Symbols, Poetry, and Dreams

Symbols fill the gap between raw energy and form. Poetry and dreams do the same.

Symbols

Symbols channel energy into form.

Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2014 Laurence Kant

Exxon CEO Joins Lawsuit to Prevent Fracking near his Home

Oh the tangled webs we weave . . .

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/02/21/1279443/-Exxon-CEO-Joins-Lawsuit-to-Stop-Fracking-Near-His-Home?detail=email

Everything is Forgotten — Nothing is Forgotten

We all will be forgotten at some point. The memory of us will disappear. 100,000 years from now who will know about us? Even recollections of Gandhi and Abraham Lincoln may vanish sooner than we might imagine.

Nothing is really forgotten, however, even the smallest, tiniest acts, because we are always affecting and swaying the world in some way. Ultimately we are not really things or objects, but waves of energy shifting, recombining, and transforming again and again and again. What we do and who we are therefore affects the energy of the world and the universe. The energy we have reshaped and the energy of who we constantly become remains forever. Everything we do affects others and the planet in some way.

So, while memory may be fleeting, our legacy, our impact, our influence are total and world-changing.

That’s why we need to play close, conscious attention to all of what we do and say. Everything enters universal consciousness in some way. For this reason, humans and all sentient beings have tremendous creative capacity and healing power.

For me this is what “spirituality” and meaning are all about.

Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2014 Laurence Kant

Looking at Myself

When I meditate, I look at myself. I watch myself breathe, sit, listen. So who is the one breathing, sitting, listening? Who is the one watching all this? I realize that I am neither the doer nor the watcher. I am the one who contains both the watcher and the doer. I exist somewhere else in another place, in another home, of which all this is but a small part.

We are each so small and so large, so near and so far. No/thing contains us, and we contain all that is.  We are right next to ourselves, yet an eternity away. We are bodies and DNA scrolls crossing space and time, conveying new stories as we compose poetry in energy, condensing and scattering, then reformulating ourselves in new patterns and structures, like a living kaleidoscope.

Seabrook Nuclear Power Backup Fails

Not too confident in our nuclear power safety procedures. I might feel differently about nuclear power if we as a nation actually took regulation seriously. But we don’t. And this is the consequence. Serious regulation would actually allow us more energy options.
http://articles.boston.com/2011-05-13/news/29540672_1_nrc-nuclear-plants-vermont-yankee

Nuclear Power Regulation Ineffective in U.S.

Regulators have cozy relationship with the nuclear power corporations and generally pass on doing their job:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/america-s-nuclear-nightmare-20110427?print=true

Enormous Health Problems from Gulf Oil Spill

The health impact is enormous, while neither BP, the state, or the U.S. government offers anywhere near sufficient assistance.

http://www.alternet.org/environment/150816/health_crisis_rocks_the_gulf_in_aftermath_of_the_spill,_but_feds_and_bp_turn_a_blind_eye/?page=entire

Dems Strategize to End Big Oil Tax Breaks

Great idea, but I’ll believe it when I see it.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/09/us/politics/09congress.html?_r=1

Problems with Off-Shore Oil Rig Regulation

This article illustrates the serious problems with oil rig regulation and the close relationship between oil companies and their regulators:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/us/politics/17regulate.html

Pennsylvania Limits Authority of Natural Gas Inspectors

What a world: http://www.propublica.org/article/pennsylvania-limits-authority-of-oil-and-gas-inspectors

Mountaintop Removal Destroys Town

How a coal company destroyed a community:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/13/us/13lindytown.html?_r=1&hp=&pagewanted=all

Carcinogens Injected into Natural Gas Wells

Another concerning aspect of natural gas exploration through the process of hydraulic fracturing:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110417/ap_on_re_us/us_drilling_chemicals

Shale Natural Gas Worse Than Coal on Climate

Guess the good energy may not be so good after all.
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/155101-report-gas-from-fracking-worse-than-coal-on-climate

Koch Brothers’ Web of Influence

This provides an excellent overview of the Koch brothers’ industrial empire and their influence over U.S. politics.
www.publicintegrity.org/articles/entry/3120/

