Beacons Fostering Light and Love Through Storms

Greetings my gentle readers to this week’s installment of the “Be Yourself, Often” blog. As you all well know, this is a time when we can all sit back and think and the moments that were in a segment of time on this plane that will not return again.  When one stops and reflects on it from that sort of perspective, it is quite a sobering point. A collection of events that transpire in our lives that result in negative outcomes, most often beyond our control and results in “The Perfect Storm” or “Frankenstorm”, which may be more appropriate given the weather patterns across the Eastern seaboard of the United States as this is being written.

However, what we do with challenges and forces of positive and negative that integrate themselves into our path is always a potential for reflection. It is not that we are lucky or unlucky, but if we are to address these forces that intersect our vector, awareness is essential. 

There are some situations that occur that are so much an act of aggression that it is us during times that we are so least deserving or ready to fight that battle, yet we most. It is an interface of the worlds we have that co-exist on Earth in a spectrum. In my experience, these challenges that impact these people are most often debilitating, severe and impact on a persons financial or personal health and well being encompassing disaster and disease that results in dis-ease.

It is an attack also on the psyche of the person and results in an alteration of the orbit of their world, that can cause nothing less than a marked change, coupled with a health degree of positive self-talk, reflection and looking to the root cause analysis of why. Root cause analysis is a pattern of asking the question “why?” 5 times in a sequential and structured format. Why did this happen? Why me? Why now? Why are the forces causing challenges at this point and time?

One of the hardest questions that I have had to grapple with, is that why is it always the kindest, most warm and loving people that this happens to often?  The people that give so much and earn from the Universe trials and tribulations for their efforts and kindness helping others while those that may not care the same or are more self-centered seem unafflicted? Blindness, neurological, psychological, physiological, autoimmune, nerve and immobility to name a few.  It is what the people do with these challenges that make them beacons of Light that translate into positive outcomes across time and give for others.

These are individuals, and we all know one that is a beacon of Light on the dark and stormy seas. Their guiding light saves many mariners such as myself from the darkness and towering waves of the moment. They are truly Light-givers and altruistic in nature. They are heroes that push humanity ahead.  They ensure that the vectors of humanity are not fully divergent, but have the opportunity if so chosen and selected for the masses to learn love and light.

And I believe to have the true honour to touch these individuals and have them touch you is to touch the spirit in the sky. And just maybe the gift that they carry will translate to you if you have the willingness and fortitude to learn. And to learn the gift of love and light is to touch the person and spirit that we truly are, and allow you to be yourself, often.

                        ~~~~ Rev. Dr. Joel Lamoure     October 2012

First World Whining

Greetings my gentle readers to another installment of the “Be Yourself, Often” blog. A time when we can step back and reflect on the moments that are and the week that was and reflect and wonder about the footprints in the sand that we have made on the beach of life.  No matter the sand, the warmth of the beach or the fact that the sand may be captured by the waves of times, the footprints that have been done solo and collectively still remain in memory and spirit.

This week one stops and ponders on the positives and challenges of the day and life that we enjoy. One tends to besmirch the moments with shades of black and grey that deaden the life that is. Smear poop all over the tapestry that is our life, often very unwittingly. Plus there are those that were to take the beautiful tapestry of others and drag it down. Why is that? We are creatures of love and light and full of our spirit and spiritual energies that make us more than the sum of our parts.

These parts that make us up are skin and bones, hair and neurons but beyond that lies a beautiful amorphic that one can only begin to conceptualize. It is the “I’ and the “Me” in the equation that is so very much more than mono-syllabic terms and words. This is a battle between the spiritus and the ego. That ego dog is fed all of the time and the First World dynamic is a constant 24/7 buffet of unending opportunities for the ego dog. And what does it eat? But relationships in the end run, all along the way with small meals in the format of commercials, consumerism, commercialism, capitalism and the proverbial “Keeping up with the Joneses”.

