Earth: A Happy Accident Or A Planet With A Purpose?

With all of the conditions and circumstances that had to be present for life to develop on this planet, it is amazing that life has not only emerged, but that it evolved to the point that it became capable of manipulating and quantifying it’s environment. So what exactly is life, and is it rare in the universe or is it common as the galaxies?

Science says that Life is an organismic state characterized by the capacity for metabolism, growth, reaction to stimuli, and reproduction. But there is more to life than just these characteristics. There is also sensation, there is experience, there is instinct and there is purpose even in the smallest forms of life, and even rudimentary life is a rare and precious thing. Yes, there are billions, maybe zillions of galaxies, containing countless solar systems, and it would be arrogant to assume that life is not plentiful in the universe. Nevertheless, there are so many prerequisites for the development of life, even simple life forms, it’s a high probability that it’s not something that has happened all that often.

Mammalian life, it appears, could be even more rare, being that there are so many elements and conditions required for it to develop and to survive. The development of sentience (the capacity for self-awareness, the capacity to utilize and manipulate the environment for the benefit of the group or colony) is even rarer, as that would require a series of conditions that would be statistically impossible to be accidentally repeated very often.

So what are the conditions necessary for the development of simple forms of life? We already know that we are not able to define life, and our limited knowledge of life is based on the only reference system available, planet Earth. The discovery of extremophiles, microorganisms that can develop in extreme conditions, has expanded the window of possibilities for the existence of life in the universe. But what can we say about the conditions required for life?

In a classical paper presented by G. Wald in 1964 to the US National Academy of Sciences, it was established that life requires:

• the presence of liquid water;

• the elements needed for metabolism and reproduction;

• a source of energy; and

• suitable environmental conditions.

Of these conditions the most important is the existence of water in a liquid state. All the current space missions designed for the search of life in the universe have a common obsessive instruction: look for water.

However, other conditions also play a decisive role. Without certain other elements, a sufficient source of energy and stable and protective surroundings, it is difficult to imagine that life could survive for very long.

In addition to water, life requires other elements that have both structural and metabolic roles. As will be seen, some of these form part of the various “vitamins” that human beings need to survive – others are known as “trace elements” and they are equally important for our well-being.

• atomic carbon (C) which comes mainly from Carbon Dioxide (CO2);

• atomic hydrogen (H) which can be generated from water (H2O) and molecular Hydrogen (H2);

• atomic oxygen (O) from water (H2O);

• atomic nitrogen (N) from molecular Nitrogen (N2);

• atomic sulphur (S) from hydrogen sulphide (H2S); and

• atomic phosphor (P) obtained from the phosphatic anion (PO43-); together with

• monovalent and divalent metals like sodium (Na), potassium (K), magnesium (Mg), calcium (Ca), manganese (Mn), iron (Fe), cobalt (Co), copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn); as well as

• anions like that of chlorine Cl-.

Interestingly enough, most of these elements are the ones that are most abundant in the Universe. Also the molecules used to obtain them by the living systems are quite common. So it is reasonable to conclude that life is made of components that are easily available in the environment.

Of course, you have to have a planet where those components are available in its environment, and not all planets have that environment. Some planets are primarily gas; some are primarily frozen ice balls, and not water ice either. Some planets are too far away from their suns, and some are too close. Some are too large and some are too small. What’s required is what is called “a rocky planet,” which is a planet that is composed primarily of silicate rocks or metals. Only a rocky planet has the elements and minerals that are necessary to support the development of complex life forms.

Then, that rocky planet has to be located, within it’s solar system, not too close and not to far from it’s primary, or sun. This, according to science, is called “The Goldilocks Zone”. The Goldilocks principle states that a planet must neither be too far away from, nor too close to the sun to support life. Either extreme would result in a planet incapable of supporting life. The Goldilocks principle for planets supporting life would have relatively few parameters if the life was to remain unicellular or possibly multicellular at best, however the number of critical parameters needed for reptilian life would be greater, and even more and stricter parameters would be required for the emergence of mammalian life.

Thus, the probability for the emergence of a particular type of life on a planet would be directly proportional to the number of essential physical, chemical and astrological parameters, upon that planet, required to allow for that particular classification of life to arise.

The Goldilocks principle that appears to govern the development and survival of life would also include the optimum position of the planet in the Milky Way galaxy (free from lethal radiation or frequent collisions) as well as the age, size and stability of the planetary sun. Such a planet is colloquially called a “Goldilocks Planet”.

My gosh! Just think of all the parameters that had to be met before life could evolve! And we aren’t finished yet, because there are even more so-called happy accidents had to occur before mammals could evolve, preliminary to the development of Homo sapiens. For instance, our Earth is generally protected from large comets and asteroids due to the amount of gravity imposed upon them by Saturn and Jupiter, the imposing Centuries that guard our solar system. And still there is more!