Corporations Own Us–Lock, Stock and Barrel–But We are Ultimately More Powerful

The American Petroleum Institute plans to contribute directly to political candidates.  Ah, a new way to buy our political system.  I guess American no longer own our own country anymore.

http://thinkprogress.org/2011/02/24/api-direct/

And here’s Paul Krugman’s take on corporatizing of both Iraq and Wisconsin

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/25/opinion/25krugman.html

In the meantime, we talk a lot about bullies in schools, but what about these bullies from the Chamber of Commerce who hack activist computers?

http://thinkprogress.org/2011/02/17/chamberleaks-malware-hacking/

Through all this, we need to remember that we have the choice to accept this or not. The corporate interests seem all-powerful, but that’s only because we the people allow them to do what they do. We could change that tomorrow if we so chose. We have the capacity to through peaceful means to stop the madness in its tracks.  How? By voting, by contacting our elected representatives regularly, by speaking out publicly, by refusing to shop (where reasonably possible) with companies that engage in autocratic and harmful behavior, by frequenting local establishments that are friendly to the environment and workers, by protesting on the street or on the web, and (most of all) by living according to our own beliefs and our own souls–not according to the manipulations of corporate media machine’s. Often we (including me) are rats in a maze running around following the expectations of a consumption-driven economy, but we can choose to follow our own paths and live our own lives however we want. There is nothing that we cannot change collectively if we follow our authentic selves and share that with others. It seems simple and polyannish, but it also happens to be true. Instead of succumbing to anxiety and fear (which corporate interests feed off of), we simply need to tap into courage and step into genuine freedom.

Memory: Everything will be Forgotten. Nothing will be Forgotten

Memory:  Everything will be forgotten. Nothing will be forgotten.

A friend asked me about this comes from and what it means. Actually it is something I cam up with when I was meditating. I realized that we will all be forgotten at some point, even Abraham Lincoln or Gandhi or whoever. 10,000 years from now who will know about us. But, at the same time, nothing is really forgotten–even the littlest, tiny acts. What we do and who we are affects the energy of the world. The energy we have produced and the energy of who we are will always remain. Everything we do affects others and the planet in some way. So, while memory may be fleeting, our legacy, impact, and influence are total and world-changing.

That’s why we also to need to play close, conscious attention to all of what we do and say. Everything enters the world’s energy in some way. For this reason, humans and all sentient beings have tremendous creative capacity and healing power. For me this is what “spirituality” is all about.

Malaysia Gambles on Rare Earths and the Environment

A fascinating discussion of attempting to mine rare earths in an environmentally responsible way: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/09/business/energy-environment/09rare.html?hp=&pagewanted=all

Ultimate Questions

What is death? A transitional period of life.

What is life? Becoming.

Where are heaven and hell? Right next to each other, like the back and front of a door.

What is hell? A place in which we decide to reside until we decide to live elsewhere.

What is heaven? Home.

Who are we? No/thing, energy, crossing time and space, but not confined by them.

Who is the Source? Pure no/thing, raw energy out of which form emerges.

Natural Gas and the Environment

Natural gas water recycling from hydrofacking is not always effective:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/02/us/02gas.html

In the meantime, political pressures effectively prevent the EPA from regulating natural gas hydrofracking:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/04/us/04gas.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1299182443-NixtuTtKRONgUcRrCHY2eQ

WikiLeaks documents reveal that the EPA wanted to regulate hydrofacking waster water, but political pressures prevented them from acting in Pennsylvania and New York.  Now in New York there is an opportunity to exert regulatory pressure
http://www.democracynow.org/2011/3/4/leaked_epa_documents_expose_decades_old

What is the Source like?

What is the Source like?  Like the wind.  You cannot hold or see it, but it’s there just the same.

Earth Energy

Tapping into the earth’s energy is a lot easier than creating our own.

The Energy Inside You

When you think you’re exhausted, inside you there are many deeper pools of energy from which to draw.

