Love Transcends

At this time there is nothing else that really matters. To discover your love. This is imperative if you want to feel the freedom you so seek. This is not a matter of finding love around the corner, or in someone´s arms, but to discover that it resides in your own heart, and that it always has.

This love is why you came here. To find it, experience it and share it. That is your purpose. The love is unconditional, it is un-stoppable, it is, ultimately, undeniable. But it is the most challenging quest that you will ever embark upon – especially in your world.

The game as it has been orchestrated has drawn your attention to innumerable distractions – other objectives that seem to be paramount. But this is not the case. The foundation of all activity in this cosmos is based on love. It is the prime ingredient to be assured that what you create is in alignment with the One´s design.

Discovering this can be one of the most elusive tasks that you might take on. Living as a human being on the Earth at this time in your history is leading to “the great rub”. This is the point where it becomes an either or choice for acting from a place of unconditional love, or something else. The something else(s) have increased in so many forms and so much intensity of energy as to be especially distracting.

Your world speaks of love more than any single idea. Yet your understanding of its true nature is so misunderstood. It is really the most simplest, and actually the only truth in your world. It is at the bottom, and behind all of the experiences that you are orchestrating and so distracted with the details. The experiences are all accessories to the point. And the point is love. Can´t you see that all of this creative wonder that you observe in your external perceptions is the result of love? And you will step beyond the production of material trinkets when you discover that the love power you are so yearning to express exists in the core of your being. When you discover this love you will realize that there is nothing to “own” or “possess” or to hold onto because what you so yearn for is the makeup of your actual being. It is what is holding all of the molecules of your body together. It is what is containing all of the information in your DNA and blood. The thoughts that you have are supported, contained within the love matrix, the One´s thoughts. But you are a thought filled being and have the same capacities.

But your task in this life is to discover, not the One´s love, or someone else´s love, but your love. Go to that place inside yourself and discover the spark of the love that created you. That you are to share – that is your purpose. That is the One´s purpose for you. That is why you stepped into this existence.

You have been clear on this idea for longer than you could ever imagine, before you came into this form. But the veil, the curtain had to be heavy in order for us to discover some new characteristics of this thing that we share in all points and waves across infinity.

You have been a wonderful agent in this life, investigating distractions, diversions, untruths of how love might express itself – “I will love you if”, “share your love if you get paid”, “looking for love in all the wrong places”. My what an adventure you have created.

But the time has come for you to get down to business. Enter your own heart and find the spark, that WE put there. Yes, you were a designer of this system too. You were the architect, as was Eye. But you had primary input. You had the experiences in the realms of love across the cosmos and instructed us in the design of this new adventure space called “Earth” and the universe. But you have been pulled from the core of its knowing – this is evidenced by the state of your world. You have forgotten your truth birth mother, Gaia, and you abuse those around you with the distractions of what you think are obligations you believe are a result of love – obligations that have been placed on you in the game that you are playing.

If you would have been informed as a baby about the task of finding your own divine spark to then share this with the world, you would have found a very different experience. But we had a purpose for it to play out in this exact way. But now, now my dear comrades, associates, partners, MY BEING, the time is quickly approaching for the quickening. I am sure you feel it. Don´t you feel kind of crazy? Do you feel time passing quickly? That is the true quickening. It is love beckoning. And the only place you will find peace of mind, is discovering your true nature and that that power to transform the entire cosmos in the “twinkle of an eye” resides at the center of your being.

Now how you experience or find this spark can be as varied as you see yourselves as beings. There are some pointers. One possibility is to find another soul who vibrates, or resonates on an energetic level and begin to immerse yourself into an investigation of this love. Invite that other person to find their love. Invite yourself to examine what it is that makes you tick – what inspires, how do you really feel about the people in your life that you love. This is not about the “stories” and dramas and traumas that are playing out in yours or their lives, but the core of the connection to them. This may require some effort to get past the surface experience which you are lost in on a day to day basis. This requires a sense of deep meditation, but not necessarily in the image you have been given, such in a sitting lotus posture. You can examine your heart in all moments. While you walk, while you lay, as you gaze into a child´s eyes. As you look in the mirror at yourself. As you write, or listen to a song. The sources, or access points, to the love in your own heart are as innumerable as the moments in your day. But, you must dedicate your conscious attention to them. You must reflect on them.

Many of you find yourselves pulled away in the stream of external life. But this is not the external world´s fault. This is an expression of where you are in yourself. If you are struggling and finding yourself overwhelmed, in any area of your life, it is love´s invitation to take a look. It is you that is saying – is this what you want? Love is so close and inviting you to examine what you want to create. It is inviting you go to your love and have it show you the way to your own joy, your own “master plan” – which you designed and imprinted, with love, into the core of your very makeup. Physically it is easiest to find this if you work with your heart area. That is where this expression is most powerfully emanating moment to moment as your heart beats and cascades the essence of your love through your blood throughout your body. There is a cosmic, and eternal energy pulse with our Divine signature that the entire cosmos is waiting for you to find, key into, and then express the results as this program turns on and takes over your existence. When this event occurs there will be no turning back, and you will begin to reveal to yourself the true nature of your cosmic being. Showing yourself, via your own unique love quotient, the path that you had laid down for yourself eons ago, in fact in many respects back to the moment your soul was conceived in the beginning from my Divine Love blueprint.

This experience will reveal to you just how spectacular you are, and thusly, as only the love model allows, you will begin to see the divinity of all that exists. All of this was created for this knowing, but the fact could not be fully appreciated until there was a thorough and complete forgetting. As you likely have discovered in your human form, we often take for granted that which is given to us without effort. Thus, this is not a unique experience to humanity on Earth, and this is specifically why we decided to create this world – and it has been the most phenomenal success!!!!

You, my dear ones, have ventured into the depths of new experiences that were not imagined before this. And the cosmic consciousness will be able to process and include each and every experience into the collective. And now your rewards for your dedicated service is to be granted, but there is one last effort that you must do. Find your heart. Find your Love. Experience it. Go to it. Embrace it. Allow it to embrace you. It is all-ready, you must know, but bring this experience into your conscious mind. FEEL IT – do whatever you must to experience this truth of who and what you are, because if you don´t, you will continue with the same results you are experiencing.

I emplore you to give this your utmost consideration and dedication. Because you will be astounded to find out that this thing, that you have been yearning and searching for, you have been dancing and singing for, you have been suffering and crying for, is embedded into the fabric of your being down to the most minute level. It is who you are, and nothing less. It is your DNA, it is your bodily parts, it is the functions, it is the Being that you are, and it is closer than anything else. But your consciousness must entertain it. You must open a doorway to it, because if you don´t you will remain locked in the prison of your perceptions, your beliefs, your thoughts and your habits. Those, dear one, are not you. None of those things – and you will be overjoyed to discover the truth of what is being shared with you.

This process, will have its way with you no matter what. The difference will be, do you want to experience it now, in this body where you believe you reside, in this stage of your life. Do you want to share the most astoundingly beautiful gifts with all those you “believed” that you “love and cherish”? Do you want to experience this? This is your most important assignment. This is why you agreed to come to this sphere of existence. This is why you were made, and why you made yourself. And, the time has come to find this truth within your being and Share it.

Be happy. Because you are so beautiful. Drop all beliefs about your experiences, ideas you have been given, and give yourself a chance to experience the pure essence of the love that you are truly made of. All of these things that you are afraid to face about yourself is what you have contributed to the cosmic database of experiences. It is very important. But there is no meaning in it any longer, as the time has come for the great reckoning, beckoning, love inviting you home to yourself. Because, in the end this is what you have been looking for. You are your own answer. Your own destination. Your own love source, that once found will be shared with every other being across creation – and it will be there forever, for that is the nature of how love works. It is pure, kind, gracious, patient, powerful and any other positive attributes that you might use. But more importantly, it is yours. You have never been without it. There was no need to fear. But to appreciate what has been going on, or how great this thing is, you had to know what it would be like for the “possibility” for love not to be cascading in infinite abundance over your soul and being. You had to experience this, for the ONE. It has been necessary for this, and you have done GOOD!

