Posted by Lonelyguide (Member # 353) on 05-06-2003 03:09 PM : Dear Rick, Thank you for sharing. Taking into account what you share as to your history it isn't difficult to comprehend why, as a young man, you would have selected law enforcement as a career and why, having amply sampled that life and having learnt from it what you surely must have learnt, you eventually chose another path and why, at this stage of your life, truth within a spiritual context would be your focus. You have seen a lot. You have had a disproportional opportunity to see how things should not be done in life and have created what is positive out off what was negative. Considering the circumstances during the earlier phases of your life I commend you on your constructiveness. Do, however, try to be mild with yourself. People who come from where you have been often impose rather strict rules of conduct on themselves. Excellent as that may be for the true seeker, a gentle discipline often lasts longer than a harsh and rigorous one. There is a title of a book that I should like to mention to you. Is is called "Life and how to survive it". It was co-authored by Robin Skynner, one of the world's most famous psychotherapists, and John Cleese (yes, THE John Cleese; the man we know from Monty Python, from Fawlty Towers and from a vast range of publications and videos about management techniques and other educational subjects). Even though the book has been written in a very humouristic and thus accessible manner, it is not the kind of book that one finishes in one breath. It is the kind of book that one reads for some time (30 or 50 pages) until suddenly the coin drops and one understands where it is all leading. From that moment on it becomes truly interesting and every page contains a gift, especially for people who carry excess baggage from the past; baggage of the type that you have described. It may deepen your understanding of yourself, of yourself in relation to yourself, to others and to your world. Much of it is about the importance of integrity - integrity of the individual, integrity amongst groups of individuals and the integrity of society - and of living life based on "a philosophy of plenty". It is a veritable treasure chest of valuable insights and I believe that you will greatly enjoy it. Love, LG [ May 06, 2003, 02:09 PM: Message edited by: Lonelyguide ] ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Lonelyguide (Member # 353) on 05-06-2003 06:46 PM : On the subject of the Angel messages that Doreen Virtue has been channeling and the preferences of 70% of the US population: Benjamin Franklin once remarked "there are lies, there are damned lies and there are statistics" and I myself happen to know about quite a few people who drowned in rivers that were on average only two feet deep! Ask yourselves: in a general non-political sense not related to the subject of mr. Bush: would you say that from many perspectives you are part of the majority (comparable to the 70% of mr. Bush's rating) of the US population or that - in terms of education, income, assets, belief, etc. - it is much more likely that you are part of a large minority (comparable to e.g. a 30% context)? Since you possess a PC, are at a discussion forum and are formulating thoughts that require a certain level of education, I presume that in many cases you will come to realise that it is much more likely that you are part of a 30% group (or, in fact, of a much smaller group) than of a 70% group, you will also see the relevance or, if you like, irrelevance of the fact that 70% of a population would give their approval or, for that matter, vote to someone. In other words ... the 70% approval rating doesn't necessarily say something about you. Besides ... it is not said that someone is right simply because seven people out off ten say that he is right. It could very well be that he is dead wrong and that the three people out off ten who say that he is wrong are right. In that context you should perhaps also take into consideration that 83% of Europe, your #1 ally in many respects, is - to put it very mildly - not very taken with mr. Bush and his performance and that both the economical and political relations with that ally have seriously deteriorated since mr. Bush is your president. In fact, in the eyes of many Europeans mr. Bush has turned himself into a pariah in the international political arena. I'm only mentioning these things, because I believe that it is not important what a majority believes. If that were important we would all have to speak Chinese, ride a bicycle and have to be Buddhists right now! After all, if the majority were to decide to jump off the Chrysler Building, you wouldn't do it either, would you? In all things you do, dare to be yourself, dare to have your own opinions and dare to stand up for them even if the majority tells you otherwise. Meanwhile I have attentitively read all your posts, but haven't yet heard arguments that invalidate what Doreen Virtue has been channeling. Love, LG ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Lonelyguide (Member # 353) on 05-10-2003 05:22 PM : Hi