Posts Tagged With: spirit

Words of Wisdom (Part 2): Einstein

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When someone says the word “genius,” who is the first person you think of?
We continue onward with the Words of Wisdom series to the man who brought us some of the most profound understandings of the universe yet uncovered: Albert Einstein. Without this mastermind the world of scientific inquiry, its applications, and our general understanding on how reality works would be vastly different. His concepts of the photoelectric effect, special relativity, matter-energy equivalence (E=mc^2 for all y’all nerdy folk), general relativity, and more has built the foundation of modern physics and our framework of perceiving the universe.

Of course Einstein stood on the shoulders of giants to develop his theories (Maxwell, Planck, Newton, etc.), but in doing so he himself became a giant. Perhaps it was his wacked hair style or dynamic facial expressions that rendered him such an icon in pop-culture, but it is irrefutable this man had a mighty mind. Einstein was not always correct and it is true some of his theories were tossed (ex: concept of a cosmological constant). However the essence of what makes Albert Einstein so great is that he did make mistakes, he was human, and thus attainable. His humility and ability to relate with words matched his intellect, and so we call him wise.

SJC Wellness Top Five Quotes by Albert Einstein:

#5: “Out of Clutter, find simplicity. From Discord, find Harmony. In the middle of difficulty lies Opportunity.”

#4: “Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.”

#3: “Every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life are based on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving.”

#2: “My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind.”

#1: “The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery every day. Never lose a holy curiosity.”

Food for thought: If our consciousness is a part of the universe,  how do we draw conclusions on what the universe is without understanding our consciousness?

photo cred: Randy Halverson

Categories: Green Room, Mind | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

Dream Work and Healing

DreamingBrainHow many times have you woke up and recalled a dream. The dream could have been pleasant. We sometimes wake up and remember a dream that shakes us to our core. Dreams link us up with someone who has passed on, we meet spirit guides and/or ancestors, dreams transports us to majestic places. Often people recount that they dream that they are flying. We also are subject to recurring dreams, messages from our physical body, messages from our emotional centers, dreams that we are falling, battling in war, or have premonitions of what is to come. We may wake up, out of breath, sweating, smiling, in utter awe, inspired, angry, scared, happy, at peace, or feeling a sense of wellness and healing. We wake up and say… What is going on? “It was just a dream”… or was it?

Ancient civilizations such as ancient China about 4500 years ago, belief system included the correlation of our dreams and the body, mind, and spirit connection. In Greece, Hippocrates, “The Father of Modern Medicine” about 400 BCE used dream therapy and encouraged the use of a designing your own healing dreams. Throughout the ancient world, dream temples could be found. The ancient Temple of Asklepius in Greece is an architectural and historical proof of a dream temple. You can research it.

Galen of Pergamum, a Greco-Roman physician who greatly impacted on European medicine, receiving his training in the second century AD used dreams for both diagnosis and treatment. He even used received dream guidance to perform surgery. Dr. Bernie S. Siegel, a leading surgeon in the U.S. and an interested party in the matter of dream healing states, “As a practicing surgeon, I explored the active role of the mind in illness and was astonished at the amount of information available via dreams.”

Dreams are an abstract portal to healing! Understanding the connection between dreams and healing started in ancient times. For thousands of years dream healing was respected. Throughout history, dream healing has gone through being removed from modern healing to becoming a very important component in integrative medicine at this moment in time. At present, Psychoneuroimmunology or PNI is providing the science behind our mind/body/spirit connection.

Dreams and nightmares subject us to waking up in a stir of emotions, perceptions, and patterns of behavior that need our conscious attention. Dreams spotlight our inner conflicts. Dreams outline our fears. Dreams have the ability to show us how to move through this journey we call life to achieve our deepest desires and hopes. Healing Power of Dreams offers techniques for using our dream imagery to positively impact the immune system. Dream-work methods in unison with time-tested relaxation and guided imagery practices are powerful tools in healing. Using dream imagery through a variety of meditative activities, you learn to transform nightmare experiences and to integrate healing imagery into the waking state. In doing so, an expert in dream healing can assist you discover the many levels on which dreams do indeed heal!

As per, Wendy Pannier who wrote an article on the matter, ” A function of dreaming appears to be emotional processing. During dreaming these highly activated areas of the brain communicate in different ways than during waking consciousness, and allow for emotions to be processed differently. Our limbic system speaks in the language of symbolic imagery. Working with dream imagery in the waking state can help change perceptions and resolve conflicts, which are critical keys for mind/body healing.”

Scientific research proves that the amygdala and hypothalamus, are both highly active during dreaming. They have 40 times the opiate and neuropeptide receptors as other parts of the brain. For example, when we positively affect them they in turn can have a positive impact on our immune system. The ancient Greeks called them “prodromal” dreams from the Greek words “pro” meaning before, and “dromos” meaning running. Thus, prodromal dreams can tell us what is going on in our bodies before the symptoms become obvious and readily diagnosable.