Earth’s climate would be much different, and Earth’s rotation would be much slower if we did not have a moon. Back in Earths infancy, it didn’t have a moon. The most popular theory as to how Earth got it’s moon is, back when the solar system was still young and still in the process of establishing the planetary orbits, there was a lot of debris floating around, coalescing into planets or crashing into the planets that had already formed. This period lasted for a few billion years, and near the end of it, a planet sized object, bumped into earth and glanced off, dislodging a significant portion of both planet earth and this object. This debris was captured in Earth’s orbit, and after a few million years it coalesced into what we now call our moon.

Before the moon, Earth was not tilted on its axis, like it is today. It had a slower rotation period and there were no seasons, as we know them today. The Earth’s climate was hotter than it is now, and was not a very hospitable place, possibly due to its almost circular orbit around the sun. Then, this planet sized object slammed into Earth, and out of the violence of that event came conditions more suitable to the development of more complex life forms. The impact knocked Earth into an elliptical orbit and left Her tilted on Her axis.

After the moon formed, from the debris in orbit around Earth, tides began to pull on the planet, generating the rhythms of life, and the atmospheric conditions that generate weather. Now, life would flourish, but not mammals, yet.

As we all know, mammals didn’t really flourish until after the demise of the dinosaurs, and that my friends, was another happy accident. This time a huge asteroid hit the Earth and the resulting violence changed the temperature of the planet, quite rapidly, resulting in the deaths of several billion dinosaurs. Nevertheless, the more adaptive burrowing animals (mammals) managed to survive and the rapid changes in temperature forced the mammals to not only adapt, but to grow larger and flourish.

It took several billion years before humanity arose, and a few more to develop into mechanized societies. That’s the last happy accident. In the history of the world there have been collisions and chaos, cataclysmic volcanic and seismic events and then rebirth, and reformation. It has only been in the last few thousand years that the climate and conditions on this planet has become calmer, the volcanic and seismic activity diminished to a level that was conducive to the development of societies, nations, the industrial revolution, and the possibility of a planetary society that is on the verge of developing a means through which to spread itself throughout the galaxy.

Could all of this have happened by accident? Even scientists marvel at all the amazing coincidences that were required for the development of life, as we now know it. It would seem to me that if so many specific parameters had to be met, and we have yet to find anywhere else in this solar system where those parameters have been met, and although SETI and scientific teams and astronomers, all over the world are combing the cosmos for any evidence of life elsewhere, we have yet to find it.

That doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist elsewhere, but it does drive home the reality that, at least for now, we haven’t found it and that so far our Blue Earth Home is a rare gem. I am sure that Earth has a Soul-Mate Planet out there somewhere and that, one day, we will meet our long lost brothers and sisters. Nevertheless, until then, every time you think your life has no purpose, just think of what it took for you to even be here. Surely, there is a plan for our Blue Earth Home and a plan for Earth’s people. I believe that if we look for it, we will find it’s secrets are hidden deep within each human heart.

The Grand Illusion

Deep within this Grand Illusion hides the spark of Truth and Light
That cuts the fog of indecision and melts the darkness of the night.
But, as they intertwine each other, homogenize, solidify
They lose themselves in one another, as light melts to shadow, and sea to sky.

The inside then expresses outward, the outside turns to hide within
Truth obscures in dark illusion, virtue masquerades as sin.
But, illumination now approaches, and the Darkest Forces fight
To keep the pendulum from swinging out of darkness, into the light

But there are Cycles in the cycles, smaller wheels the larger turn
and cogs may stick if oils wanting, and you cannot teach who will not learn.
But the masses, reach for reaching’s inborn, out of darkness, toward the dawn
As the stars of night flow westward, from darkness’ womb to be reborn

And the time of birth approaches, and the pains more frequent come
And the world in awful waiting trembles, in advent of the coming One
But as birth nears the unborn fear it, fear, born of darks familiar hue
So, death to darkness! But…what’s beyond it? Is the doctrine of the New Dawn true?

Unknowingly we clutch at darkness, while longing, hoping for the Light
Never seeing that sunset and sunrise are both the answer to our plight
For in the end is new beginning, and new beginnings end what’s past
Within the womb birth seems like dyeing, for last comes first and first comes last!

And truth is always veiled in darkness until the Principle is known
That melts confusion into wholeness
And then the wholeness stands alone!

The Unification Of Antitheses

  What is an antithesis? Essentially, it is a statement or a concept that embodies the attributes of polar opposites. It is a representation of the art of polarization. Humanity has become very good at the art of polarization, and as a result have also become very good at making war, generating fear, alienation, poverty, disease and misery.

In the book of Genesis; a book embraced by at least three of the world’s best known religions, Judaism, Islam and Christianity; the story of Adam and Eve ends with the two of them going against God’s direction by eating the fruit from the Tree of knowledge of good and evil. As the result of this action, Adam and Eve suddenly discover shame and are driven from the Garden Of Eden and prevented, by a flaming sword, from returning there ever again.

