A  DAILY 

The world needs our love.  Humanity needs our loving awareness. Staying awake and mindful and aligned with The Good, the True and Beautiful is a great service.  There are painful and horrific events occurring every day.  Do not turn yourself away.  Open more.  Be Present. 

SOUL SOURCE invites you to join us in a Daily Practice.  Please take 10 minutes or longer each day to breathe with the planet and all her kingdoms.  Please do anything within this 10 minutes which feels right to you to bring greater Light, Love and Power as a healing balm to us all. Open to the chaos and the shadow parts, release resistance, feel the fear, let your heart break open.  And do not limit yourself to this 10 minutes as your practice, but LIVE as the Wholeness you wish to see manifest in the world.

A few suggestions for your 10 minute practice ...

2. Do Tonglen, breathing in the heaviness of the world, breathing out Lightness of Being

3. Sing a hymn or a chant.

4. Say The Great Invocation, a favorite prayer or poem which invokes healing.

5. Do Ho'oponopono

6. Focus on Beauty, on Gratitude, and Love

7. Dance a healing dance.

8. Devote your yoga practice, making your bed, doing your dishes, living peacefully with your relations, to the upliftment of the world.

9. Walk mindfully, each step as a healing step for all.

10. Breathe into your Heart and expand the Love that you are to the world. 

And please read these offerings.  Our hope is that they will inspire you and uplift you and help you to BE the Light of the World.  And please let us know if you are willing to participate, to Witness the suffering, the pain and horror, but hold a Witnessing calm, a Lighted, Loving Presence in the midst of this transition time for our planet.  We are grateful for all that you all do to heal and love more. 

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 THE CIRCLE OF LIFE

All over the world, and in the news every day, people killing people. People on one 'side' killing people on the other 'side'. Each 'side' claiming that they are right. Each 'side' holding onto ancient pain, each 'side' unwilling be the first to let go, coming up with all the reasons in the world why they can't and won't. A tragic tale as old as humanity itself. 

When will we wake up to the obvious fact that we are all the same Consciousness in disguise? That no matter who we think we are, no matter how we appear, beyond our stories and histories, our religions, our nationalities, our beliefs, the colour of our skin, our heavy pasts and uncertain futures, we are all expressions of the One life? That in truth there are no Israelis or Palestinians, Jews or Christians, Muslims or Buddhists, atheists or agnostics, Republicans or Democrats, gurus or disciples, that those images can never define us. That who we truly are at the most fundamental level is indefinable, mysterious, never fixed or separate, never identified with an image, just as the vast ocean can never be defined by its waves. 

Consciousness has no religion, and no nationality. It gives birth to Palestinians and Israelis, Iraqis and Americans, light and dark, the yin and yang of the ever-changing dream world.

As consciousness itself, when we hurt each other, we are only hurting our own brothers and sisters, our own kin, waves of ourselves. We are only fighting reflections of our original Face. We are only killing the ones we love, ancient friends from long ago. 

Outer war has never lead to inner peace. How much more bloodshed? How much more pain? How many more men, women and children must disappear into infinity before we wake up? 

That bleeding child is my own. The circle of life takes no 'sides'. 

- Jeff Foster 

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Many mornings I check out the news as soon as I wake up, because if it turns out that the world is coming to an end that day, I am going to eat the frosting off an entire carrot cake; just for a start. Then I will move onto vats of clam dip, pots of crime brûlée, nachos, M & M's etc. Then I will max out both my credit cards.

I used to think that if the world--or I--were coming to an end, I'd start smoking again, and maybe have a cool refreshing pitcher of lime Rickeys. But that's going too far, because if the world or I was saved at the last minute, I'd be back in the old familiar nightmare. In 1986, grace swooped down like a mighty mud hen, and fished me out of that canal. I got the big prize. I can't risk losing it.

But creme brûlée, nachos, maybe the random Buche Noel? Now you're talking.

The last two weeks have been about as grim and hopeless as any of us can remember, and yet, I have not gotten out the lobster bib and fork. The drunken Russian separatists in Ukraine with their refrigerated train cars? I mean, come on. Vonnegut could not have thought this up. Dead children children on beaches, and markets, at play, in the holy land?? Stop.

The two hour execution in festive Arizona? Dear God.

And let's not bog down on the stuff that was already true, before Ukraine, Gaza, Arizona, like the heartbreaking scenes of young refugees at our border, the locals with their pitchforks. The people in ruins in our own families. Or the tiny problem that we have essentially destroyed the earth--I know, pick pick pick.

Hasn't your mind just been blown lately, even if you try not to watch the news? Does it surprise you that a pretty girl's mind turns to thoughts of entire carrot cakes, and credit cards?

My friend said recently, "It's all just too Lifey. No wonder we all love TV." Her 16 year old kid has a brain tumor. "Hey, that's just great, God. Thanks a lot. This really works for me."

My brother's brand new wife has tumors of the everything. "Fabulous, God. Loving your will, Dude."

My dog Lily's ear drum burst recently, for no apparent reason, with blood splatter on the walls on the entire house--on my sleeping grandson's pillow. Do you think I am well enough for that?
 

Let me go ahead and answer. I'm not. It was CSI around here; me with my bad nerves. And it burst again last night.

Crazy!

Did someone here get the latest updated owner's manual? Were they handed out two weeks ago when I was getting root canal, and was kind of self-obsessed and out of it? The day before my dog's ear drum first burst? If so, is there is an index, and if so, could you look up Totally Fucking Overwhelm?

