Two Worlds and Energy: Manifesting the Positive

“Focus on the positive,” my friend tells me.  “Envision the results you want, not the problems you have getting there.  Completely accept where you are, and you might move ahead.”   I had been discussing some of my frustrations – something I might not do at work, but which I like to be able to do with friends.  Stomping on frustrations and burying them does not make them go away.   On the other hand, complaining does not make them go away, either.  My friend was not telling me something I did not know already, but something I am habitually too busy to work with.

The advice my friend was giving me is certainly not new advice.  It sounds easier to do than it is, though, including for me.  Focusing on results instead of issues is something with which I have difficulty, even though I understand the instructions.   How can I focus on a solution if I haven’t understood the problem and dealt with what’s holding my solution back?   How can I bring anything about if I haven’t first removed what’s in the way?

Although it seems logical to identify and remove obstacles before paying a similar attention to creating positive results in the vacated space, that reasonable stance is in fact a trap, keeping me – and others – repeatedly focused on obstacles.   Those obstacles seem to obediently keep popping up when one is focused on them, much as in the legend of Sisyphus, who had to forever roll a stone up a hill.

Our minds are creative, even if we believe that there is not an ounce of creativity in us.  They will unfailingly create that which we focus upon.  Often that focus is inadvertent, including the imbedded stories we run repeatedly beneath the level of our consciousness.  Focus can also be purposeful, such as contemplation by choice, as when we are doing a math problem or painting a picture.  Or, focus can be habitual.  We may know what we do, but withdraw our thinking mind from our action, as in riding a bicycle, brushing our teeth, or reacting to a stimulus.  This focus, subconscious, purposeful or habitual, is what draws to us and creates either a desired outcome or a roadblock to that outcome or, sometimes, even a nightmare.

The solution to achieving a goal, be it a personal goal such as a new job, or a more overarching goal, such as bringing healing to the Earth, is theoretically quite simple: focus purposeful, subconscious and habitual attention on the goal to be achieved.  Avoid being distracted by attention- diverting thought-entities with the message of “You can’t”, “It won’t work”, “It can’t happen,” or any other thought or action contrary to steady focus on the goal.  The challenge comes in actually focusing the attention by choice, especially the powerful subconscious and habitual processes.

There is a wealth of information in books, on the Internet, and in various webinars, seminars and presentations on how to identify subconscious thoughts and habitual reactions.  Psychiatrists delve into the past in the hopes of uncovering the particularly powerful occurrence that gave us our negative thoughts, resentful and angry feelings, or stubborn resistance to change;  therapists work with people to help them overcome their fears and anxieties and visions of what might happen in the future.   To some extent, these can be quite helpful.  However, once these techniques and processes are exhausted, there remains what perhaps was being avoided in the first place: what is going on now.  What we focused on in the past or fear in the future have a limited influence on our ability to create because they are nonexistent.  Yesterday has passed away into memory, and tomorrow is not yet born.  Only what is now really exists.  If we are to focus on a result, it must be now, in the present.  We must see, feel, taste, smell, hear and believe the existence of our goal in this very moment.

For most of us, that seems impossible, like believing lies or inhabiting illusions.  Its basis lies in the essential oneness of everything, the connections between all that exists.   We live surrounded at every moment by an invisible energy (an ‘ether’, to use a very old word), directly inaccessible via our five material senses.  Some of us can perceive this energy via non-material senses; others cannot.  Whether or not a given individual can perceive it, this energy is very real.  It surrounds us, sustains us, connects us, and of it is formed the material world, including our material bodies.  This energy exists independently of the concept of time, which is a concept formed in materiality, and by which humans, who can grasp the concept, bind themselves.  Because this energy, of which we are composed, is independent of time, it contains the past and the future, melded into an infinite now.  It is past, present and future, wrapped in one.  It contains all that was, all that is, and all that will be.   Because we are composed of this energy, we, too, when we can identify with it, are able to move in time.  Most of us do not identify to that extent; a few, who prefer to remain unnoticed, do.  It is in this way that we can perceive our goals, sense them as if they were already here, in our concept of time, and focus our attention upon them in the present moment.