Along the way there are such feckless whines and complaints that one hears and is against the spiritus in the favour of the ego that is hungry. One of the things that the ego tends to ingest and inhale is the life, light and shining candle of spiritus that lies deeply within each of us. And one can hear these first worlds whines all of the time. They are that a person is never having enough or as much or what they deserve of what they feel that they should have or deserve. And that creates a sense of un-ease, dis-ease and ultimately disease. That there is an incidence of mental health disorders that is up to 25 times that of remote, severely underprivileged third world countries.

You my gentle readers know of what we are speaking. The constant complaints about things that end of the day and almost certainly by the end of the week will not matter in the slightest. It creates a “Poor Me” situation and can you believe it, the personal actually feels downgraded, downcast and put upon!! When they have health, energy, life, senses, lights, electricity, cars, clean air, clothing (enough for 25 outfits or more)… and you see how insane this situation is. And to make it even worse, often they will take those at ease and try to foist their delusional beliefs upon others in the form of hassling, harassment or bullying. Basically drag them down and shred the beautiful tapestry that is one person being themselves.

How can this be overcome? By being careful of Faith and knowing our faith will define our beliefs which will define our thoughts and thus our actions and outcomes. It is about stepping back in the milieu of the moment and being able to be at ease. To be a kid, a healing entity at heart and mind and be at ease with the moment. To have fun and truly feel and appreciate the senses and elements and connections with the earth that we have. To breathe in fresh air and understand its good to be alive and that we can, if we so choose, know that we can define and write the next set of chapters in our book of life on our Destiny. And then we can touch the heavens that exist on earth, turn our back to some of the hell that coexists and spread our wings. To do so is to be yourself, often.

            ~~~ Rev. Dr. Joel Lamoure   October 2012              

Thanks for ALL blessings on Thanksgiving

Small cheer and great welcome make a merry feast. William Shakespeare.

We give thanks for unknown blessings already on their way. Ritual Chant, religion unknown.

This is the time my friends for Thanksgiving in Canada. To my American friends and colleagues, y'all have to wait for a few more weeks. However the sentiments hold true day to day, so please don't stop reading, ok? Maybe it is and should be a single day event, and can be conceptualized much like religion.

How can that be? That is being that often with religion we “do our duty” for an hour a week and then as soon as we get out of the parking lot its time to vent and bring back out the person that we are. No piousness, but hypocrisy. Sad isnt it? So instead of giving thanks for 1 day of the year, here is that challenge, that being to appreciate the smallest things of life at point of need. There truly are no atheists in the foxholes. Would be such a horrible thing to biatch, moan and whine your way through life and only see the positives when tragedy or the end of days tends towards rolling the credits of the movie that was your life.

Thanksgiving this year, as it should be every year is a time for reflective, meditation and appreciation. That is an appreciation of person, animal and crystal…all living things that co-exist on this rolling blue marble before its too late. Perhaps more of a spiritual perspective would help give us all some clarity.

Oh my friends, it is so easy to give Thanks for the good things in life and the plentiful bounties that are there and the ready access to so many amazing and incredible things and gifts that we have. For the merry feasts and family and loved ones. For the opening of hockey season (if it ever comes) and the roof over our head and all of the plusses on the positive side of the ledger of life. But there is so much more than that to give thanks for, in the life, respiration, colours, sights, sounds and all the blessings and interactions that we are able to sense and touch. A time for blessings and peace if we so choose that if handled correctly, allows our true angelic wings to spread that will ripple out benefits and healings in concentric circles. Not negatives, only positives…yet sadly too many choose the hard route of only focusing on the negatives. That is that there is anger, resentments, feelings of being put down, left out etc etc. L:ife isnt fair to YOU when you are full of negatives. Waaah you.

But this is also a time to give Thanks for the challenges in life, the red ink in the ledger in life that we have experienced and continue to experience. The ledger of life will balance out at the end when the summative tally is assessed and the call to accounting is made and the ultimate withdrawal. But how many actually look at how they handle the challenges in life? How do you deal with these "unknown blessings?" Can you believe I could call a challenge an unknown blessing? The blasphemy of it all! If you think or are thinking this, you my friend are losing out big time. Missing life, opportunities and frankly have a little too much self-entitlement for my liking. Good or bad, richer or poorer, sickness in health we should always be learning, always taking stock.

