurp the Power of the Church and disallow the control needed to monitor and manage the people. It would empower them to Think for Themselves. So meditation was twisted to be “thought based” movement, and used to focus on the manuscripts and interpretations that the Church had developed and very strategically altered and revised in order to keep the people under control. Disconnected.

Meditation means access to the very Presence and Spirit from which we all came. it’s Essential for any type of Spiritual growth. Furthermore, the Church created the concept that “an idle mind (true Meditation), is the devils playground or workshop. Thus…you need to let the Church think for you. Listen to what they say. Dogma. Tradition. Theology. The pope, the elders, the bishops, the preachers and priests. Why would they be so afraid of the people Meditating and becoming Still and Quiet and Silent?? Hmmmmm….seems pretty obvious to me. Be still and KNOW. That’s the scripture itself. It’s not “Be still and think about what we tell you to think about..”.. It’s BE STILL…AND…. KNOW.

In the Stillness… In the Quiet… In Meditation we find the Connection and the Wisdom and The Power and The Presence we’re usually busy running from.

I’ve been meditating for almost 20 years. I remember the first time I sat quietly, went within, into the Stillness. It was in College. I shared it with a fellow musician and when I shared what had happened, the Peace I had felt, the Stillness and the Power that I had experienced, they immediately told me I was ‘playing with the devil.’ Of course they said it was something that I shouldn’t do, that it wasn’t taught by the Baptist church. Read your church history folks. It’s not that difficult to read the history of the Church and see what happened.

I’m so grateful that I’ve found this tool for Becoming. For Connecting. For leaving what is all around and moving through and busying my world, leaving it for a place of Quiet and Stillness and Knowing. And Connecting.

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“Be Still and Know” • “The Kingdom is Within You” • “Seek Ye First the Kingdom”

~ Jesus, the Christ

My thoughts to share.

Namaste

Paul

Just Start Over

There is nothing more powerful than the gift to choose. The freedom to establish a relationship with that Element – CHOICE, is one of the greatest gifts we’ve been offered. Today is a new day. What a great day to start over, in some ways, and choose more deeply, more wisely and more consciously – in others. Forgive yourself, and begin again. No one is holding you back, but you. NAMASTE  Paul P

Graceful Awakening

Like many of us, I’ve done a lot of work with my past. With my childhood and exploring what, why, when and where? So deep and rich. Beautifully and graciously, as Light would have it, it wasn’t an unending circle for me. I was able to move forward and find the gifts in the shadows. It took tremendous work, tenacity, massive amounts of courage and seemingly unending debits from my bank account I call Grace.

I remember when I first started exploring things ‘that happened’ or what my ‘childhood traumas were.’. People would say, “You have to move forward.! “You just need to let go, move on, it’s over.” Or one said, “Get over it and grow up!”

My heart for some reason said, “No.” For some unknown reason, I needed to explore more and understand a bit more of how and why I responded the way I did as a child. So, I began on a journey that followed my heart, taking the risk of listening to few outside of mySelf.

And this is what I discovered:

Within every excuse, no matter what our excuse is for, we’ll find a Wound. Sometimes deep and sometimes more surface. Face the fear from the wound and every excuse and every story we’ve created for not doing what we want, or what we, with integrity know we’re here to do, will just disappear. This insight is what I call Grace.

This is a process. An unending Journey of discovery and exploration. But one I welcome and encourage others to take. Sure, there comes a time to let go of the Story, but don’t rob yourSelf of the Gifts of experience and the insights that come from opening your heart to see what was and like an angel opening it’s wings, you’ll find the Freedom, finally, to Fly.

NAMASTE

Who Wants to Be Free Anyway?

“You want to know the truth!??…You can’t handle the Truth!”  Jack Nicholson was right for most of us.  Most of us say we want to see what’s real and know the truth.  But do we really?  Are we really willing to SEE the Truth?  What if the Truth isn’t what we thought?  What if the truth contradicts what we’ve always believed? What we’ve preached and shared and taught and witnessed. Is it at all possible that we’ve been seeing or believing or thinking something that just isn’t true??  Have we been in denial?  What if?

In order to see the truth, we have to be willing to see that we’ve possibly been wrong.  We have to be willing to see things differently..if  it’s the Truth.   It’s not an easy choice…to ask to see the Truth.