So, what exactly is the knowledge of good and evil and why was it the one thing that was forbidden by God? To begin with knowledge is a socially agreed upon body of considerations about reality, about life, based upon the most common apprehension of circumstances and conditions as they are encountered by the physical senses. Next, the concepts of good and evil are the embodiment of the universal presentation of antithesis, such as up and down, in and out, on and off, pleasurable and abhorrent.

Wherever you look, whatever you feel, whatever you perceive to be true, there will always be an antithesis, an opposite, an opposing concept or expression. That is because the physical universe is based upon, literally held together by, polarization. The planet Earth is held within it’s orbit around the sun by the centripetal forces generated by the sun’s gravity and the centrifugal forces generated by the Earths motion around the sun. These are principles that most of us have been familiar with since grade school.

But why is it that God forbade Adam and Eve from obtaining this knowledge? After all, without this knowledge, Humanity would never have discovered the wonders of the physical universe, would never have developed the sciences of medicine, astronomy, and physics. No scientific discovery has ever been made that was not based upon the observation of, and the utilization of antitheses. Ah, but the piece of the story often missed, is that within the garden of Eden was also The Tree of Life, and if they had also eaten from that tree, then they would live forever, and with the knowledge of good and evil, this could not be permitted, as they would have become as gods without the capacity for godliness.

Personally, I do not consider the book of Genesis as the literal description of Creation and the origin of humanity on Earth, but rather as an allegory, a collection of symbolic stories, generated to answer the burning questions of a developing race. Having studied the Bible and it’s origins, I have learned that the actual book of Genesis was first a series of stories, told around campfires, by the most learned of the time. They may not depict the actual events of Creation and the development of mankind, but they do contain great insights, metaphysical truths, that can assist humanity, today, in connecting with it’s spiritual origin.

When humanity first recognized the bi-polar nature of physical existence, they also realized that within that knowledge lay great power. They also realized that without an inner, spiritual connection with their Creator and without a set of laws or guidelines through which to develop and a sense of ethics, humanity would eventually be destroyed. In fact, one of the earliest allegories of how that destruction might occur also appears in Genesis. The story of Noah and the flood may very well be based upon actual events where a large portion of the known world, at that time, was destroyed by massive earthquakes, which in turn generated massive tsunamis, that inundated much of the African and Middle Eastern regions.

In reality, at least from my point of view, all that exists is Spirit. All things were created by Spirit, from the substance of Spirit, for nothing existed before Spirit created it. At the point of Creation, Aspects of Spirit chose to express in physical form, possibly for the purpose of gaining experience, which is most easily gained by dealing with struggle. Struggle can only occur within a bi-polar universe, where opposition is regularly encountered. Those Aspects of Spirit, you and I and all the other lifeforms in this universe, are always seeking to reunite with The Source Of All Being, and The Source Of All Being continually seeks to assist those Aspects in attaining that reunification. Nevertheless, for us, this cannot be accomplished until we understand the true meaning of Antitheses.

The magnet is a good symbolic representation of the meaning of antithesis. A magnet has a positive and a negative pole. Each pole exerts the same amount of force. Neither pole is better than the other. Each pole is the reflection of the other. If there could ever be a war between the poles to determine supremacy, neither would win, because they are evenly matched. Not only that, but they are dependent upon one another for their very existence. You can not cut the negative pole off of a magnet, for all you will end up with is two magnets, both with equally charged positive and negative poles. Herein lies the secret of the Unification Of Antitheses.

Within this physical universe, life cannot exist without death, even as death cannot exist without life. Good cannot exist without evil, even as evil cannot exist without good. There can be no in without an out, there can be no up without down. Physical reality infers a Spiritual reality, just as a Spiritual reality infers a physical reality. The only way to end the struggle within the physical experience is to embrace any and all opposing forces or conditions as a unified whole.  In Some religions this is called The Middle Path. To follow the Middle Path successfully, you must be committed to focusing on remaining consciously balanced in all your affairs, in your thoughts and in your emotions.

There is a quote I especially like from the book, The Good Earth. It states: “There is no good and there is no bad, there are just the things that people do.” As long as we are focused in what is right and wrong, good and bad, we will always be confronted with emotional ups and downs, with feeling good about some people, places and things and feeling bad about others. True joy, true love is experienced when you become the fulcrum between the pairs of opposites. Joy is not just a refined form of happiness, Joy is that state in which struggle does not exist, that state in which one is free of all resistance. In that state lies the true connection to The Source Of All Being. For in that state is the perfect peace that comes from the Unification Of Antitheses.