The Peacemaker

All these fragmented perceptions,
are there really any pieces?
Coming to feel the One-ness of One.
Each apparent piece of the puzzle
is not what it seems.
Each projection no matter how small, is complete.
Yet without each there is not completeness.
Like the process of putting a puzzle,
back into its form, each piece complete.
Consciousness creates viewing, experience windows.
Each with multitudinous realms of perception.
All Eyes looking back.
As if from different points of view.
But the truth even the space between
the puzzle pieces when apart.
As the puzzle is always complete
the process of Peace Making.
Is a truth acceptance of the One.
the puzzle of my own consciousness
experience, thoughts, feelings, senses
each an elaborate display
of my ability to make puzzles of creation.
This idea extends across the world -
imagining lines drawn, things torn apart
but in the end the reckoning has come.
Eye accept, embrace, worship, love
each aspect of my Being.
No matter by what means that I have judged.
The Peacemaker resides within me,
inviting me to turn my view
on the intricate and ever present One-ness.
Which my mind cannot comprehend.
Eye Am the Peacemaker.
Eye Am the Peacemaker.
My heart it´s the one that knows.
It rejoices, dances, sings.
At the thought of coming home.
All along it has been waiting
for me to put the pieces down.
Step back and look with wonder,
at the beauty to behold.
Peace breathes through me each moment.
The energy behind
is here to be worshipped, honored, known
to settle in and accept all of my life.
Not of fragments, parts within
but one blended, apart of the One,
not to be excluded
for anything it might have done.
Nothing, absolutely nothing is exempt
from the love that contains All.
So the process of Peacemaking
is not so much of doing something
as it is to allow to Be.
There is a natural emerging
the essence of peace being exposed
emerging, showing, revealing
its wonders, the glory so it´s known.
Consciousness in human form invited
to return to its Source.
To the place where it all started, and yet ended
as no time exists it shall be known.
The process of segmenting, counting, meting out
was only necessary as it has shown
an illusion of piece making.
unsettled, disturbance, separation.
There exists none of this
unless we entertain it – but I no more.
Eye now, release, and embrace
as my experience up till now
it all has been a blessing
to which there is no return.
The wonders of existence,
revealed and showered upon,
All the One.

My Burning Bush

Today I am compelled to relate the story that describes the most profound spiritual experience I have ever had up until this year (Note: today’s date of editing is November 20, 2009 and a most recent experience that eclipses the one shared here happened on November 14th, but I will have to Share at some future date).

I believe it was 1996. I had been on a spiritual path for many years, and known about spontaneous spiritual “awakenings”, or experiences, that resulted in a person having a completely different perspective on life and existence. Those similar to the one described about Moses. My experiences for the most part from 1981 until 1996 had been of the “educational variety” (as per William James), a sort of slow progressive process of having greater awareness and clarity gradually over many years. Part of me wanted to experience the sudden cosmic enlightenment, but I was satisfied with my progress nevertheless.

I was living in Austin Texas. I was working at a state agency, but also driving a city commuter bus before I went to my regular job. I had to wake up at about 4:00 am. I was living in a rented room in a friend’s house on Lake Austin.

I believe the stage was set for my experience by the Landmark Education Forum. There were a few friends who were talking about the experience so I decided to participate.

It was a weekend program. I was quite impressed with the instructor, the various exercises and the transformation of one of the students who was selected as a focus of the instructor’s attention. I found the focus of the introductory program on discovering where our beliefs originated the most powerful. To question my accumulated ideas about reality, and the “facts” of the world, and how I had come to believe in them was something that I had previously never really considered. There was also an exercise in examining our greatest fears that was similarly powerful. Essentially arriving at the point that our greatest fears, to discover that we are really afraid of each other – people fear people. Then the question that arises from this is “why”?

I could write much more about the program, but the point to get to is to describe my experience. As a result of the energy of the workshop and the shift towards awareness I believe I was in a highly charged spiritual condition. I also had a friend whom I was sharing in the experience and we had great enthusiasm over the weekend. To this point my efforts toward spiritual development had been very mundane for the most part over about fifteen years. I was living semi-successfully, but also struggling in other respects. Life changes like a divorce had been weighing on me emotionally, but then living in Austin was a blessing for I believe the energy of the place is highly charged andmotivates people to grow.

My experience occurred as I was waking up on a Monday morning, after the weekend seminar. The alarm clock went off at four am, and I was resting in a half awake state. The radio was on and I could hear the DJ and the other radio personalities talking. On this particular occasion they were making jokes about a politician who was immersed in some sort of sexual scandal. In this half awake state I remember sinking into this very sad place where I felt it a travesty that we live in a world where it is acceptable to make humor, publicly especially, about the challenges of individual people. These thoughts of “who in this world doesn’t have frailties?”, and “who are these guys to be judging?” were floating through my mind. I really came to a near state of despair – and felt like crying. At that moment, the strangest experience I have ever had occurred. As I recollect it, it was like a small window opened to Divine Consciousness. It felt like God opened just a small portal, a window to “All Knowing”, for just a nano-second. And in that brief moment I was carried away into an indescribable experience of awareness. In no time at all I was given a glimpse, or sense of the power that had motivated people like Ghandi, Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Buddha and Jesus. I was given a glimpse, but an experiential one which told me that it wasn’t supposed to be that kind of world that I was contemplating from the radio show. And there was a power that was accessible that could assist me to make a difference.

The experience was so brief, but overwhelming that I was totally astounded. I was taken to a place, a feeling place of great, great Joy. A place where I knew we didn’t have to let the world stay the same with the sorrow and suffering that we all seem to experience.

It was as if a tiny window had opened up to cosmic knowing for the briefest moment and I was submerged in the Divine Light of God, and it told me that I was responsible.

That I too, like the great beings that I had admired so much, had some responsibility to bring change – to free humanity from all of suffering. I had the distinct feeling that it was my time to “step up to the plate”. This idea relates to baseball: when it is your time up to bat, you go. You don’t tell the coach, ¨well coach, I’ll pass on this one¨. You just get up to bat. And you always do the best that you can. Without question. You stand, look at the pitcher, keep your eye on the ball, and each time is an individual example of “doing your best”. And in this brief span of time in the world, I experienced an almost indeterminable amount of knowing that I had a part to play.

Now in this moment, which I have no idea how much time had passed, but I am sure it was only a few seconds for a world of thoughts, and more importantly feelings to wash me away into this “cosmic knowing”, it scared the livin’ daylights out of me. Within a second of this “gap” opening, I immediately felt incredible fear. How can I live up to this? Why me? What can I do? I felt this conflicted sense of, I finally knew the power, personally, experientially behind all of creation, but how could I live up to the expectations, the responsibility. I was elated, exhalted, expanded for the first time in my life and then more afraid than I had ever been before. I believe, but I don’t know for sure, that this all happened in a few seconds. As the fear overwhelmed me, and I went to the place of not thinking I could do this, I physically curled up in a ball and started weeping.

I am not absolutely sure how much time passed. But I know I made it to work and proceeded with my usual day. I did call my friend and tried to relate the story. I remember that during the Landmark experiences, that he had been referring to a very elusive but powerful experience. And he kept telling me about it, but I had no idea what he was talking about. And to this day I still don’t. Because when I told him about my experience, I felt he didn’t have any idea what I was talking about either. I sensed that what I was describing was way beyond what he had been referring to.

I came away from this experience, even though it ended with great, great fear, with a sense of calm knowing. I felt more empowered and more sure of the path I was on. I am just realizing this more fully as I am writing this now. Although I am not sure what this experience was all about, over the years I have come to believe that a sort of seed was planted. That seed was to grow into what I am not totally sure.

I have never connected all of the dots, or even thought to any great extent, about the repercussions of this experience, but as I write this I know that shortly after I was back in college working on my doctorate. I had taken a radical and risky step to go back to school and pursue my dreams rather than just work a job. And I know that my work as a professor after finishing my doctorate, and as a research scientist has never been of an ordinary nature. I have always had this passion for looking at the big picture, putting things in context, having a vision for how can we make the living systems of the world work better and take care of the living things in a way that protects and enhances lives. I have never met anyone else who understands the broad perspectives that I do.

As a professor I just couldn’t see the purpose to writing a bunch of articles to increase the lines on my CV, with the purpose of increasing my pay, taking care of my own and being satisfied. There hasn’t been a time I could be satisfied with my own comfortable life while knowing that people are starving, trees and environments are getting destroyed by the thousands of hectares a day, while I publish words that go sit on a shelf that only a handful of people will read in the entire world.

I sense, as I reflect, that many of my creative capacities were enhanced from this experience. I may never know. After this, as I returned to academia, I found myself able to understand greater arrays of information. I have been able to examine the greater phenomena, like the Internet, while at the same time contextualizing that “on the ground”, as in the case of my dissertation which examined the Internet as a global phenomena, but then drilled down vertically to ask the question, how is this impacting people and the planet? I was interested in how small nature tourism business owners were using the Internet to grow their business, but at the same time I could see the astounding potentials of the Internet as a phenomena for changing everything on the planet. In many respects, the ideas contained within the concept of the “I Am Sharing” collaborative network encompass these understandings.

