Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card

Any book which focuses on father - son relationships pulls on my heartstrings which will be forever taut.  But not every book makes it to my thoughts and resonates with my beliefs so thoroughly.  The purpose of Speaker for the Dead, is stated by the author:  to make a book which would tell the truth about someone's life, not a saint, but someone who is utterly cruel and evil.  Of course that's paraphasing and the book is about way more than I feel like writing tonight but it's interesting anyway.  Why would an author want to write the truth about someone cruel?  He said because the cruelest thing someone can do after a person dies is lie about them in order to remake their life to how you see fit.  That erases who they are which truly kills them.  The hardest thing to do is tell the truth even though you know it will cause much pain and possibly much suffering to do it.  He describes the pain like unto a hot iron which cauterizes a wound.  The truth will eliminate the lies and the cycle or patterns of life we've set up to carry those lies will also be eliminated.  This book is about exactly that.  The truth will eliminate destructive patterns.  Why?  The author explains that as well.  Knowing the truth allows love to take form.  We were not made to love lies, we were made to love the truth.  It is our foundation and so knowing a truth is really recognizing what we already knew to be true, it is knowing ourself, and it is knowing our Maker.  Try it out sometime, if there is anyone or anything you feel anger and hate towards, spend sometime getting to know the truth about them.  I bet you come away much richer from the experience than if you decided to build that hate into your life.

Life in a Day

What an amazing film! I can't believe I hadn't heard of this.  Basically this film was made from citizens around the world and what they recorded on July 24th, 2010.  The directors took this footage (over 4,500hrs) and wove a story about us and what our lives reflect all over the world on the same day.  Looking into the lives of all these people I couldn't help but to feel a deep connection and appreciation for the diversity we represent.  From race, religion, expressions, thoughts, behaviors, routines, jobs, there's so much in this film that the directors don't explain which adds to the viewers experience and interpretation.  We are truly a complex and beautiful race. Life in a day.

"Just write down what you're thinking"

March 2nd - March 20th is known to Baha'i's as the month of the Fast, where we abstain from eating and drinking from sun up to sun down.  It's a whole month (Baha'i months are 19 days) dedicated to spiritual rejuvenation.  The Fast acts like a mechanic working to align your spiritual orientation towards prayer, teaching, and service to others day by day.  The hope is this alignment will last a full year.  Each year is different for me.  I'm continuing my adventure within the realm of love.  It's not like we ever leave this realm but we can choose to take a closer look if we want to.



So there's this book.  Love: Jewels from the words of Abdu'l-Baha.  It's short but literally filled with jewels.  Each small quote is only a few lines long but holds such beauty and profoundness that I had to share one with you.  It goes.

Love is the light that guideth in darkness, the living link that uniteth God with man, that assureth the progress of every illumined soul.

If you look back to an earlier post I wrote called "Love - the Adam Lanza part" and in that post I wrote about this theme of love as a light.  That's why I so enjoy reading spiritual Words because they hold Truths we already know, but something else also happens when we read them and connect with them.  Hard to explain it.

So this quote strikes me as particularly beautiful because of the analogy of love being a link between us and God, and not just any link, a living link!  Plugging in a USB cable to a computer uploads or downloads information to and from a computer and happens at a consistent rate, I'd call this an electrical link.  But a living link, what would that be?  Maybe like some form of a symbiotic relationship?  A link made from love.  I remember someone talking about this like if God was the generator then all man had to do was plug in.  Love is the link, the plug, the cable.  If man has no love then he can't receive God's love.  Like sitting next to a generator without plugging in, all that power and potential waiting for us to reach out.  That's God, always loving, always the powerful generator, waiting for us to reach for Him and plug in.

To This Day...

I hate Pork Chops.

That is a video about a lot of things.  Isolation and love or lack thereof are the main themes.  We tried to do a short film about name calling and nicknames when I was in Ecuador.  It didn't come out so powerful.  This is a very powerful spoken word if you can hear it.  And it's got me thinking.  About the kids who get picked on, about the kids who pick on, and about everyone else who either watch, take a side, or react.  Not many of us react when we see it happening.  We might feel bad or guilty or scared or unsure, but we feel something don't we?  Which means we are a part of it, even if we weren't the bully or the victim, we experience a feeling.  Why not react to that feeling?  Why not do something brave, something incredibly brave?  Like talk. Talk to the bully, talk to the victim, talk to the people around you, talk to them about what you felt and pray that will lead to the truth of that experience.  The truth is bullies and victims are happening all the time, and it's not just trying to find the one or two hundred adam lanza's out there and making sure they get help, it's making sure the 6 billion people on our planet are getting help, are getting a friend to listen to them, are getting a hand to help them up, are getting encouraged to be their true Self.  Beauty is how that video ends and beauty is what we all are, we sometimes just need a friend to show us.

Silver Linings Playbook

There are only two romance dramas worth watching, as far as I know, 1. Rachel getting married, and...                          

2. Silver Linings Playbook.  Such a refreshing film.  Open, honest, vulnerable, and tasteful to love.  There are so many themes in this film and all get touched on in meaningful ways.  Hands down one of the best written films I've ever seen.  Even though the actors did an amazing job, the lines in this film were well thought out, especially the background banter that would overlap into dialogue at times.  Great film.  Go watch it.  