Spirituality, The Key To Wellness

Let me begin by saying that the development of spirituality is not dependent upon one’s religious affiliation or background. You do not have to go to church or attend temple or keep the Sabbath, or maintain any other religious rituals to acquire spirituality. Doing these things are fine and good, especially if they assist you in your quest for spirituality or help you to feel good about yourself. Nevertheless, they are not a mandatory part of the development and maintenance of spirituality.

To begin with, spirituality has little to do with what religion you choose to affiliate with. Spirituality is a personal path that each individual chooses for themselves. It is not based on a set of tenets or rituals that have been established by a religious organization or a spiritual leader. It is based upon that inner, personal connection, that you have with your Higher Power, whatever you envision that Higher Power to be.

Spirituality is that special inner guidance you receive, from that Power greater than yourself, directing you toward the most loving, most positive life choices.

It may be difficult at first to see that you need to develop spirituality. “What do I need spirituality for?” You may ask yourself. “I have survived till now without it, so what good is it? All my life people have been preaching to me about God, and all I got out of it was just more abuse, so why would I want to believe in God anyway? What has He done for me?”

I don’t know that these questions fit you or not, but these were my questions and all I can do here is share my own experience with you. Before I really began to recover from my early childhood abuse and from the drugs and alcohol I turned to, to deal with the memories and the flashbacks, I had no use for God. To be quite honest I hated God and anything that had to do with God.

Nevertheless, I was in intense pain and considering suicide. I had no hope, and saw no end to my inner turmoil. The only power I felt I truly possessed was the power to take my own life, on my own terms, when I decided the time was right. As a result of this position, my life was an endless night of drugs and alcohol, and a desperate search for the “one” who could help me.

I went from therapist to therapist, from hospital ward to hospital ward, looking for, hoping for someone, somewhere who would see my pain and know just what to do to get me out of it.

I found lots of individuals who thought they knew what to do, but each time I would get involved with another therapist, another counselor, my life would go into a spin and the flashbacks would increase and the pain would get worse and my drinking and drugging increased. At that time I had no idea why that was happening, all I knew was that what I was doing wasn’t working.

After my husband suffered a severe stroke and I was left to care for him and my seven year old adopted daughter, alone, I just pulled into myself and did my drugs and alcohol full time. I cared for my husband, who was paralyzed and couldn’t speak, and for my daughter, in minimal ways, but mostly I just wrote about my feelings, and drank and took drugs. The more I wrote, the more I began to see that my life was empty, hollow and meaningless. I decided that I had to end it, but before that, I would have to find a place for my daughter and husband first.

After making arrangements for them, I sat alone drinking, crying and wondering why my life was so meaningless. I turned on the television to help me to settle down so that I could do what I had decided to do. On TV was the movie, “Oh GOD”, and it got me to laughing. It also got me thinking. It seems silly now, that a comedy about God would have made me think about trying one more time to get better, but it did.

I called the minister of a church my husband and I had gone to, not any specific denomination, just a group of people who had started a church to help people find God in their own way. I told him that I had been planning to kill myself but that I had decided to give life one more chance. I asked him if he knew of anyone who might be able to help me. He gave me a name and a number and I called it. It was late in the evening, but the man who answered talked with me for about an hour and I made an appointment to see him the next day. I won’t give this counselor’s whole name, but I will call him Craig.

The next day, when I saw him, Craig asked me if I drank a lot. I said yes, I did. I told him that it was the only way that I could handle the pain inside me, and hold back the flashbacks. He told me that if I was going to continue to see him he would ask only two things of me. To attend at least one AA meeting a week and to come to my sessions sober, if I could. I decided that I would try doing as he asked. He was not a pushy person, and he didn’t talk down to me, so I thought I would at least try.

When I got to AA I was terrified. I thought these people were a bunch of Bible thumping Jesus freaks and almost all of my abuse had come from such people, so I wasn’t sure that I would be able to go through with this. Still, I stayed and I listened and I discovered I was wrong. These people were just like me. Everyone who spoke told about being at the end of their rope, until they came to AA and found a new way of life. Some of them told stories that sounded a lot like my own. Even so, most of these people seemed happy, and free of the pain of their past. Suddenly, hope burst forth within me.

I continued to see Craig, go to meetings, as well as write. Craig said that writing was a good way to get in touch with those parts of me that were injured and needed to tell about their pain. In meetings I heard a lot of talk about “coming to believe in a Power greater then ourselves”, and I listened to what they said. They said that this Power could be anything you chose. It didn’t matter, as long as it was a Power greater then you. They talked about “firing the God of their youth” and “hiring a God they could do business with”. This made sense to me for some reason. I needed something in my life that was bigger, more powerful than my pain and once I decided that I would try to find that, my life began to change.