I believe that the book that I recently completed “A Vision to Re-Create the World”, is a snap-shot of the capabilities, or perspectives that were possibly “downloaded” from the experience described in this essay. I have no idea what ultimately is going to happen with all of the work that I have done, and the decision to help change the world. All I know, is that I will continue to pursue the things that I have been motivated to do. Not really understanding where the drive comes from, but knowing, without one single shred of doubt, that it is the right thing for me to do. And even though I have struggled as a very “non-traditional” person, and one whom people may consider to be a little crazy, that I know in my heart I am doing the best that I can – and that, ultimately, is all I am responsible for.

Feeling One

The One had to forget. If we came into this form knowing all, having experienced all, being infinite, there would only be continued knowing.

Somehow source effectively created an experiential shroud, a seemingly thick veil which previously human perception found challenging to pierce or dissolve. And yet the process of this life, or the purpose it seems is to be just that. By consciously, patiently attending to one´s thoughts and experiences to pass through to this greater knowing.

Duality "appears" to create an inner and outer challenge - the individual separated from the rest. Then, to go up to the next scales (e.g. family, community, etc.) we seem to imagine there are more blockages to who and what we are. But the challenges at each scale seem to be of the same nature. Just different, apparently, but only really as a result of perception. If I can clear and deal with my perceptive challenges - if I can accomplish my "remembering", then will that ripple out across the world? The word "re-membering" is quite interesting: to be put back together.

I have stated before that Socrates didn´t believe that we learned - such as putting information from outside in, but discovered more from the inside - like my son Joshua said "we already know everything, we just don´t know it". Maybe it is a combination of both. Balancing. However, the "balance" for the majority of people seems to be on the external experience. And the "collective" almost exclusively focusing on this. But isn´t this somewhat its nature? Unless we internalize what we share together, to make it part of our "collective body" - and everything between our human form, like the earth, air fire, water, and ether, we will never understand the nature of the All That Is - which first must be expressed and experienced here on Earth. We really all are in this together.

Socrates asked questions. Others suggest meditation, going within.

I have this sense that this process is not so much mental, as of something less cognitive, more of feeling. Rectifying another of dilemmas, is rectifying the male and female idea. The female can remember its connection to Source through feeling. Thus a remembering throughout the whole can be caused. Stepping out of mental constructs, and in an experiential way, finding within - that spark of creation, from whence all forms begin. The "big bang" is not only one of a physical nature but one that emerges from the experience which is, at its core, of feeling. To be able to go to, and sort of identify the Source within our being, and really feel it to leave an imprint of knowing on the molecular or cellular level, could cascade that effect through that first "human" body. Then, that effect, like a cataclysmic event, would continue through our collective body, affecting each molecule, no matter what form. At an exponential rate the transformation, or re-creation, would not take long at all.

Is it possible the remembering is about feeling and not thinking?

And how would one accomplish this? Maybe it is as simple as to say "Eye am ready, to experience and feel the love that created me.? No muss, no fuss. No mental gyrations. No elaborate discourses or activities. Just the invitation to access that "feeling" which has to be imprinted upon every particle in the cosmos. Then, just let it go. Allow the process, which must be totally natural for the One love to have its way with us.

Hmmm, could it be so simple? We´ll see.

The Stage of Life

a smile says "I love you",
and so does a frown.
They each express an aspect of life.
Find within the unique treasure,
to be expressed from Source,
each blade of grass, flower, sea
has complete and unique form.
Each molecule, leaf, ray -
unique as only one can.
The nature of life is revealed
by an inner voice, sound, vibration
orchestrated by some Divine purpose,
the mystery to be revealed.
Impositions from outside
also effect how it emerges,
but each in its own nature Share
an ever present expression and adventure
of forms, thoughts, stages within
that reflect out for us to see
the performance of the eons.
There is no need for judgment
and yet, if so, that too
for All That Is - Is
and we all came here to join the show.

The Tempest

The tempest´s energies are rising,
swirling energies mix with the ether,
emotions, feelings, experiences, coalescing,
an opportunity to break with the past,
life emerges among the ways of movement,
cataclysmic events push change and growth,
the fires racing across the prairies,
the winds that clear a mountain forest,
waters rise and then fall,
leaving fertile gifts of life to come,
amidst what we perceive as destruction,
is actually a primal force of nature,
bringing opportunities to renew,
recycling, collections of debri,
that choke new life, new emergent forms,
human, divine consciousness creates forms,
spiritual, physical, emotional and psychic,
like the glade that spawns too much life,
innumerable forms pack within,
eventually crowding, choking, inhibiting,
those creative life forces expressed,
until the water, fire, earth and air,
decide the time has come,
for new life to emerge.

Unusual Love messages - toilet paper

Well, this is a strange experience. Here I was, thinking of my post for Facebook - (And Source asks "what will you share for me today, what thoughts, feelings, Sharings?"). Then I went into the bathroom and was still thinking about this.

I have known and learned so much that what is going on here, as we experience it, and as science proves, it is about vibrational frequency. As we live and yearn to create a new world, the way that it all plays out in our "light forms", which is what we really are made of, is our vibrational energy. Our world has been stuck, for a long time, in a low vibrational, dense energetic vibration that has prevented us from creating a world that aligns with all those things we desire - as expressed in our feelings - in our lives. The dominant energy reducing emotion is "fear" which stems all the other "negative" emotions (negative does not mean bad - if there weren´t duality of experience we wouldn´t be here as we know it - but that is a whole other story).

Anyway, back to my morning story. So I am contemplating this profound thought - about what we bring to the world each day. How we create our day. What do we share? - Fear, complaining, conflict - or happiness, joy, wonder - excitement at the mystery, adventure in the uncertainty?

And then I go a little deeper as I walk to the bathroom to sit on one of my contemplation thrones. Now, as of late, I have been getting more and more open about where my messages might come from. For years I have been aware of synchronicities - what Carl Jung described as the "acausal connecting principle". I have learned to be open. And in the past few weeks the messages, important messages for my personal path have been coming in from totally unexpected sources. But, I never ever could have been prepared to receive a message from "toilet paper".

What message and how, you ask? Very simple, I sat down for just a minute or two (seriously), was thinking about this deep, deep (and I´m serious about that too) question of how we raise the vibrational, or light quotient of the planet. This is the issue my dear brothers and sisters. If we want the new world, we have to create it. We have to invite it. We, each one of us, day after day, moment after moment have to raise our own vibrational energy. And how do we do that? Well first we learn about the guidance system we were programmed with. Then we have to do what the toilet paper told me.

There, on the toilet paper were flowers and hearts - but there was one particular heart that caught my attention. Here it is.
Now how in the world this message got on a roll of toilet paper - I don´t know. But I am sure that the message came to me for the specific purpose for me to focus on just what I needed to do - today.

Blessings friends,
Andy

Hearts Beating the Dream of Love

Today I was waiting for my wife at the insurance company to get a form filed. It is actually a funny story. It turns out, according to their records, she is already married. To a 92 year old. This afternoon we have to go back to show them a piece of paper to prove it is their mistake. Another mirror - institutions.

(note: Oct. 15, potentially a sad turn to the story, the man died shortly after the insurance company sent him a letter about a law suit – he was 92—but then again, maybe a happy ending).

While she was dealing with that, I was having a beautiful meditation. Then I went outside to watch people. I was having so many interesting thoughts. Then I thought about my friend's brush with death. A near death experience, pneumonia that settled around his heart. And I thought about his heart—it is wonderful and generous.

Then I started looking at people and realized they all have the same heart. Like my heart. And your heart. The heart of God beating, beating, beating - beating the dream of love into the world. The little birds have hearts. Benjamin (my new son) has a heart, which this morning shared a very interesting perspective of my life experiences of letting go.

That's a digression though.I was surrounded by a group of men as these thoughts and feelings moved through me.

They didn't see the tears come to my eyes as these beautiful thoughts washed through me. No matter what the outside container looks like each person has the same dream of love. And that persists through the most incredible conditions. I think of the people on the street. Or the 1200 pound man who has been featured on T.V. numerous times. His heart is so persistent. And in a really strange way the story of his heart is being shared to the world. But not very many people really pay attention to the true message.

I felt, that for the first time in my life, I glimpsed the "Christ" within all. I also thought of the planet's heart. The one I was told by my friend that I am in touch with. I don't know what the structure of the Earth's heart is, but I know it is beating the same dream of love.

I've had a wonderful morning of awakenings. It started out with my shedding some tears with my wife about not getting to be with my daughter Serena for her birthday (at least physically). I also shared a secret that very few people know. About being alone.

I know in my heart of hearts, that I have never intentionally hurt anyone. And I am a good person. So these apparent sacrifices, or experiences of "letting go" are the Divine's training plan. The plan for me to fulfill my destiny. I know that the heart of God beats my heart. And I am grateful for my friend Tom's intervention to help me realize the phantasmical truth at deeper and more meaningful levels.

