Archive for the ‘ancient wisdom’ Category

Pondering 2012

September 10th, 2009

A couple posts ago I touched very briefly on the 2012 scenarios.  Truth is, I’ve thought a lot about this for a few years now.  I’ve read quite a bit and it really fascinates me.   I do find it a little tiring when I hear people calling people who believe in the various ‘outcomes’ of 2012 either nuts or crazy or whatever derogatory word they pull out of their vocabulary.

In that previous post I wrote that I thought the world was coming into some type of age of spiritual awareness and hoped that the 2012 predictions of destruction would not come into play.  But…after mulling this over I began to wonder….what if it’s the destruction that culminates in mass realization of spirituality.  What if the only way to get TO this point IS the destruction of the world as we know it.  There will be many that will survive…just as in the flood stories.  (people from all over the earth DID survive and passed on their stories and knowledge through their respective cultures/religions).  Maybe it’s like the old saying of ‘having to hit rock bottom’ that will come into play.  Maybe we have so desecrated our planet, so poorly treated our fellow man, so enveloped our self in greed, so ignored what was there all along for us to turn it around…that something has to happen.

Maybe it’s something natural.   We know that our magnetic fields around the earth are decreasing and that will enable foreign matters to enter our atmosphere and pelt us with astroids or meteors and the like, or the continued melting of the glaciers and ice at the poles, whether it’s war, Armageddon or whatever you want to name it….is it something that has happened before?  Something that is already in our history?  Is there something mysterious that will happen in 2012 when our Sun lines up in the center of the galactic equator?   I’m not sure if we know considering it hasn’t happened in 26,000 years.

I mean who knows?  Who really knows what is going to happen in 2012?  This is just as big of a mystery as waiting for the return of Christ or what happens when you die or even the cultural stories of the end of one world and the beginning of another.  All of these things are from stories.  From the Bible, from the Torah, from religious beliefs, from the Hopi, Hindus, Sumerians, Mayans etc, etc.  They are all ANCIENT handed down stories.  All of them, including some of the 2012 beliefs.  So what makes one of these so unbelievable over all the others?  Is it because there’s an actual date / time frame for 2012?  If so, that’s pretty silly.

So many cultures believe that the world has seen a couple of catastrophic endings, and were blessed with new beginnings.   There were the Maya in Central America extremely advanced in numerous areas , the Hopi Indians who believe that the world was destroyed by the Creator 4 times and is fast approaching the end of the 5th world.  There’s the Hindus believing that we are currently in the end of the Kali Yuga cycle where (at the end of this cycle) the world will be destroyed and then be reborn.  How about the Sumerians who gave us the earliest found writings in tablet form some 7000 years ago?

So I wonder what is so different from the beliefs above from, for instance, Christians believing in 4 horsemen galloping over the earth and snatching souls to live out their days in a fiery hell.   Again, the world ending in the Christian Revelation just like the other cultures.   Or the stories of the floods in civilization after civilization, destroying the world.  Gods or a God, all pretty pissed off…decide that enough is enough and ends the world….then lets life start a new in hopes the outcome is better and the people ‘get it’ the next time around.

All ancient stories, all passed down generation after generation.  Some written on parchment, some written in hieroglyphics, some on the skin of animals, some with the very first alphabet nearly 7000 years ago.   Some were passed on verbally and eventually written.  The point is that they were written.  They were written down, carved, immortalized for a reason.  Our ancients knew what was coming because their ancients had seen an end and those lucky enough to have survived passed on the information, the devastating details and the know how to succeed.  And those ancients had been passed information from their ancients.

Why no one learned any lessons is beyond me…it was all there for them to follow and live accordingly.   Then again, look at the world today.   What have we learned now that we’ve seen the numerous writings?   Maybe the question is ‘What do we actually make of these writings?  Do we need to have archaeological (physical) evidence to support the stories in order to believe them?’   I find that also very sad.  I mean…how many times does God/The Supreme/Whatever you want to call It have to destroy the world for us to ‘get it’?

And the whole concept of the Mayan calender is amazing.  You have evidence that these people lived a couple thousand years ago.  But their calender covers worlds/ages/events/astronomy that was present 26,000 years ago?  So how are they so accurate for 10’s of thousands of years of time prior to their own existence?  Lucky guesses?  I don’t think so.  It’s that passed down knowledge again.  I seriously doubt if the ancients, anywhere in any area of the earth….one day established a language and the first thing they thought about doing was writing a work of fiction.   They wrote down things of importance.  What they know, their rituals, their beliefs, their knowledge.  How they saw the world and interpreted it.