I continued to work with Craig, as well as another therapist, whom another part of me chose to work with. Craig didn’t mind and we all worked together on getting in touch with and getting to know the “family” within me. I soon discovered that this part of me, a male aspect whom I choose to call Adrian, was my inner guide. This was the one part of me that knew everything about everything. This part of me chose this other therapist because he was willing to follow his instructions on how to assist me, and because he was a hypnotherapist and also a recovering alcoholic who lived and worked the program. I’ll call him Bob.

Between Bob, Craig, AA and the directions of Adrian I found recovery, not only from alcoholism and drug addiction, but also from the ravages of MPD/DID. It wasn’t just stopping the drugs and alcohol that assisted me in finding a new life, a new me, for I had only been drinking and drugging for a short time. No, it was the discovery of spirituality that really set me free!

I couldn’t have discovered that spirituality until I really wanted it. Even when I wanted it, I had to be willing to build it for myself, and then live it, daily. The God I chose to assist me had to be one that I could do business with. Then, I had to be willing to turn my life and will over to that God of my understanding. Only then could I be truly free of the struggle within.

As I grew in this new found spirituality, I discovered unconditional love, true friendship and the joy that comes from service to others. The more I helped others find their way, the less I hurt. The more I acted like a friend to others, the more friends I found. The more I accepted others, unconditionally, the more I found acceptance.

Though following this simple spiritual path, I found the ability not only to face my pain and the abuses that I had endured, I also found something even more precious, more healing. I found the ability to forgive. First, I found the ability to forgive myself, and finally, the ability to even forgive my abusers. I came to realize, through assisting others, that my abusers had also been abused, and were coming from that abuse when they hurt me. I realized that most of the time they were doing only what they knew, and that they had been twisted by others who had been twisted by others before them. Who was I to blame for my abuse? Adam and Eve?

In the final analysis there is no one to blame but a society that is spiritually bankrupt. The only way to change that is to assist as many individuals as I can in discovering a spiritual path toward healing.

You can find that spiritual path within yourself or you can turn to a 12 step program as I did. You can find these same steps in CoDA (CoDependents Anonymous), in OEA (Over Eaters Anonymous), EA (Emotions Anonymous), CA (Cocaine Anonymous), NA (Narcotics Anonymous) and in many, many more organizations that use the 12 steps. The reason the 12 steps are so widely used is because they work. The reason they work is that they instill a sense of spirituality within the individual that is both healing and empowering. If you seek healing, from addiction, from past abuse, or from any emotional difficulty, find a 12 step organization that fits you and your needs and follow these simple steps. I guarantee that if you will do this honestly and thoroughly, you will find a new hope, a new freedom, and a new life.

Finding Love, Happiness And Inner Peace

So often, when things go wrong in our lives, when taxes are too high, when food becomes scarce, when adversity, hardship or distress overwhelms us, we seek to blame our situation, our desperate circumstances, our pain on others. We blame it on the government, we blame it on the people around us, our parents, our children, our spouses and on those we view as having control over us, our lives, and our choices. We become angry and resentful. All we can think about is: If they weren’t such terrible people; If they had done a better job; If they hadn’t had it in for me; If they weren’t this religion or that race, everything would be different. Unfortunately, the more we blame others, the more power we ascribe to others, the more helpless we feel and the angrier we get.

So, what is the truth? Is the condition of our world, the condition of our society, the condition of our lives, our happiness, our sense of worth and well being based upon what others do? Is it based upon the actions and choices of our world leaders, our politicians, our bosses, our co-workers, our teachers, our fellow students, our family members and estranged friends? If you believe it is, then you are indeed helpless, hopeless, powerless and doomed to continuing misery. Just remember that what you believe is your choice and you can choose differently.

Really? How will changing what I believe make a difference in the way things are? No matter what I believe, those who have power over my life will still have power over my life. No matter what I choose to believe, I still won’t have the money to pay my bills. No matter what I believe my family, my teachers, or my boss and co-workers won’t treat me any better and won’t care how I feel. How can you say that changing what I choose to believe will make any difference in my life?

One of the greatest misconceptions in our society is that people, places and things can bring us happiness. We are constantly being barraged by the media, on TV, in the movies, in advertisements, that possessions, relationships, that living in the right place, and having more than enough money will provide happiness. If this were true, then most of the people who are in relationships, most of the people who have amassed a lot of possessions, most of the people who live in idyllic places, and most of the people who have a lot of money would be happy. Nevertheless, just looking around and paying attention to the lives of those who have all these things or live in the most idyllic places will attest to the fact that this just isn’t true. The physical world cannot provide happiness, only opportunities through which to learn to develop it.

So where does happiness, self esteem and inner peace come from? Some say that it comes from within ourselves, and that’s true, but there is more to it than that. It’s not just deciding to be happy, or self empowered or to find inner peace. It requires a complete shift in the way we think. It requires taking personal responsibility for all of our thoughts, feelings and actions. Never again can we blame people, places and things for the conditions in our life, for it is not these things that make life good or bad, but rather how we choose to experience and react to them. It is not what people say to us, or how they treat us that can hurt us, but rather what we choose to believe about ourselves and how we choose to experience the words and actions of others. It is not the price of gas or the lack of money that makes us miserable, but rather how we chose to react to and deal with those challenges.