Tribute to Laurie Skadberg

Tribute to Laurie Skadberg
July 30, 1953– May 30, 1985

My sister passed before I wanted her to. However, the impact of her, my memories of her and what I realized from her death have very much shaped my life and my commitment to my own life. She still, after 22 years, is fresh in my mind. And that is good. Laurie was an amazing person. And this book is partly about sharing her impact on my life and hopefully the lives that have been touched subsequently.

I just found this letter and poem in 2007. I don't remember writing it. I believe the year must have been 1996 or 1997. I was suffering from chronic back pain that regular doctors had no remedy for. I went to a wonderful kinesiologist named Ann and that began my recovery, which essentially was that I had acquired an allergy to wheat. The poem pretty much speaks for itself.

The letter I wrote is included first. Now I'm glad to report I think that allergy is going away - it is nice to be healing.

Sometime in 1997.
My sister Laurie committed suicide May 30, 1985. This experience contributed to my growth as a person in so many ways. Every year for about 12 years, around the anniversary of her death, I dealt with considerable issues until I discovered a book entitled "Closer to the Light", a book of several case-studies of near death experiences. It relieved a great deal of the suffering, However, Laurie is still very close in my mind. I even had another direct contact from her in 2008. That story is relayed in the blog posting "Laurie's Angel" (p. 38).

This letter was with the poem that I wrote to Laurie in 1997.

Dear Laurie,
I’m sorry. I can’t believe it has been so long that I am still working through your death. What a mix of confusing feelings. I still am mad that you killed yourself and then on the other hand I feel like I may have been at fault. I am sorry that I didn’t write to you. When I used the excuse that I didn’t like to write to you because it made me miss you – I think there was some truth.

However, I also felt like I was lying too. I was confused. I think at some level I was just too lazy to write.

Recently I realized that I have some guilt that maybe by me not writing that you didn’t feel that you were loved and that’s why you killed yourself. Intellectually, I am pretty sure that is not the case and I know no matter what I must let go of the guilt of the past. And I know that you would not want me to punish myself anymore for what has long passed. But, I have been punishing myself unconsciously for a long time – I think.

I don’t understand any of this stuff because there seems to be no logical understanding of it.

However, the emotions and the memories continue to arise and it seems that for me to set myself free I need to do the same thing.

Not too long ago I realized what a beautiful contribution you made to my life. And you didn’t even know it. The music you left behind helped me to decide to try to work toward love. You’re music became my music and still is the foundation of my preferences today.

Another realization I had was that my using started and ended very close to your departure and return from Norway. I don’t know if there is a direct correlation but the two would appear to have some relationship.

Just today I had another realization about you rescuing me from Phyllis. I had a lot of emotions come up about Devon and having to tell someone else what was happening. It brought up a lot of memories/feelings from deep inside me. Like it was my own pain coming out. I realized that you rescued me from a situation that might have made me an angry, bitter person. Thank you.

I miss you Laurie. I would have liked to have known you better. And I’m really sorry if I let you down. How did you make the angel happen?

Today I want to set myself free. I went to my chiropractor today and you came up again, together with a lot of emotions. This lady is very special and she said I need to ask You, God and myself to forgive myself. And she said I need to forgive you.

I don’t really believe that God condemns and I don’t think you had any hard feelings towards me but I believe I have condemned myself. I have carried a guilt for you, Devon and Arlis. And I think I punish myself by my lifestyle with how I handle money and how I let my God shine from me. I want to set myself free. So I am writing you and God and me this letter to bring this about. I am asking God to help me forgive you – if I haven’t. And I am asking that you and God forgive me and for me to allow you to forgive me, if that is necessary, and finally for me to forgive myself. Please help me to let all of God’s love in.

Love,
Andy

Writing Poetry
I used to write poetry.
I liked it when my sister and mother said they were good.
Then my sister went away.
She wrote poetry.
She was an artist.
I don't think I wrote any more poetry.
My sister died.
She hung herself.
I couldn't imagine writing poetry
I've cried.
I miss my sister.
I saw a doctor today.
My back was hurting.
We cried together - I don't really know why.
She said she asked my body a question.
Then she felt very sad.
She told me to forgive.
She told me to ask for forgiveness.
And to let myself to be forgiven.
I don't think God condemns.
I do - but I'm trying not to.
I wrote my sister a letter.
I didn't write her when she went away.
I told her things I could remember.
I remember more.
My sister was my friend.
I asked for forgiveness and to forgive.
Is this a poem?

Tribute to Marvin Skadberg

Tribute to Marvin Skadberg
December 6, 1927 – January 12, 2007

Note: this is an unedited version of what I shared on January 28, 2007 at Marvin’s memorial service at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Ames, Iowa.

These situations are always difficult to figure out what to share. I don’t want to just fabricate some trite things, but want to say something meaningful, and from the heart.

The challenge comes in how not to get too much in my head, and to keep my emotions at bay.

The following thoughts came to me as I woke up early a few days ago. They are random, but represent some of the meaningful memories and affects that John Marvin’s life had on me and my life.

Dad was my hero.

I remember when I was very young, I suppose after saying the prayer that begins “If I die before I wake” I would imagine what it would be like if Dad died. I would have to stop myself quickly and force myself to think of something else – because I wanted to keep myself from crying, because even the thought was too painful. I know it didn’t always work - I cried sometimes. Now faced with the reality of Dad being gone, it’s worse than I imagined.

There are so many good things to remember about Dad. I remember when I was a boy so clearly those nights when I would have a bad dream, or there was a storm, I would go sleep next to him. I have never felt so safe since.

Dad was also a super nice guy –

I’ve been trying to remember if he ever asked me for anything – I couldn’t think of one thing. – But one thing I do know that he wanted from me - he wanted/expected me to live my life, and live it boldly and fully.

Retrospect and his passing have given me a different view on things. One significant example is a story my folks told me about when I was very young – about one of Dad’s regrets. I was four or five and in trouble. I stood up to Dad when he was going to discipline me and said defiantly “you can’t make me cry”. I did. Mom told me that Dad cried after that incident. For years I saw this incident as possibly one mistake that Dad made – now I understand that it wasn’t. I wish I could tell Dad that he needn’t have any regrets.

It was a very important lesson for me.

Now, at 47, and with my life experiences I see this as an important lesson about life. It can be captured I think in a quote of Frederick Neitchze “What doesn’t kill us, makes us stronger”.

I suspect that that was the first of many lessons for me that life might knock me down, emotionally and other ways, but no matter what I need to keep going. Dad demonstrated this in his own life – especially when Laurie died so tragically and also when he lost his lifetime sweetheart just two years ago. Dad just kept on going, but actually became an even more loving and compassionate person. He taught me that my life is valuable, to be treasured, nurtured and enjoyed no matter what trials and tribulations might confront me. That’s how he lived his life.

I remember the arguments between Laurie and Dad when she was a young woman, becoming aware of the strife, tragedies and hypocrisies of the world. I remember how passionate she was to make the world better, and Dad’s pragmatic/logical/stoic position, his views of the world. His experienced, wise, understanding that the challenges we face are monumental. It frustrated Laurie to no end. Both views are necessary for change – we can’t be naive to the harsh realities of the challenges to break down or remake entrenched systems, but we must be passionate for the cause.

I know this day isn’t about me, but then again, in a way it is. It’s the only reference point that I have. And John Marvin is my father.

One of the proudest things that I say when I speak in my line of work, is that I followed my Father’s footsteps, even though the rebel in me didn’t really want to acknowledge that. I still remember when Dad dropped the hint about me maybe pursuing a career in Extension, when I was having some difficulty with choosing a vocation. For those who don’t know, Extension is the “Service” side of the Land Grant University system – to extend the knowledge that we discover in Universities and be of service to the public.

What I have learned from Dad is that trying to live ones life for service can be quite rewarding – in a multiplicity of ways. Dad showed me how to do it – I guess, however, I might still need some lessons in humility.

Mom taught me to believe in myself, and that I can do nearly anything if I put my mind to it, and that there is something extraordinary in each one of us. Dad taught me that I can make a difference and that I should die trying.

About 1 ½ year sago I found myself getting tremendously sad at the thought of my children facing the “age of enlightenment” – when the reality of the problems of the world start pressing down on them. I found myself slipping into that dreaded state of desperate resignation – what could I possibly do to make it better?- the problems seem insurmountable.

. . . but then a thought came to me about what I could do about it. What I realized is that I can try to change the world. I don’t care if people think it’s grandiose or pompous to think or believe this. Either way it will be better. . . if I make a difference, great! If I don’t, at least I died trying. I think both Mom and Dad did that in their lives.