I understand the concepts and the explanations.  I can recognize the feelings in music, dance and nature.   I have yet to develop skill in bringing into material manifestation – actually doing – what I think I understand and feel.  I cannot tell anyone HOW to do that about which I write or which I feel in song and movement.  I am still figuring that out.  Rather, I think I am still growing into it, which is not a figuring out, but a process over time.  In an infinite world, I am skillful now; in our material world, I still need patience.  Patience can be hard when one has been traveling for a while. 

I wish for us all, especially me, the ability to perceive myself as whole, and the ability to draw to myself what is needed and desired.  I wish for us all the ability to heal ourselves, each other and the Earth.

Peace, Diane

An Apology for Arts

This Wednesday and Thursday, I watched the debates between the prospective Democratic candidates for president; mostly, they did not solve much, just argued with differing degrees of passion which one-sided views they espouse and will promote. (Republicans are not much better, although their specific issues act as alternative window-dressing).  Neither side seems to be willing to really discuss, without attacking each other, real differences of opinion on real issues so that change can be proposed that would satisfy the deepest issues of the respective sides.   At the same time, I have begun to work with a startup arts center that is currently only partly up and running.  I do this because we seem to have forgotten the arts in the pursuit of science, and I believe we are the poorer for that.   Hence, the following reflections.

We live in a world of complementary dualities, each of which is a part of a complete whole.  Light complements dark, sorrow complements joy, effort complements ease, sleep and relaxation (down time) complement our working life.  In life as in art, the negative spaces empower and define the positive ones.  Each defines the other, each gives life to the other, and thus in our world the whole exists.  They are sides of a single coin.

In fashion now are the sciences, currently called STEM, science, technology, engineering and math.  Sciences are concerned with the physical world, the observable and quantifiable.  They seek to understand how the physical universe is constructed, how it works, how it might be changed to adapt to circumstances, how it might serve people.   The sciences work with what can be logically proven or disproven through experimentation.   Together, the sciences have brought about immense and rapid advances in our understanding and in applications in our physical world. 

My grandmother began life in a world in which the use of horses was still common.  Before she passed, men traveled to the moon.  Technology in the present advances even more rapidly. The quickened pace of these advances comes at a cost.  In order to devote the amount of attention and cultural value to STEM topics and to fully support these rapid advances, we have largely neglected the partner of STEM, the arts.

Arts – visual arts, music, dance, theater, literature, philosophy and writing, to include some – are more concerned with that which is less readily apprehensible.  Arts apply themselves to our values, our pursuit of wisdom, subjective perceptions and emotions, and to concepts such as joy, beauty and existential truth.  STEM deals exceptionally well with the concretely physical; arts express marvelously our souls.  Both are necessary.

Our world today is unbalanced; some would say it is chaotic.   This is not amazing if we notice that we have neglected the sisters of STEM.  The whole cannot be complete while only half of it is fully accepted and appreciated.  Putting an “A” into the acronym “STEM” to make “STEAM” does little.  The four strands of STEM are still emphasized while the arts are lumped together and given lip service. 

At one time – my grandmother’s and maybe also my mother’s – arts had a greater place in our culture.  Schools gave emphasis to literature, writing and music.  Elocution, painting, drawing and crafts were also given instructional time, and exhibitions of these were valued.  Dance and theater were not only performing arts, to be enjoyed if one had time and money, but also often popular pastimes.   In private life, there was time to create beauty.   Math and science were certainly not ignored, but the whole was more balanced.

Not so today.  Schools emphasize and promote STEM subjects, and parents rush to enroll their children in STEM summer camps and extracurricular lessons. Arts in the schools are underfunded and minimal. Those who enroll their children in the few art camps do so mainly because their children demand that.  (There are also sports camps, some of which are neither STEM nor arts.  These, too, are more accepted than camps that feature arts.) 