It is also important to remember that we cannot change the way another believe or choose to act, we can only change these things in ourselves. Becoming angry or resentful about the what another person chooses to believe or how they choose to behave serves no purpose other than to poison our own lives, disturbing our peace, sapping our inner strength and shattering our happiness. Being resentful towards someone else is like taking poison and hoping for the offending person to die from it. Coming to the awareness that we are all unique and special human beings, divine creations of the Source Of All Being, created by Love to love, will do more to insulate us from the spiteful and reckless behaviors of others than all the anger and resentment we can muster.

Finding happiness, inner strength and inner peace begins by coming to believe that we were all created to be happy, strong and filled with peace. It doesn’t matter what others believe, it matters what you believe. It doesn’t matter how others act but rather how you choose to respond to the words and actions of others. If you can come to realize that no amount of retaliation against another for their words or actions is going to bring you true and lasting happiness, you will feel more comfortable with allowing others to do what they do and be more willing to live as an example of how and where happiness is truly found.

Forgiveness is not what you do for someone else, although that someone else might think so, forgiveness is what you do for yourself. It is not condoning an action but rather placing that action where it belongs, in the past, and being willing to express acceptance and love for the purpose of opening the door to change, for yourself, as well as for the other person. Forgiveness doesn’t demand change, it encourages and allows change.

Still, that other person may not be willing to change. They may continue to act in unloving and destructive ways. Nevertheless you have a choice as to how to respond. For some, continuing to express love and acceptance while living as an example of one who has found their inner strength, peace and happiness is a viable choice. For others, holding to love and acceptance while distancing themselves from the offending individual is a more appropriate choice. The important thing here is never loosing site of the truth: that you were created by Love, to love, even in the most difficult situations. And no, it’s not that easy. It takes years of practice, prayer and meditation to change your thinking, your beliefs and your life. On the other hand, if your life is fraught with frustration, anger and resentment, where will you be in a few years if you don’t give this a try?

The fact is, how you believe, how you think, determines how you experience life. Experience is the operative word here. The ways of the world may never change, but how you experience them can. There may be earthquakes and floods, famine and war, but you can still experience happiness and inner peace if you change your perspective, your beliefs and the way that you think. Happiness and peace don’t come from what happens in the world, happiness and peace happen within you, because of who you’ve become, within your heart, your mind and your soul. Seek love, happiness and peace within every circumstance of your life and you will surely find it.

A Poem Of Hope

The Grand Illusion

 

Deep within this Grand Illusion hides the spark of Truth and Light
That cuts the fog of indecision and melts the darkness of the night.
But, as they intertwine each other, homogenize, solidify
They lose themselves in one another, light melts to shadow, as sea to sky.

The inside then expresses outward, the outside turns to hide within
Truth obscures in dark illusion, virtue masquerades as sin.
But, illumination now approaches, and the Darkest Forces fight
To keep the pendulum from swinging out of darkness, into the light.

But there are Cycles in the cycles, smaller wheels the larger turn
And cogs may stick if oils wanting, but you cannot teach who will not learn.
The masses reach for reaching’s inborn, out of darkness, toward the dawn
As the stars of night flow westward, from darkness’ womb to be reborn

And the time of birth approaches, and the pains more frequent come
And the world in awful waiting trembles, in advent of the coming One
But as birth nears the unborn fear it, fear, born of darks familiar hue
So, death to darkness! But…what’s beyond it? Is the doctrine of the New Dawn true?

Unknowingly we clutch at darkness, while longing, hoping for the Light
Never seeing that sunset and sunrise are both an answer to our plight
For in the end is new beginning, and new beginnings end what’s past
Within the womb birth seems like dyeing, for last comes first and first comes last!

And truth is always veiled in darkness until the Principle is known
That melts confusion into wholeness
And then the wholeness stands alone!

By Kerry Dennis

I Guess, At Least I Should Try

In this time of great foreboding, pregnant with flashbacks of fear and pain

I find that I’m, at times transported back, into the not so distant past

Where forgiveness gave birth to love and caring, on a not so fertile plane

Of alienation, of righteous anger, and a life filled with hate, blame and shame

 

I find myself in fond remembrance, of beatific and sweet, elderly faces

Shaped by a lifetime of struggle and resolve, to survive, to overcome

The mistakes, the misgivings, the overwhelming times and places

The bruising losses, forgotten causes that only the aging of the mind erases

 

I remember the words “You’re a good daughter” I’d waited so long to hear

The gentle touches, the loving embraces that I never dreamed would come

The laughter, the fun of afternoon games, all of the times I hold so dear

I’m angry these memories are now overshadowed, by flashes of pain and fear

 