I’ve been very fortunate in following Dad’s line of work. To a significant degree the successes have been a result of my exchange of ideas with Dad. He was my mentor. Up until the last, Dad and I discussed the challenges and opportunities facing higher education, changing economic paradigms and rural communities and the role of technology in these rapidly changing times. Even after he was already gone I received a newspaper clipping from the Des Moines Register. He’d sent it just a couple of days before he passed.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do now that he’s gone – but, I know eventually it’s going to be OK.

A funny story happened in this last year. I was speaking at a conference in Des Moines and it was the first (and now only) time that Dad could hear me talk. He sat in my session and I was hopefully anticipating grand accolades from him about how awesome I did. Silly Andy! I didn’t get that. In fact he didn’t say much at all, until we were riding home in the car. He just said – you need to get rid of about half of your powerpoint slides. I think Dad knew I didn’t need any help with inflating my ego.

I pray that my work and my life represent my Father and Mother’s legacies. That I continue to make my contribution to making the world a better place!

That I possibly live as a beacon, to ignite the spark of enthusiasm, and extraordinaryness in myself and in others, and that I fuel it with the love in my heart (which they gave me)!

I don’t want to live my life in quiet desperation.

I truly believe that we are put here to serve because that is what my friend, my Father taught me. Not by lecturing me, but how he lived his life.

Dad, if you’re out there and you can hear this, thank you for helping out this past year with Devon during a difficult time and for supporting me with my most difficult decisions.

Thank you for the Harley Davidson calendar and motorcycle clock that you sent for my birthday (January 13). Also, finally, thank you for teaching Devon about how to be a good man. You would be so proud of him.

Mark´s Memorial Letter - Marvin Skadberg

My brother Mark was able to capture in much fewer words, who Dad was. This is what Mark shared at Dad´s memorial service.

Mark´s Memorial Letter
Dad’s life was one of service. Service to the community, to his church, to his kid’s and of course to Mom. At ISU, he was among the top three economists in the whole country for hog and cattle market futures.(Economist joke?)

After he retired from ISU his new job was to take care of Mom as her health began to fail. The way he took care of Mom, and all of us was phenomenal. His devotion and dedication was amazing. His life really was a life of service. Even after he passed, he still tried, to serve by donating organs so others might have a second chance in life.

He never asked much for himself nor could I get him to do so. Many times I admonished him to get things or do more for himself, but his answer was always the same, “You know, buying junk or doing things just for myself doesn’t make me any happier so why do it?”

And as a Dad he always kept a light touch. He never tried to push or drive us in a direction that he thought was right. He let us all choose our own path yet was always there when we stumbled on that path. When I compared him to other Dad’s of friends of mine I always thought, “Boy, did I get the better deal.”

Now Dad and I were different in that he was a scientist and I was more of a spiritualist. These paths seem diametrically opposed but in one thing there was always a constant.

Within the sphere of our respective paradigms I conducted myself the way that he had showed me. Basically, I just copied what he had taught me and applied it to my own path. They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Well I don’t see it as flattery, I just never found anyone who showed me a better way of doing things.

Dad just accepted us as were we even if he didn’t always understand.

I think that is what’s called unconditional Love.

But to my mind the most profound thing about him was this:

Dad didn’t believe in heaven or hell. He didn’t even believe in reincarnation, and the subsequent “law of Karma” where the upshot is “that if you screw up in this life then you get to come back the next life and fix it.”

He didn’t believe in any of those things which begs the question “Why be good?” Why spend your life doing the right thing?

There was no reward in the afterlife for being good, and there was no punishment for being bad. So why be good? Why do the right thing?

For him the answer was simple and really not scientific: You did the right thing just because it was the right thing.

And that to me is the purest form of “being” that there is.

And when you strip away all the human frailties and foibles that we all have, that was who Dad was.

Marvel Skadberg´s Art

Here are just a few of hundreds of paintings my mother created. I just want to leave a footprint in addition to the impact she had in the people whom she shared here life with.

I Love You Mom! I know you´re still around.

Marvin Skadberg on Marvel

My father shared this at my mother´s memorial.

This short biography is dedicated to my memory of Marvel

I want to write a few words about Marvel as she was the most important person in my life and my life would not been the same without her and her influence. I would not be Emeritus Professor of Iowa State University if it had not been for Marvel.

She taught me how to be social, and to love music, especially the classics.

Many of you didn’t know Marvel when she was younger and before her medical problems began to hinder her activities and reduce her confidence.

Marvel brought the joy of living into my life as I was a rather stogie, shy person when I first met Marvel.

Marvel was the most enthusiastic, engaging, full of life person I had ever met. There was nothing she wouldn’t be willing to do which might be interesting.

When we went to the various State Fairs around North Dakota, she would insist on taking all of the rides in the fair, many times with my initial, sometimes reluctant vocal objection. She wanted me to try all of the booths that required some skill. I failed to achieve one of her greatest desire was for me to win her a fluffy stuffed animal. I could have bought ten all of them with the money I lost trying the games skill, throwing darts, tossing hoops, throwing baseballs at bowling balls or shooting an air rifle.

Marvel did two major things for my career that I will never forget. When we were in Langdon and she was going through a severe personnel crisis of an emotional breakdown. I suggested that I was not happy with my County Agents work and would like after things improved, to go back to college and get my Masters degree. One must remember that in doing so we would give up a good salary and live on my GI bill and a small assistantship, raising two children. Marvels answer was” Marvin I am not very happy now, I want you to go to school, then maybe at least one of us would be happy”. Four months later we were back at college.

The second time occurred when I had been at Iowa State University, for four years, going to school for my Ph.D. and working as a research assistant. I was tired of working and going to school and scraping by financially. I received an offer to be an extension area specialist in Maine. The salary was twice what I was receiving at Iowa State. Marvel’s suggestion was that we were able to live on my salary at Iowa State University and we should not give up our dream for me to get my Ph.D.
Marvel always waited up for me till midnight when I had extension meetings around the state. After midnight, she would go to bed and visit with me when I came home, no matter how late it was.

Marvel always fought back from any illness, depression, severe sunstroke, arthritis attack, intrusive thoughts and two strokes. She was always determined to get her life back to normal. She would use any help she could get to speed the recovery or understand it. She had the greatest will to live and live a normal life that I have ever seen.

Marvel tackled with vigor every project she got involved in, be it copper tooling, candle making, learning about the great composers and listening to them, signing, and her latest passion painting

Marvel was the least person to judge other people and she never gossiped about any friends or neighbors. I know she heard many things about friends and neighbors, but I never learned anything about them from her. I would hear some tales about people and tell her about them and she would say,” I know I have heard that before”.

Marvel loved her children, even though she was strict, there was very little that she wouldn’t have done for them.

I loved Marvel’s hugs and kisses, even when she was dying, when I gave her a kiss and she said, “ Do it again!”

If there is reincarnation, as Marvel believed, she will come back as the most loving being on this planet.

Goodbye my LOVE.
Marvin

Grandpa Marvin

I am taking the liberty of Sharing what was one of the proudest moments of my life. To see my son share, with confidence, about his experiences and connection to my father. At the memorial for Dad, Devon was the star of the show.

Grandpa Marvin
By Devon Skadberg

I just want to say some things about grandpa Marvin. I am very blessed to have had the opportunity to come and stay the spring of 06 with him. If I hadn’t I would have never gotten the opportunity to get to know someone as amazingly awesome as he was. The memories I have of him are very recent but I believe the characteristics I discovered in him were ones he had his entire life. What I respected most was how I could state my opinion and belief on a subject and if he didn’t agree he would say something along the lines of “I disagree because….etc.” Then he would go no further. We NEVER got into an argument. He was very willing to accept what someone would believe and still love them for who they were. He would take me to my church which he almost completely disagreed with, but he would still let me go to and be glad that I was where I felt comfortable. He is an excellent role-model for me. He will not be forgotten.

Friday when we were burying him, I saw the vase sitting there…something was missing. A golf ball! I said to everyone, “You know what grandpa would love to have? A hole-in-one.” I knew that he would have at least one golf ball in the trunk of his car, sure enough he had a brand new 18 pack of Noodle golf balls. I got one and set it next to his vase. I couldn’t help but smile, that was the one thing grandpa would want to be next to for eternity.

I always remember seeing him in his chair reading a book or watching a black and white movie about WWI or WWII on the American Movie Channel. I would usually join him. He and I would always have a root beer float once a week, of course I would always try and sneak another every now and then. I might have been a bit of a rebel in my school work but I am very grateful to grandpa for taking the act that he did when I needed a place to stay. He said immediately said yes, he didn’t even think twice. He will ALWAYS be a hero in my book.