Nick, If you really knew me, Nick, you would know that condescension is something that I have no need for. There were days when, notwithstanding who I already was by then, I may still have had some remnants of insecurity in me that might have induced me to resort to rhetorics such as yours, but I have left all of that behind me some time ago . Thus, since you don't know me I wonder how you could possibly have my number. Within that context it would be interesting if you were not to delete any of your posts so that you could read them again say one year from now and then, with the eyes of the man who you will by then have become, would re-read some of your present posts. I'm sure that at that time you would see what I see now: a man whose lack of respect for others points to a lack of respect for himself (low self-esteem) and to the kind of insecurity that is usually the result thereof. Ergo, a man who doesn't even have his own number. What you call robust language is merely what I would refer to as an escape; as a way to avoid having to debate the issues on the issues by creating side-effects and smokescreens that have nothing to do with the issues themselves. Sometimes one can spot these typical shoulder rollers in a crowd; individuals who use these silly techniques so as to avoid having to deal with (the arguments of) others on a basis of equality. That, in my opinion, is what condescension is about, Nick: making use of advantages in an unloving or even unfair manner. Not my cup of tea. And usually people who say that they don't require lectures often are the ones whose need to learn is the greatest or whose insecurity obliges them to exercise such control over everything that anyone they cannot get a grip on constitutes someone who frightens them into all sorts of agressive comportment. That, Nick, is what control freaks are all about: people whose inferiority complexes often cause their egos to compulsively resort to agressive comportment when they are confronted with authority of any kind. As for opinions in the UK: I know that there are people in the UK who haven't decided whether they'd rather team up with North America or with Europe. I know that there are also those who'd rather not team up with anyone and I also know that there are British citizens who will opt for the USA and that there are others who will opt for Europe. I have no idea what the population of the UK will eventually choose, but - knowing the British as I have come to know them - I'm pretty sure that chances are that none of us will live to see the day that they will actually really choose (sorry, couldn't help teasing you a little). Yes, Nick, that is correct. Usually a superiority complex points to an underlying inferiority complex. Both, in fact, point to a psychological imbalance . And actually ... I do hope that I haven't claimed anywhere that I am "spiritually advanced" . The thing is ... anyone claiming something like that wouldn't be very advanced, now would he? No, Nick, I still have a lot to learn but calling myself spiritually advanced is something that you shouldn't expect from me. Could it be, Nick, that this, that for some reason, is one of your own perceptions that you are projecting on me ? You know, for a little while - just a little while - before I started writing this post, I was playing with the thought of using some of your "robust language" to reply to you just to show you what it would be like if you were at the brunt of some really acerbic language and to give you an impression of what an ugly environment a forum like this can become when we don't respect others and address them from a place of ego rather than from a place of love. I decided against it. I fortunately grew out off that nonsense and know how counter-productive it can be. In the end it is one ego against the other, it only gets nastier and nastier and the topics don't get a fair chance any more. The posters are being addressed and not the posts. It's a phase, Nick. Just a phase. Believe me, I can see a lot of potential in you and I'm confident that you'll grow out off it. Love, LG ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by Lonelyguide (Member # 353) on 05-11-2003 06:08 PM : Dear Louise, Thank you for your kind words. Let me reply to your post point by point: Politicians (Mr. Bush): Put thirty sturdy men in a bus and drive them to one of the large Sequoiah trees that are to be found in the State that you reside in and ask them to shake the tree. Nothing, Louise, nothing will happen. They can work themselves into a sweat, but the tree won't move. Wait for a small gust of wind, a mere gentle breeze, and you will see the leaves and some of the branches move. The earth rotates and everything on her moves along. For us, standing on her, she turns invisibly but yet she moves. It is the unseen things, Louise, the wind, the ideas, the ideologies that really make things move, that really make the world turn. Not the men, not the actors that promote those ideas and ideologies, not the politicians. Always they merely believe in the things that the majority believes in. Always they merely believe