To see.  To really see from an inner eye that show us, “THIS IS THE TRUTH” is not the hard part.  The hardest part is hearing from the inner ear when it says to us, “You’ve been wrong. You’ve been blinded with fear.  Unwilling to hear the voice that says THIS IS THE WAY.”

Most people are so afraid to get out of their traditional box.  Their fear coated cage of inner horror that for all these years they might just have believed something other than the Truth.

So the redemption here?  Moving forward  and opening to the Truth, facing your Self, opening your heart, mind, eyes and ears will never do anything more powerful than this:  ”You shall know the Truth and the Truth Will set you Free.”   If you’re Free, don’t seek any further.  Good for you!  If every part of your life is sweet, simple, powerful, easy, passionate and filled with Grace, then don’t seek no mo’! . Don’t ask to know any more. Seriously.  But if something inside, that inner ear says, “There’s something more…”, then lay down your old ideas and systems that believed you knew it all, already and ask, “Please show me the Truth, I’m willing to see.”

I believe in you.  You SHALL know the Truth, you DO know the Truth and the Truth will and has, set you Free.

PP

Eyesight? Or Insight?

I find it so curious that many teachings say to “Go within.”  ”Be Still and Know”.   “Listen.”   Even Christianity teaches, theologically, dogmatically, that we are to be ‘led’ when to go left and when to turn to the right.   How curious that we immediately leave that direction for a manual, teachings, literature, bibles, books and teachers, how we leave our own insight for the direction and teachings of others.  Sacrificing our own inner site and thus tossing out our own personal, optimal peace.

Either we do or we do not have the ability to know.  The ability to hear and be guided.  The ability to tap into the inner teacher that can give us every single bit of information we need to know in every situation.

Learning to ’see’ from the inside out is one of the greatest gifts we’ve been given.  The ‘knowing’s and the ’seeing’s from the hart and soul will guide to know, be, do, or have at any moment, in any time.   It’s our radar, our gps, our teacher and our very soul.  It IS the very Spirit of the Presence of all that is, coming through us to give us what we need to be on Purpose during this life experience.

I remember when I was 21.  I had just come out of many years of training and teachings from Christianity.  I remember one day deciding to give up everything I knew.  Or thought I knew.  I remmber saying to God, “I’m willing to give up everything I think I know is true, if you will one at a time, show me what teachings are really true.”   Sure enough, for me, one at a time I began to see things differently. I suddenly was free from what I had been told and I was able to start to see the light that had been guiding me all these years.  I had been working so hard for so long to understand and learn ‘teachings’ and dogma and doctrine – theology.

Now, my teacher is within.  It is God.  It is the Presence of the Holy Spirit but it isn’t because it’s been fed to me from a book, a bible, Oprah or Billy Graham.   Insight to who and what we are, internally, is our truest power. Tapping us into the finest stream of knowing and Presence than could ever possibly be fed to us from any other direction, anywhere.

Open your heart and your eyes will be open.  Open your eyes and your ears will hear.  Follow what you see and honor what you find is the Way and suddenly everything changes.  Suddenly Love IS the way and the practices and princples that were taught by the great enlightened teachers of the stories we’ve read and been given begin to shine through us in a way that we only used to THINK we really had any idea as to their meaning.

PP

 

Journey to The Soul (Mother Vine)

How deep do you want to go?  What is your commitment to evolving, to waking up?   What are you willing to do?   What are you willing to give up that no longer serves you?  How passionately do you want what you sense you are?

You know the depth and breadth of the connection, and love and peace and satisfaction that your identity really holds for you.  How badly do you want it ? Do you yearn for it from the depths of your entire being?  Do you taste it?  What are you willing to choose in order to have this?

Are you consumed by too much computer?  Too much information?  Too much idle conversation and chatter with those that don’t?  To much food?  Too much relationship?  Too much… Consumption?  When there is too much, too much of anything, it’s hard to be open and to be empty enough to be filled full of what Really matters.   The energy pushes one out and replaces it with the other….create Space.  Space is what you seek, internally for growth.