In the most ancient writings thousands of years before there were secular beliefs, there were ancient civilizations living all over the earth.  They all have similar ’stories’, they all were extremely advanced people…in astronomy, mathematics, agriculture, technology of their time, and even cartography (yes, they were map makers!  Creating nautical maps which means they actually navigated the seas – and…thousands of years before Columbus).  They all had similar visions and multiple gods.  They all had creation stories.  They all had stories of cataclysmic floods destroying the world, of raging volcanoes and fires and devastation.  And rebirth.

The people surviving to repopulate the areas were given the knowledge to succeed.  And it seems like they all failed.  While some stuck to their knowledge, the majority did fail and the cycle repeated itself in the cosmic hope that the human form would get it eventually.  Starting from scratch every time.  Maybe the right people didn’t get the knowledge, maybe it wasn’t completely understood?   All religions now a days have certain ‘rules’ on how life should be conducted…but through thousands of years of re-writing and misinterpretation or trying to be politically correct…distortions have blinded followers off the path of what was intended to guide them.

Never before in the history of modern man…in a history that we’ve had documented…has the earth been in such bad shape as it is right now.   Maybe it’s cyclical and just repeating a pattern of natural occurrences that have before drastically altered things….maybe it’s more.    Maybe we’ve had the knowledge of how to cope with this all along, what to expect or how to reverse it….but we just don’t do anything about it because instead of trying to live in harmony and strive for what is the basis for why we are here (our spirit, our soul) we are too fixated on the material.   And in the end, we’ll repeat the mistakes of those that came before us.   Just like those who came before them.

It’s not a secret that people are trying to find themselves now more than ever.   Why is this?  Is it some inborn trait that our subconscious somehow remembers?  Is it that some have in another physical life lived through the end of an age/a world and there’s a thread of memory there seeping through that enables us to continue this quest so that we may survive?

Comment ( 1 )

, , , , , ,

Focusing on inner peace
The Ages and the world today

September 5th, 2009

Do you think that world is entering into some type of spiritual awareness stage?  I read somewhere that people searching for their own spirituality has gone up in significant numbers in the last few years.  Is this the dawning of the Age of Aquarius*?  (you know you’ll be singing that song all day now…sorry)

With all the hype of the Dec 2012 approach, I’m wondering if this is going to be the start of the world coming together as a spiritual collaborative.  (Rather than the end of the world or the earth falling off it’s axis or something completely catastrophic).  Wouldn’t that be a nice thing to happen?  (spirituality of course, NOT catastrophe)

When I look at other parts of the world I often wonder how on earth these people live such meager lives and keep their hope in the most desperate of times.  I’m guessing that if you never experience the temptations of material things it’s a lot easier to be in touch with what’s really truly important.  I’d suppose that living poor all your life, you are not tainted by the reality of money and how it can destroy you.

I find it difficult sometimes to try and be a person who lives a good life…one not concerned with the material things.  The stress for me comes in the fact that we’re struggling financially right now more than we have ever struggled and to try to push that aside and not worry about it….to put my main focus on the inner important things.  It’s very hard to do that when in the back of your mind you’ve got bills coming in faster than money coming in.

I think back to two years ago when, although we weren’t rich, we weren’t struggling.   I could take the kids shopping and within a budget…get them what they needed without worrying about it.  Or take them to a movie on a whim…or go out to eat once a week.  Now?  Well, we’ve changed our lifestyle considerably.   No more going out to eat unless it’s once in a blue moon.  Cutting back on every single thing, every service we use.  And after two years, do I feel we’re less happy?  Ironically…no.  In fact it’s better.  Actually it’s become easy to live on less.

The stress lies in the debt accumulated.  How do people strive to focus on their inner selves and not be concerned with material things….when they’ve got that looming in the recesses of their minds?  I’d love to hear suggestions for this.