I want to hold on to them, to keep them safe, in a secret place within my heart

I want to remember the wizened faces, the people Mom and Dad had become

I want to beat back the searing flashbacks of the abuses that drove us apart

And to only remember the beatific faces that allowed love back into my heart

 

But I know that healing can’t come until, all the abuse is brought to light

That my shattered soul can’t become one, until each aspect’s pain is known

And I do want to heal my splintered self and I do want to do what’s right

But I’m terrified to go back, to that 12 year old me, trapped in her endless night

 

Back to that night when, what I’ve come to believe, will surely become a lie

Back to childhood’s end, where pain and fear imprison that terrified child

I don’t want to know! I don’t want to see! I don’t want to go back there, I cry

But love says, I must free the imprisoned me, so, I guess, at least I should try

What’s wrong with me?

What do you do when you are so far down that you need a stepladder to reach the bottom? What do you do when you are so overwhelmed that you feel like you are walking through jell-o? When your life is coming apart and your heart is breaking, when you’re feeling like just chucking it all and jumping off the nearest bridge, or drinking a drain-o and gasoline cocktail, how do you get over it?

Sometimes life is hard. Sometimes we don’t get a good deal as a kid and it screws up our whole life, our whole reality. Those of us who experienced a lot of abuse in early childhood wind up being haunted by it, internally tortured by our memories, and even by our continuing contact, with people, places and things that remind us of those horrific times.

What makes things even more difficult, especially when I am having difficulty overcoming my past, is to have family members and friends who didn’t experience the same abuse, the same horrific times, tell me to “Just get over it, for God sakes!” or “I don’t know what you are so worked up about, it wasn’t that bad.”

It’s times like these that I find myself wondering what it is that makes me so weak, so ineffectual, so trigger prone, that my life comes to these stand-stills where I am so depressed and distressed that I think about just ending it all. I mean, what’s wrong with me?

Maybe there is nothing wrong with me. Maybe it’s normal to become extremely distressed and overwrought after telling someone, a therapist maybe, about an incident when you were four years old that is as clear as a bell in your mind, where you watched you mother kill a kitten before your eyes.

Maybe it is normal to become triggered and depressed when I discuss events that were so personally shattering, even years later, that I have difficulty rationalizing them. After all, they happened when I was a child, with no capacity for rationalization, let alone understanding. It could very well be that this is the most right, most natural reaction to remembering childhood trauma.

And, lets face it, there are some traumas that remain hidden, because they occurred before the formation of our capacity for cognition, or they are wrapped in such terror, such emotionally shattering pain that we shelved them in some untraveled part of our mind. Or, as in my case, I dissociated and the memory is being held by another aspect of myself because it’s import is so personally shattering that it can only be contacted by connecting with that alternate part of myself. Nevertheless, it surfaces in nightmares and flashbacks. This is what I am dealing with right now, and let me tell you, it’s no picnic.

For a while I feared that I might need hospitalization, but I have a really good therapist who feels we can deal with this without resorting to such disruptive measures. Still, I sometimes think it would be better to do so, as my functionality has become severely hampered by the flash backs and the mind numbing fear that surrounds the memory.

It has me questioning the validity of my life, and other memories and perceptions that I have always felt were true. Sometimes I feel as though everything I always believed to be true is nothing more than just an illusion. I feel lost, totally alone, and completely helpless. In fact, it is very difficult to write this, as I have always prided myself in producing positive and supportive articles through which I have always tried to give hope and positive direction.

Nevertheless, right now I feel completely hopeless and devoid of positive direction. But, my therapist told me to write about it, to express it in any way I can, and so that is what I am doing. The truth is, right now my life is a struggle, and I fear that I may not get through it. Sometimes I feel downright suicidal.

I would like to end this article on a positive note, but at the moment, I don’t see how. Maybe, in a month or two I will be able to share with you the resolution to this dilemma, maybe not. Maybe, instead, I will decide that continuing my life isn’t worth the effort. If nothing else, I must be truthful.

Kerry Dennis

ILLUSIONS

        As I sit, wrapped in my warm jacket, steeling myself against the coolness of the night, I hear the sirens of ambulances wheedle and honk as they transport another hapless soul to Boswell Hospital’s emergency room door. Yes, I see it clearly in my minds eye, for I have followed an ambulance or two and I have watched as they took my aging father, my aging mother, to the place they would spend some of the last days of their lives.

        I can easily imagine the EMT’s transferring their charges into the care of worn and weary doctors and nurses working the night shift. Doctors and nurses who have, in the words of T.S. Elliot, “known the voices dying with a dying fall beneath the music from a farther room…”

        And again, I think of Elliot’s words, “I should have been a pair of ragged claws scuttling across the floors of silent seas…” for I see now that I am that beast, that scuttles beneath the murky waters of illusion, spurred along by storms of emotion I can neither track nor control.

