This blog is updated weekly with a Thought for the Week, an Inspirational Quote and News about Ed P and his pictures. To make sure you don’t miss anything, type in your email address in the Subscribe panel on the right.
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Reflections is almost complete. I just have to do a print out and see how it looks and make a few final adjustments then and it’s ready to go to the printer who will produce photographic prints of it for me.
Thought for the week
So many of us resist change, yet it comes to us whether we like it or not. Life is change in so many ways.
The seasons change constantly.
The weather changes, sometimes within minutes, sometimes it takes weeks.
Our family and friends change. They grow up and grow old. They grow close and grow away.
Plants and gardens change. They bloom and wither, bear fruit and weeds, bring pleasure and work.
The environment changes. Buildings rise up, communities move in and out of areas, the wilderness takes over, the weather patterns change.
Our world is in constant change.
Change of Attitude
One of the ways we can handle change is through a change of attitude. Our attitude is something we can control. We can change our attitude and thereby we can live a happier life. If we can see life as an exciting adventure which is constantly changing, it becomes an exciting life. We don't know what is going to happen next but if we have an attitude of happy anticipation we can greet each change with the confidence that we can handle it. If we can see change as something to be embraced, not something to be avoided, our lives will become happier and more adventurous.
Is there something consistent, something we can depend on, in this storm of change? There is something which stands like a lighthouse against the constant waves of change. This lighthouse is our true selves, Soul. If we can get to know this inner part of ourselves it can be a place of refuge for us, no matter what storms of life rage around us.
Questions of life
For those of us with a busy and ever changing life, the thought of having a Soul or to put it correctly, being Soul, is often way down on our list of priorities. This is natural and is part of the whole objective of our physical life, to keep us distracted so that we don’t seek our true self, Soul. It works very well. Most people spend their lives busy and working to fulfil some goal of physical worth, only to see it crumble to dust when they die.
After several lives we begin to seek something more than just physical goods and attachments. We begin to seek the truth behind life:
How it works,
Why it works,
What is its purpose?
How do we fit into life?
Why are we where we are?
How did it all start?
When we begin to have these thoughts and questions, we change to become a seeker. A seeker of the truth behind life, its purpose and our place in it. We want to learn more about life and our quest for new knowledge leads us to new things, new insights and new changes. We begin to embrace change as we can see that it teaches us something more about life and the Souls we share our life with.
How to reconnect with Soul
To explore these questions, we can try a simple spiritual exercise. Go to a comfortable quite place where you can be at peace for 15 to 20 minutes. Firstly think of a question, it could be from the list above or something personal. Ask your God, guide, guru, angel or master to give you an answer to this question, if it is appropriate for you and for the general good, at this time. Then sing HUuuu on your outgoing breath. This is an ancient name for God. It is used in many cultures and can be found in the word Alleluia, a corruption of Allah and Hu. It is also in the word Human. Hu meaning God, and man meaning mind, so that a human is a combination of God and mind.
So sing HU for a number of minutes or as long as you like and just observe your thoughts as they float around your consciousness. Some thoughts may be of interest and can be explored. When you finish you may have an answer or you may just have a more comfortable feeling that the issue is under control and does not concern you as much any more. It’s a good idea to write down any insights you get while contemplating.
Life is spiritual
We go through life’s changes so that we can learn not to be attached to the physical things we collect in life. These changes teach us that life is spiritual. We are a spiritual being with a changeable human body, living in a changeable world. We seek the unchanging but it is not of this world, it is of our spiritual world. When we realise that the security and unchanging stability we seek in our lives is that lighthouse within us, Soul, life becomes a more enjoyable and enlightening experience.
Wishing you well on your voyage through life and I hope you find your lighthouse soon.
*Ed Parkinson
P.S. The concept for the lighthouse came to as I wrote this Thought for the Week. It is only a rough unfunished picture but I think it illustrates the point reasonably well.
"Life is known only by those who have found a way to be comfortable with change and the unknown. Given the nature of life, there may be no security, but only adventure."
-Rachel Naomi Remen
"It is the eye of ignorance that assigns a fixed and unchangeable colour to every object; beware of this stumbling block."
-Paul Gauguin
"Human beings, by changing the inner attitudes of their minds, can change the outer aspects of their lives."