*The Ages have long been known since ancient times.  Ancient priests and astronomers knew that there was a new ‘age’  once every approximately 2600 years.  The Ages are based on the 12 astronomical signs:  For instance:  Age of Leo:  sphinx built.   Age of Pisces:   Jesus (correlation to fish?)  Age of Aries:   War, the idea of monotheism (one God).   Ironically Moses comes into being in the Age of Aries and denounces worship of the calf….which is the symbol of the previous age, the Age of Taurus (the bull)   Before the end of one age, the next age influences life.   A recent example would be that we are still living in the Age of Pisces….’the house of prayer, worship, religion’ yet are being influenced by the upcoming Age of Aquarius….”technology, organized religion going into the background while science comes into the forefront, personal awareness and moral standards over standard religion’.     Also, the opposites of the signs come into play….for instance…The sign opposite Aquarius is Leo. This indicates we’ll focus our thoughts and efforts in the pursuit of excellence, perfection, mutual respect and spirituality.
Fascinating stuff!

Comment ( 1 )

, ,

Ancient India – The ‘new’ cradle of civilization.

July 31st, 2009

I’ve had a long fascination with ancient cultures and civilizations.   I think it’s funny that when we were kids, we were told that primitive peoples were pretty dumb walked around grunting.  Since I’ve been a kid, we’ve learned so much more about our ancestors.  And oddly, we’ve learned they were actually brilliant astronomers, builders, mathematicians, artisans and so much more.

And every so often were finding out that history needs to be re-written because they find something new and exciting that pre-dates historical fact.  For instance for centuries we were told that the ‘cradle of civilization’ was in the Middle East.  Iraq I believe.   With the discoveries in India a few years ago I suppose that’s completely out the window now.  (and rightly so)

What I find irritating is that we have to have some type of concrete evidence to correlate to the ancients in order to ‘believe’ what has been handed down orally for thousands of years.  It just doesn’t make any sense to me.

Case in point, India.   Now archaeologists are finding that the oldest civilizations are in India.  (The finding of the ancient civilization of Mehrgarh which dates back to 7500 BC and the underwater city off the Coast of Gujarat which dates back to 9000BC) These predate biblical times by thousands of years (c. 3400BC) and even predates the ancient Sumerians (c. 5000 BC) which are known to have very advanced civilizations (and the oldest writings found so far) and the Babylonians.

What I find silly is that the Indian culture has long since known they are ‘that’ ancient.  In fact, they are probably even older than they are being given credit for.    Take a look at the Indian Veda’s for example.  Archeologists only  assign a date for these writings of about 1500-1800 BC.   Up until a decade or so ago, they figured that the Indian culture ‘must’ have started or became ‘civilized’ (by being taken over by Europeans) around the same time as they dated the Veda’s too.

First of all I ask, ‘why’?  Why would scholars assume that?  The Veda’s themselves indicate that their civilization has been around for MANY thousands of years.  They speak of the ancients, their gods, their way of living and gives clues to exactly what these ancients saw in their lifetimes.   They saw great floods that wiped out their cities and people.  They saw ice ages!  So why wouldn’t archeologists read and interpret them as an actual happening…rather than myth?  What gives them the right to label something that they cannot find physical evidence to… as myth?  Sometimes I think that the more schooled someone is, the less common sense they retain.  And the common sense in this case would be to study the Veda’s and base your archeological digs on clues you find.  That just perplexes me!

We know that the ancient Indians had a very developed system of writing because we’ve unearthed objects with many signs and symbols on them.  These predate the dates they have classified the Veda dates.

Now, the Vedas contain ancient knowledge and beliefs that have been passed down orally for many thousands of years (we know this from the descriptions of ice ages and flooding…and those events can be confirmed scientifically).  So if you have a culture that passes oral tradition down, what makes that any less believable than physical evidence?

That would be a little like people in Boston who, for generations have been lobster fisherman.  Then we have another ice age…and an ice melting phase and those people in that area and surrounding areas are wiped out.   But, their extended family who live in Texas….survive and tell future generations through stories about how their ‘people’ would hunt lobster for centuries up North.  Over time, who would we believe them?  There’s no longer a fishing town there, it’s now under 100 ft of water with barnacles growing all over it.   Over time it might be considered myth.  “Myth of the Boston lobster fisherman”.   It wouldn’t be until someone decided to dive down there that the myth would become reality.

Sorta like Troy.  How long were we told Troy was a myth?  Well, I’d say up until the time they actually excavated an area that turned out to be….Troy!