Two days before he passed away I had been thinking, “Man, I should call grandpa I haven’t called him in a while.” I did just that and I am very glad I did because I would have felt much worse if I hadn’t called him. Being in Ames these past few days has felt emptier than before. I really miss him as well as how I miss having someone to guess which elevator will come first. Most of the time the one he would guess was the one that would show up first. I miss having that root beer float with him. I miss him saying that I listen to “Noise” all the time. Most of all I just miss him. I think we all do. He was an amazingly awesome person.

Marvel´s Adventures by Mark Skadberg

Today I have a very special sharing. It is from my brother Mark - who wrote and shared this piece at our Mother´s memorial service Sept. 11, 2004. There isn´t much more to share except the incredibly beautiful message.


Mark’s talk at the Memorial Service

When Mom asked me to write something spiritual for her memorial I knew I would focus on what came after—on what her journey might be. But we are still here in this world and just the other day it hit me: for about the twelfth time I wanted to call and ask her the proper way to make beef roast. And she was no longer there to ask.

It is one of the unfortunate aspects of the human condition that you never know how much you love someone until they are gone. I miss her so.

But her last years were calm and peaceful and almost carefree. She found the joy of a multitude of books and they took her to worlds she couldn’t go to for herself. Dad is the one who gets nearly sole credit for making these last peaceful years a reality for her. And I am asking all his friends and family to help him find ways to fill in the great gulf that has been left by her passing and to find joys for himself.

And now we turn to what came after.

Up and Out, Beyond and Back

Her time was close,
she knew it sure
and yes a little fear
But family close
that she could feel.
That she could hear
and know them all,
yes those so far away.
They gave her solace, hope and ease.
Their love began to lift her high
With one last push it was up and out.
The colors swirled around her now
The purple of passion The blue of the sad
The green of regret the yellow of joy.
These colors they swirled and swirled and swirled
A tunnel was formed before.
It was not dark but silver grey
Along this way she slowly passed
Before her now she saw it clear
The white light beckoning
She’d seen it before and back she drew
Afraid of what’s to come
But gentle hands they took her arms
And led her through the light.

To her surprise She found herself seated on a finely carved bench. A soft mist was all around her and it gave her comfort and warmth and drove away the fear. Her guides who she knew but did not know caressed her shoulders, mind and heart.
“They will come soon,” they said and drew away.

Slowly the mist began to drift away and she saw a vast open meadow surrounded by tall trees of many and varied colors and shapes. She took great delight in this and she felt the joy well up inside her. And then she pondered. Had she ever felt pain before or was pain just an illusion?

The mist closed in around her once more and it was soft and warm.

And then they were there, Laurie, and Helen and Anna and Butch. A joy took her that she could not describe but soon this was followed by something else and she remembered things she did not wish to remember in this place.

Questions hard as steel rose into the air and hung there demanding to be answered. ”How could you? Why? Why did this have to be? Why did you go away?”

But the answers came fast and quick and complete. A spiritual, cosmic sense of all that had gone before, the reasons, the mystery that lingered behind every event was now at her command.

And the hard of that steel dissolved like a fog in the summer sun and all, yes all was understood in the light of true and complete understanding.

They lingered a day, a year, an age. No question was left unspoken and no answer was left unsaid. And in the end she knew all of what had happened and mostly importantly why. And all was joy and love and laughter once again.

“We will leave you awhile now but not for long.” They said.

The mist closed around her once more and before her appeared a beautiful tapestry. It was hers. Her life, her loves, her struggles all were woven into this work, and the knowing of the many lives she knew. Each image or symbol was an event, a person, a feeling. All were connected in lines and circles and love. All she had to do was put her finger on an image or a symbol and she understood. She laughed with joy. It was all so complex, yet so, so simple and in the end it was only beautiful. There was no other way to see it. It was.

Then through the mist the elders joined her once again.
“It’s time to play.” They said and smiled.

She rode a comet among the stars and gasped at the wonders that she saw. She swam in a thousand oceans, of a thousand colors, of a thousand worlds, with a thousand people and strange creatures she had never dreamed before—or had she?

She sang in a celestial choir just one of a multitude of voices. And she sang solo while an entire world gazed in wonder, enthralled by the power and beauty of her voice.

And the colors that she saw. Pink trees and purple rivers and mountains of all gold. The worlds she saw were unnumbered but all were strange and beautiful and real.

She held the universe in her hand and saw it as it was--a living breathing thing. And she played golf with an electron as a ball, and did it just for fun. “Hole in one!” she shouted with glee as a nucleus burst apart.

And last she rode a unicorn along a rainbow that stretched a thousand miles. And she found the pot of gold. As she peered inside she found to her delight that the gold inside was Love—yes merely, just merely love. She left the pot, the pot of gold, for someone else less fortunate. For in Love--both within and without she was wealthy beyond all count.

But then in time she began to still and her spirit calmed and became quiet once more.

She found herself on the same bench and the warm mist closed about her once more. She saw before her a small blue/green planet on the edge of a galaxy and it drew close before her. She balanced it on her finger as she watched it slowly revolve. It was such a pretty little thing.

She stayed and gazed for a day, a year, an age.
And then she called the elders to her side.
“Playtime was fun but there’s work to be done.” She said.
“Indeed?” They asked.
“Indeed.” She said. “The world I think, it needs me now.”
“Indeed?” They asked.
“Indeed.” She said. “There’s more to learn, to teach, to Love. It’s time—it’s time to try again.
“Indeed.” They said.

And it was so.

Realization of Self Love

This is a very personal description of a great discovery about self-love and the teachings of Jesus and the ten commandments.

About twelve years ago (1997), I was recovering from divorce. It turned out to be one of the most challenging times in my life. This process literally took years. I am not sure why I drug it out so long, but that was just the process. I mostly felt myself to have been a failure as a father. Not upholding the social agreement of marriage, mostly for the sake of my son.

I struggled a great deal financially, probably a form of self punishment. I also had periods of deep sorrow- even so far as contemplating the end of my life. I never went so far to actually do anything, just going to that place of desperate resignation. The most profound of these times I actually went to the place of no feelings. Ambivalence, numbness, not caring. That I discovered is a much more desperate and dangerous place than anger or depression.

When I was at the lowest place I was in my apartment and I picked up the Bible. Now, I have never read the Bible to any great extent. I have tried a number of times, but found the language difficult to comprehend. Plus I have come to believe that much of the greatest truths to have been culled out. However, I still believe that it is filled with great wisdom and truth, it is just difficult for me to decipher what might have been added or deleted. Not the best use of my time, this is my opinion.

However, on this occasion I opened up the book at random, dropped my finger on the passage where the disciples are asking Jesus to speak on the commandments, I remember reading "and what of the ten commandments"? And Jesus's response, in my recollection "There are only two. Love God with all your being. And Love your neighbor as yourself".

Reading this caused great realizations for me, and insights on my perspectives on love of self, and also my access to the love of God. You see, I read in that passage in the Bible, having a scientific mind, a case of deductive reasoning. The bottom line, or the basic challenge of Jesus' message relates to Self love. The deduction, or the leap of reasoning comes because he did not mention three points - 1) Love God, 2) Love Yourself, and 3) Love Your Neighbor as Yourself. The second step in this reasoning is missing.

Why? I assume that Jesus "assumed" that we would love ourselves. But is this the case in our world? I think mostly not. For many reasons - one is that it has become "tabu" in many ways to "Love ourselves" (e.g. narcissism, arrogance, selfishness).

However, as I have since discovered, if I don't harbor Love in my heart for myself, how can I truly Love others? And I am not talking about "selfish" love. I'm talking about the Love for God and for all others. For if I truly Love Andy in the true sense of Love then I do not have to worry about selfish love. My brother-in-law many years ago (1981) confronted me on this. I think I said something him to about loving my girlfriend more than I loved myself. And he replied, "Andy how can you expect others to Love you, if you don't Love yourself?" This I have realized over the years is one of the most powerful questions a person can ask - either of themselves, or of a dear one.

This reverie from the quote from Jesus made me think why I might have arrived at the point of not Loving myself. I thought that it probably had something to do with pain - and pain being a sign of being excluded from God's Love, which to me is the greatest fear. Much greater than the fear of death. (a little digression, imagine the world of people living day to day their greatest fear as their truth!)

I thought back to my first unconscious "comprehension" of God - which would have been my parents. They were bigger than me, took care of all my needs, protected me, loved me. But did they love me when they punished me? I think I came to understand/feel that when I did "bad", I was being excluded from Love. When I felt pain, either external or internal, I began to separate myself from Love. I began to believe that I could actually do something and become un-Lovable. A ridiculous notion as I understand today, but for most of my life I believed, I felt this. As my friend Tom says "little Andy", had programmed this idea into the very core of my being. This is the idea that the church has placed on us. The idea of "original sin", or at least the way that I interpreted it. And, if I look at many people in the world, I think others believe it too.

