No More Sacrifices, No More Blessings, No More Prayers!

Until I was 10, my family went to an Orthodox synagogue for the High Holy Days each year (and only for the High Holy Days -- my parents really weren't into it). I clearly remember sitting upstairs in a balcony with the women, as worship is sex-segregated in Orthodox shuls. I always sat next to my grandmother, who could read Hebrew (very unusual for a woman of her age). She read the prayer books in Hebrew, turning the pages with the service, and I would follow along in English.

I was amazed to read, over and over again, "I am a jealous God, I am a wrathful God, I am a vengeful God", along with detailed descriptions of exactly what sacrifices were required, as well as how they would be prepared, for example (and this is a vague memory), seven unblemished kids, and seven ephahs of flour, to be burned on the altar, along with seven ephahs of wine, to be poured out before the altar. (An ephah is about a bushel.)

Though no one ever talked to me about this, I understood the sacrifices as a pagan rite of a desert people (circa 5000BC) who lived in a harsh environment, and just wanted to have enough to eat to live through the year.

In "The Gift of the Jews", Thomas Cahill makes the point that the cultural innovation of the Jews was seeing all the desert gods around them as aspects of one supremely powerful GOD. This was apparently the main change -- so all the petty, jealous gods didn't lose their characteristics, they just became agglomerated into One. Hence the jealous, vengeful, wrathful GOD.

Please note that the word, 'sacrifice', is derived from a combination of the Latin words 'sacer', meaning 'holy', and facere, 'to make'. So sacrificing literally means making sacred. The Romans were sacrificing to their gods, too. So when you sacrifice, you are making a holy covenant with a vengeful, wrathful, jealous GOD. I'll give you these seven kids, see, and you'll make sure that my goats make 15 more goats, and they all live, okay, GOD? (The word might have come about at the same time as the Jews were beginning to venerate the ONE or perhaps as many as 5 millennia later.)

Similarly, the word, 'blessing' comes from the Old English word, 'bledsian' (before 950AD, or at least 7 centuries after the height of the Roman Empire). It means to consecrate, or make sacred, with blood. Sounds suspiciously like blessings come from blood sacrifices, doesn't it? You keep the wrathful GOD happy by spilling blood...

Fast forward another millennium or so, to a time when many of us don't believe in appeasing an angry god outside of ourselves, but rather that GOD is All That Is, so that you can't be separate. So why are we still 'making sacrifices'? Why are we still asking for blessings, for ourselves or for others? Why are we still 'praying', which comes from the Latin, 'precari', to beg?

We need a new language for uniting with All That Is, to create in joy, love and peace. Anyone care to help? Please post here!

Modern Love - Those Aren’t Fighting Words, Dear - NYTimes.com

This is clarity, and staying centered, and the knowledge that you can't fix someone else, in action:

Modern Love - Those Aren’t Fighting Words, Dear - NYTimes.com

Does this explain why my stepson doesn't see the trash he leaves on the kitchen counter!

The long and short of how men and women see | Mail Online

(hat tip Ray)

Ever made a bad decision, even though part of you knew better?

You know how it is -- you take a job, even though you have a bad feeling in the pit of your stomach. Or you get into a relationship, even though that still, small voice inside says, "No!" Or you say 'yes' to a project, even though a red light flashes internally.

It doesn't have to be that way! You can learn how to access your own intuition, your own psychic abilities, and test them in a low stress atmosphere, so that you learn to trust that feeling, that voice, that vision. It's easy, it's fun, and it's coming to a telephone near you.

I've been doing psychic readings as an expert intuitive for over 25 years. In that time, I've teased apart the building blocks of intuition. After you know what these building blocks are, you'll begin to identify what your special gifts are, and how they manifest for you. You'll also learn an undetectable method of using your hands to get information anywhere, any time, under any circumstance.

Once you know these things, you can practice -- the class provides safe opportunities to practice. You'll also learn how to practice on your own, so you can build the self confidence to trust your intuition when it really counts -- for the job offer, the relationship, the project.

The class meets twice a month for 5 months -- and the first month costs only $1!

To learn more, click here. Space is limited, so if you already know this is for you, call me now at 888-4-hollis to sign up.

Good News: Science is Now Taking Intuition Seriously

The good news is that science is now taking intuition seriously; the bad news is that it is taking a war to do it.

What they are mostly investigating here is clairsentience, or the gut feeling of knowing something that you can't put your finger on. Turns out it's very valuable for sensing danger, which makes sense, because all animals need it, or they'll be eaten.

The ability to notice patterns at an unconscious level is very important. The ability of one's eyes to see things that they aren't looking at is important, too. Certain areas of the brain are involved, and some people's work better than others'. So, yes, clairsentient ability is probably going to be normally distributed in the population, just like most abilities.

Here's the whole article:

Brain Power - In Battle, Hunches Prove to Be Valuable - Series - NYTimes.com

Finally! Scientists take the aura seriously

Now that scientists can take photos with very sensitive cameras, which can record light at 1/1000 the brightness that it would have to be for you to see it, they are looking at auras! And talking about how they might be useful medically. See the photos and read all about it:

Humans Glow

[ht Paul]

THe NJ I know and love

Now that's the NJ I remember growing up in! I grew up near the Jersey Shore, and often went to the beach (every day for whole summers, in fact) near Deal and Elberon.

2 N.J. Mayors Arrested in Broad Inquiry on Corruption - NYTimes.com

And fwiw, we always knew that when someone died in a light plane or boating accident, it wasn't really an accident.

Can Meditation Change Your Brain And Affect Your Genes?

Drum roll, please! And the answer is

YES!

From Dr. Patricia Fitzgerald: Can Meditation Change Your Brain And Affect Your Genes? on HuffPo:

They used an fMRI scan (functional magnetic resonance imaging) during what is called an affect labeling task. So they had people do this task where they have to label someone's emotional expression (e.g. fearful or surprised). There are certain parts of the brain that are known to be involved in doing that task, particularly the prefrontal cortex modulating the emotional center which is the amygdala. When they did this study they found that the more mindful people were, the more activity in the frontal cortex quieting down the emotional center.

In other studies, mindfulness is shown to change brain activity and even structure with practice. For example, Sara Lazar's research found that the structure of parts of the brain differed in long-time meditators compared to non-meditators. There are now many studies supporting brain changes with various sorts of meditation, including mindfulness meditation.

PF: Are you speaking about neuroplasticity?

SS: Yes, the capacity of the brain to change as a function of experience. And as a geneticist, I'm really interested in epigenetic phenomenon, that is, the capacity of our genes to change in their expression as a function of experience. Meditation seems to do that as well! There is one really great study where a set of about 15 genes were shown to differ (in expression) as function of a type of meditation. Those genes are ones involved in the stress response. And I'm sure there will be more studies like that.

What's really cool about that, from my background in genetics, is that it illustrates that a mind state that we can self-induce can regulate gene expression - turn gene expression up or down.

There is a growing body of scientific evidence about mindfulness that I think is sufficient today to say: Try it, it's likely beneficial, harmless, free, and relatively simple.

Why girls go in twos and boys hunt in packs - Times Online

Neuropsychology is giving us some amazing insights:

Why girls go in twos and boys hunt in packs - Times Online

Do you remember agreeing to be part of a vast chemical experiment?

I sure don't. Yet I am, and we are, living in the midst of a vast chemical experiment that none of us ever agreed to.

I was part of the first generation of kids to grow up in and around swimming pools. My family jokingly referred to me as 'the fish', because I spent as many hours as I could in the community pool each summer, being on a swimming team, learning how to dive, playing Marco Polo, and on and on.

At the age of 23, I was one of the first cases of what is today called Chronic Fatigue Immune Dysfunction Syndrome (I was so early, it didn't even have a name). 10 years later, I was told by an MD, who was also trained in Chinese medicine, that "there's always an adrenal problem" in CFIDS.

25 years later, John Gray ("Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus"), who is amazingly widely read, and very knowledgeable on many subjects, told me privately that adrenal problems are always the result of thyroid dysfunction (hypothyroidism), because when the thyroid doesn't work, the adrenals step in to do the work, work for which they aren't intended, and burn out. Further, he said these cases almost always have to do with exposure to chlorine (swimming pools), and/or fluorine (fluoridated water), which displace iodine, which is critically necessary to adequate functioning of the thyroid.

So did spending all that time in the pool create the CFIDS 15 years later? I'll never know for sure.

And now we have these two studies, which link air pollution to lower IQs:

Education Week: Kids' lower IQ scores linked to prenatal pollution

Smog Linked in School Study to Lower IQ Scores

Every time you gas up, heck, every time you time you drive, you're adding to the vast chemical experiment, since most of the myriad of compounds unleashed were never tested in any way for safety. Scrubbing Bubbles? That stuff goes down the drain and into our water. Hair spray? Goes into the air we all breathe. And the residue gets washed down the drain and into our water. Nail polish? There are fumes when you use it, and when you later clip your nails, the polish goes into the waste bin, which decomposes into who-knows-what that percolates into our soil and ground water. The drugs you take? I'd guess that whatever isn't absorbed by your body gets flushed down the toilet and into our water, too.