No, this isn’t about sacrafice, but yes, it IS about choice.   You see, only in  the vibration of closest resonance to who you REALLY ARE…your soul vibration…only resonating with that while your on the planet can you most fully awake and be who you really are. And be deeply and fully satisfied. With out stress of evolving.

You may ask, But is this necessary?   Then you are not ready.  When you realize that clearing the space for the landing of your soul, making ready for the experience that you have come here to have, when you realize, or acknowledge that this is all that really matters, it’s then your life experience will become one that is purely magic.

So, we ask again, what are you willing to do in order to have this.

We ask about choosing because it’s in  choosing that you live your life on planet earth. It’s in making choices, deliberately that you  are defined to be who you really are.  A name is chosen for you at birth.  You are not your name.  This was chosen for you to identify for you parts of who you are.  As you wake up and evolve and grow, you become more identified with MORE of who you really are.  As you remember more of your fullness, from your soul as who you are, you do what is called AWAKEN.  You start to remember this depth, this trueness of your Spirit. This Identity.  It’s now that you’re remembering more than ever and it’s now that you are waking up.

So, we ask again, what are you willing to do for this greater, most refined, most beautifully satisfying connection and memory of who you REALLY are?

Is it the food you eat that keeps you from being a vibrational match to your soul?  Or your thoughts?  or your choice to stay in stressful situations?  Is it your busy busy life that keeps you running, preoccupied (intentionally) from the quiet of the Presence?  What is your practice that allows you to be with your True self?  Regularly. Daily. Even many times within a day if necessary?  What are you already choosing that keeps You, the real YOU disconnected?  Are you willing to choose the opposite.  To choose what you’re really seeking?  You know who you are.

Do you realize that everything you do, think, choose, feel….everything has a vibrational frequency and each frequency is closer to who you are or pulls you farther away?  Are you going Deeper and higher?  You know this innately as a spiritual being in a body.  What are you choosing?  Going up? or Going down?  Higher?  Clearer? More easy and peaceful.  Stop and sense what it’s like to live like this.  This is your destiny.  This is why you’ve come.  This is part of the process of waking up so you can REALLY live on this planet, NOW.

What are you willing to do to maintain the height of your connection. Think about it. It’s easy for you to see in the quiet.  Be still, and know.

Managing and maintaing your vibration, your connection, your Soulful life is all that matters to you, really.  It’s what you want more than anything.  It’s why you’ve come here.   Here is where you’ll find what you call Self-empowerment.  It’s really not self empowerment at all, it’s really Soul empowerment. Channeling your soul. Being Real.  Integrity. Within. The highest form of power and connection is your freedom to choose with your heart, with your knowing.

You will find as you continue to consider these thoughts, you’re writing and reading, your clarity will expand and open and become more and more clear to you.

Consider this…

RIGHT NOW, there is an opportunity for you, internally, spiritually, from a place in the soul expanding through your physical world, there is an opportunity to AWAKEN.  Herein is the manifestation of your love, relationships finances, and all purposeful experiences.  But that’s really so surface for YOUR experience.  Here in is the true bliss and ecstasy of your soul and it’s presence coming through you and emanating out and through to others on the planet.  This is REAL purpose.  The other things are already done, the relationships, careers, loves, monies.  They’re so insignificant and easy to create outside of the power that you are journeying to now live.

What are you willing to do to manage your vibration?  To grow your awareness of your connection and know and experience love, joy, peace, bliss, ecstasy and the very Presence of Gods spirit in this life.  Your own.

How deep do you want to go?  How much do you want to be open to?  How far do you want to travel, within, to know what’s really real?   Really consider these questions.

It’s time my friend.   Sit and listen.  You already know. Cultivate what you know.  Cultivate the peace and subtle nuances of your souls longing to know you and you will find what you’re looking for and what you came here to share.  So simple and so exquisitely sweet. Purely, it is deepest Love.

You came here to support and love, those who too, want to wake up and live from this place of Presence.  It’s sweet and you are drawn to this work because it’s time for you to be the Difference for your soul, in body, right now, on this planet, in this time and space.  Taste this and tell yourself that you are ready.  You know in your depths that the ego has been cracked and your world is no longer the same.

Peace and light are all around you.  You are guided.  You are blessed and the hand of the Spirit of the universe is all over you.  Listen and see and follow and Choose.