-William James
"Could we change our attitude, we should not only see life differently, but life itself would come to be different. Life would undergo a change of appearance because we ourselves had undergone a change of attitude."
-Katherine Mansfield
"Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next. Delicious ambiguity."
-Gilda Radner
"We cannot change anything until we accept it. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses."
-Carl Gustav Jung,
"Change the changeable, accept the unchangeable, and remove yourself from the unacceptable."
-Denis Waitley
Last week you saw the couple on the bright side of Reflections, below is the couple on the dark side.
Thought for the Week
Our own experience is our best teacher, in other words, we learn best by experiencing things ourselves. We can be taught about things and told what to expect when certain things happen but until we actually have the experience ourselves we really don't know.
For example, we can be told about the taste of ginger, we can learn how it grows, where it comes from, how to use it, but until we taste it ourselves, we really have no idea of its flavour. We can get excellent instructions from a herbalist, a health practitioner, or a renowned chef. All their instructions cannot give us the taste of ginger. Only when we experience it ourselves can we truly know how it tastes.
When we move this thinking on to spiritual things the same rule applies. We can get lots of guidance and advice from teachers, priests, sages, masters and gurus, but until we have the experience of whatever they are teaching us, we are really not going to know what they are talking about. Some of these teachers haven't experienced the subject they teach and are just passing on information they've read. We can listen to teachers and get some idea of the point being discussed but there is no way we can experience it through their words.
We could be discussing out of body travel, with one person explaining their experience of an accident where they left their body and another using their daydreaming experience as a comparison. Both are real spiritual experiences but one is likely to be dramatic and the other quiet natural. One could be a life changing event, the other a regular part of daily life.
The thing to be aware of is that we are having spiritual experiences all the time. We are constantly using our inner selves to manage and survive in our physical lives. The reason we have a physical life is to discover our spiritual life. By experiencing life and all it has to offer we eventually come to the realisation that love is the key to a happier life. When we’ve spent enough time with hate, power, greed and violence we begin to realise they do not make us happy. The promise of happiness through using them is false.
When we daydream we are going within ourselves to explore. That is, we have gone to a different place other than our physical location using our imagination. This is a spiritual experience.
When we dream we are operating in our dream worlds, another spiritual world.
Coincidences, synchronicity and convenient accidents all point to another power or influence in our lives. Could these events be manipulated by spirit?
All these are evidence that we have a spiritual life. They are all part of daily life too, we just need to stop and take note of them. If we can build up an awareness of them we will begin to slip into the flow of life. We will be able to see the messages and signals from our inner selves in our physical world.
By opening our awareness to these spiritual elements we become conscious of our spiritual experiences. We can begin to consciously have our own experiences and learn what we need to know to have a happy and fruitful life. The key is to learn from these experiences. Learn the reason for our life, learn to be happy and learn about love.
Lots of Love
*Ed Parkinson
St. Stephen’s Green
The People’s Art exhibition on St. Stephen’s Green, in Dublin, was an interesting event. Normally there about 150 to 170 artists showing their work. At this event there were over 300. For the first time there were a large number of artists on the South side of the Green, which is usually empty.
I can see what I think
One of the big thrills for me was when Avtar, after spending some time looking at my pictures, said “What I think I can't see, but now that I see your pictures I can see what I think. I can see the spiritual side of my life.” This is the reason I create my art. Our life is spiritual but many of us can’t see that because we are caught up in our daily fight for survival. If you can catch sight of the spiritual side of you life through one of my pictures, then it was well worth my while creating it.
Avtar, a Seik, was with his wife, Rani, a Muslim. This mixed religion marriage is bit like a Catholic being married to a Protestant, similar faiths but the extremists of either religion often cause death and destruction in the name of their beliefs. It was nice to meet a couple who were still happy and in love, after many years of marriage regardless of their different beliefs.
The Leeson Street entrance to St. Stephen’s Green, showing the busy South side on the left and East side on the right.
“Experience is that marvellous thing that enables you to recognize a mistake when you make it again.”
Franklin P. Jones
“The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science.”
Albert Einstein
“Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.”
Oscar Wilde
“Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.”