In any case, I examined this idea of doing things, and being "out of Love". And it explained my behaviors. You see, once I was out of Love, or had excluded myself consciously, it doesn't matter. Bad in degrees is immaterial. And, because of the internal pain, the need to blot it out became more and more necessary. Thus, in my case, I turned to drugs and alcohol as a young person. However, at the time of this experience reading the Bible, in 1997, I had been 16 year sober.

I think I somehow got the idea or belief that if I felt pain, I wasn't being Loved. Of course it started with my parents, but then I think it extended to God, and of course to everyone. Because, how or why would I feel pain (which is "bad") if I was Loved?

Pain is a sign of being a "sinner" and "sinners" can't be Loved by God, right? Because we have to become an "un-sinner" for God to really Love us, right? We have to become totally clean to be accepted into the Love of God. And this only happens when you "do something", and are transformed into being "white as snow". But if I feel pain inside, then I feel that I am the same. I know that this is not the case, and this seems like a very childish way of understanding. However, I think this childish "program" was actually running in my life - it explained my behaviors.

In truth, I do not think God condemns. It is a man made construct, like so many other concepts that have imprisoned us - but these are OK, because there is a purpose to all.

I also realized at this moment that pain is not "bad". It is merely an aspect on a continuum. And, in actuality, it can be very, very good. In fact, it was deep and desperate pain that lead me to "no pain", no cares, no feeling which was the stimulus for all of these epiphanies about "Self Love". And in that moment, and in previous moments, I realized that "pain" can be exquisite. And then I wasn't sitting in judgment about my feelings, about my actions, which would result in me being excluded from God's Love, which is not possible.

Whether I consciously bought into the idea of "sin" and condemnation, I think at some level I believed that I had done things that had placed me out of God's Love. Divorce.

Abandoning my son (this was my "programmed" belief). Having a tendency to be somewhat of a "womanizer". But this actually tied to my own condemnation of myself. It became a self fulfilling prophecy. It was like, OK, I'm already a "screw-up" (a sinner) so fuck it! And I had come to believe that I was the kind of person to do those things. So, if I believe myself to be that kind of person, how could I do anything else? But in reality all I was doing in that process was trying to find love. Love from others. Love to fill the void in me. But no other person can ever fill that void. Because that was a void created by my lack of Love for my Self.

And I think Loving my Self first is actually one of the most gracious things that I could ever do. I am God's first gift to me. To my person. This physical, spiritual and intellectual being was God's gift to me first. And from there, all other expressions arise, at least in my conscious experience.

I realized this in another way a few years ago when I heard the song by Bad Company "Feel like making Love". I realized that we are supposed to be "Love factories". But how could I generate Love if I don't have the first ingredient - Love for the being, the gift that God gave me - me, myself and I. Isn't it a tremendous lack of gratitude to not love what God gave me, first?

Through all of this thinking I realized that "Self love" was to "Love God with All My Being" - and that if I could accomplish Self Love in the most pure and profound way, then "Love Others as Your Self" would flow naturally and effortlessly. That was the "missing deduction" in Jesus's statement about there only being two commandments.

I also realized that maybe, these feelings, were God experiencing itself through me. I imagined my joys, sorrows, and the agelessness of the feelings. I imagined how my body, and my mind seem to age, but my feelings don't. I thought of the loves and deepness of those profound feelings that I had experienced in my life and felt that that truly was a God living through me. And those forces are the ones that have motivated me, truly to seek Love with all my being. To be Love in all ways that I can.

So what next? Forgiveness. Yes, but if God doesn't condemn why would I need forgiveness?

I don't really know, but for me at that (and this) moment, the forgiveness was to know that God's Love was immediately available to me - all-ways, always. It happened to me long ago when I realized my life was in the "shitter", I was a drunk and a junkie, mostly because of my dishonesty with myself. When I had this realization that dishonesty had created my twisted little life, and admitted I was lying, and committed to take a different path, and said the prayer "God help me". My life began to be totally different.

All I had to do, I guess, was to accept the Love to flow. It was there waiting. I didn't grow any new Love acceptance organs.

Oh, you may be thinking, why do I say that God doesn't judge - well for me, it's about Love. Love Loves it doesn't judge. And if God is Love then God doesn't judge. God just Loves.

So what I had to do at that moment was look at Andy, and see him for who he was, and just appreciate that he never meant to hurt anyone - on purpose. That many times he was confused, and did things that resulted in apparent "problems" but that those really don't matter to Love. That no matter what I think that I do that is bad, and no matter how bad I might feel, I am always Loved by God. Period. There is no way out of it. It is everywhere and always.

And today, I have learned more and more about my feelings and their connection to the Divine. That they are actually the "program" the "guidance system" that I was given in order to know how to avoid doing the things that were contrary to my, and others, best interest. But I didn't learn this until about 2 years ago.

Questioning Beliefs

Why?
Why not?
Are they yours?
Who came up with them?
Do you really believe they´re true?
Do you know where they came from?
Who do they serve?
Do they make you happy?

It is strange to me sometimes when I hear people say things like "war will always exist".
How do they know this? Why would they give their energy to such a belief?

Are we learning from our mistakes?

Evaluation, assessment, contemplation, processing is a matter of looking at our experiences and finding out if we might want to change something. I have looked at civilization and wondered why haven´t we ever gone back to the drawing board to start over. It seems, collectively, we never make an assessment and re-design our approach to things. We just go forward, pall mall, it seems blindly, without really looking at things and asking the question - is this working?

This is one of the most important factors when designing anything (a piece of furniture, a car, a essay, a project) - evaluation. We do this when we are walking - look out for obstacles, alter our route to avoid trees, etc. But do we do this with societies?

Or maybe we like, prefer, desire, things like conflict, strife, people not having enough food, seeing people being killed, not being able to drink out of the river like I suppose we could do at one time in the not-too-distant past.

I don´t think we really prefer these things. I suspect we are just caught up in the idea of history repeating itself - that life is constituted by "our" beliefs - which were created by other people, or someone, likely long ago. Maybe these people were really stupid - or mean.

Am I really my name? or my ID number? or the job that I hold, or the amount of money that I have in the bank?

Where did all these ideas come from? Do I agree with them?
Do they serve a greater good?
Do I want my children to carry on, along the same lines?
Am I happy with the results?
Could things be different? - better?
Does the past actually exist?
Who came up with the idea of guilt?
Do we really need money?
Could we make the world peaceful?
Could we feed, house and clothe everyone?
Who has the power here?
Who have I been following? Why?

I don´t know. These are some of the questions that I Am asking, some for a very long time. Mostly in my head. But today I have decided to share these questions. Maybe you have wondered too? What if we got together?

Socrates asked questions. That, I think, is how he figured so many things out. He believed that we don´t learn things, but that we actually remember. This really makes sense if you put it in the context of there being only One thing (God, creation, existence, or whatever you might believe). This idea is contained throughout most ancient teachings about who and what we are. Where we came from. Where we are going. If there is One thing - it would know everything, right - we have just forgotten.

In asking these question I have discovered a great many things. Like, I am very powerful. What I am thinking is very important. That I am always being guided. Love is the truth.

What would love do?
How would I prefer to be treated?
Is cause and effect real?
If I do something to someone else, what happens?
What can I do?
What can I share?
Can I make a difference?

The surprising thing is that living in this mystery, this place of being open to new answers, new beliefs, new possibilities is quite interesting, and exciting. I never know what to expect next - what new information might come in.

And, it seems, as long as I continue to guide my questions, actions and beliefs by the truth of love, it keeps getting better and better.

Lesson 1 Light Star Study Group

June 22, 2010 Light Star Study Group

Here is a little, well actually not so little, compilation of ideas that might help people with changes that are occurring. I believe we are in for the most profound transitional times that humanity has experienced here on Earth. Some are calling is ascension. Desmond Green, my friend and mentor came up with "incension" the other day. I think this is very important because we, humanity as a whole, and as individuals, have been focusing on the external experience more than the internal. As above, so below - as outward, so inward so to speak.

What I share below comes from my experience. All that I share, I have done. All books and resources that I recommend, I have read and studied. That is why I can recommend them.

This is not about me telling you how to do something, this is about you discovering what works for you. These are just suggestions, based on what I did. I wouldn´t necessarily recommend what I did for others, because it likely is kind of confusing. But, there might be something useful here. Make it work for you - that is the key.