Peace and light from your Soul

November 23, 2009  PP

Manifestation

We have to stop waiting to get there to live there… We have to start living there in order to get there.  PP

Picture Perfect in Strange, Still Waters

I pity those whose feel their lives are ‘perfect’.  I find it’s in the challenge and in the uncomfortable and strange waters of change that shift most deeply occurs.  I’m grateful for the transitional times of life when my desires and dreams become more and more clear and the light of who I am is what I reach for most.   It’s here I find Peace.  And though I love the quiet, the centered times of more of who I Am, I wouldn’t ask for less, fewer uncomfortable  moments than I’m offered, to see the difference.

Paul

Hunches to Personal Power

Your highest level of Personal power is accessed via your hunches and your intutition.  Testing these elements with Faith is utlimately Discovering how to REALLY live your Life.  This ‘guidance” avenues your Ability to Access your own power and navigate on the planet with ease, with clarity,  with great personal satisfaction and with REAL Knowing and Power. This is where True Self-Esteem is found.  This is where You become YOU and your Soul can share it’s fullness through this life experience.   Without Self ESteem there is no full acceptance of the being that you came to express that you really are.  PP

Being Real, Being True, Being Free.

For years I was afraid of what my family would think of me for being gay.  I was mostly afraid of hurting my parents and my sisters.  I lived a life of fraudulent front in horror, in deep desperation, dark depression and in the constant shadow of the consideration of suicide, for so many years.   I just didn’t want to cause “them” pain.  I had rather been in pain myself, tortured myself, even would have chose to die, rather than cause them to suffer because of who I realized I was.

I put my life on hold for so many years in exchange for nothing.  I refused to show up for my own life in order to keep peace, not cause a disturbance and to keep things ‘calm’.

Yes, there is much to this story.  So much Shadow. So much sadness and fear.  So much self deprecating hatred expressing itself through addiction and depression.  But there’s another side to this crazy coin.  How can I teach and share with others what Self Esteem is if I myself am refusing to embrace it?  Something that I could taste and sense and yet couldn’t seem to choose.

This is where I saw the Light.  Where I actually realized that I was protecting them to my own detriment.  I was hating me, but protecting them? Could they possibly really need this from me?  I was protecting them from their feelings and ideas about my being gay, from my spiritual path being different from theirs?  Yes.   I was protecting them from their pain and sacrificing myself. Willing to go through whatever it took to keep me off-line. Out of sync.  In a hole.  How futile is that path?!  It wasn’t until I recognized that I was not only keeping myself from showing up for my life, but I was literally taking away their own opportunity for growth as a result of the difference of who I am.  Maybe their opportunity to come closer to their Truth and learn about peace?  Power?  Sadness?  Strength?  A relationship with their religious experience?  I was literally attempting to manipulate their potential karmic directives by limiting the Truth that they might hear, know, fear or experience beacuse of Who I Am. I was robbing them of their potential gifts.

Do you see how powerful it is to be True?  To be honest?   For everyone around you!? To allow people to experience their own Journey in their own way?!  How will we change if people are afraid to speak their Truth? How will realize where we’ve been sheep?  Where we need to shift our perpsective?   The light the light the light!  We’re only as screwed up as our deepest secret is hidden.  Where there is light and exposure there is Freedom and possibility for radical shift in understanding, awakening and Freedom. For Truth!  It’s all there. In that process of coming forth and being REAL.   For me, for you, for them.  But if we limit our own Journey because of what we’re afraid others will have to go through, we’re doing nothing but interfering in that amazing things we call Life and growth.

We’re here to learn.  To make mistakes. To reach. To forgive. To support each other and ourselves by being easy with it all.  The Shadow brings gifts and in these gifts, when we’re willing, we find the gold in the dark that liberates us all!  The freedom that comes in being Authentic is the greatest freedom we may ever know.  Whether it’s the difference of a spiritual or religious belief, or personal or political point of view.  Or you’re gay or different or socially, regionally unacceptable by those around you…Don’t be afraid to be who you are. Don’t be afraid of others having to deal with it!  Be Real. Be Free.  Be light.  It’s your Divine right.

Namaste

Paul