From Sacramento Christian radio this morning:

We need to accept the Bible as the sole source of Truth.

We must believe the universe is earth-centric because that is where God chose to enact his plan of Salvation.

If scientists ever discover microbes on any other planet, it is because when Noah's flood occurred, dust from the earth escaped into space.

Ocean Beach at Sunset – San Francisco, CA 2008

In a lengthy debate with my father this evening on the subject of God and the apocalypse (see where I get it from?), I was reminded about looking into this year 2012 thing. My ex-roommate was the first to suggest it to me, so I looked into it a bit further tonight. Here were 2 fun websites to peruse:

A Dutch website on Mayan Predictions (heavily slanted against President Bush):
http://www.daanspeak.com/Maya01Eng.html

And a little bit of reason from a Yahoo surfer:
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070916192830AAfw7Iz

It boils down to something very interesting, which is that the earth’s magnetic poles will likely reverse in our lifetime, something that only happens with a frequency of once every couple dozen-thousands of years, and that the year 2012 will have some significance in terms of a shift of energy (may be as sudden as 3 days of darkness, may be as gradual as 100 years of shifting magnetic poles, which means your camping compasses will be useless for 100 years, then they’ll point the opposite direction).

Energetically, this change in the position of the world as it relates to our position in the Milky Way Galaxy is said to bring about a period of peace. The bible refers to a period of 1,000 years of peace. The Mayans refer to a period of peace about 5,000 years long. If we didn’t live such A.D.D. lives (most of us), we probably would have learned this from our elders or deduced it ourselves along the way by universal osmosis, but we’ve shut ourselves off to nature’s wisdom by spending too much time figuring out how to collect and hoarde MONEY (see the movie Office Space, and the section on How to Make a Million Dollars):

“Smykowski: “You know there are people in this world that don’t have to put up with all this bleep. Like that guy that invented the Pet Rock? You see, that’s what you have to do. You have to use your mind and come up with some really great idea like that. And you can make millions, never have to work again.”
Michael: “You think the Pet Rock was a really great idea?”
Smykowski: “Sure it was. The guy made a million dollars.”

I swear, if I didn’t have thousands of dollars in credit card debt I’d join a 3rd world tribe and live a real life. I guess if I was really serious about that I’d file bankruptcy and go join a third world tribe tomorrow.

I’m a brainwashed pussy. Makes me want to go rent “Into the Wild” and take some inspiration.

“I also happen to like it when feminists attack these fat-ass housewives who think there’s nothing more to life that sitting home on the telephone, drinking coffee, watching TV and pumping out a baby every nine months. P-poom, p-poom, p-poom, p-poom, p-poom…will seven be enough Bob?…p-poom, p-poom. But what’s the alternative? What’s the alternative to pumping out a unit every nine months? Pointless careerism? Pointless careerism? Putting on a man-tailored suit with shoulder pads and imitating all the worst behavior of men? This is the noblest thing that women can think of? To take a job in a criminal corporation that’s poisoning the environment and robbing customers out of their money? This is the worthiest thing they can think of? Isn’t there something nobler they can do to be helping this planet heal? You don’t hear much about that from these middle-class women.”
~George Carlin, Parental Advisory – Explicit Lyrics CD

Going through My Essays, I dusted off a couple of quotes I had written about in college. Good stuff!

“Love is a high inducement for individuals to ripen, to strive to mature in the inner self, to manifest maturity in the outer world, to become that manifestation for the sake of another. This is a great, demanding task; it calls one to expand one’s horizon greatly. . .It is the final goal, perhaps one which human beings as yet hardly ever seek to attain.”
~ Rainer Maria Rilke, “Letters to A Young Poet”

“And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not love, I am nothing.”
(I Corinthians 13:2)

I've heard a lot of people complain about cell phone technology that enables total strangers to hear, sometimes very loudly, the intimate, mundane details about people's lives they don't necessarily care to hear about.

I think this is very amusing, and it makes me wonder how we would react to reading each other's minds. Mind reading is a scary idea for many people. Sometimes you think things and you are later glad that you didn't speak them aloud. You can learn a lot about a person sitting next to them on a bus while they are on a cell phone; just imagine what you might learn if you could read minds.

The digital age has also spawned more grief for opponents of mind-reading with the coming of age of "reality TV," blogging, and Myspace. I think there is a fundamental understanding among members of our species that human minds are imperfect, therefore careful filtering and censorship is prudent and necessary.

I worry about how young people are being more 'honest' with what they put on Myspace. I think our culture is reaching a tipping point where we are trying to decide how much privacy & prudence is necessary to maintain a stable society. I believe that is why people look down upon those that talk too much on their cell phones in public (or play weird ring tones), expose too much in magazines or on TV, or showcase half-baked opinions and young ideas on the internet.

I think deep down people are excited and nervous about exposing the human condition for what it is. We are flawed, we are constantly evolving in the sophistication (or stupefication) of our thoughts. Imagine if we all knew exactly what everyone was thinking all of the time…we are getting close!

I think it could possibly lead to either chaos or a complete understanding and acceptance of each other for our imperfections.

No time to ponder the end of the world right now…that will have to wait.