So think each time you use a chemical product: the brain you save may be your own -- or your kids'.

7 Ways to Avoid Getting Sucked In to Other People's Dramas

Have you ever found yourself in the middle of a situation, that doesn't really concern you, where there is a lot of anger, or fear, or even sadness, going around? Perhaps you've been invited to dinner by a couple whose marriage is falling apart, and the air crackles with the intensity of silent recrminations. Or maybe two of your colleagues, both of whom you like, can't stand each other, and they each come crying to you. Or perhaps an acquaintance, not someone you are close to, has just been diagnosed with cancer, or a friend's sibling (whom you've never met) just died. Emotion swirls around you, but it isn't of your making, and really, it doesn't concern you, except in John Donne's sense:

"No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."

Well, I was in one of those situations this week. (Sorry, I can't talk about it, but I promised I wouldn't.)

I kept hearing my guides say, "It serves no one for you to get caught up in their drama", which is, of course, true. If I get caught up in these others' drama, then I am not available to support them, and I feel lousy, too. It also serves no one for me to feel sorry for them, because that actually prevents their healing. (Don't believe me about that last? Take my Intuition Development telecourse, and you'll learn through your own experience that it's true.)

So what can you do to avoid getting caught up in other people's dramas? Here are a few ideas:

• Get out of the situation! Literally. Remove yourself from physical proximity to the actors in the drama as much as possible. If you can't help, and often the actors in the drama don't want help, why stay? Whom would it benefit?
  
• Keep reminding yourself that it is not your drama, and that it serves no one for you to get sucked in to it.
• Visualize yourself as standing at the fulcrum of a see-saw -- You stay neutral while they have all the ups and downs.
• Ground -- and pull up earth energy through you for more protection. Use this energy to fill your aura.
• Put your shields up. Remember all the energetic protections you have learned -- thicken the edges of your aura, put a shield in front of your second chakra, etc. (Again, check out the Intuition Development telecourse for more.)
• Ask your guides/angels for protection -- they can remember to protect you even when you can't.
• Turn down the volume of the feeling -- if you feel something in your body, notice where that is, and then literally turn down the intensity of the feeling, or move the feeling out of your body.

Remember, these methods of protecting yourself are not either/or. You can use all of these more or less simultaneously, if necessary.

Lavender Planting

Yesterday morning, I walked by a lovely lavender bush just 3 houses down from mine. Now, I walk by this bush almost every day, and don't really notice it. As I admired her (seems like a 'her' to me), I had the thought that I'd like to cut the lavender flowers to have in the house. But my conscious mind kicked in, saying, "You barely know these neighbors, and even though they obviously aren't cutting the flowers, it's a little forward to ask." So I didn't.

This morning, as I walked by, a man was digging up the plants nearby, and asked me if I'd like the lavender plant! He explained that my neighbors are removing these plants (including, sadly, a magnolia tree), to widen their driveway. I immediately said that I'd like the flowers, and then agreed to take the plants as well! So they will very shortly be gracing my front walk, where a couple of mine had died and needed to be replaced.

I wonder, did the lavender plant the idea in my mind? (Pun intended.)

What You Resist, Persists

The old saying, "What you resist, persists" is now borne out by research:

Mind - Why the Imp in Your Brain Gets Out - NYTimes.com

This is also evidence of the NLP dictum to only speak in the positive. The usual example is "don't think of a purple elephant!" What happens for you? You think of a purple elephant, because you have to make the picture to get rid of it.

If I say, think of a red rhinoceros, what happens? You think of a red rhino, not a purple elephant. So if you want someone not to think of something, direct them to something else. The easy way to accomplish this is, eliminate the word 'not' from your vocabulary.

Ladies, get your beauty (okay, health) sleep!

Lack of sleep is more dangerous for women than men, claim scientists - Telegraph

Unshakeable self confidence is in the genes, claim scientists - Telegraph

Unshakeable self confidence is in the genes, claim scientists - Telegraph

Apparently, the ability to perform under pressure is, too.

Be happy, see more!

From Facebook | Marci Shimoff's Notes:

Did you know that people who are more positive and optimistic have better peripheral vision? That’s right; a recent study shows that happier people actually see MORE! When you have more positive emotions, your choices are broader; you’ll see more options and perceive more possibilities. If you have more negative emotions, you’ll have narrower vision.

The implications of that are pretty amazing: positive emotions open us up!

And now for a little black humor

Part 1 -

A new advertising slogan?

"Dying to quit smoking? Try Chantix!"

Part 2 -

What's missing from this list? Karl Malden, Ed McMahon, Farah Fawcett, Michael Jackson, Billy Mays

Here's my thinking:
Karl Malden - 1950's - I'm the tough guy
Ed McMahon - 1960's - I'm the jovial uncle
Farah Fawcett - 1970's - I'm the gorgeous girl next door
Michael Jackson - 1980's - I'm bad
Billy Mays - 2000's - I'm selling LOUDLY

10 Coach's Tips for Getting Yourself to Do Something You HATE

We all have things we need to do that we don't want to do. As a coach, I know many of them. I found myself having to put a few to use this morning to get myself to do my bookkeeping (which I hate), and I thought I'd share them with you.

1. Chunk it down -- Break it into smaller pieces, so it doesn't look so huge. For me, this means saying, I'll just balance one electronic checkbook today.
2. Time delimit it -- This is a variation of 'chunk it down': you're chunking by time instead of by the task. For example, I'll just work on this for one hour each day.
3. Set up a reward system -- Reward yourself for doing a set amount of the chore, or accomplishing some goal. The rewards have to come often enough to keep you motivated, but not so often that they mean nothing, or that you get nothing done. For example, for each hour I spend working on the project, I get a 10 minute break.
   
4. Set up accountability -- This can be a partner (including a coach) to whom you must report, or it can be a negative consequence for not doing what you promised. There is economic research to show that this works very well. Perhaps a $100 check to someone else's favorite charity?
   
5. Remind yourself of the natural negative consequences of not doing it -- for example, if I don't do my bookkeeping (ever), my taxes never get done and I end up with a huge IRS problem. Make this look bigger and bigger, and you'll get it done.
6. Find a way to make it pleasant -- Can you play music while you do it? Listen to the radio? Watch TV? (I actually listen to daytime TV, which makes me feel like I'm at a coffee klatsch, instead of doing a chore.)
7. Set up a regular time to do it -- if it's not a one time thing. So I'll just do the bookkeeping at a set time each day. This, btw, is particularly good for exercise, because your body gets used to it, and the day will begin to feel wrong if you don't exercise when you're used to doing it.
   
8. Do it with a friend -- This one doesn't apply to bookkeeping, so I'll use a different example. Years ago, I was bemoaning the need to clean out my garage to a friend, who confessed the same need. We decided to do it together, one Saturday at her garage, and one at mine. And that actually made it fun! It went more than twice as fast, and working with someone who is emotionally neutral about the task makes it easier. (I didn't see that ugly umbrella stand as a gift from her long dead aunt, I just saw it as unused and really hideous. That made it much easier for her to give it away.) Plus we exchanged some charity pile items, so working in my friend's garage felt a bit like Christmas to me, as working in my garage did for her.
9. Delegate it -- You can pay people to do many things! (Honestly, delegating bookkeeping hasn't worked too well for me, so if you've had a good experience, let me know.) And even if you can't afford to pay someone, you might be able to trade with a friend. I was a horrible typist (and am still working on those keyboarding skills -- many blessing to spell check programs), so in college, I used to hem a friend's pants in exchange for her typing my papers.
10. Remove the underlying resistance -- There's generally a deeper reason why you don't want to do something, and if you remove that, the resistance goes away, and you just do it. If you'd like to do that, please call me, because shifting a deeper level issue is unique to the person and the issue, one size does not fit all.

And then, just do it!

On (Not) Being a Fan

I really don't get the whole idea of being a fan of someone. I don't mean fan, as in I-really-enjoy-that-music, which I certainly do. I appreciate talent and skill, especially when they come together, in any field, from singing to dancing to figure skating to waiting tables or knitting, all of which can be an art form. I honor and respect anyone who really masters these or any other skills, which is what elevates them from craft to art.

No, I don't get being a fan (short for 'fanatic'), as in I-love-everything-she-does-have-to-have-the-CD-immediately-willing-to-camp-out-in-line-for-tickets-to-every-concert-buy-the-tee-shirt-follow-her-on-Twitter-and-cut-my-hair-like-hers. I don't get it, and I never have. When I was 5 or 6, my Mom (bless her heart) took my toddler sister and me to see the movie, "A Hard Day's Night". I didn't get why all those teenage girls were screaming their heads off. Yes, the Beatles were the hottest thing on Earth, but they weren't even in the theater -- it was a movie.

So when Michael Jackson died, I said as much to my sister, now a very wise woman, who replied, "People see God through these very talented people." Okay, that I get. I do really get that Michael Jackson was channeling energy, at least some of the time, and that that experience can be called 'seeing God'. In an interview on ABC news, Martin Bashir asked him what he thought when he danced, and he answered words to the effect of "I don't think; you can't think, because that ruins it; you just have to be the music". Umm, doesn't that sound like channeling music through the body? And wow, was he a superlative dancer.