We have lost something.  Social structures have lost center or direction as they change and grow.  Balance is good as change progresses; it keeps the change from falling into destructive chaos.  We have lost that balance, that sense of direction, that guidance system.  Some would say we have lost our soul.  Re-including and re-establishing the importance of what we have neglected can help restore what we have lost. 

Let us individually grow our whole selves, both the logical and the intuitive, with a sense of the wonder of the universe.

Peace, Diane

It Doesn’t Always Make Sense

During the time I was working for the government, some of what was going on around us did not make a great deal of sense.  For example, people who spoke Spanish were assigned to Asian language programs, people who spoke French or Chinese were assigned to Spanish language programs, and so on.  In order to qualify for grants, grant recipients were required to promise to pay for those items for which they needed a grant to accomplish.  Data processors were hired to computerize data that we didn’t collect.  In short, it didn’t always make sense.

For a long time, this bothered me, until a co-worker explained.  “It doesn’t have to make sense,” he elucidated, “just do it.”  That took a little while to sink in, but in its own way, it was a relief.  I didn’t have to figure out the reasons (if any) for what went on.  After all, the bureaucracy has survived for a long time while incorporating this meme.  In fact, the bureaucracy is one of the more resilient of organized structures.

Subsequently, I broadened my perspective.  The events of life, too, contain elements that seem to make no sense.   Currently, in our era of rapid change, there appear to be many of them.   People may comment in frustration, “But that makes no sense.”  Perhaps, translated, it is another version of “The Emperor has no clothes!”  The fact is that we do not always have the information we need to determine if something makes long-range sense.  (Sometimes it doesn’t; sometimes it does when seen from a different viewpoint.)   Additionally, creativity rarely flows from that which is tightly controlled along logical lines.  Creativity flows from the Void in which everything happens simultaneously, and which is ordered and chaotic at the same time.  Hindsight is often the only tool to give meaning to a seemingly random happening.

We can recall the past and conceive the future, but it is in the present we must act.  We will be happier, or at least less stressed, if we do not demand that what is beyond our control makes sense.   We can discern if an action or event is in accord with our values, we can project a possible or probable outcome of a pattern, and we can decide whether we will participate, but we cannot demand that it always make sense.  Sometimes it takes hindsight to determine that.  Sometimes we will never know.  We can feel good about something that does not make sense, intuiting that it will lead to positive results, or we can feel the opposite. 

Intuition and logic are distinct functions.  Intuition is often accurate, but it is not bound to whether something makes sense. Logic wants cause and effect, linear reasoning, sense.  An accurate intuition may not always make logical sense.   When we demand only logical sense, we cut off intuition, using only part of our perception, and are impoverished thereby. If we can temporarily suspend the need for something to make immediate sense, we are freed to use both perceptual processes, allowing the intuition and examining the logic later.   The two processes are complementary.

Letting go of the need to know that, obviously, something makes sense is not the same as blindly following what seems to make no sense or contorting the meanings of words to make it so; nor is it the same as actively opposing such an event.  It is letting go of the stress, acknowledging discrepancies perceived, and trusting the intuition.  Most importantly, it is letting go of the stress.   Sometimes what is will make sense; sometimes it will not.  Letting go is not stressing about it, and calmly following one’s inner guidance.

It doesn’t always have to make sense.

Peace, Diane

An Age of Machines?

Several days ago, I made a stop at the post office to find out if I had put enough postage on the letters I was mailing for them to reach their destinations.  Most post offices now have machines that can tell the amount of postage a given item requires.   As I was making the stop on the way from one appointment to another, I thought I would be efficient and use the machine rather than stand in line for the attention of a clerk.  To my surprise, the machine had been re-programmed; instead of telling me what postage was due, the machine now insisted I buy a pre-printed label.  I did not want a pre-printed label.  I had one stamp on each letter already; I simply needed to know if that was enough.  At first, I thought I was doing something wrong with this postal computer.  I focused, concentrated and tried again, several times. No luck.  The machine still insisted I buy a pre-printed label.  Frustrated, I finally left the machine and stood in a rather long line to get the information I needed.