        And where is it that I should go? And how should I decide or even understand the workings of life, and reality, and meaning? Who am I that life should even care, or that meaning should even connect itself to me? As for reality, well, that too seems to be as much an illusion as meaning and life itself. Ah, and how I have so deeply felt that there was a purpose to it all. Such is the power of illusion.

        At times like this, when the cold and darkness closes in, I know that I am alone, and that in that aloneness I am nothing but a ripple on the sea of time, a tick that emanates from the great clock of eternal strife, just another dust mote tossed and blown by the winds of change, signifying nothing at all.

        From deep within me there is the cry of a desperate child, crying for a mother that was never really there and will never come, will never suckle or nurture, just another illusion fostered by fairy tales of connectedness and love. Illusions, illusions all, generated by need, and desperation, seeking substance, seeking proof that existence is more than just desultory dreams brought about by the play of energies that vibrate through an endless continuum.

        And who am I that I should wish for connectedness and love? Who am I that I should hope to find meaning, consistency, constancy, or order? It exists, for sure, in the positive and negative flows of energy, in the particles and the atoms, and yet, it is as meaningless as the birth and the death of stars, as meaningless in the grand scheme of things as gravity and motion. It’s just the natural outcome of the interaction of physics and the physical. It doesn’t mean anything.

        And as I listen to the ambulances come and go, I know that there are others, like me, who long for that which is swiftly passing away, who grieve for that which seemed to be but never really was, who have hoped for that which can never be, and must, in the end, let go… of the illusion.

Kerry Dennis

The Recovery Dance

There are times during one’s recovery when it feels like you are not only not making progress, but you are losing ground. It doesn’t matter what you are recovering from; Alcoholism, drug addiction, a physical injury or illness or a mental disturbance. I call this the Recovery Dance. You know, two steps forward, one step back. It doesn’t mean all is lost when you come to that one step back. It just means that you are preparing for another two steps forward. It feels like you have lost ground, but actually, if you really look at it, you have been moving forward all along.

Sometimes it’s just that you are expecting too much from yourself and have pushed yourself too hard. Maybe you need to digress a little. Sometimes it’s okay to take a step back and look at where you are going, as well as how far you have come. In recovery, it’s important to have goals. Don’t set them too high, don’t make them to difficult to achieve or you will lose heart before you are halfway there. Make it okay to fall short of your goal once in a while and don’t beat yourself up for it. Still, try to make your goals a bit of a stretch, to keep that forward momentum going and don’t give up five minutes before the miracle.

If you are recovering from addiction or a mental disturbance in your life, try to keep your goals focused in one day at a time. The truth is, all we have is today. Tomorrow is only a promissory note. Yesterday is a canceled check. Only today is ready cash. Sometimes all we can do is nickel and dime it, or just take it a minute or an hour at a time. Sometimes all we can promise ourselves is that we won’t use or drink, that we won’t go off or self harm for the next hour or two. Then, in an hour or two, make the promise again. You are only as good as your promise to yourself.

Others may want you to stop using, drinking or thinking self-destructive thoughts, but the promise that counts, the only commitment that works, the only one that really makes the difference, is the one you make to yourself. You are the only one who can live your life, and you are the only one who can decide to make your life worth living. No matter what anyone else says or does, no matter how much others want to help, you are the only one who can make the decision to do the next right thing. Sometimes you slip up. It’s okay. Its just part of the Recovery Dance. You haven’t lost it all; you’ve just taken that step back. Just make that promise to yourself again, recommit to another day, or if that’s too much, just another minute, another hour.

If you are recovering from a physical illness or injury and you wake up one day and it feels like you’ve lost most of the progress you’ve made, it’s okay. Its just part of the Recovery Dance. Give yourself a break. Sometimes you are going to have relapses, especially when you’ve expected too much from yourself or you have pushed too hard. Just rest a while and then recommit to your recovery. You can do it if you really believe that you can. There is more power in your desire to recover, in your belief that you can recover than there is in all the medicine and all the therapy there is.

Finally, there is one more component to a successful recovery, beyond commitment, beyond the desire to recover and that is faith. Faith in something more powerful than yourself that you can draw strength from, and that gives you hope for a better tomorrow. For some, it is a Higher Power. For some it is a community of individuals who support you, and who show you, with their own lives, that recovery is possible. In that faith, and the hope that it provides there lies the promise that you too will someday give others hope and strength as the result of your own experience, your own struggle through the recovery process.

When you can find that strength and hope and use it to power your own recovery; When you can give it away by sharing your experiences to make a difference in someone else’s life, in someone else’s recovery; Then your recovery will have become real for you. It will have become more than just a struggle to survive, but rather a gift to share, to assist others in their healing. Seek that, and the Recovery Dance will become your dance of joy and healing.