I think this second type of fan creates a number of problems, both for the fan, and more obviously for the channel, aka celebrity. It seems to me that if you're a fan, you're probably not honoring your own ability to channel, or to touch God, or have God flow through you, or however you want to say it. What a waste, for the fan and for the world!

The problem for the celebrity/channel is that fans don't discriminate between the person, who is just as human as anyone else (which is probably why one of People magazine's most popular features is something like "Celebrities are Just Like You and Me"), and the channeled energy, which is special. So the channels get treated like deities, and can lose touch with reality, especially if their adulation began quite young, before they even knew who they were. Wouldn't that at least partly explain the meltdowns of Britney Spears, Lindsey Lohan, and of course, Michael Jackson?

Thomas Jefferson on Walking

"The object of walking is to relax the mind. You should therefore not permit yourself even to think while you walk; but divert yourself by the objects surrounding you. Walking is the best possible exercise."

That pretty much says it for me!

Brain scans show how hypnosis can paralyze a limb - USATODAY.com

Brain scans show how hypnosis can paralyze a limb - USATODAY.com

Try this at home!

Have you ever felt like someone else's negativity really sapped your energy? It's true -- and you can demonstrate it yourself with kinesiology.

In the last year, I've seen two great lecture/demonstations that use kinesiology. The first was by Donna Eden ("Energy Medicine"), and the second, just last week, by Jack Canfield ("Chicken Soup for the Soul", and many more). They were so wonderful -- clear ad easy to do -- that I want to share them with you, and encourage you to try them at home.

First, a description of kinesiology in case you don't know about it. Version one requires 2 people, the tester and the one being tested (or Testee). The Testee puts one arm, generally the non-dominant one, directly out from his/her shoulder at shoulder height. This can be done directly forward from the shoulder, with palm facing center, or directly out to the side, with palm facing front. I've seen it done both ways. The tester asks the Testee to resist, and then pushes down on the Testee's arm, to see how much force the person can resist.

Version two requires only 1 person, and an appropriately sized weight (this method courtesy of Donna Eden). You determine your appropriate weight by finding one that you can lift with your arm outstretched at shoulder height when thinking a true thought, but can't lift when thinking a false thought. Yes, this really works! For me, as well as 2 other women with whom I've done this, it's a 9 pound weight. [Go to a gym or sporting goods store and try different weights till you find the right one for you.]

Both Eden and Canfield began with things I'd seen before:

• Testee thinks a positive thought (and can resist tester's push easily)
• Testee thinks a negative thought (and can't resist)

Here is one of Donna Eden's new twists, whcih she says proves that energy automatically goes from the strong to the weak:

• Testee is part of a couple, and is strong. Testee can resist push.
• Testee's partner is weak (upset, ill, etc.), and can't resist push.
• They hold hands. Testee can't resist push -- but Testee's partner can!

She also has Testees who are weak (can't resist push) do simple interventions, like walking a few steps backwards, and then they can resist! Unfortunately, you have to be able to see clairvoyantly to know which intervention will work, though you can try them all until one works.

Here is the first of Jack Canfield's new twists, designed to show group effects on an individual:

• He has 4 random people join the Testee in a line, holding hands
• All think a positive thought, and the Testee can resist a push.
• One of the line up, but not the Testee, thinks a negative thought. The Testee, who is still thinking a positive thought, as are all 3 others in the line, can't resist a push.
  

So it's important that people with whom you are working (or living, etc.) are aligned, or you're going to significantly weaken their effectiveness.

Here's the second, which shows that protecting your energy field really does work:

• The Testee stands alone on the stage and thinks a positive thought. Testee can resist a push.
• The audience thinks something negative about the Testee. Testee can't resist a push.
• The audience thinks something positive about the Testee. Testee can resist a push.
  
• Testee puts up energetic protection around his/her energy field.
  
• The audience thinks something negative about the Testee. Testee can resist a push.

If you work in an unfriendly setting, or need to deal with negative and/or hostile people in other parts of your life, and would like to learn how to put up energetic shields, call me at 888-4-hollis (888-446-5547).

Flashbulbs!

How do you know one of your non-physical friends (aka guides or angels) is around? There are a lot of ways. Some people feel things, some people hear them, some see things and/or the spirits themselves. I'm not much of a feeler, but I hear my guides internally, and I see internally. Lately, I'm beginning to see things externally, too.

I was teaching my Intuition Development teleclass recently, and saw a 'flashbulb' go off in the (otherwise empty) room, just a few feet away from me. It was about the size and shape of a firefly, but turned on and off much faster, at the speed of a flashbulb, which is why I'm calling it that. It could not have been a firefly, as it was broad daylight in the room, much too bright to see a firefly's light.

I have seen these before, and they are generally white or a deep, but bright, blue or purple. And I know they are caused by my guides' presence. Here's the thing -- I saw them for many years, but dismissed them as a figment of my imagination, until someone else mentioned them to me -- and showed them to me on video.

So if you have ever seen these 'flashbulbs', don't dismiss them. They are not figments of your imagination; on the contrary, I believe they are evidence of a guide's presence.

SCORE!

Wow! Manifestation is easy! Let me say it again:

• be clear what you want,
  
• know it will come to you,
  
• relax and let it go.
  
• Follow your inner promptings.
  
• Do your part.
  

And the universe provides. I had another example today.

In 1997, when I bought my house in Mill Valley, I bought my very first gas grill. It was $79, the smallest model. It came in a tiny box, and I put it together myself, from the directions. I used it every summer (some winters, too), but it didn't come with a cover, and I didn't understand the necessity of getting one. Over the last couple of years, we've lost the knob to one side of the grill, and so have to use pliers to use the entire grill surface. This annoys me enough that I rarely use the grill. In any case, the grill doesn't owe me anything. But I don't have anyone who can fix it for me -- no way to buy a single knob these days, either.

I got very clear what I wanted: a gas barbecue with a side burner, small enough to fit the available space, and under $100. So last summer, I shoppped half-heartedly for a new one, idly looking at different models to see which were small enough to fit, and checking prices. When barbecues went on sale at the end of summer, the model I wanted came down to $99. Since there was only one left, the floor model, it was already assembled, which was the good news and the bad news. I didn't have to put it together, but it wouldn't fit it in my car, either. I put it on hold, and told them I'd be back the next day with a truck and someone to help move it. When we went back the next day, it had been sold!

A few weeks ago, I went back to Lowe's, but they no longer carry the model I wanted, and all the new ones are too big for my space. I wasn't desperate for a new barbecue -- it's not like I went to other stores to check their inventory. So I let it go.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Normally, I use my morning exercise time to run errands. I walk, as quickly as I can, to the bank, the library, the drugstore, the gym, and a few different grocery stores, with different specialty items, so most mornings, I have a destination. This morning, I had none, for the first time in about 8 months.

I remembered the running workout I'd been given last fall by Mike Spino, running coach extraordinaire, and thought, well, today is the day to go up to the old high school and use its decrepit track to work out. [I was following my intuition.] I walked up to the track, and just as I arrived, I noticed that the last house before the high school had a 'free' sign taped to a barbecue -- the exact model I'd wanted! But did it work? Who knew? There were also some used bricks, as well as some lumber scraps and used window blinds.

I'm a sucker for used bricks -- there are a million uses for them. But it wasn't clear if the bricks were free, so I knocked on the door. No answer. I decided I'd do the workout, walk home, get the car, and come back for the bricks, which were probably free. [I took action.] When I got back to pick up the bricks, the garage door opened, and the homeowner emerged! And sure enough, the bricks were free, and even better, the barbecue worked, just needed a tank of propane! I took the FREE sign off the barbecue, put it on the pile of lumber, and arranged with the homeowner to come back later for it, with my husband and his car, which is larger than mine.

Tonight, we went back for the barbecue. There was no way it would fit in the car. So I wheeled it home, 1/3 of a mile or so, downhill and uphill. My husband helped me get it through the house to the back deck. I attached the propane tank from the dying barbecue, and the new one really does work! The universe provides.

Amen Clinics Study on Meditation Using Brain SPECT Imaging

We just received some exciting news here at the Amen Clinics. A study we conducted on the effects of meditation on the brain will be appearing in an upcoming issue of the journal Nuclear Medicine Communications, one of the premiere journals in the field of nuclear medicine.

For years, I’ve been recommending meditation to my patients as a great way to relieve stress, increase focus, and improve relaxation. In our practice, we have seen patients with Alzheimer’s disease or who have had a stroke make great improvements thanks to meditation. With this study, we set out to examine what happens in the brain during meditation to bring about these positive benefits.

We performed the study in conjunction with Dharma Singh Kalsa at the Alzheimer’s Prevention Research Foundation in Arizona and Dr. Andrew Newberg at the University of Pennsylvania. Together, we examined changes in brain physiology during Kirtan Kriya meditation using SPECT imaging.

Here’s what we found. The left posterior parietal lobe, a region known to control spatial orientation, was deactivated during meditation. Consistent with this finding, the participants reported a sense of transcendence or detachment.