More than any one thing, as of late, I feel this idea of "remembering" is critical. Socrates believed that we don´t learn, we remember. In other words, like my son Joshua told me at 7 years old "our brains already know everything, we just don´t know it." Socrates demonstrated his theory. This perspective would totally shift education, and learning. Instead of seeking outside, we can find the answers inside. How do we do this? Ask questions - that is what Socrates did. That is what I have been doing for the last three years, finally discovering that my, unconscious, prayers have been answered - as Jesus shared at the Sermon on the Mount.

"Ask and it shall be given unto you."
"Seek and you shall find."
"Knock and it will be opened unto you."

Joshua also said "pain makes us stronger" - amazingly similar to what Frederick Nietzsche said - "what doesn´t kill us makes us stronger".

So, without further introduction, here are some suggestions for how a person might find out what is going with themselves, and with the world.

One of the first things to determine, with some level of objectivity is "what is the context" - to that end you might consider the following questions, and/or ideas.

Context – Seeing the Game, What is reality?, Who are we/You?
- Life and death is not what we think - you better get over any aversion to the idea of reincarnation.
- Suppression by threat, death, many other imaginary threats
- Busy-ness / money seems to be about the only real tool that is being used to keep our vibrations low.
- Parasites (e.g. "the powers that were" - existing governments, corporations, etc.) will do anything they think they need to, to maintain apparent control
1) It really is like a video game. Science proves this (What the bleep).
2) Bhagavad Gita authorizes to fight and win a righteous battle.
3) Accessing the Quiet voice, the still small voice, intuition
Who are we, what are you?
- Pineal, third eye, (suppression with fluoride, not proper breathing)
- Chakras
- How light moves through our bodies – Law of One (see Our Star Power).
- Paramahansa´s Yogi demonstrated eternal life, and reported the character of our existence (see Sri Yuketswar on Causal, astral, physical - from Autobiography of a Yogi)
- Emotional guidance system (Abraham Hicks – Jerry and Ester Hicks)
- Our Powers
o Energetic in nature (light, star stuff) - The Word
- Connected to God (Image and likeness,
“Anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these.” John 14: 12

“It is the father, living in me who is doing his work.” John 14: 10

o Creative - Thought - Angels
o Cosmic (maybe 11th density) - Higher assistance - ETs

What we need to do - this is, in my assessment what is going on, what we each need to accomplish to be a part of the new Earth
- Raising vibrations (together with the natural process that is occurring – Breath of God – See The Return of the Light)
- De-program, Clear the old programs, pain, guilts, suffering, focus on Now (Echart Tolle), “shoulds” (Louise Hay)
- Knowledge that you are in the game, know the rules of the game,
- Entertainment of the Game – detach emotionally from the show - "watching the wheels go round´and round´"(Lennon)
- Know eternal life (from all great spiritual teachings)
- Know what our true nature is – light, love (Wayne Dwyer demonstrates muscle test on interview with Louise Hay, “You can heal your life”)
- Did we create the game, and then get lost? – 11th dimensional beings (Andromedans – Alex Collier, “Defending Sacred Ground”)
- These movies, books, shows are signposts (Tron, 1984, Star Trek, Star Wars, The Matrix, Terminator, Dune, What the Bleep, Hitchhikers Guide, etc.)
- Connect with Gaia Vibrations currently going to 5D

How we are kept in the lower vibrations?
- Not following our guidance system - like the original "program" that was installed in us.
- Looking outside of ourselves for learning, guidance, how to live
- Focus on materialism (stuff, body, job, identification with worldly roles and responsibilities)
- Electromagnetic influences, technology, TV, news, bad news, etc.
- Chemicals in food, water, air (Colgate tootpaste, fluoride effects on Pineal)

The “Powers that Were” are (important change in phrase):
- Very insecure, look at the systems they use to maintain control – manifestation of their truth, their reality, but it doesn´t align with nature or the cosmos
- They are afraid of our power - scared shitless that we will access our true power – game over!!
- As suggested by the Andromedans, that we are “Gods”, that have somehow fallen into a trance and the “powers that were” have been vampiring off of this high level energy (Disney – the little mermaid)

What do we do? – How do we awaken?
- Meditate - enjoy the silence of your Self
- Spend time in nature
- Breathe – consciously, deeply, whenever we remember
- Follow guidance of feelings – follow your bliss
- Gather, surround yourself with other higher vibrational people
- Trust God (Source, the One, All That Is)
- Pray
- Seek God, know that All is in perfect order – try to find this feeling place
- Know that your final destination is God
- At least 51% “service to others – but likely much more, whatever you can accomplish
- Know that the Cosmos is “ever expanding possibilities” – Fact is Stranger than Fiction
- Have FUN!!!!
- De-program, from family, society, the collective dream of pain and suffering
- Seek God.
- Love One Another – 2 Commandments from Jesus, Love God with all your being, and love your neighbor as yourself. – assumes you LOVE YOURSELF!
- Seek the Truth
- Refine discernment
- Find and listen to your inner voice

The Gaia, or Earth Connection – we need to tap into this energy, and share our love.

- Gaia, an important aspect of awakening is connection to the Earth, that is where much of our power, our “Divine Light” is transferred from. Enters our bodies from our feet – you can learn about the process from “Our Star Power” extracted from the Law of One Series.

- The earth is reported to already be at 4D and she wants us to evolve with her.
The Human world “reality” does not match up with the harmony of nature/Cosmos. Seek the truth teachings of Love. See the old “reality” for what it was, so you can extract yourself, and recognize when it is trying to pull you down into lower vibrational energies.

Remembering / Education / Awakening – starting resources
- When Love Guides Your Thoughts, Andrew Skadberg, (Solomon)
- The Science of Getting Rich, Wallace D. Wattles
- There is a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which, in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces of the universe.
- A thought, in this substance, Produces the thing that is imaged by the thought.
- Man can form things in his thought, and, by impressing his thought upon formless substance, can cause the thing he thinks about to be created.
- Starseed Transmissions, Ken Carey
- Law of One Series, L/L Research
- Defending Sacred Ground, Alex Collier, Andromedan
- The Practice, and The 4th “R” - both in The Global Citizenship Passport by Desmond Green
- Cracking the Money Bands, Metatron
- Paramahansa Yogananda, Autobiography of a Yogi - Chapter on Sri Yuketswar´s return – 3 level nature
- Living from the Heart, James – Wingmakers
- Our Star Power – extracted from the Law of One Series
- Breath as a Single Solution – Wingmakers (Living from the Heart)
- Extracted exercises from the Law of One Series

Extra Terrestrial (ET), Other worlds, contacts, etc.
- Iarga
- Return of the Light
- Thiaoooba Prophecy
- The Day After Roswell, Corso

Recommended FREE Videos
David Wilcock – Event Horizon – 4 parts
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEyqT2_ricA

Delores Cannon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihH0L_bffAA

David Wilcock interview with Graham Hancock
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvNEVvHgOOY

David Icke interview with Project Avalon
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7WTxb-Oe7s&feature=related

The Day Before Disclosure
http://www.thedaybeforedisclosure.com/index.html

They Live – John Carpenter
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-9005367754264973286#

Other recommended books
- Bhagavad Gita
- Other´s inspirational books, just a few listed here.
o Conversations with God – Neal Donald Walsch
o Wayne Dwyer - audio book - Change Your Thoughts Change Your Life - interpretation of the Tao De Ching, by Lao Tsu
o You Can Heal Your Life, Louise Hay
o Books About Edgar Cayce.
o The Teachings of Abraham, Jerry and Ester Hicks
o Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramahansa Yogananda
o Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill
o Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, Depak Chopra
o The Law of Success, Paramahansa Yogananda

Other Resources
David Wilcock (I highly recommend this) www.divinecosmos.com
L/L Research – Law of One Series http://www.llresearch.org/home.aspx
Whistle Blowers, etc. www.projectcamelot.org (be careful with this one)
Crop Circles - http://www.cropcircleconnector.com/index2.html
Disclosure Project, to get US government to disclose ET records http://www.disclosureproject.org/
Wingmakers - http://www.wingmakers.com/

Andy´s stuff
My Blog - www.13LightMessages.blogspot.com
Global Breath Consciousness Institute - Jamaica project
Vision Excelerator - Business, Idea incubator
Rural Innovation Institute - New Digital University - Experiential Education
QC Collective - local, creative arts and crafts, consignment shop using a cooperative model
Experience Co-Evolution Group - expert consulting team for tourism and economic development

Fun Movies to Watch, in the mainstream, which point to Higher Awareness
- Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
- Tron
- The Matrix
- What the Bleep do we know
- Star Trek Series
- Star Wars
- Many Disney movies have hidden signs and messages that point to the truth in some form or fashion.