in what makes that the majority will believe in them and thus at one point they will say this and the next moment they will say that. Their approval rating is way more important to them than their integrity and hence they have the conscience of a weather condition. They believe that making more noise than some of their opponents equals persuading and that bombing other opponents equals being right. Getting people to follow them and believe in them and their words is more important to them than getting people to live according to the words of Christ. Just try to find one politician who will be prepared to stick his neck out to propose the two laws that supersede any law as an amendment for your constitution . And the masses? The masses will follow their actors, their heroes until they drop them again for another actor who will expose their present hero and make more noise and create more of a spectacle. Thus I don't listen to what politicians say. I merely observe what they do. In that I don't treat them unlike I would treat any other man. I merely observe and notice to which extent they act in separation. Enough said? War: Unrighteous war? Righteous war? Why not talk about righteous evil? What of the Islamic fundamentalists yelling Jihad? What of the wars and acts of violence for which they claimed to have a mandate from God? How often will we still cloak God in the blood of others just to provide ourselves with an alibi? He who lives by the sword shall perish by the sword is what Divine wisdom says. That, however, is a prophecy, not a blessing or a manual for those who wish to spill the blood of others! Please don't talk to me about a righteous war unless God has clearly sanctioned it. War begets war. Ignorance begets ignorance. For well over a thousand years we've had crusades. We still have them. We haven't learnt a thing. Short term some good things have come out off this war, but long term we've merely once more fed the inferiority complex of the Islamic world. Long term we will have to continue looking over our shoulder and live in separation. There were way more intelligent (wise) alternatives to have Saddam removed. Meditation, I'm one of very, very few human beings, Louise, who has been blessed by what is known as a "lightning flash experience"; a rare spiritual privilege that is even mentioned in the Qabalah and other scripture. I'm not saying that I possess the truth, Louise, but that I know where to get it, that the Source is open to me and - lies being what I abhor most - that truth is important for me. From what I hear I don't doubt for a moment that Mr. Masters is an extraordinary person, but I wonder why you would think why any man could give me more than what our Heavenly Father has given me. Having said that I'll gladly take some quality time one day to take a look at what you're mentioning. Right now, however, my life is such that I truly don't have that time. Truth, Yes, Louise, truth is simple. The moment we hear it we know it to be truth. Lies are always complex as in "the bigger the lie, the harder to disprove it". Truth, however, is simple. Truth is merely another name for God. Love, LG [ May 12, 2003, 02:28 AM: Message edited by: Lonelyguide ] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Posted by Lonelyguide (Member # 353) on 05-13-2003 05:09 PM : Hi Rick, This is in reply to your post of 12th May, 2003 (05:44): You will never hear or see me trying to convince others and certainly not whilst merely saying "I know". When I say "I know", Rick, I am talking of Faith; of a Faith that only applies to myself. In your post you write "although I have neither died nor been to the other side" and this indicates to me that you are indentifying with mind rather than with soul. Let me therefore repeat some words that I mentioned in a post addressed to another member somewhere else in this forum; words from "The Power of Now" by Eckhart Tolle: ------------------- The greatest obstacle to experience Being (God introduced Himself to Moses as I Am) is identification with your mind, which causes thought to become compulsive. Not to be able to stop thinking is a dreadful affliction, but we don’t realise this because almost everybody is suffering from it, so it is considered "normal". This incessant mental noise prevents you from finding that realm of inner stillness that is inseparable from Being. It also creates a false mind-made self that casts a shadow of fear and suffering. The French philosopher Descartes believed that he had found the most fundamental truth when he made his famous statement "Cogito ergo sum" (I think, therefore I am). He had, in fact, given expression to the most basic error: to equate thinking with Being and identity with thinking. The compulsive thinker - almost everyone - lives in a state of apparent separateness, in an insanely complex world of continuous problems and conflict; a world that reflects the ever-increasing fragmentation of the mind. Enlightenment is a state of wholeness, of being "at one" and therefore at peace. At one with life in its manifested aspect, the world, as well as with your deepest self and life