Crop Circle Documentary

Dear Friends,

I thoroughly recommend this award-winning Crop Circle documentary from Friend of The Aetherius Society, Suzanne Taylor. To watch the trailer, click on What on Earth?

If you have been skeptical about this topic, now is the time to take a second look. For those who are already intrigued, allow yourself to be further inspired by this awesome phenomenon taking place upon our planet.

You may also like to sign up for Suzanne’s blog by joining www.TheConversation.org

KS&L 307 The Best Gift

There is really only one gift that keeps on giving and that gift is love. Love is the ultimate gift on every level that embraces the physical, the mental, the emotional and the spiritual aspects of life itself. Without love, life for mortal people could not exist.

Love is an energy that embraces you in a thousand ways, in a thousand situations. Every person will describe love differently. It’s what we all want, it’s what we all seek but it is not what we all know how to give. Some people give love the way it was given to them – which may have been limited. Some people just open up their whole heart to everyone, even though this may not be what was given to them. It’s just who they are.

Love is the gift you give yourself because you can see your own goodness in the warm and loving ways that people react to you. Love is the way you care for your body; love is the way you see your body and enjoy the body you came in with. The more you love yourself and your body, the better body, the healthier body you will have for a very long time. The length of mortal life does not measure a person’s ‘long time, or long life’. The length of mortal life is measured by the length and breadth of that person’s soul evolution. Long life does not mean a person is well evolved. Long life means that a person has a long mortal contract this particular lifetime in which to learn greater and greater lessons of love.

Love is an energy that lives within you. The more you love, the more you will find yourself surrounded by loving people, people who are just like you in the way you love. Your resonance with all the Divine aspects of love will attract other people who are also in resonance with those same Divine aspects. What is a Divine aspect of love? A Divine aspect of love is a feeling of goodness you get when you are with that person, a feeling of unselfishness, of caring, of giving. It is also a feeling of non-judgment. When you are with other loving people, you can see how hard they try, how much they love not just you, but how much they love other people in their life. Being with that person makes you feel happy inside, hopeful. That person may be quite different from you and yet their core qualities are the same as yours: warmth and love.

Love is the pleasure that you find when a special friend knocks at your door, you hear her voice on the phone or he embraces you. Love is a combination of all the little bits and pieces of information, knowledge, hope and insight that every single person brings to you. Every person has a gift for you, no matter how small it may seem. Sometimes that gift can be the opportunity that person has to teach you and sometimes you give the gift of your own knowledge, lovingly shared with them.

Adversity visits all of us, not as a hardship so much as again, an opportunity to learn a new facet of love. Sometimes, you just need to learn what love isn’t, and why certain actions are not what anyone would call love. Some of our greatest lessons arise out of overcoming adversity. If this were not true, why would we even have a mortal life at all? Mortal life is a schoolhouse of opportunities to learn every single facet of what love is and isn’t. The more you learn, the more you evolve.

An evolved person loves everyone around them and unconsciously surrounds themselves with loving persons – it is just who they have become. An evolved person loves people and sees the perfection in each person’s path. Each new person is a new gift of friendship, possibly shared experience and hope. Old friends, new friends, precious family members offer some of the greatest gifts one person can ever have. Loving people, are the best gifts to have on your birthday, on Christmas day, and on every day of your life.

KS&L 87/88 Holiday Service

The holidays are a great time - so we think. The truth is, most people who do the lion’s share of getting ready for the holidays are frequently overwhelmed with the volume of work that is required to get it all done. The regular schedule of day-to-day responsibilities is magnified with the endless list of extras.

We are also overwhelmed with the concept of the neediness of so many people. Someone's child is sick, someone's relative is dying or has died, it is the anniversary of a death for another person. The homeless shelter needs volunteers, your church is doing charity work and your office has adopted a family to give to at Christmas. Some people are irritable and angry in November and December and we dread living through this time with them. So with all that comes up in this window of time, we quietly ask ourselves: Is it really worth it? Is it really worth the volume of energy to get ready for Christmas or Hanukkah?

