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#3063 - Friday, February 1, 2008 - Editor: Jerry Katz
Nonduality Highlights - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NDhighlights
Brahms, Vicki, Stephen, and Dante.
Brahms - Violin Concerto in D major
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkIULqYxiPU
(thank you, Ben Hassine)
Vicki Woodyard
One's Own Truth
To own one's own truth is what life is
about. To reach the place where
all of the bells ring....to heal the godforsaken stretches of
your
inner desertions....
Yesterday I heard Gavin de Becker say that if someone cannot
accept
your "no," then they are trying to control you. After
my husband died,
I said three noes that first year. Two led to a desertion by the
ones
to whom I said no. And they each led to a deepening resolve to
continue the practice of "no."
"No" to the outer world is a yes to your inner world.
And the inner
determines the outer. It is daunting to go so deep into your own
spirit that you understand that you are one with everything. It
doesn't necessarily make you any happier.
This morning as I entered the grocery store, one of the employees
said
a clear "I love you" into her cell phone. I told her it
was so nice to
hear her say that. She was speaking to her soulmate, she said,
her
husband of three years. I told her I was widowed...
Being alone is not the end of the world. For me, it is a time for
going deeper into what I have chosen. I want to be with myself
from
now on. In a way that heals inner division, in a way that
comforts and
stretches me. For this I must say "no" to things that
do not nourish
me. I am facing myself directly, which is a difficult thing to
do. I
often prefer to nibble at the cheesy things of this world. Like a
rat,
I sample American Idol, and that makes me want more. The world is
like
that...making you want more of what can never sustain you.
So I sit here at the computer, wanting you to love me. But that
is
just another bite of cheese in the trap. What I really want is to
love
myself so clearly that I never say "yes" when I feel
"no." That is a
big, big thing. The bigger the truth, the more it can
change and heal
you.
We are all waiting for you
to strike that one chord
in your own heart.
You know, the one you haven't
strummed in so long.
The one that will make us all
stop for a moment and sigh...
For we have enough false notes
stored up in our music benches.
We need to see your single finger
pluck the harmony and sorrow chord
so we will remember who we are.
http://www.vickiwoodyard.com
Stephen Wingate publishes an excellent newsletter: http://livinginpeace-thenaturalstate.com/Newsletter%20Main.htm
Here's a selection found in Stephen's letter:
From The Divine Comedy
O grace abounding that had made me fit
to fix my eyes on the eternal light
until my vision was consumed in it!I saw within its depth how it conceives
all things in a single volume bound by Love,
of which the universe is the scattered leaves;Substance, accident, and their relation
so fused that all I say could do no more
than yield a glimpse of that bright revelation.I think I saw the universal form
that binds these things, for as I speak these words
I feel my joy swell and my spirits warm.—Dante