unmanifested – at one with Being (God). Enlightenment is not only the end of suffering and of continuous conflict within and without, but also the end of the dreadful enslavement to incessant thinking. What an incredible liberation this is! Identification with your mind creates an opaque screen of concepts, labels, images, words, judgments and definitions that blocks all true relationships. It comes between you and yourself, between you and your fellow man and woman, between you and nature and ... between you and God. It is this screen of thought that creates the illusion of separateness, the illusion that there is you and a totally separate "other". You then forget the essential fact that, underneath the level of physical appearances and separate forms, you are one with all that is. By "forget", I mean that you can no longer feel this oneness as self-evident reality. You may believe it to be true, but you no longer know it to be true. A belief may be comforting. Only through your own experience, however, does it become liberating. Thinking has become a disease. Disease happens when things get out off balance. For example, there is nothing wrong with cells dividing and multiplying in the body, but when this process continues in disregard of the total organism, cells proliferate and we have disease. Note: the mind is a superb instrument if used rightly. Used wrongly, however, it becomes very destructive. To put it more accurately, it is not so much that you use your mind wrongly - you usually don’t use it at all. It uses you. This is the disease. You believe that you are your mind. This is the delusion. The instrument has taken you over. And so you take the possessing entity to be yourself. The beginning of freedom is the realisation that you are not the possessing entity – the thinker. Knowing this enables you to observe the entity. The moment that you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated. You then begin to realise that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought and that thought is only a tiny aspect of intelligence. You also realise that all the things that truly matter – beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace – arise from beyond the mind. You begin to awaken. ------------------- You see, Rick, your mind is telling you that you have never died before. The thing is, however, that your mind has never died before. It may, however, very well be that your soul has left (and entered) a human body many times . Let me try and find the text on re-incarnation that I mentioned elsewhere in this thread. You may find it interesting. Love, LG -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by DoriZ (Member # 638) on 09-07-2003 04:23 PM : Of course it creates problems to turn everyone and his uncle into moderators. Whenever there is change people will test the possibilities of a new picking order. In many cases it is like giving a gun to a ten year old. I read some of their first posts as moderators and those posts explain it all. I visited a few Christian and other boards while I was away. You know what? 80% of the fighting was on the boards that called themselves Christian. Go figure. As soon as one member stepped out off line and shared something new a whole wolfpack would jump on him and the others would stand by and let it happen. Same thing everywhere all the time. The nicer boards with lots of sharing were the nonChristian boards or the boards where many had run away from Christian boards and were calling themselves disenchanted Christians. All these agressive intolerant types are giving Christianity a bad name. [ September 07, 2003, 01:35 PM: Message edited by: DoriZ ] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by DoriZ (Member # 638) on 09-07-2003 06:14 PM : You want clear language, Kendrick? Clear language without inappropriate words? How about this: Exasperation is a word that I might also have selected if I was trying to find excuses for someone who I would want to give preferential (unfair) treatment to. Exasperation does not justify inappropriate language, Kendrick and words like "tenuous" and "baiting" don't cut it for me either. I'm not impressed. Opinion and bias instead of objectivity all of it. A moderator should be moderate and should mediate. Not try to make a fool out off another mediator by undermining her on board. In doing so you have undermined yourself and all other moderators on this board. A moderator should be wise and patient, Kendrick. You apparently are neither. "As long as they are not honest with us"? Life is about learning to be honest with yourself, Kendrick. Why should anyone care what you think of them as long as they know that they are honest? Can you in the light of the above say that you are honest with yourself? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by DoriZ (Member # 638) on 08-17-2003 02:52 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I don't hate anyone, Doreen. Its all the hate that is coming out off you all the time that I find so surprising. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posts: 56 | Registered: Jun 2003 | IP: Logged