It takes a fortitude and culture of self courage and self-drive to tackle the negatives from a learning perspective. If you want any supportive evidence my friends, look in the mirror and do a bit of self-reflection and mindfulness on the moment. You are where you are at this point of time of reading this because of all the goods in your life, AND the challenges. If you get stuck in a rut of challenges, you may need to reflect on why you keep getting the same negative outcomes. <bit of a hint here.... try something different!>  You dont have to LIKE the negatives (consider masochism and its linked psychopathologies via root cause analysis) but you DO have the power to decide HOW they affect you and What you are going to do about them!

The expression goes that you dont appreciate something until its gone. Thats why you need to live the moment, seize the day and please take nothing for granted. Whether it be a voice, hug, sensation, feeling, sight or smell... never take it for granted. Life is not designed to be a fight, and uphill battle that we lose, but a gift.... a present. Dont lose out.

To all the happiness and sadness, wins and challenges and positives and negatives.... thank you. Love is an intelligent concern for others. I learned that a decade ago and one of the critical learnings of my life.

Be yourself, often.

                           --- Rev. Dr. Joel Lamoure   October 2012

The Magical Mystery Tour of the “Z-Prime Factor”

Greetings my gentle readers to another week’s installment of the “Be Yourself, Often” blog. This is that time where we are able to step back and with love, insight and appreciation or the converse (that’s your choice there my friends), reflect, dissect, analyze and revisit the moments that have been what we called the week that was.

Last week we looked at integrate many of the life facets together, finding there is and was something beyond the point in time and life that we call where we are. We started to intuit that there is something even more incredible and a Spiritus we can only begin to see and touch (and even then, only through an oblique angle). This is a point and dimension and represents beyond a medical, psychological or even bio psychosocial model. It represents the infinite blessings and gifts that we enjoy and is the true expression of the Free Will Covenant. This may be called the “Z- Prime” factor and transcends all levels of knowledge, science, and into the amorphic world of theory. To do so is to look at the positives and negatives that used a time that shall never come again and at the expense of that valuable resource, assess the spirit and power to learn and walk away in a way that begets more positives.

As we are well comfortable with there are the axis that exist that may be labeled stuff and time. The cross axis that extends across the two is the person and people that imbue a positive spin on the life, adding in the third dimension and the Z-axis to the days of our lives.

However, there is much more to people than being a carbon life form. We are all here for a set reason, objective and mission that all is as meant to be. Even in the positives and the negatives, it is about the impact that we impart upon this beautiful world that we call Earth.

It is a sorrow that many of us remain grounded in the X and Y-axis and per wit is a shadow on the Light that we can be and dampen the signals to themselves and others when this happens. For there are miracle that abound all about of and we can see them, not directly through the filter of the supermarket, but obliquely through the incredible gifts of the moment that are.
To be grounded in the world of stuff is to be a shade of darkness on the beauty of the noon light. And sorry folks, that darkness and worshipping of darker entities impacts on you, rippling out in negative concentric circles on others.

The converse is true and some of the most enlightened individuals that I know are not rich in monetary value, but inspired as human beings. That they are able to radiate a white light that extends and diminishes that deadened shadows at noon that walk amongst us. These individuals are rooted in the moment and knowing what they are able to touch, and that is a world of the amorphic and beauty. As such, they themselves become a beacon of light that others look to.

Others may not see it directly, but it’s a sense that they have when they see one of these persons of Light. They seem to smile, be less bothered by the meaningless and more successful. Not necessarily successful in the moment of stuff collection, but in success with contentment of the moment of themselves and others. They have a radiance that others see and they can never fully know or appreciate how those moments of joys and blessings occur. Often they try to eclipse the light of the person through a dark cloud of bullying and negativity. But hey, haters gotta hate sadly, don’t they?

Want to feel that magical, mystery tour that is life in the Z-Prime dimension? Be bright, and knowing that YOU do have wings, even if you cant see or feel them... know that they are they are dont be afraid to spread them. Then be light, appreciate all, know things are meant to be and feel the positives and learnings of the moment. Be a kid at heart and then you can touch and be yourself, often.

~~~ Rev. Dr. Joel Lamoure  October 2012