Peripheral Voices

 What's that you say?  We all have one.  It's a voice that speaks to us, faintly, sometimes barely even audible or noticeable, but it's there.  I like to think of it as peripheral because it's comparable to something moving outside of your vision and at times we're lucky enough to turn and see it, but usually we're left wondering what it was that passed.  Was it even real or did I just imagine something?  Same thing, except it's a voice, or a feeling, or an impulse, and it's real.

For example.  Today I was rushing to get to a meeting.  I ran down my apt stairs to find my neighbors little dog looking up at me.  I said, "Hey Doggy" and as I passed the door, yelled in, "Hey So-and-So!" Whereupon she replied, "Hi, how are you?" So I stopped for a second and talked to her.  Small talk because I was trying to leave.  But when I asked how she was doing, she opened up on a rather personal matter, a health issue.  So I was conflicted.  My brain and body were trying to urge the conversation to an ending point so I could get in the car and get to the meeting, but this voice said no you should listen to her, this is important, more important than arriving on time to the important meeting.  Many times I've ended those kind of conversations and left and felt fine for doing it.  The voice never scolds you, it just vanishes and your left wondering if it was real at all.  This time I stayed.  The voice spoke a few more times during that conversation and basically now I am looking up food remedies to buy on my next shopping trip for my neighbor Susie.

It feels a bit overwhelming to have a voice grounded in pure love for others.  And yet I have no control over when it will speak or when it will not speak.  I only have the ability to listen or not listen.  I can tell you this though, the more you listen and act upon what you've heard, the more the voice speaks.

THE SADDLEBAG by Bahiyyih Nakhjavani

"When his wife died it was not from sickness either.  She just looked at him in bed one early morning, her cheeks as ruddy as the hour when he first kissed them, and said, 'I'm tired.' Whereupon she turned her back to him, as if in sleep, and died.  The soft breeze of spring winnowing through her hair was like human breath, but it came from T'ien, the Mandate of Heaven.  He never forgave himself for not having recognized the proximity of her immortality and realized then that it was not enough to have mastered the art of diagnosing death."  pg155

"And as he searched the riddles of a thousand sandstorms, he also realized that he would never be able to save his people from the poison of his dream unless he overcame his fear.  Fear's antidote lay somewhere in the region of trust.  But where was that?"  pg155

light, plant, call, become, gather, cause, bestow, enlarge, refine, direct

"O thou my respected son:

         The letter that thou hast written with the utmost love became the cause of perfect happiness. Truly, I say, thou art striving with heart and soul, to obtain the good pleasure of God.  It is assured that this blessed intention will have great effect.  The good intention is like an ignited candle whose rays are cast to all parts.  Now, praise be to God, that thou hast manifested the utmost effort so that thou mayest light a candle of guidance in that region; plant a tree of the utmost freshness and delicacy in the garden of the world of humanity; call the people to the divine Kingdom; become the means of the progress of intellects and souls; gather the lost sheep under the protection of the Real Shepherd; cause the awakening of the sleepy ones; bestow health upon those who are spiritually sick; enlarge the sphere of human minds; refine the moral fibre of the people and direct the wandering birds to the rose-garden of Reality.

Rest assured that the Eternal Outpouring shall descend upon thee, and the Confirmations of His Holiness Baha'u'llah shall encircle thee.

Convey to all the believers the wonderful 'Abhá greetings.

Upon thee be the Glory of the Most Glorious." 

(Signed) 'Abdu'l-Bahá Abbás
Mt. Carmel,
Haifa, Syria
March 31st, 1914.

Love - the Adam Lanza part

This may seem like a crazy title in regards to what happened today but if you’ll just permit me a few lines I think you’ll agree.  

I’ve been thinking about love for a long time now and was going to post a different kind of comment today but in light of this young person, Adam, I feel it’s more appropriate to adapt my thoughts. 

This world is just one big love story and Adam plays a part in it.   What that part is exactly I do not know.  For I, as you, feel confused and saddened from today’s tragic event.  My heart goes out to all those children, to their mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, and all the people who are angry and confused and don’t know what to do with these feelings.  Certainly a ban on automatic weapons feels like a step in the right direction, but we know in our hearts it’s not the automatic weapons.  It’s adam and the role he plays in this love story. 

It’s a beautiful name isn’t it?  Adam.  From Adam and Eve, the beginning of awareness of one another.  Of vulnerability.

So why did he do it?  We would have to understand adam’s mind.  We would have to understand his life.  We would have to live his life.  I’m no expert on adam’s life but I’m willing to bet there was a great deal of pain associated with living it. 

Adam’s pain is probably like many others out there and my heart goes out to them as well.  I can’t imagine what it would be like to live in darkness all the time.  No love, no life.  How can we live without feeling love, without giving love?  What is life’s purpose if not to love?  

Adam reminded me today, or rather he shook me awake, as to the reality of things right now, and that is we are all looking for love, looking for ways to express our vulnerability.  Some of us are wandering in the darkness, looking for light but finding none. 

I’m very sad for Adam and those he hurt, but he is a reminder that those that can must do something, no matter how small, to bring just a little more light into this world so next time adam can find it.