The subjects also reported an increased sense of focus and capacity for concentration, although we did not find increased activation in the attentional networks of the brain. This suggests that it is the willful act of focusing, not necessarily the mere act of meditating, that improves attention.

We also found heightened activity in the areas associated with working memory and language. Deactivation in a region called the subgenual cingulated gyrus might explain subjective reports of happiness and a sense of well-being while meditating.

Overall, the results offer evidence that this form of meditation changes brain function in a way that is consistent with the positive benefits we have observed in our patients.

Try meditation in your own life to enhance brain function and reduce stress. Just a few minutes a day may be all you need to see results.

[hat tip, Seth]

The Upside of Failure

Paul Tudor Jones - Failure Speech June 2009

Michael Beckwith, Live

A friend invited me to an event in Sf where Michael Beckwith, the minister of Agape Church, and one of the people featured in the DVD, "The Secret", is speaking today. He is a truly inspiring speaker, who spouts great, memorable on-liners about every 30 seconds. He preaches spirituality, as opposed to religion, in the excitable, sliding cadences of the black church. He never mentions any religious dogma, and it takes a while before he even gets around to using the word, "God". It makes me think of Jesus, who was also preaching spirituality, not dogma. And I guess the 'good news' that you are a part of God is inspiring all by itself.

He talks about reincarnation as if it is a fact (which it pretty well is, if you read the works of Ian Stevenson, M.D.). He does some of his preaching with his eyes closed, and I do wonder if he was channeling some of what he said.

I had planned to Twitter from the session, but since I couldn't get onto the hotel's network, here are a few gems from this morning (though my poor notes don't really capture his talk very well):

• "The facts of matter are not the truth of spirit" - What you see is the congelaing of ideas, some of which are lies.
  
• "A lie is law, until it is neutralized" - We are taught to believe in scarcity, lack, limitation, poverty, war, etc. as if they are a fact of human existence. They are NOT. It is up to us to change out paradigm. There is plenty, there is enough.
  
• "We are taught to worship fear" - on the nightly news, set to music.
• "God speaks through inspiration, revelation, insight."
• "God can only count to one." [my personal favority]
  
• "Quantity is only in the mind of man, not of God."
• "There are no delays in the mind of God." [ Well, of course, if time isn't real, how can delays be? HP]
  
• "God is seeking to become more itself through each individual."
• "You WILL evolve; your only choice is to do it through pain or joy." [Like the affirmation gave me years ago: learn through awareness and joy. HP]
• "Everything is speaking itself into expression through you -- the Universe is saying, "Tag, you're it!"
  
• "I went to bed and fell awake." Followed by a great story of experiencing being God, as expressed through different individuals.

As a trainer, I got some great insights, too, about having people breathe together to increase their unity. He also has each half of the audience appreciate the other half with a standing ovation -- a concretization of "God don't make no trash", as a friend once said to me, or "You have value just because you exist", as my guides put it. Really wonderful! And that was just the morning!

The View from Sacramento

I've been in the Sacramento area for the past couple of weeks -- that's why I've been so quiet. The view from up here is significantly different from that of the Bay Area. I haven't had to spend much time here in the last 2 years. I'm shocked at how many small businesses are just... gone. There are check cashing places in areas where there didn't used to be check cashing places -- always a bad sign. My 2 favorite family owned cafes are gone, along with a Starbucks. A couple of chains, too: the local JoAnn Fabrics closed, as did (of course) Mervyn's, and Linens n Things. The only stores that seem to have any foot traffic are the grocery stores and the thrift stores.

The place is a forest of "For Rent" signs, both residential and commercial. Whole retail buildings, which used to have half a dozen stores, as part of a bigger complex, are vacant. You don't see much residential real estate for sale that isn't a short sale or foreclosure -- and believe me, I'm looking.

The most extreme case is some 2 bedroom/1 bath condominiums in an okay area, that were clearly remodeled with the intent to sell. They came on the market in 2006, and the first sales were for around $225,00. The high price was $245,000. Want to guess what they're going for now? Go ahead, guess.

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Ready? $50,000. Yes, that's an 80% loss for that poor bastard who bought at the top. And his payments are probably what, at least $1200/month if he put down 20% and had a good loan, plus HOA dues of $200, plus taxes of $204, unless he's petitioned to have them lowered (which is easy to do). So that adds up to what? In the best case scenario, about $1600/month. Want to guess what they rent for? $825 - 850. This is the heart of the foreclosure crisis. This is the essence of jingle mail. Even if you have a good job, you're going to walk away from this one -- and remember, Sacramento is the state capital of California, the home of the unbalanced budget, lawmakers who won't budge on raising taxes, which means cuts, cuts and more cuts. Everyone knows someone, usually more than one, who has lost a job and/or a home.

On the other hand, people are pretty sanguine. Most of those who have been displaced in one way or another are looking forward to the next chapter in their lives. That's very heartening.

Spiritual Principles in Action

Wow! A President who brings the deep truth that we are all one into very practical words and actions:

Text - Obama’s Speech in Cairo - Text - NYTimes.com

Also, a very NLP-ish focus on "what do we want to create?" A must read.

Happiness, Meditation, Reverie

A really nice romp, through the eyes of philosophers of the ages -- apparently, being in the present is happiness:

Happy Like God - Happy Days Blog - NYTimes.com

It bothers me a bit, though, that he stops shy of accepting that yes, we are all God.

What You Don’t Know Makes You Nervous - Happy Days Blog - NYTimes.com

What You Don’t Know Makes You Nervous - Happy Days Blog - NYTimes.com

Don't waste your money on designer shoes!

Findings - Message in What We Buy, but Nobody’s Listening - NYTimes.com

Love and Unity

My friend, Kit, also a talented channel, called the other day to say she'd just had this amazing insight: beyond identity is where the 'I am' presence lives.

That makes sense to me. If you let go of your identity as, say, a woman, wife, mother, American, hypnotherapist, even of past life identities here and/or on other planets, what's left? Pure existence.

Many years ago, my guides showed me a vision of the heart chakra as a sort of valve. If you turn a person inside out, kind of like you would a sock, at the heart chakra, you get the universe, or oneness, or God, or the 'I am' presence, or whatever you want to call it. And that's how we're all connected, how we're all one -- when you turn each of us inside out at the heart chakra, you end up in the same place!

I explained this to Kit, who then asked me, 'Well, then, what is love? How is this different from love?' And this was the answer from m guides:

Love is sort of the opposite of the experience of God. To experience oneness, you go out through you heart chakra to All That Is. To love, you bring the universe's energy through your heart chakra into the physical world. Often, but not always, you direct love to someone or something, but that's not actually necessary.

How do you measure happiness on a national level?

utan takes the pursuit of happiness to a national level:

Thimphu Journal - Recalculating Happiness in a Himalayan Kingdom - NYTimes.com

The measures are really ineresting.

Practice, Practice, Practice

George Leonard talked about it in 'Mastery', Malcolm Gladwell talks about it in 'Outliers: the Story of Success', and here it is again, with a little different slant:

Op-Ed Columnist - Genius - The Modern View - NYTimes.com

Do what's most important first

and other recommendations from

The Science of Concentration - NYTimes.com

What's the single best question to ask NOW for your self-development?

Q: What's the single best question to ask yourself, anywhere, any time, for your self-development?
A: What does this have to teach me?

It's long been popular in spiritual/self-development circles for people to ask, "What am I supposed to learn from this?" in the face or aftermath of a crisis. And that's useful. But it's not what I'm talking about.

I'm talking about asking the question, "What does this have to teach me?" about things in your environment. Here are a few examples from the room I'm in while I write this:

• Salt lamp - A salt lamp is a hunk of pink sea salt (i.e. salt precipitated from sea water back when the land where it is found was underwater), hollowed out and fitted with a low wattage light bulb, and set on a wooden disk for a base, with an electrical cord.What does the salt lamp have to teach me? It teaches that light comes through structure, and that both are necessary for manifestation in the physical world. Light without structure is formless, and so not obvious, not really seen; structure without light is literally in the dark and not seen. Also, it teaches that illumination comes from within, and from the connection to 'all that is' (in the lamp's case, electricity).
  
• Wooden Armoire - What does the armoire have to teach me? It teaches that something can have structure and solidity, but also be open to hold space for others. I choose what those things are. It also teaches that structure supports (I have baskets holding scarves, etc. on top of the armoire & necklaces hanging from the door knobs.)
• Black UniBall pen - What doe sthe pen have to teac h me? It teaches that simply being a tool that energy can flow through to communicate with others is useful (when I write with it, I communicate, but I also am a tool of communication for higher energies). Darkness (black ink) can be useful, sometimes just because of contrast (with white paper). Even those things that communicate can also adhere (clip on side of pen).

If you do this for a while, you'll notice that the world is almost literally screaming lessons at you, profound truths that you just have to pay attention to notice. I suspect, having just stumbled upon this today, that the lessons each person learns from the objects they choose to focus on will be the perfect lessons for that person at that moment. So you really can't go wrong!