The answer is more complicated than we think. The answer may center on our concepts of service. What is service?

Service is frequently giving money, time or effort to someone in need. It is the giving of ourselves. This is easy to recognize.

However, there are other types of service that we would be wise to honor, namely the service of getting any type of celebration together. It isn't just this time of year; it can be any time of the year.

The neighbor who decorates for Halloween, the mom who never misses making the favorite birthday cake, the welcome home celebration for a service member, the delight of a Valentine's dinner or a 4th of July cookout. The Thanksgiving Dinner with a cast of thousands is a tremendous service as well. Few people appreciate the volume of planning that goes into feeding all those people, plus the decorations that accompany the food, the candles, the greens and the creative effort all create the atmosphere for any celebration. All these things are service - these creative efforts of love made visible are also spiritual service.

How do we view the volume of effort required for Christmas and Hanukkah?

December is a challenge because there seems to be so much for everyone to do:
• Shop for gifts, wrap presents
• Plan meals
• Grocery shop
• Decorate the house
• Plan parties
• Grocery shop
• Do the holiday cards, buy the stamps, write the yearly letter, collate and mail.
• Help out at school, church and/or office parties
• Grocery shop
• Make the list of food gifts to give
• Grocery shop
• Make all the food, do the baking, package the items
• Mail things

This modest, very incomplete list above usually falls to women who think they have to do it all. Getting your family members to help will reduce some stress and let everyone have the opportunity of doing service. This can be as simple as making the list and letting them make the grocery runs and some of the dinners so that you can do the extras.

The real service is in the patience of doing the mundane, day-to-day things of getting ready. People love a house filled with the smells of the holidays. If your holidays were horrific growing up, mitigate the past sadness by making the present something warmly memorable.

It is so wonderful to come home to a house beautifully decorated with bright candles and wonderful food. The element of the house and the food are tremendous service to all family members.

What makes it difficult for the person doing the planning, cooking, shopping and decorating is that people take their efforts for granted. It just looks so easy. Family members frequently don’t seem grateful for what has been done because you always do it. They are not callous or unkind; it is just that your excellent work is normal to them. Your service is transparent to them but transparent or not, it does not change the fact that it is service all the same. Even if family members do not overtly recognize it, it is appreciated on some level. You earn the karma for your efforts because you are creating the memories that they will treasure and emulate. You are teaching them what a warm holiday looks and feels like, and that lesson changes the future. That is the purpose of this work, the reason for this effort: creating a pattern of love, hard work and togetherness. This is part of the element of what makes the holidays an important example of spiritual service.

KS&L 17 Christmas Time and Holiday Visits

The holiday program is about to run. No matter what your faith or belief system, somehow, all the glitter in western culture at this time of the year sparks lots of old memories and accelerates emotional "stuff". Actually, it starts at Thanksgiving and goes through New Years.

The Feng Shui effect of using bright and shiny things to stir up and circulate energy usually throws all of us off balance because there is so much of it, everywhere we go. Remember the feeling when you finally take those decorations down, Whew! Things are so much calmer now! So, all those sparkly lights and bright decorations and root chakra [red] colors really awaken old memories and can accelerate our issues. This is also why so many people feel extra tired and burdened this time of year – yes, there’s lots to do, but even more than that, there is tremendous extra energy circulating everywhere you turn.

So, its beautiful, fun exciting – what’s the problem? No problem really, just an awareness of what is happening on a subtle level. This means that it is a good idea to be EXTRA mindful of what is said, or how something is heard. Extra sensitivity to yourself and others will help this be a great time. Which brings us to holiday visits. People are stressed. Travel less if you can. People are tired, stay in hotels if a relative is elderly and/or is not used to a houseful of people. Shorten a visit or do not visit a person who the rest of the year is pretty prickly and at this time of the year is a walking cactus.

Colds and flu and general malaise seem to hit people in December especially hard. These are old griefs, unspent or unreleased emotions manifesting in the physical body. Have extra rest. Have extra fun – go to the movies and enjoy yourself. Shop without having to buy something. Rest. Love one another.