If I am to believe what I am told, machines (especially computers or computer-facilitated machines) have been invented for our convenience.  Self-service postal machines, self-checkouts in stores, pay-at-the-pump gasoline pumps – all are there so a customer can quickly do his or her business without having to talk with another human being.   I use these as little as possible, as I like talking with people, so I am not an expert.  Yet, it seems that, at least in the post office case, the machine was commanding me – making me do something in a way I did not wish to – instead of serving me.  I am wondering to what extent that which was designed to serve us has morphed – or is morphing – into what we serve.

I am also in the process of looking for a summer position to provide me with work for the summer.  Many of the openings that I find online, such as data entry operators, or website maintainers, or operators of accounting software (not to include actual computer repair people), require people whose function it is to supply computer programs with information needed to keep the computers running at the top efficiency required by their employers.  These programs, of course, operate by methods and rules designed into their software, and provide their end users with specific and limited types of information.  They are useful, and they do calculate faster and store information in a less bulky way than paper files.  However, to what extent are they serving people, and to what extent are people having to adapt to and serve them?   I do not have a clear answer, yet it seems to me that frequently those of us who interact with computers, especially at the entry levels, are being required to operate using machine methods of process, increasingly becoming a part of the machines, perhaps beginning to become ersatz machines ourselves.

A machine does not need to eat, sleep or take a break.  A machine functions at high speed.  A machine requires certain specific means of interaction, but it does not require emotional support, such as compassion or appreciation.   In today’s workplace, what is being required of many employees, particularly those at lower or entry levels (even middle management) is an ability to work in tandem with a computer.   A high degree of competence in interacting with the computer (a machine) in the manner required by the computer is mandatory.  Being able to work faster and faster with complete accuracy is important.  Being able to accomplish more and more, even when necessary to continue without a break, and the ability to tolerate repetitive tasks is preferred.   Unless one is supervised by a sensitive middle manager, appreciation, compassion, personal interaction with co-workers is discouraged.  And as for compensation, which is not required by a machine, many if not most of these machine-like jobs are paid close to minimum wage, barely enough to house, transport and hopefully feed oneself.  Machines, of course, do not have many needs.  It would seem that some of us at least are being required to become like machines as we interact with them.

Medical practice, too, is more and more being run by computers and sophisticated machines.   Conversation is now often by computer interface, and it would seem that the doctor who can diagnose without a computer is a dying breed. AI, another upcoming development, draws ever closer.  AI is expected to replace many kinds of jobs, and whether people can be trained to do other jobs (maintaining the AI computers/robots?) fast enough to keep employed is another question.  Yet another touted invention and one of my pet peeves is the self-driving (computer driven) car, in which the passenger is to simply sit and give instructions in a language the computer understands and be driven from one place to another. All of this is billed as marvelous progress, but I wonder.  Are we not losing precious aspects of our humanity to this progress?

Perhaps things are not as dire as I am describing, and it is just that I am observing only that part of what is happening.  I hope so.  We do need our technology and our progress.  But if people would pause for just a bit to question what we are losing for what we gain, we might be able to keep more of what is precious to us from the past and present and still make progress into the future.  We are not machines. Keeping on chugging, faster and faster, without reflection is not the answer.   We, the people, need to retain our privilege of thought and reflection, and to maintain enough control over what we have designed to serve us so that our human needs take priority, for all of us.  An Age of Machines is not only destructive towards humans, but also inimical to the planet and its denizens.

It is time to pause, to observe trends and patterns, and to understand more deeply where they are taking us.

Peace, Diane