Trees!

Wow! I went out for my usual walk this morning, maintaining a new state, pulling Source energy down through my crown chakra. There is an area I walk through several times a week, the large central part of a condominium complex, that has many trees, as well as some lawn and a pool. When I came onto this central area from a side path, maintaining my new state, I could see the energy that makes a tree! It kind of spirals up from the ground, and I think maybe it spirals down from the sky, too. When I looked more closely at many of the trees, I could see how branches, or leaves, or bark, or the bend of the trunk all matched this spiraling energy. And I swear that at least one of the trees was hugely happy that I noticed, as if it were saying to me, "Wow! You really see me! Not just my form, but ME." And isn't that what we all want?

I mentioned seeing this energy to a friend, a fellow channel, who said that she got a big smile in her heart from it, which is one of the ways she recognizes truth, and heard a tree laughing, thrilled that I saw it. Then I mentioned it to a chirpopractor friend, who said that he had heard about the spiraling energy from friends who had spent weeks alone in the Sierras, when they came back. (I only mention this because it validates what I saw, and honestly, as out there as I am, I'm still a bit afraid you might think I've really lost it this time.)

One Reason Your Affirmation May Not Work

It's often said, "Be careful what you ask for -- you might get it." And I've noticed, over the years, working with clients, friends and myself, that a better way to say this is, "Be careful what you ask for -- you WILL get it." This is sometimes referred to, with a rueful laugh, as the Law of Unintended Consequences.

I think I've figured out how this works, at least for those of us who use affirmations to create what we choose in our lives:

1. An affirmation is a positive, present tense, first person statement of what you are choosing.
2. By repeating it over and over, you are implanting it as a belief in your unconscious mind. And, as Seth (channeled through Jane Roberts) said, about 30 years ago, you create your reality through your beliefs.
3. The unconscious mind is very literal, so it will draw to you, or have you notice in physical reality, the manifestation of the words of your affirmation/new belief.
4. Because it is so literal, the unconscious mind will screen out everything BUT what you are stating in your affirmation.

And I've only just now realized point #4! A case in point: for many years, I have had the affirmation that "By being who I am and doing what I love, I now prosper beyond my wildest dreams." And I am who I am, in pretty much all circumstances. And I do what I love a lot. But I also feel like I need to do things like honor agreements, even when I don't particularly feel like it, and do chores like brushing my teeth, even when I don't feel like it. For the last couple of years, I have tried many, many ways to market my services, to very little avail, that is, business has not increased on the trajectory that I would prefer. No matter how hard I worked, no matter what I tried, it didn't seem to help.

Now I get why! My very literal, unconscious mind, was saying, "If I am who I am, and do what I love, I'll prosper." Period. It interpreted my doing something I didn't love, as me not choosing prosperity. Every time I made myself do something I didn't want to do, it shut down the prosperity thereby negating all the actions I took! Duh!

Twittering on the Inner Planes

On the inner planes, we're all twittering, all the time!We're all broadcasting every thought, every emotion, our location, everything! It's the nature of our oneness --you can't not do it.

Don't let this scare you -- most people won't perceive any of it. The people who receive that communication are the people who have chosen to 'follow' us, whether they're aware of it or not. And of those who have chosen to 'follow' us, most aren't aware of what they're getting, most of the time, or maybe ever, because they simply aren't that aware psychically.

Conversely, we're able to receive everyone else's constant stream of updates -- but we choose only to 'follow' certain people. This is a good thing, because following too many people would quickly overwhelm us. Ask any psychic and concerned parent -- following even one person (your child), can be overwhelming! And in fact, we only choose to get updates sometimes, the same way most of us only look at our Twitter page occasionally.

Actually, I think Twitter is important because it is another facet of the way we are simulating the real reality (aka spiritual reality or inner palnes) in physical reality. In the same way, the world wide web on the internet is our access to all knowledge on the inner planes.

Critical Alert: The Swine Flu Pandemic – Fact or Fiction?

Critical Alert: The Swine Flu Pandemic – Fact or Fiction?

This seems to make sense about the swine flu. And I have to say that when I look at it psychically, the swine flu just doesn't look all that serious to me.

Who's in charge here?

I've been privileged to be the listing agent on a home that is in short sale. It's not something I went looking for, it fell in my lap because of the good reputation I had in the days when I was a real estate broker for a living. The lesson here is: It pays to maintain that license -- you never know when it will come in handy.

The home is in good condition, well-maintained, but it was built in the 1930s, when building codes weren't what they are today. That means that the foundation is considered inadequate, though it held up fine during the 1989 earthquake, the sewer lines are too small by today's standards, etc.

We had an agreement for a purchase price that satisfied both the first and second lenders. The first lender was getting almost all their money back, and under CA law, can't get a deficiency judgment on a purchase money first mortgage. They agreed to this amount because the offer was about the same as the value put on the house by the bank's appraiser. The second lender was getting pennies on the dollar at close, because the first lender knows they won't settle without some payment. Although the second mortgage holder can get a deficiency judgment against the (former) homeowner under CA law, apparently it's common to settle these after the sale, for a few more pennies on the dollar. (I really have to wonder about the financial strength of the banks here, and the efficacy of the stress tests -- I suspect that these junior liens are being carried on the books at a lot more than 10 cents on the dollar.)

It's common for a buyer to try to renegotiate a bit after inspections, when the termite, contractor's and other inspections put a price on the repairs to be done. And usually, you can finesse a few thousand dollars, by everyone kicking in some -- seller, both agents, and the buyer compromising their request. But holy carp! The buyer is asking for a price reduction so big that it wipes out the pennies on the dollar for the second (which they would never agree to in any case), both agents and a huge chunk of the first mortgage. I really don't know if this is posturing, or if the buyer doesn't really want the house, but figures, hey, if I can get it for that much less than the appraised value, hell, then it's worth it.

Here's the weird part: the owner/seller of the house is not in a position to decide what happens, what counteroffer is made. The first lender is. So who really owns the house? Who's in charge here? And in fact, since the seller realizes that the amount that the house sells for won't change his situation one iota, he's pretty neutral. The homeowner here has effectively become the agent of the bank. How weird is that? There used to be an old joke, something people would say when they bought a house with a mortgage, which was that the bank owned the house. In a short sale, it's pretty much true. The seller owns the house in name only, and the banks make all the decisions.

That brings me to the bigger questions. What happens when someone has no equity? And what is equity, anyway? I think that here, equity doesn't just mean housing equity, it means a stake in the economy, a stake in our society.

One can definitely have a stake in society without a financial stake -- that's called community, or emotional connection. But so much of what used to be supplied by community has been replaced by market forces (think restaurants instead of home-cooked food, cleaning services instead of the family cleaning the house, car detailing instead of Dad washing the car, child care centers instead of Mom or Grandma or a neighbor watching the kids), that non-financial equity has declined substantially, over at least the last 30 years, replaced by financial equity -- money, in one form or other.

So as our financial equity declines, we have to/are substituting community again. That substitution, though, has consequences for the economy. As more people are out of work, they are substituting community for things they used to pay for. That puts more people out of work. So the monetary economy declines, while the non-monetary community grows stronger and larger.

But what happens to someone who has no financial equity, and no community ties? Do they become violent, because they're angry, and don't care what happens to them? Do they become depressed and suicidal? And as a society, what do we do about that?

Zen Boogie, Part 2

Yesterday, thanks to abnormally warm weather and the glories of the wetsuit, I was able to swim in the Pacific Ocean. There are days when the origin of the name, Pacific, becomes obvious, and this was one of them -- the sea was like old glass, barely rippling, at Linda Mar beach. Body surfing was clearly out, so I decided to swim distance, parallel to the shore. And as always, the ocean had a lot to teach:

• You can never sit still. The ocean is always moving, and because it is so much bigger than you, it will move you, often in unpredictable ways. You may be unaware of your shifting, but it's happening nonetheless. Life is like that, too -- you're immersed in a sea of never-ending physical, cultural, emotional and psychological changes and cross-currents, so your relationship to everything changes, whether you want it to or not. In fact, it changes whether you are aware of it or not.
  
• You are not in control. If you do nothing, you go where the ocean (the culture) wants you to go. If you swim, you can affect your own trajectory and position, but you are always dealing with the larger force of the ocean -- and it is much more powerful than you are.
• You have to be aware of the larger forces, to maneuver successfully within them. If you don't notice the tide pulling you out to sea, you'll never get back to shore. If you don't notice that people are driving less and wanting more fuel efficient cars, first because of high gasoline prices and then because they realize they've been incredibly wasteful, you'll keep making gas-guzzling cars.
  
• To keep your bearings, you have to swim toward something. If you keep swimming toward a goal (a landmark on the shore, for example), you'll at least know you're going in the right direction, and you'll be aware of where you are, even if you don't get there. In fact, when you swim in nature, you almost never swim to the thing you are sighting on -- by definition, it has to be big enough to see from water level quite far away, so it's often something tall that you cannot literally swim to, like a lighthouse or mountain peak. You can only swim in its direction; you can never get there, because it isn't at the water's edge. This is why you have to have goals -- you have to work toward something to keep your bearings, even if you never attain your goal.
• Waves arise and break, even on the calmest days. You can enjoy them, or not. You can enjoy that unexpected rise and fall, or you can curse the fact that it put you off course slightly. Your choice, but it's your only choice, because the waves will arise and break either way.
  
