Cat Tax

National Geographic

First Amendment Broken

A great flame follows a little spark.
 Dante Alighieri

Be the Love Generation

Official Version with Music Video

This song is perfect at this point in our drastically changing lives since it speaks about a new love generation, the legacy we want to leave behind for the children. 

Full Version

This version is the one i like the best because he begins to talk more about spirituality then he was able to on his offical radio edit due to the previous time constraints. 

Keep faith and inspire a new love generation

Standing Rock Native Indian Camp

Native American leaders want the protest camp near Cannon Ball, N.D. 

cleared so a major highway can re-open. Credit: Getty Images

https://insideclimatenews.org/news/23012017/standing-rock-dakota-pipeline-protest-camp

Rufus Wainwright singing Hallelujah

Live in Concert 2013
Here is the link

I'd heard there was a secret chord
That David played and it pleased the Lord
But you don't really care for music, do you?
Well, it goes like this
The fourth, the fifth, the minor fall, the major lift
The baffled king composing Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Well, your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof
Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew ya
She tied you to the kitchen chair
She broke your throne and she cut your hair
And from your lips, she drew the Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Well baby, I've been here before
I've seen this room and I've walked this floor
I used to live alone before I knew ya
And I've seen your flag on the marble arch
And love is not a victory march
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Well, maybe there's a God above
But all I've ever learned from love
Was how to shoot somebody who outdrew ya
And it's not a cry that you hear at night
It's not somebody who's seen the light
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Lanterns

Time Crisis

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,   

But I have promises to keep,   

And miles to go before I sleep,   

And miles to go before I sleep.

The Second Coming by Yeats

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
    The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
    Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
    Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
    The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
    The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
    The best lack all conviction, while the worst
    Are full of passionate intensity.

    

Surely some revelation is at hand;
    Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
    The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
    When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
    Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
    A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
    A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
    Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
    Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.

The darkness drops again but now I know

    That twenty centuries of stony sleep
    Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
    And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
    Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Breakfast for Thought

Sometimes

being lost

is

knowing where 

you are

Being Right is Not Truth

Truth is not “being right” in discussions, dialogues, and debates. Being right is merely feeling like the winner of an argument; or, “knowing” that “they” are wrong. There's that “us” verses “them” feeling. Those who play for money, power, and victory easily forget truth in their rush to win, be on top, or in control. Unfortunately – it pulls societies away from justice.  

Reflection

A lake is a container and a reflector of worlds around and above; at times revealing worlds deep below the surface. 

  Three Spheres II, by M. C. Esher (lithography, 1946)   

Within each of us is a picture, a map of the entire universe. We are living holograms of all that is.  

Meditation and Society

At first glance, meditation appears to be purely personal, even selfish. It's about you sitting and looking within, letting go of thought-forms as they arise. At first glance it seems most personal, most selfish because it's about "you". At second glance, you begin to realize that your ego structures may not be fundamentally real. You start noticing that "others" are not all that separate from "you". As meditation practice deepens, the line between "self" and "other" begins to burr. Compassion, forgiveness, and love flowers. Judgement mind begins to drop away. Suddenly, doing meditation practice is an unselfish action that improves the world. I believe that  societies composed of people with "unselfish love" are healthier than societies of selfish people. Indeed, if enough people meditated long enough - over many years - enlightened societies may well arise.