Translating “God” and “Lord”

Because of the anthropomorphic connotations of the English words, “God” and “Lord,” because of the human tendency to use “God” as a thing or object (thereby objectifying “God”), and because of their inherently gendered meanings (”Lord” as opposed to “Lady” and “God” as opposed to “Goddess”), these words have too much baggage to use in current translations of the Hebrew Bible. Therefore, I often replace “God” with “THE ALL” and “LORD GOD” with “ALL THAT IS.” For “LORD,” I simply use “SOURCE.” This will no doubt prove strange for many readers, but de-familiarization is part of the process of reacquainting oneself with the deeper meanings of the biblical text.      These translations also have the advantage of preserving the actual significance of the Hebrew words which have become ossified in English (and other modern languages) translations and consequently lost their original meanings.

YHWH comes from the Hebrew word, “to be” (hayah), and is explicitly associated with being, becoming, existence, etc. By using a verb to describe the Divine, early Jewish writers imply that the Divine is fundamentally not an object or a thing, but rather that it is relational in nature. One might describe it as “energy,” because it is a force, not an object. The English word, “Lord,” reflects the Hebrew vowel pointing of YHWH as adonai (a – o – ai), used by Jews from antiquity to the present day to avoid saying the Divine name. There are other circumlocutions used by Jews to avoid saying the Divine name:   e.g. “the name” ( hashem) and “the place” (hamaqom). By using “SOURCE” or “ALL THAT IS,” I maintain the original meaning of the word without using the Divine name.

Elohim  is the word that normally translates “God” (from El, the chief deity of the Ugaritic pantheon), but it is a plural form that naturally implies a multiplicity of deities. In the Hebrew Bible, it normally indicates the deity of the Jewish people: the One God, the Eternal. Occasionally it directly indicates more than one god (such as in Genesis 1:26 and 3:22), but even there the notion of oneness persists. As a plural form, Elohim suggests that one cannot limit the Divine to a single thing (which a singular form would connote) and actually implies that the Divine is so all-encompassing that no thing falls outside of its compass. Elohim means unity. From a metaphorical perspective, one might see the Divine as a choir rather than a soloist; here the many become one. This is why the term, “monotheism” (which implies singularity rather than oneness or unity) is inadequate for describing the Jewish and Christian concepts of Divinity. “THE ALL” preserves the all-encompassing character, relationality, unity, and oneness of the Divine.

See how I do this in “translations of Genesis by larry” in “about mystic scholar”: http://mysticscholar.org/about-mystic-scholar/translations-of-genesis-by-larry/

Wisdom Takes Time

Wisdom takes time and energy. It does not happen according to schedule.

Feel Your Heart

Feel your heart, its beat, its warmth, your mind’s energy source.

We Are Everwhere

The more deeply we feel, the more we fill the universe with our energy. We evaporate and are everywhere.

Our Legacy

Our legacy is not money, power, buildings, or books, but rather the core energy that we release from ourselves into the universe.

Energy

Energy is what makes us who we are. That energy never disappears and is never destroyed.

When Moses Was Too Humble

When Moses was too humble, the Source reminded him that “I will be with you” through deeds, words, and feelings. And so our energy reaches out to those yet to be born. (Ex 3.12)

Authentic Energy

No matter where we go and with whatever people we are spending time, we carry with us the authentic energy that makes us who we are.

We are Energy

We are energy, body and soul, a stream of light in the body and soul of the universe.

Ruach

Often translated “wind” or “spirit”, ruach in Genesis 1:2 refers to the underlying force of existence and the universe: ” “Energy.”  It’s gender is feminine and is frequently understood in Jewish tradition (especially mysticism) as a feminine counterpart to a more masculine organizing creator.  Whether or not these gender connotations are useful or accurate in some way, they offer a picturesque and poetic way of describing the ultimate.

Ruach

Ruach is pregnant energy, partner of the Source in creation (Gen 1.2).

The SOURCE

The SOURCE is nothing. Nothing does not mean a vacuum, but no thing (no/thing). No/thing is pure energy.