• Perspective is a result of where you stand. 50 yards from shore, you can't even see those rocks that were so difficult to navigate as you picked your way down to the water. Terns get very territorial when you're in their patch of ocean. Try a different perspective -- go somewhere unusual, or try standing on your head!
  
• People come equipped with different perceptual abilities. The ocean is pretty murky at Linda Mar, even on a calm day, so you can't see down through the water at all. With a mask and snorkel, though, you can easily see what's under the surface. Yes, this particular improvement in perception is artifical, but it's true for all sorts of abilities -- some people hear better than others, some have a more acute sense of smell, some see clairvoyantly better than others, etc.

(Here's the original Zen Boogie post.)

What Are Friends for? Good Health & A Longer Life - NYTimes.com

The most interesting part of this research is that it doesn't matter how far away your friends are, they are still really important.

Well - What Are Friends for? A Longer Life - NYTimes.com

The Fundamental Dichotomy of Churches (and Ashrams, etc.)

Churches (here I include ashrams, temples, etc., but for convenience will use the word 'church' to denote all of these) actually have 2 purposes:

• the development of the members' spirituality
• community

The announced purpose of a church is to develop its members' spirituality, no matter what language you'd like to use to describe this: moral sense, closeness to God (Allah, J_w_, etc.), etc. Thus the prayers, meditations, sermons, etc.

The other purpose of the church is to foster community, so we have people with whom to learn, to celebrate, to mourn, to share daily joys and sorrows, to learn, to play, to share food, to raise children.

But for the person who is growing faster spiritually than the community is growing, these two begin to feel like they are antithetical to each other. That is, I want to be part of the community, because of the warm feeling and support I feel as part of it, but it limits my spiritual development, because to stay at one with the community, I have to develop more slowly than I'd really like to develop, or maybe not develop at all. What I choose depends on which is my higher priority -- my development or my participation in the community. So if it's more important to me to grow spiritually, then I'll move on, perhaps to another community, or perhaps to none at all. If it's more important to me to have community, I will either compromise my development, or hide my development.

This dichotomy plays out for the church as a whole, too. Each church member's spiritual development happens at its own pace -- some don't develop at all, others bound ahead, still others grow at a moderate pace in their understanding. So at what rate does the community as a whole develop? Generally not with those who are changing the fastest. Perhaps it develops at the rate of the slowest, or perhaps at the rate of the bulk of the members. Whatever rate it changes at, will not suit everyone.

But community thrives on stability and with numbers -- the more people who are in the community, the more there are for the support of all in good times and bad. The longer they are there, the more trust there is among them, and therefore the group is stronger, too. So it is natural for the community to want to keep people to keep them 'in the fold'. That means keeping them growing (or even not growing) spiritually at the same rate, which will, by definition, be inappropriate for some members. The means people will keep coming and going as they match the spiritual intent/level of the church. But it's bad for community to have constant change in its membership.

Not Enough Bandwidth

I don't know about you, but I feel like I just don't have enough bandwidth!

wordnet.princeton.edu defines "bandwidth" as

'a data transmission rate; the maximum amount of information (bits/second) that can be transmitted along a channel'

What I mean is, there is too much information trying to come in and go out. I am

• checking out a new market for my psychic/coaching services
  
• learning several new types of software,necessary to my work
  
• channeling every morning with a friend, and
• representing the seller as a real estate broker on a short sale.

All of these take time, and all, except the channeling, require learning.

Perhaps you are in a similar predicament -- you're working, and trying to stay on top of things there, worried about your job or business, and so learning new skills or ways to market your services, not to mention taking care of a home and/or family. Do you feel overwhelmed? Or, like me, do you just have a problem setting priorities? Because priorities are necessary whenever you have limited resources, like bandwidth.

The first thing to remember is how much you are trying to do in how little time. So forgive yourself for not getting it all done right now. Take a deep breath.

Remember, there is a difference between urgency and importance. Urgent things have to be done now or calamity ensues (does it really?). Important things will make a huge difference in the quality of your life down the road. What is really important here? What will make the biggest difference in your life down the road?

When I think about setting my own priorities, they look like this:

1. Things that will keep me healthy (e.g. sleep, exercise, good food, maintaining good relationships), because without good health, I can't do anything else
2. Things that will bring in money today, including keeping my on-going commitments (scheduled clients and classes)
3. Things that are are most likely to most positively affect the bottom line in the future
4. Everything else (like bookkeeping)

Within these broad categories, there is still a lot of room, for a couple of reasons. First, the answer to the same question can vary day to day. Is is more important to my health to sleep a bit more or to exercise today? Today, the exercise is more important. But last Saturday, after I'd been out ridiculously late on Friday night, the sleep was more important.

Second, in some cases, things are out of your control and you're working with probabilities. The commission on the short sale is not insignificant -- but it's very iffy. The buyer and the seller have agreed on the price, and both of the shorted lenders have signed off. (This took a full 30 days.) But the buyer has to approve the inspections of the property, which are scheduled a mere 4 days before the lenders' approvals expire, and close within those 4 days, 2 of which are Saturday and Sunday -- or we begin all over again with the lenders, and this time, they could reject the agreement. So how much sense does it make to put a lot of time into this?

The standard business school way of evaluating an iffy proposition is to multiply the expected return from a positive outcome by the percentage chance that that outcome will happen, and use that to compare outcomes. What's the percentage chance of success? This is where intuition comes in -- you make an informed guess. (Or you can call me to 'look' at it with you.)

Mind - When All You Have Left Is Your Pride - NYTimes.com

Mind - When All You Have Left Is Your Pride - NYTimes.com

Mind over matter -- for pain, too!

Throw out those painkillers: the secret to solving physical aches may lie in using a pair of binoculars the wrong way round, claims research performed at Oxford University.

The study, published in Current Biology, reveals how powerfully pain and even swelling can be a product of our mental attitude.

Researchers asked ten people who suffered chronic pain in one arm to move the limb around while looking at it through a pair of binoculars that were either the right or wrong way round;

When they saw their arm magnified to double its size, the patients reported that their levels of pain increased, but when they exercised the arm while watching a minimised image of it through
inverted binoculars, their pain levels were cut significantly.

But it was not only their perceived pain levels that changed, says the lead researcher, G. Lorimer Moseley. Their levels of physical swelling in the affected areas were also reduced through using the backwards binocular trick.

Moseley says he is not sure how this phenomenon works in terms of specific neurons firing, but he believes that The brain changes its protective responses according to its perception of danger levels. if it looks bigger, it looks sorer, therefore the brain acts to protect it,” he explains.

In effect, the binocular trick offers a much simpler and cheaper version of a pain-lowering brain-scan.

Moseley hopes that the optical-trick discovery will lead to a practical method for lowering pain and trauma levels in hospitals.

[This was sent to me by a fellow hypnotherapist, hat tip, Seth-Deborah. Link here.

Mind over matter -- for pain, too!

Throw out those painkillers: the secret to solving physical aches may lie in using a pair of binoculars the wrong way round, claims research performed at Oxford University.

The study, published in Current Biology, reveals how powerfully pain and even swelling can be a product of our mental attitude.

Researchers asked ten people who suffered chronic pain in one arm to move the limb around while looking at it through a pair of binoculars that were either the right or wrong way round;

When they saw their arm magnified to double its size, the patients reported that their levels of pain increased, but when they exercised the arm while watching a minimised image of it through
inverted binoculars, their pain levels were cut significantly.

But it was not only their perceived pain levels that changed, says the lead researcher, G. Lorimer Moseley. Their levels of physical swelling in the affected areas were also reduced through using the backwards binocular trick.

Moseley says he is not sure how this phenomenon works in terms of specific neurons firing, but he believes that The brain changes its protective responses according to its perception of danger levels. if it looks bigger, it looks sorer, therefore the brain acts to protect it,” he explains.

In effect, the binocular trick offers a much simpler and cheaper version of a pain-lowering brain-scan.

Moseley hopes that the optical-trick discovery will lead to a practical method for lowering pain and trauma levels in hospitals.

[This was sent to me by a fellow hypnotherapist, hat tip, Seth-Deborah -- but did not include a link. Sorry.]

Holy anomaly, Batman! Someone left me a message

Since I've been under the weather for the last few days, I have my laptop set up on a bed tray, and have been reading and googling and writing from bed. It's great -- I recommend it highly.

Last night, when I went to sleep, I put the bed tray down on the floor with the laptop on it, still on, still open, and with Photoshop in operation, as I'd begun to work on a photo of ocotillo I took in the desert a couple of weeks ago, absracting the ocotillo from the background to use in my art. The tool I was using was the magic wand tool, which selects areas based on (I think) color intensity.