Now, the last ice age was around 11-12,000 years ago.  Actually, technically it wasn’t the last ice AGE, it’s technically the last ‘glacial period’.  (Ice ages last for extremely long time periods sometimes tens of thousands of years…where as ‘glacial periods’ are colder periods within the time frame of the ice age.  So I should say, the last GLACIAL PERIOD ended around 11-12,000 years ago.    Anyhow, if you’ve got an oral (and written down sometime around 1500BC) tradition that speaks directly to the last glacial period. )  Of the description of thick ice sheets and then melting) wouldn’t you then put two and two together and figure out that the Indian culture has been around since AT LEAST 11-12,000 years ago?

I can only imagine what they would find along the coastlines of the world.  Underwater hundreds of feet deep.  Japan is currently exploring several sites as well as India.  Oh the history our oceans hold!  If you’d like to read more interesting information on India or Japan…I highly recommend the book Underworld: The Mysterious Origins of Civilization By Graham Hancock. Fascinating!

Comments ( 0 )

, ,

You are what you eat. And drink.

July 28th, 2009

I was thinking about something someone said to me awhile back on how people should eat and drink in a spiritual way as to bless the food going into your body.  And it’s been conveyed to me a couple times now, so it makes me curious.

The offering of a blessing is a part of every religion and although many people of faith do it every day…they might not know (or remember) why.  And I never really thought of that much.  When I was growing up, we always said a prayer before dinner.  But I always thought of it as a formality.

Hindu’s believe that food needs to be pure in order to keep a good state of mind.  And being balanced as such is on the path to enlightenment.   Practicers do not eat that which has not first been offered to God.   Eating blessed food is essential because it promotes peace of your mind.   Makes sense to me.  (well, now it does…read on)

It amazes me how things seem to come together sometimes when I’m interested in them.  For instance, water.   Every religion incorporates the importance and purity of water.  Whether it’s baptizing, ritual bathing, washing of feet or just consuming it.  Water historically or rather religiously plays an incredibly large role in so many belief systems.   Doctors have been telling us forever that we need water….so many glasses per day…to maintain our bodies.  Our bodies are made up of like 70% water.   The ancient people respected water and realized the importance of it.   It’s ironic that we once thought the ancients were ‘primitive’ when in fact they understood the importance of nature and the elements better than the whole of people can even begin to comprehend now.  Maybe without all the material things to ‘worry’ about and trying to out do each other or live up to a person in a magazine….they understood what is actual vital and absolutely necessary in survival of not only the body….but of the mind, the soul.

My husband and I were friends with someone (I befriended him through my husband) for many years.  Then, after a stupid argument, we didn’t speak to him or him to us for about 7 years.  We recently contacted him and are now speaking again via email as we’re in different States.  Well, over the last couple months I’ve really curious as to the whole blessing of the food/water thing.  I’ve been mulling over in my (western) brain over how blessing food or drink would make any real difference in the body when ingested.   I hadn’t mentioned anything at all regarding my curiosities on the Eastern religions to this friend.  But the other day as we were shooting a couple short emails back and forth about unexplained things (like Stonehenge type things)…he included a link to a trailer of a film made in 2004 called “What the bleep do we know…Down the rabbit hole”.   The trailer gave little information but I have an inquiring mind.

I ended up doing a search on Youtube for the title and came up with about 15 segments of around 10 minutes each of that movie!  The first 5 segments (mostly about Quantum mechanics/theroies) were interesting but ‘just okay’.  The 6th?  Well, the sixth dealt with…get this…water and how a scientist did studies on the crystals of frozen water and found that the water which was ‘talked to’ or ‘implanted with good thought’ (I know it sounds hokey but stay with me) actually produced beautiful crystals.  While water treated in a negative way did not.   I was astounded in two ways.  Because (like I’ve said before) things seem to happen to me at odd times.   Seven years go by without talking to this person and suddenly we’re speaking and I’m sent a link to something that explains a curiosity that up until now I cannot wrap my mind around.  And I was equally astounded by the experiments themselves of this person, Dr. Masaru Emoto.   Here’s a link to a site with photos of the water crystals and what they look like before and after within different experiments.

So then a lightbulb went off.   I started thinking that if this is true (that water can be changed – it’s molecular structure – with energy, thoughts, vibration, words, etc) then our bodies, which are 70% water…our cells…can be influenced as well.   Healed.  Managed.   And what about amniotic fluid?  How then does this relate to the unborn child?