PNI, suggests use of interventions that maximize the right brain “limbic logic” in order to stimulate more profound, positive psychophysiologic change. To date, commonly accepted integrative medicine interventions that do this include guided imagery, hypnosis and biofeedback just to name a few. Dream work and healing falls into two categories: Working with and transforming negative dream images, such as those from nightmares, and working with positive and healing dream images. Dream work shows a person how to transform negative images into positive images and that transformed images from nightmares can be used effectively with visualization techniques aimed at pain reduction, treatment and recovery.

The amygdala is all about perception. Positively change your perception = positive change physiologically.

For more information on Dream Work and Healing click here

Categories: Alternative Health, Green Room | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Christmas Parable

StoryThe old man sat in his gas station on a cold Christmas Eve. He hadn’t been anywhere on Christmas Eve in years, since his wife had passed away. It and Christmas Day were just like any day to him. He didn’t hate Christmas, he just couldn’t find a reason to celebrate. He was sitting there looking at the snow that had been falling for the last hour and wondering what it was all about when the door opened and a homeless man stepped through.

Instead of throwing the man out, Old George as he was known by his customers, told the man to come and sit by the heater and warm up. “Thank you, but I don’t mean to intrude,” said the stranger “If you’re busy, I’ll just go.” “Not without something hot in your belly.” George said. He turned and opened a wide mouth Thermos and handed it to the stranger. “It ain’t fancy, but it’s hot and tasty. Stew … made it myself. When you’re done, there’s coffee and it’s fresh.”

Just at that moment he heard the “ding” of the driveway bell. “Excuse me, be right back,” George said. There in the driveway was an old ’53 Chevy. Steam was rolling out of the front. The driver was panicked. “Mister can you help me!” said the driver, with a deep accent. “My car quit and my wife is having baby any minute.”

George opened the hood. It was bad. The block looked cracked from the cold, the car was dead. “You ain’t going anywhere in this thing. Wait here.” George said as he turned away.

“But Mister, please help …” The door of the office closed behind George as he went inside. He went to the office wall and got the keys to his old truck, and went back outside. He walked around the building, opened the garage, started the truck and drove it around to where the couple was waiting. “Here, take my truck,” he said. “She ain’t the best thing you ever looked at, but she runs real good.”

George helped put the woman in the truck and watched as it sped off into the night. He turned and walked back inside the office. “Glad I gave ‘em the truck, their tires were shot too. That ‘ol truck has brand new . . .” George thought he was talking to the stranger, but the man was gone. The thermos was on the desk, empty, with a used coffee cup beside it. Well, at least he got something hot in his belly, George thought.

George went back outside to see if the old Chevy would start. It cranked slowly, but it started. He pulled it into the garage where the truck had been. He thought he would tinker with it for something to do. Christmas Eve meant no customers. He discovered that the block hadn’t cracked, it was just the bottom hose on the radiator. “Well, shoot, I can fix this,” he said to himself. So he put a new hose on.

Those tires ain’t gonna get ‘em through the winter either. He took the snow treads off of his wife’s old Lincoln. They were like new and he wasn’t going to drive the car anyway.

As he was working, he heard shots being fired. He ran outside and beside a police car an officer lay on the cold ground. Bleeding from the left shoulder, the officer moaned, “Please help me.”

George helped the officer inside as he remembered the training he had received in the Army as a medic. He knew the wound needed attention. Pressure to stop the bleeding, he thought. The uniform company had been there that morning and had left clean shop towels. He used those and duct tape to bind the wound. “Hey, they say duct tape can fix anything,” he said, trying to make the policeman feel at ease.

Something for pain, George thought. All he had were the pills he used for his back. These ought to work. He put some water in a cup and gave the policeman the pills. ”You hang in there, I’m going to get you an ambulance.”

The phone was dead. “Maybe I can get one of your buddies on your car radio.” He went out only to find that a bullet had gone into the dashboard destroying the two-way radio.

He went back in to find the policeman sitting up. “Thanks,” said the officer. “You could have left me there. The guy that shot me is still in the area.”

George sat down beside him, “I would never leave an injured man in the Army and I wasn’t going to leave you.” George pulled back the bandage to check for bleeding. ”Looks worse than what it is. Bullet went all the way through. Good thing it missed the important stuff though. I think with time you’re gonna be right as rain.”

George got up and poured a cup of coffee. “How do you take it?” he asked. ”None for me,” said the officer. “Oh, your gonna wanna drink this. Best in the city. Too bad I ain’t got no donuts.” The officer laughed and winced at the same time.

The front door of the office flew open and in burst a young man with a gun. “Give me all your cash! Do it now!” the young man yelled. His hand was shaking and George thought he looked like he’d never done anything like this before.

“That’s the guy that shot me!” exclaimed the officer.

“Son, why are you doing this?” asked George, “You need to put that cannon away. Somebody else might get hurt.”

The young man was confused. “Shut up old man, or I’ll shoot you, too. Now give me the cash!”