When I woke up this morning, Photoshop had been switched to the type tool, the areas I'd selected were no longer selected and this was written across the center of the photo:

ARTZ

Caps lock was NOT on! My husband swears he never touched my computer, and I believe him, because we never touch each other's computers without prior permission. My step son never comes in the bedroom when we're asleep, so it wasn't him. I can't imagine that my cat could have done only this exact sort of typing -- occasionally a cat will step on the computer, but cats kind of make a mess, long strings of one letter, that sort of thing. I don't sleepwalk or anything; I know it wasn't me.

So who was it?

The Real 'Being Erica'

'Being Erica' is a Canadian soap opera which airs in the US on the cable TV channel, SoapNet. Erica describes herself as a cute 32 year old, with a good education, a dead-end job and no real love life to speak of. In the pilot, she wanders into a therapist's office, and the therapist sends her back in time for a 'do over' of an incident that affected her ability to, say, stand up for herself, which set up her current situation.

It's done really well, with great spinning special effects which move her from today to 'then', in the body she had at the time. That lets her take today's wisdom back to that time, and do it over, in a way that will have a more positive outcome.

The thing is -- you really can do that! Just without the special effects. I've been guiding clients through 'do overs' for over 15 years now, with some astounding results. Things seem to change effortlessly for my clients after that -- all of a sudden, she is, say, standing up for herself, or choosing better guys to date, or he's dealing with his father more effectively. And it usually takes under an hour.

So if you have a problem of long standing, something that you just can't seem to shift, call me at 888-4-hollis (888-446-5547), and we'll do a 'do over'!

A Simple Way to Cultivate Non-attachment

I hadn't heard from Sally, a long-time friend, in quite a while, either by phone or email. I got a little worried, as this really isn't like her. I called a few weeks ago, left messages on both her home and cell phones, and she didn't return the call. So I called again yesterday, and she picked up the phone! Hooray!

Now, Sally is unbelievably capable. At one point, she was raising a son as a single mom, running an apartment complex -- and finishing her undergraduate degree at Harvard. She has always managed to provide for herself and her (now grown) son -- often quite well. But she bought too much investment real estate too late in the bubble, and is now underwater on all of it -- not to mention its negative cash flow. Luckily she's still employed, still likes her job. And she's writing a book to help others cope with the chronic illness her son has.

She said she's been hiding out. That she really doesn't want to see me, or anyone for that matter. That sometimes, during the week, she'll make plans with someone for Saturday or Sunday, and then not be up to following through when it gets around to the weekend. She said something that struck me, though -- that she's had to let go of her identity as a successful business woman.

I'm not sure I agree with her. She still had all the successes she had -- she just made a bad judgment or three.

In any case, as people lose jobs, or homes, or investments, they are letting go of their identities as successful workers, or homeowners or prosperous investors. Perhaps letting go of the identity is more painful than the actual loss -- after all, as Sally says, you wouldn't know anything was different by how I live -- nothing's really changed.

I ruminated on her comments all day yesterday, and woke up in the middle of the night with this exercise:

1) Get a lined 8.5x11" pad.
2) In a column down the left side, write a series of "I am" statements, filling the page. Here are a few examples:

• I am a human being.
• I am a woman.
• I am a homeowner.
• I am a teacher.
• I am afraid.

3) Next to each one, write a '/' an then the corresponding "I am not" statements, like this:

• I am a human being./ I am not a human being
• I am a woman./ I am not a woman.
• I am a homeowner./ I am not a homeowner.
• I am a teacher./ I am not a teacher./
• I am afraid./ I am not afraid.

4) Ask yourself how both of those things can be true. So,

• I am a human being -- but I am a spirit in a human body.
• I am a woman, but as a spirit, I may or may not be female.
• I am a homeowner -- but does my home more own me?
• I am a teacher, but I do other things, as well.
• I am afraid -- some of the time, but much of the time I am not afraid.

The effect should be a real neutrality, or non-attachment.

All for one and one for all | The Intention Experiment

Maybe 'dumb animals' are smarter than we are!

All for one and one for all | The Intention Experiment

Think for Yourself!

Like I say to my clients, you have to evaluate everything for yourself. And you can't even trust the experts -- at least not the well-known ones:

Op-Ed Columnist - Learning How to Think - NYTimes.com

The problem is that most of our education doesn't teach us how to think. I suspect we are better off then, with discussion groups of well-informed peers than reading the 'experts'. But how do we create those groups?

Meaningful Work

In his book, "Outliers, The Story of Success", Malcolm Gladwell defines meaningful work as work that has

• complexity
• autonomy
• a connection between effort and reward

I agree, and I think I'd take it further. More than just complexity, it needs a degree of difficulty that is a 'stretch' for the worker (if I remember correctly, this comes from Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's "Flow"). This 'stretch' will, of course, be constantly changing, because what begins as a 'stretch' eventually, through practice, becomes quite easy. When you rode a bicycle for the first time, it was really hard! And pretty soon, it became so second nature that you almost didn't notice you were doing it. Of course, if the stretch is too great, you get frustrated, because there is no reward for all that effort.

Webster's New World Dictionary defines 'autonomy' as being self-governing or functioning independently of other parts. Obviously, the level of autonomy varies from the relatively low level of the assembly line worker to the relatively high ones of the solopreneur or research scientist. Those with the lowest level of autonomy, that is, the lowest amount of control over their work, tend to have adverse health outcomes because of it. I suspect that above some minimum level, however, different people prefer different levels of autonomy.

The connection between effort and reward is a bit murkier, however. What sorts of rewards? Monetary? Benefits? Appreciation? Status? And what happens when the relationship between effort and reward changes for the worse, i.e. more work, less reward? I know I've had several small business owners remark to me that "I'm working harder for less" in the last few months -- and it's true for me, as well.

So what do you do if that connection between effort and reward isn't what it used to be? Here are a few ideas about where to look for that improved connection between work and reward (in no particular order):

• Realize that things have shifted -- permanently. You can call it the economy, but it's really larger than that. The industrial model (more or bigger is always better, regimentation) has broken down. The earth can't support it, for one thing. Factory farming (an oxymoron if I ever heard one) is poisoning the earth, from toxic fertilizers to seeds that are controlled by one company to poisonous vats of excrement. Fossil fuel, which is what allowed our industrial culture to flourish, is causing global warming -- and is running out. (That may be a good thing, in the long run, but it's destabilizing in the short run.) Treating people like numbers for health care doesn't work, either. We are moving to appreciating each person's unique make up.
• Looking backwards isn't likely to help. The earth supported many fewer people before the industrial revolution than it does now. The speed of the internet, and the connections it makes, are genuinely new, and not likely to go away.
  
• The speed of processing has outstripped human rational thinking. We all need to process faster -- and the fastest human processing is intuition. So begin working with yours so that you learn to trust it. (And call me if you'd like some help there -- either in private sessions or in classes.)
• People do still have needs -- food, clothing, shelter, health, safety, connection/belonging, and self-actualization -- but you may want to consider how your talents, skills and resources can be useful lower down on Maslow's hierarchy. Anything that helps with health (human or the earth's) or efficiency, i.e. doing more with less, is probably a good idea.
  
• At some level, you agreed to be here, on Earth, at this interesting/critical time. So part of you knows that, and knows what you came here to do -- and it may well not be what you think. Listen to your own heart -- it knows.
• Count your blessings regularly. That will both point you in the right direction and keep your spirits up.
• Group effort and sharing are key to this. There's an old problem, referred to as the commons problem. If a community has a finite amount of grazing area available to it, what's best for an individual herd owner is to have as many cows as possible. But if everyone does this, there are too many cows, they're all sickly, the land gets overgrazed and in the long run, won't support very many cows at all. What's best for the community is for them to agree on the number of cows that's best for the community and how they're going to apportion that number. (Apparently, they actually did this with the fish in the waters off Iceland -- mentioned incidentally in Michael Lewis' wonderful article about Iceland's financial meltdown.)
  

It's an incomplete list, and I'm working the murkiness like everyone else. Co-housing, anyone? Want to to add to the list?

Grasping Reality with Both Hands: Neurological Evidence of Money Illusion

Grasping Reality with Both Hands: Neurological Evidence of Money Illusion

Like I said, the electronic mob has pitchforks & torches

Again. forget privacy -

Scorn Trails A.I.G. Executives, Even in Their Driveways - NYTimes.com

Please note that I am not condoning anything anyone at AIG did, and I am just as outraged as everyone else at the bonuses that my tax dollars are paying. I just think that death threats and affecting the kids, who did nothing, are a little much.

Manifestation

A couple of nights ago, I was at a friend's home, a loft in downtown SF, with a few others, chatting about our businesses. I forget how it came up, but I told my friends some of the amazing things that have happened as a result of the mantra I sing internally (for other examples, click here, here and here). So I volunteered to do it briefly for them.

So we sat in a circle and meditated, with me thinking the sounds of the mantra. After a while, I just felt like it was enough, so I stopped. We all opened our eyes, and the homeowner said, "Do you hear that?" Everyone else said yes immediately. It took me a moment to pay attention to the sounds around me, which I hadn't been doing, because I'd been listening to the sounds in my mind. Wow! There were voices toning -- it was beautiful, kind of like harmonious chanting. It lasted for 5 - 10 seconds and faded out. But then the toning started again a few minutes later. This went on, alternating toning and silence, for probably 45 minutes!