Douglas Adams
“Men are wise in proportion, not to their experience, but to their capacity for experience.”
James Boswell
“Nothing is a waste of time if you use the experience wisely.”
Rodin
“Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson afterwards.”
Vernon Sanders Law
“You cannot acquire experience by making experiments. You cannot create experience. You must undergo it.”
Albert Camus
“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do.”
Eleanor Roosevelt
“Don't be discouraged by a failure. It can be a positive experience. Failure is, in a sense, the highway to success, inasmuch as every discovery of what is false leads us to seek earnestly after what is true, and every fresh experience points out some form of error which we shall afterwards carefully avoid.”
John Keats
“Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure.”
Helen Keller
“Every time we remember to say "thank you," we experience nothing less than heaven on earth.”
Sarah Ban Breathnach
“I am convinced that life in a physical body is meant to be an ecstatic experience.”
Shakti Gawain
“With every experience, you alone are painting your own canvas, thought by thought, choice by choice.”
Oprah Winfrey
“Truth is what stands the test of experience.”
Albert Einstein
Here’s an interesting detail within Reflections, which I’m still working on, at the moment.
Thought for the Week
Sleep on it, is an old saying which we apply to a problem or situation, which we can't easily find a solution for. Most people think it is a just a figure of speech, but there is wisdom in it. It doesn't matter what kind of a challenge we have, sleeping on it, is one of the great problem solving exercises.
How does it work?
When we sleep we relax. Our physical body shuts down but our inner bodies continue to work and be active. In fact they work a lot better because now they don't have the distraction of dealing with the physical world. We, as Soul, can now focus on our inner life. We can do lots of things like, be present at major events, visit and meet significant people, family and friends, go to places around the world and to other worlds, and we can even fly, if we wish.
How to work it
Before you go to sleep ask for an answer to a particular situation or problem. Then leave it at that and go to sleep. In the morning, just as you wake up, watch your thoughts. What are your thoughts about? There may be a variety of things floating into your consciousness as you awaken. Check what your thoughts are on the question you asked about. Do you have any ideas related to that?
Don't just hop out of bed. Take time to observe your thoughts and record them into your memory. Once you have a good grasp of them, get out of bed. It is a good idea to write these thoughts into a dream or sleep journal so that you will recall them later. The act of writing will further embed the ideas into your memory and you may recall other details as you write.
Using the problem solving exercises
While writing this article I came to a piece which I couldn't find the words for. Putting the 'Sleep on it' problem solving exercise into practice, I did just that. The next morning there were no enlightening thoughts to help me write a better article but as I sat down to go over the article, a number of ideas about where to get information to develop the article, came to mind.
This is an example of how our inner selves work while we sleep. The insight to go to different sources to check for information would have been suggested to me while sleeping. Then while working on the article, the related insight comes to mind. The insight wasn’t available when I woke up because it wasn’t related to me getting out of bed. When I went to write, the insight came to mind and I was able to use it. The results of the ‘sleep on it’ exercises can be quite subtle but they work.
Learn while we sleep
We can also learn while we sleep. If we have had a restless nights sleep, it may be caused by our apprehension about something happening the next day. This can often be because you are preparing yourself for the event or task. As we are working on a task that relates to the physical world, we will spend your sleep time closer to the physical. When we sleep soundly we generally go deep into our inner worlds, far away from the physical. If we are learning something to do with our physical, it needs to be placed into our memory and we have to be somewhat awake to do that. This causes our restlessness while we sleep.
If you are having a restless night and you have ideas coming to you, it may be a good idea to write the ideas or insights down. Many people use a sleep journal or a dream journal to harvest the inspiration coming from their inner worlds. The act of writing it down will do a few things:
It will capture the idea in a solid physical form,
It will signal to the mind that the idea is now available for use when we wake up,
It will relive our memory which doesn’t have to try to remember the ideas,
All of this can help calm the mind and allow you to sleep better.
Contemplation
Contemplation is another method of finding new ideas to challenges. It's a more conscious way of connecting with our inner worlds. Because we are more conscious we can remember the new ideas easier, we can even take notes if we wish during our contemplation. There's more information on contemplation in this article.
Wishing you sweet dreams and inspirational insights with these problem solving exercises.
*Ed Parkinson
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