EARTH DAY SHOULD BE AN EVERY DAY OCCURANCE

Last Monday was Earth Day which I suppose was created to encourage attention to the environment.  That's fine except I believe we're missing the point. 

During my spiritual journey get-together last week, we were discussing the environment and how important it is not to just appreciate it but consider nature from a spiritual perspective. 
We are CONNECTED to nature.  We are not separate from it.  EVERYTHING is connected.   Everything is related and I mean that in a literal "family" way.  When you stop and think about the moon, the stars, the earth, the air, the water, the animals as part of your spiritual unity family, you begin to see all this in a different light and sense a deeper responsibility to care for it but more importantly, to love it. 

For millenia, man relied on nature to exist.  Now, we have stores with food and stores with clothes and stores with communication devices and no longer have respect or reverence for what we have or how it was obtained.  If you remember that everything in the universe is part of creation just as you are, you can sense the greater family ties of it all.

For example, a fish isn't just a fish, put here for me to consume.  It's a relative of mine.  I need to care for and nurture it.  The earth isn't just a planet I happen to call home.  It's a part of me.  When you remember that we and everything in the universe is created from the same cosmic STUFF (to quote Carl Sagan) you begin to know this is absolutely true.  Everything is connected; every one and every thing is RELATED. 

I love the custom of the American Indians who, after killing an animal for food or shelter, will thank its spirit for giving itself to help the whole.

It should be in our minds to protect the environment as fervently as we would protect our children. 

I suggest thinking of something you can do today on Earth Day to help protect that to which we are related.  How about Recycling?  That's an easy thing to do and makes an enormous amount of difference. 

 

 

 

FREE AT LAST! FREE AT LAST!

My first job was 48 years ago.  I was a dish washer at my father's restaurant.  I also bussed tables and hostessed from time to time and this was a gratis job.  I got no pay except for the tips the waitresses gave me for cleaning their tables fast and I enjoyed it. 

My first PAYING job was about the same time.  It was babysitting and I hated it.  Seriously, it was tortureous for me.  I didn't like kids, had never spent time around them and had no idea how to deal with them.   This is weird considering how much I adore my kids and my grandkids.  But at age 15, for me, it sucked.

I figure babysitting is probably where I first began to develop the concept that being poor is better than doing something you hate no matter how profitable.  I wonder how many times in my life I've absent-mindedly said, "There's not enough money in the world to get me to.....".    Boy, if I had a nickel for every time I said that......hahahahahahaha!  Unfortunately, I ended up sacrificing my principals worked A LOT of jobs I didn't like.  Some were worse than others but when you're the sole supporter of a family, you do what you gotta do.    

So here it is, 48 years later, age 62 and I'm retiring the end of May.  I don't have a lot of money saved up (BIG understatement there) but I'm doing it anyway.  And the funny thing is, I plan to spend most of my time hanging out with my grandkids.  Life is one big irony, huh?