The homeowner said there was no way it could be her neighbors, that in 8 years of living there, she'd never heard a sound from any of them, so that wasn't it. One woman went up and down the hallway, trying to find the source, but she couldn't find anything, either.

So now I know that whatever I'm bringing through can not only heal people physically, but also manifest sound. I wonder what's next?

Balance

Here in California, the vernal equinox happens tomorrow afternoon. At an equinox, the sun is directly over the equator, so its path bisects the earth, and day and night are balanced, that is, of equal length.

This got me to thinking about balance in general, and about ways to pay attention to balance, both in our bodies and in our lives. Here's a great exercise -- stand up and do it right now! It will only take a few seconds, does not involve heavy breathing, and no one will even notice you're doing it.


Stand on both feet. Notice where your weight is --

• Is it equally on both feet?
• It is balanced front to back?
  
• Shift until you are balanced and notice how that feels.
• Focus very intensely on something in front of you, and notice if your balance shifts. If it does, notice how and shift back.
  
• Think of something you're doing later today, and notice if your balance shifts. If it does, notice how and shift back.
• Think of something you did yesterday, and notice if your balance shifts. If it does, notice how and shift back.
• Think of something that makes you happy, and notice if your balance shifts. If it does, notice how and shift back.
• Think of something that makes you angry, and notice if your balance shifts. If it does, notice how and shift back.

This exercise of constantly shifting back to balance should eventually help you be more balanced in your body. It will also help you find balance in your life, because your body will show you when you're out of balance, and you'll become accustomed to noticing and shifting back to balance.

Here's another great way to find balance. Spend some time thinking about how you'd like to spend your time. How many hours a day would you like to spend working (or in different work activities)? exercising? with family and/or friends? eating, sleeping, relaxing, practicing your hobby? Call this your ideal time balance. It is unique to you, and may not fit anyone else's idea of balance.

Now get a tiny notebook, approximately 2.5"x4", small enough that you can put it in your pocket or your purse (they're in every drugstore and quite cheap). Every time you begin a new activity, write down the time and the activity. Do this every day for a week.

Now compare the two, how you'd like to spend your time, with how you are actually spending your time. Do they match? What can you change, either right away or over time, so that what you actually do matches more closely what you'd like to do?

Morning Ramble

(I understand that in the UK, hiking is called 'rambling', and so this is a (bad?) pun.)

I did my normal morning walk today, doing 2 of my favorite meditation techniques simultaneously -- looking at the spaces between the tree branches and the silent mantra. Something kind of amazing happened.

First, because of looking at the spaces, I began to notice the air as it's own thing -- it had its own presence. You know that joke about one fish saying to another, "What's this water I hear so much about?" We humans are like that about air. We walk in an unnoticed sea of air. Not me, at least not this morning.

Second, the mantra developed into a field I could feel swirling around me, kind of like a gentle tornado. I'm used to that. But what happened today is that I could feel the interaction of that swirl with the energy fields of the trees as I walked by them. So I noticed that the energy fields of the trees, and eventually the bushes, even the cars and light poles, were interpenetrating my energy field. (Cars and light poles, not being alive, seem to have much smaller, much denser fields than those of living beings.)

Is this the beginning of quantum perception in the physical world, of us all as a giant soup?

Mind over matter -- something YOU can do!

Psychokinesis (PK for short) is considered one of the more 'woo-woo" psychic phenomena. But I don't think it's woo-woo at all; it's just another one of those phenomena no one likest to talk about.

Engineers at the Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research (PEAR) lab did try to change that, doing experiments that proved, in the course of almost 30 years that PK, in the form of mind-machine interactions is, in fact, real. They had some really interesting apparatus, where the operator thought about something, like how high a column of water should be, or whether the balls in a sort of giant pachinko machine on a wall should distribute themselves to the left or right, rather than falling in the standard bell curve. Then they measured hundreds of thousands of trials to see what happened.

They found out some very interesting things in those years (and I'm doing this from memory, so I may be a bit off):

• PK exists at the margins, that is, the mental influence will not change the direction of a space ship by 180 degrees, or even 90, or even 45 -- but it can shift the direction by, say, 1 degree, which, over the long distances in space could result in missing a target by millions of miles
• an individual can have either a positive or a negative signature (for example, an individual with a positive signature would desire the apparatus to move left, and it would move left while someone with a negative signature would have the exact opposite result)
• although some individuals are more effective than others, on average, individual women are as effective as individual men
  
• 2 women working together are about as effective as 1 woman; 2 men working together are about as effective as 1 man
• a man and a woman working together are 4 times as effective as either a woman or a man alone
• a man and a woman who are lovers are 7 times as effective as either a woman or a man alone

But that was at the PEAR lab. There wasn't anything you could do at home to practice, or at least I didn't know of anything -- till now!

On Sunday, a new friend of my husband's (I'll call him Dennis) came over and showed us the ridiculously simple device he's been practicing with, on and off, for the last 20 years. Here it is:


It's just a straightened out safety pin poked through a piece of plastic (a blister pack is really good for this) with the tiniest Post-It note (minus the sticky part), folded at 90 degrees and balanced on top.

You can try affecting it in a bunch of different ways. Dennis holds his right forefinger against his right thumb and his left forefinger against his left thumb, and imagines lines from those to the 'points' at each end of the paper, and uses those to either hold the paper in place, or to move it. I do it with the palms of my hands, just sending energy to the ends of the paper. My husband just thinks about the thing moving, and sometimes it does (but he's a natural at this). No, there was no wind, or other air movement. Besides, you can pretty quickly spot movement that comes from air movement, because it's chaotic, as opposed to the smooth PK movement.

Try it -- and let me know what happens!

Mom Was Right -- If You Don't Have Anything Nice To Say About Someone, Don't Say Anything At All: The Boomerang Effect Of Gossip Is Discovered

Mom Was Right -- If You Don't Have Anything Nice To Say About Someone, Don't Say Anything At All: The Boomerang Effect Of Gossip Is Discovered

WASHINGTON -- It appears to go against common sense -- not to mention classic psychological theory -- but researchers writing in the April edition of the American Psychological Association's (APA) Journal of Personality and Social Psychology say they have identified a common, but apparently mindless, psychological phenomenon that plays a previously unrecognized role in the way people form impressions of other people. Specifically, they've found that when someone attributes positive or negative traits to someone else, the listener will often attribute those same traits to the speaker. "In other words," the authors write, "politicians who allege corruption by their opponents may themselves be perceived as dishonest, critics who praise artists may themselves be perceived as talented, and gossips who describe others' infidelities may themselves be viewed as immoral."

In a recent communication, the authors suggest that this phenomenon could play a role in the public's reaction reaction to participants in the recent White House scandal. "For example," they note, "when Kenneth Starr accuses Bill Clinton of perjury, Starr himself may be seen as more deceitful. Similarly, when Linda Tripp claims that Monica Lewinsky had sex with the President, Tripp herself may be seen as more promiscuous. The gist of our research is that when you gossip, you become associated with the characteristics you describe, ultimately leading those characteristics to be 'transferred' to you."

The researchers conducted a series of four studies on the phenomenon they call spontaneous trait transference. Three of the four studies involved participants looking at photographs accompanied by brief statements. In the first study, the statements were ostensibly about someone the person in the photograph knew. In the second, the statements were either about the person in the photograph or about someone else. In the third study, participants were clearly told that the photographs and the statements had nothing to do with each other; they had been paired at random. In the final study, participants watched videotapes of actors answering off-screen questions about themselves or about someone they knew.

Some of the statements accompanying the photographs (or made on the videotape) were designed to elicit a positive or negative trait. For example "cruel" was implied by the statement "He hates animals. Today he was walking to the store and he saw this puppy. So he kicked it out of his way." But consistently through the studies, participants attributed the elicited trait to the speakers, even though these speakers described someone other than themselves. This occurred even when participants were specifically told that there was no connection between the speakers and the statements, suggesting, the authors say, that this phenomenon is irrational and largely outside of conscious awareness.

* * *
Article: "Spontaneous Trait Transference: Communicators Take on the Qualities They Describe in Others" by John J. Skowronski, Ph.D., The Ohio State University at Newark; Donal E. Carlston, Ph.D., and Lynda Mae, M.A., Purdue University and Matthew T. Crawford, Indiana University Bloomington in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 74, No. 4.

(Hat tip, Carolyn)

Thank You, Paul Krugman

I love reading Paul Krugman -- I think he makes a lot of sense, I learn a lot, and he's funny, to boot. My adoration is completely aside from the fact that he's a Professor of Economics at Princeton (I took a lot of Econ courses), which definitely endears him to me, or 'that Swedish thingie".

No, what I admire about Krugman is the way he writes. Why? Because he is just being who he is, telling his truth, based on his education and experience.

What I realize from this is that the point of education (which comes from Latin, and literally means, 'to lead out of') is to make you more of yourself. Thank you, Prof. Krugman, for all your insights, and for leading me to one of mine.