I have long since weeded out people who might respond to my condition by saying cheerfully, "God's got a perfect plan." Really? Thank you! How fun.

There is no one left in my circle who would dare say, brightly, "Let Go and Let God," because they know I would come after them with a fork.

It's not that I don't trust God or grace or good orderly direction anymore. I do, more than ever. I trust in divine intelligence, in love energy, more than ever, no matter what things look like, or how long they take. It's just that right now cute little platitudes are not helpful.

I'm not depressed. I'm overwhelmed by It All. I don't think I'm a drag. I kind of know what to do. I know that if I want to have loving feelings, I need to do loving things. It begins by putting your own oxygen mask on first: I try to keep the patient comfortable. I do the next right thing: left foot, right foot, left foot, breathe. I think Jesus had a handle on times like these: get thirsty people water. Feed the hungry. Try not to kill anyone today. Pick up some litter in your neighborhood. Lie with your old dog under the bed and tell her what a good job she is doing with the ruptured ear drum.

I try to quiet the drunken Russian separatists of my own mind, with their good ideas. I pray. I meditate. I rest, as a spiritual act. I spring for organic cherries. I return phone calls.

I remember the poor. I remember an image of Koko the sign-language gorilla, with the caption, "Law of the American Jungle: remain calm. Share your bananas." I remember Hushpuppy at the end of Beasts of the Southern Wild, just trying to take some food home to her daddy Wink, finally turning to face the hideous beast on the bridge, facing it down and saying, "I take care care of my own."

I take care of my own. You are my own, and I am yours--I think this is what God is saying, or trying to, over the din. We are each other's. Thee are many forms of thirst, many kinds of water.

 ~Anne Lamott

BODHISATTVAS AND WARRIORS

Bodhichitta exists on two levels. First there is unconditional bodhichitta, an immediate experience that is refreshingly free of concept, opinion, and our usual all-caught-upness. It's something hugely good that we are not able to pin down even slightly, like knowing at gut level that there's absolutely nothing to lose. Second there is relative bodhichitta, our ability to keep our hearts and minds open to suffering without shutting down. Those who train wholeheartedly in awakening unconditional and relative bodhichitta are called bodhisattvas or warriors-not warriors who kill and harm but warriors of nonaggression who hear the cries of the world. These are men and women who are willing to train in the middle of the fire. Training in the middle of the fire can mean that warrior-bodhisattvas enter challenging situations in order to alleviate suffering. It also refers to their willingness to cut through personal reactivity and self-deception, to their dedication to uncovering the basic undistorted energy of bodhichitta. We have many examples of master warriors-people like Mother Teresa and Martin Luther King-who recognized that the greatest harm comes from our own aggressive minds. They devoted their lives to helping others understand this truth. There are also many ordinary people who spend their lives training in opening their hearts and minds in order to help others do the same. Like them, we could learn to relate to ourselves and our world as warriors. We could train in awakening our courage and love.

~Pema Chodron

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An excerpt from Sharon  Deep...

Something is coming forth. Let us, together, work to lift it all into the Light.

Using our creative imaginations, let us see humanity rising in a knowing that it is only kindness that makes sense anymore ... it is only kindness that raises its head from the crowd of the world to say, "It is I you have been looking for" and may it go with us everywhere like a shadow or a close friend."

And let us visualize all of us together, around the planet, looking up and aligning ourselves with the available energies. Let us call in our family and friends and neighbors and co-workers and all those that we will interact with today to be with us within a spirit of goodwill or love in action. And let us reflect upon and call in all those who dwell in the higher realms of mind and heart - the Spiritual Hierarchy of saints, Rishis, Bodhisattvas, Masters and deities honored by all the world's religions and spiritual groups from around the world, and all those who are in our hearts.

And let us call in The Mother of the World to work with us ... focusing our attention on her until she becomes a reality in our consciousness and close to us ... and she joins us, guiding us, as we all continue together within the radiance of her veil ...

Let us imagine, with the hardiness and simplicity of a child, that we are together within the center of the Heart of Love.

And let us see all of the energies and rays and potencies and forces that are available to us at this particular time pouring into the center of the circle we all form together and, in using our mind's eye, let us see the energies streaming forth through pathways of light into all of the hearts and minds of humanity, infusing them with the goodwill needed to create loving and harmonious human relationships and a climate for positive social change ... let us all see that which must be loved ...

We seek to love not hate
We seek to serve and not exact due service
We seek to heal not hurt
Let pain bring due reward of light and love
Let the Soul control the life, the form and all events
And bring to light the love that underlies the happenings of the time
Let vision come and insight
Let the future stand revealed
Let inner union demonstrate
And outer cleavages be gone
Let love prevail
Let all love

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Dear God,
For the children of Gaza and for the children of Israel,
for the leaders in their right mind and for the leaders who are not, 
may Your Light pour forth
upon a darkened place.
Work a miracle
and end the war, 
end the violence, 
end the hatred
that has engulfed two peoples 
who are One in You.
Lift their relationship
to divine right order,
out of darkness and into Light,
out of war and into peace,
out of fear and into Love.
Heal all hearts
of judgement and blame.
May insanity end,
and forgiveness prevail.
Touch them all, dear God.,
Repair the world.
Amen

~ Marianne Williamson

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There is a peace that passeth understanding; it abides in the hearts of those who live in the Eternal. There is a power that maketh all things new; it lives and moves in those who know the Self as One. May that peace brood over us, that power uplift and guide us."

 OM

 Blessing to us One and All,

SOUL SOURCE

SOUL SOURCE