The cop started to reach for his gun. “Wait,” George said to the cop.

He turned his attention to the young man. “Son, it’s Christmas Eve. If you need money, well then, here. It ain’t much but it’s all I got. Now put that pee shooter away. ”

George pulled $150 out of his pocket and handed it to the young man, reaching for the barrel of the gun at the same time. The young man released his grip on the gun, fell to his knees and began to cry. “I’m not very good at this, am I. All I wanted was to buy something for my wife and son,” he went on. “I’ve lost my job, my rent is due, my car got repossessed last week .”

George handed the gun to the cop. “Son, we all get in a bit of squeeze now and then. The road gets hard sometimes, but we make it through the best we can.”

He got the young man to his feet, and sat him down on a chair across from the cop. ”Sometimes we do stupid things.” George handed the young man a cup of coffee. “Bein’ stupid is one of the things that makes us human. Comin’ in here with a gun ain’t the answer. Now sit there and get warm and we’ll sort this thing out.”

The young man had stopped crying. With deep regret on his face, he looked over at the cop. “I’m so sorry I shot you. The gun just went off. I’m sorry.”

“Shut up and drink your coffee.” the cop said.

Sirens could be heard approaching, and then the sound of a car skidding to a halt out front. Two cops came through the door, guns drawn. “Chuck! You ok?” one of the cops asked the wounded officer.

“Not bad for a guy who took a bullet. Glad you figured out I needed help.”

“When you didn’t respond to a location check, Dispatch sent us. Who did this?” the other cop asked as he approached, looking at the young man with interest.

Chuck answered him, “I don’t know. The guy ran off into the dark. Just dropped his gun and ran.”

George and the young man looked puzzled at each other.

“That guy work here?” the wounded cop asked George, as he looked him directly in the eye. George understood. “Yep,” George said, “just hired him this morning. Boy lost his job.”

The EMS that had been called arrived and the paramedics loaded Chuck onto a stretcher. The young man leaned over the wounded cop and whispered, “Why?”

Chuck just said, “Merry Christmas boy … and you too, George, and thanks for everything .”

After the others had left, George said to the boy, “Well, looks like you got one doozy of a break there. That ought to solve some of your problems.”

Then he went into the back room and came out with a box. He pulled a ring box out of it. ”Here you go, something for the little woman. I don’t think Martha would mind. She said it would come in handy some day.”

The young man looked inside to see a ring. “I can’t take this,” said the young man. “It means something to you.”

“And now it means something to you,” replied George. “I got my memories. That’s all I need.”

George reached into the box again. An airplane, a car and a truck appeared next. They were toys that the oil company had left for him to sell. ”Here’s something for your little guy too.”

The young man began to cry again as he handed back the $150 that the old man had handed him earlier.

“And what are you supposed to buy Christmas dinner with? You keep that too,” George said, “Now get home to your family.”

The young man turned with tears streaming down his face. “I’ll be here in the morning to work, if that job offer is for real.”

“Nope. I’m closed Christmas day,” George said. “See ya the day after.”

As the door closed behind the boy, George turned around to find that the stranger had returned. “Where’d you come from? I thought you left?”

“I have been here. I have always been here,” said the stranger. “You say you don’t celebrate Christmas. Why?”

“Well, after my wife passed away, I just couldn’t see what all the bother was. Puttin’ up a tree and all seemed a waste of a good pine tree. Bakin’ cookies like I used to with Martha just wasn’t the same by myself and besides I was gettin’ a little chubby.”

LightThe stranger put his hand on George’s shoulder. “But you do celebrate the holiday, George.

“You gave me food and drink and warmed me when I was cold and hungry.

“The woman with child will bear a son and he will become a great doctor.

“The policeman you helped will go on to save 19 people from being killed by terrorists.

“The young man who tried to rob you will make you a rich man and will be like a son to you for the rest of your life.

“That is the spirit of the season and you keep it as well as any man.”

George was taken aback by all this stranger had said. “And you know all this, how?” asked the old man.

“Trust me, George. I have the inside track on this sort of thing. And when your days are done you will be with Martha again.”

The stranger moved toward the door. “If you will excuse me, George, I have to go now. I have to go home where there is a big celebration planned.”

George watched as the old leather jacket and the torn pants that the stranger was wearing turned into a white robe. A golden light began to fill the room.

“You see, George … it’s My birthday. Merry Christmas.”

George fell to his knees and replied, “Happy Birthday, Lord.”

~Author Unknown

Photos By: Larry S Anderson            License: Creative Commons

Categories: Reflections | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

Lifting Up Your Spirit

Here are 5 steps to lift your spirit during the stressful times.

 

1. Take in a breath of fresh air
2. Laugh, it’s medicine for the soul
3. Talk to someone and let it out
4. Pet an animal, they are great healers
5. Look at the beauty of nature around you

Hope you like these…

Photo by:  norrisbaby on Flickr

License:   Creative Commons

Categories: Green Room, Spirit | Tags: , , | Leave a comment

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