Transparent fears
I want to rip them out of you and make them crumble in my fist
Change is so slow when you are waiting for it
When you need it
Open your fucking eyes already
My fear is I will run away
Into the arms of easy shallow love
Before the old dog can learn new tricks
And the masterpiece in progress
Will ly abandoned, half-finished
Drying up on the easel, sparkling under faint streams of dusty golden light
Don’t let your understanding of someone
Or something
Become rigid
Everything can change in an instant
The secret to change
Is to forget the past, ignore the present,
And believe with all your heart it is possible.

As bad as your life might suck right now, at least your dad didn't lock you in a cellar for 20 years and force you to birth 7 children by him.

Cheers!

‘Lead us from the fear of Death’
‘Though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I shall fear no evil.’

A big part of athletic endeavor, especially competition, is confronting fears. I’m exploring the root of those fears. The Four Agreements book says our main fear is social rejection, something that has been conditioned in each of us from the day we are born. I’ve noticed that some people get extremely good at pleasing others at a young age, and these are sometimes the people with the worst fear when they grow up and have to compete in an athletic (or other performance) setting.

I’m now starting to think that the fear of performing in front of dozens, hundreds, or thousands of strangers is because this person who is so good at deciphering how to please others one-on-one, cannot possibly control the outcome when they are being judged by myriad eyes. This is a paralyzing and very real fear in their mind that they will get rejected, possibly by dozens of people, and there is nothing they can do about it.

So how to get past this? I think any fear has original wounds which need confrontation. This person’s inner child is still fighting for its life, and the adult suffers needlessly. In fact, all fears can probably be traced back to the fear of death, and that is not something you want to be confronting 24/7.

A person needs to expose fears for what they are, so that they can begin to live the life of a fearless warrior. A warrior knows what to fear and what not to fear.

A person who fears competition is living in the past. There is nothing to fear at the moment! You are NOT going to die if you do not perform well. You behave as though there is a gun to your head.

A competition should be a venue of inspiration and glory. Can you imagine a perfect competition, where no one chokes, and everyone performs their best for that given day? That is what spectators want to see. It is not enough to do your best in spite of your fear, you must begin that slow, painful walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death to illuminate and eliminate your fears.

Because that is just what living with a fear is…merely the ‘shadow’ of death. To truly grow up, one must begin to leave the shadows for the light. No fear!

“What are you afraid of? Death? You should be afraid of not living!”
~Sri Swami Satchidananda

My take on Obama and his Reverend’s recent comments:
It goes back to the outspoken uncle syndrome. I think Rev. Wright is probably proud of Obama’s success, and like an uncle, thinks that he will now have a voice in Washington because of his close relationship with Obama.

It’s like when I first joined Chevron as an engineer, both of my favorite uncles kept asking when they were going to get their free gas cards. I love them both and find them very amusing, but if others assumed I shared all of their opinions, it would strike me as ridiculous. True, they are not my spiritual advisors, but jeez, give Obama a break. Find me one pastor of a large church in this country who does not make controversial comments.

Or, talk about the real issue which is that Sunday morning is the most segregated time in America, whether the pastors are bashing gays, promoting sodomy with minors, marriage of children or polygamy, or lamenting injustices to people of their culture.

Are we really prepared to insist that we want a president who belongs to a ‘National’ church? Some mystical, non-existant church which offends no one and accepts everyone? Or would we rather have a president who does not belong to any church?

I thought the design and the beauty of America was in the freedom to practice any religion we wanted, as long as church and state remained separated. I guess all these Fundamentalist politicians have ruined American trust in this kind of separation with their constant assertions that they cannot possibly separate their faith from their job. Way to go. Way to ruin American politics with your simple-minded pandering.

I think our founding fathers were much more bright than that, realizing that of course a person is the sum of his experiences, but that a real leader would take into account the best interests of the Nation over any single religious creed. Obama has not promised to make his church’s creeds America’s, in fact with his constitutional education and teaching credentials, it would be shocking to see him easily swayed by any local church’s opinions.

Propel, propel, propel your craft,
Unforcefully down the liquid solution.
Ecstatically, ecstatically, ecstatically, ecstatically,
Existence is merely an illusion.

I finally started another book. It is called The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom, A Toltec Wisdom Book. It echoes and builds upon all the philosophy I’ve been reading in the past couple of years. A quote for my throwers:

“That is why humans resist life. To be alive is the biggest fear humans have. Death is not the biggest fear we have; our biggest fear is taking the risk to be alive — the risk to be alive and express what we really are. Just being ourselves is the biggest fear of humans. We have learned to live our lives trying to satifsy other people’s demands. We have learned to live by other people’s points of view because of the fear of not being accepted and of not being good enough for someone else.”

Some more…

“We don’t see the truth because we are blind. What blinds us are all those false beliefs we have in our mind….We cannot see who we truly are; we cannot see that we are not [yet] free….The real us is pure love, pure light…”

I had some strange reactions to this book after reading it at the ocean: I wanted to call and tell my boyfriend I loved him, and I inquired about a job as a pizza delivery driver at Domino’s (they weren’t hiring). Read this book, then watch Fight Club again. You will see it in a new light.