Karmically what is happening? Just a great opportunity to be very mindful of what is coming up for us. Remember the past with an eye for appreciating the experience, not grieving the event. Take a different look at what occurred so long ago and how different you are now – see how you have grown.

Know that you are doing so much better on so many levels. As you go through the present, decide how you can make this month a wonderful time for yourself and those around you – which subtly changes karma in a positive way. Perhaps the best gift any of us can receive this year is the fact that day by day, in every way we really are getting better and better and better.

KS&L 182 The Gift of Food is Love in Action

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November and December are the months for food. Not just a little, but lots and lots of all types of food. These are the months when we make things we don’t make the rest of the year, when we experiment with new recipes, try new foods, buy more than we think we should and spend a lot of time at the grocery store.

No matter what your spiritual belief is, Jewish, Christian, Moslem, Hindu, in these months in the Western world, food is among the many things at the forefront of your thoughts.

Frankly, food is one of the most basic, elementary and precious gifts one person gives to another and this is absolutely a universal gift. All occasions are marked with food. In certain cultures only certain foods can be eaten at certain occasions. Some cultures fast - a denial of food - and then when they can eat again, it is not just a little food, it is a feast.

Food at the most basic level represents wealth and prosperity. In Feng Shui, one of the most important cures involves doubling the illusion of your cooking burners on your stove from the standard four to eight, using mirrors. The more burners, the more food can be prepared and shared.

One of the ways that specifically Hanukah and Christmas, Easter and birthdays are celebrated is food. The use of special foods, foods that symbolize culture, tradition and family heritage are prized, cherished. Recipes are handed down, from one generation to the other, each cook placing his or her own variation on that theme. Thanksgiving is only about food and the gratitude of actually having food.

So perhaps it is important to take just a brief moment and ponder how precious food is to us all. Food is not just for nourishment- providing the fuel to enable all the cells of the body to fire, to enable our heart to pump and our legs to move and our mind to function, food is essential to our emotional well being. That is why some foods - like macaroni and cheese, cheesecake and brownies - are just comfort food. They may or may not be good for us; it doesn’t really matter, at some level, they provide emotional nourishment beyond the physical.

So during the months of November and December as we plan our meals, ponder our recipes, watch the cooking channel and imagine all those amazing foods coming out of our own kitchens, maybe the real lesson of food is the service of giving.

When you cook, you give something of yourself - not just when you shred your fingers grating cheese, but when you think about the process of say, Christmas dinner - as an example. You think about it. You talk to your family asking them what they love, or what would they like. You try to make things that will please everyone. You consider making special things for each person because it means something. Of course you can buy food for a person, which is also a wonderful gift to receive as well, some foods from commercial houses are just wonderful, especially if you cannot be there with the person.

Back to your kitchen; so you study your recipes, and plan the meals or party menu. You shop - mostly repeatedly because some things have to be purchased at the last minute. When you can, you bake ahead you plan, and plan. When you are actually doing the cooking, you are focused on producing the most delicious food possible. That positive focus is positive energy and you give the food you are preparing positive energy. Remember: if you are angry don’t cook. People will taste it on a subtle level.

Perhaps you put on happy music as you cook, perhaps a friend or family member is helping you to cook and you are chatting and stirring and tasting. Your kitchen is warm, busy, really messy, and it smells great! This is love in action. Often what you cook, you give away as a gift, perhaps a cake, pie, cookies, soup for an ill neighbor. Cooking is the action of using your energy to create energy for another person out of the materials you have. You can’t just eat flour or spices, but combine them in a million combinations and you have a miracle!

So perhaps long ago, in the middle East another place famous for fantastic food, people also brought food to that manger to help that young couple with a new baby. Perhaps every time we share our food, we bring peace to our homes.

Let there be peace on Earth and let it begin in the kitchen, let it migrate to the dining room table and let happy hearts and friendly smiles warm your home. So over the next several days as you cook yourself silly, smile - you are love in action and that action is truly the gift of service.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukah, Happy Holidays,

Love, Tina