Obviously I’m not the first person to wonder about all this, lol.  The ‘lightbulb going off’ is more of a reference to all these years of hearing ‘how music affects the fetus’ or ‘how the power of positive thinking’ can help you.    (I wasn’t implying I was the first to think it, lol!)

Maybe since I’m from the West, I felt I needed to see some tangible evidence like the water crystals to be able to relate to the wider implications of water….which to the East are not implications but fact.  And known to be fact and practiced as fact since the beginnings of civilization.  Somehow along the line the majority of people lost this knowledge or maybe just got ’sidetracked’ by material life, thus overlooking the obvious.

footnote:  While writing this post, a story came on the news about music and the participation of children on the autism spectrum learning through music.  Helping them focus on the rest of their daily activities.  I imagine that this would be comparable to the listening of music in the womb.   Allowing the water in the cells possibly to focus and experience healthy growth.   Definitely something worth noting.

*note:   Yes, I did duplicate this post on my Wellness Blog.  I did so because although this blog reflects my thoughts and growth, I did however feel this particular post belonged in both blogs.

Comments ( 3 )

, , , , ,

Namaste

July 24th, 2009

Namaste is a gesture.  And when spoken…a beautiful word!  Say it with me…Nah-mah-stay.  Isn’t that just a beautifully flowing word?

Even more beautiful is the meaning behind it.   Coming from the Sanskrit ‘nama’ meaning ‘to bow’ and ‘te’ meaning ‘you’.   It can be conveyed by speaking the word namaste while bowing your head slightly and with your hands together (like praying hands with your fingers pointing up) in front of your chest (upon greeting a person)…or just the bow without the speaking (upon departure).   Now, if you are writing something like a letter…writing the word ‘namaste’ would replace for instance, sincerely or love or good day….any type of closing statement.

It is an expression of respect in India…although I think this is such a beautiful expression it should be used worldwide much like a smile.

Although I’ve heard this many times I never really understood what it was.  It wasn’t until I started practising yoga that I actually understood namaste.  When you say namaste or bow, you are saying “the light within me honors the light within you” or  “The Spirit (or God / Divinity) within me…recognizes the spirit (or God / Divinity) within you”  or “The God in me greets the God in you”….. Now seriously, how beautiful is that?  In yoga, we say this at the end of the class.

Now the whole reason why ‘namaste’ is done is because we are recognizing the other person as being on equal ground because…we are all one.  Children of the Divine. Of God.  Of Spirit.    A beautiful greeting that knows no lines like color of skin, age or genger.  You can use the gesture towards anyone, even people you don’t know.

In eastern religions, the gesture of namaste bowing is very meaningful and spiritually rooted.  As I said, both hands come together (prayer hands).  One hand represents the higher spiritual self, the other hand the earthly/worldly self.  When putting the two hand together it indicates you are rising above differences and connecting with the person you are bowing to.

What’s interesting to me is that I first thought that namaste would be equivalent to a hand shake.  Wrong.  The whole gesture in bowing (head / shoulders slightly forward) lessens the sense of ego (self-centeredness).  The bow also demonstrates humility.  But in shaking hands many things can be intended or even felt.  For instance power, arrogance, displeasure or pleasure.

The touching of one’s hands together puts one in touch with one’s soul….not an outer personality, it protects your own energies rather than like in hand shaking which may bring about disturbances to one’s energy from mingling with others energies.

Since there is so much more information out there on the symbolism and meaning on namaste I would suggest that if you are interested, you should go here.

Namaste

Comments ( 0 )

Ancient Thinking

April 29th, 2009

I’ve had a fascination with ancient cultures for some time now. Our ancient societies were really very smart. For some reason people tend to only think of them as primitive who drew weird pictures in caves, wore colorful garb and prayed to the stars.

Think about this.  If we were to take away all of our electronics, all of our electricity and modes of transportation, we’d be left in our own neighborhoods and wouldn’t travel very far.  At night it would be so dark and quiet.  No distractions. We wouldn’t be inside watching our favorite shows on t.v., but we’d be sitting around a warm fire with nothing to see but black sky and bright stars and planets above us.  All night, every night.   Left to appreciate our families, our lives and every thing around us would be significant. (more…)

Comment ( 1 )

RSS Feed

  • Digg
  • Delicious
  • Furl
  • Stumble
  • Technorati
  • Yahoo