G.W. meets D.L.

So, Congress and George W. will meet with the Dali Lama come hell or high water or a huge objection from China. How do great powers, mostly led by old men, get off on pretending they did not do away with a sovereign nation? We did it most recently with Iraq and China did it so long ago with Tibet, it feels more like a bumper sticker campaign than a nation with an ancient history and a vibrant culture. Will we launch a bumper sticker campaign for Iraq? Free Iraq with some photo of some antiquity needlessly destroyed or peed on by some American troops in need of entertainment, housed with some priceless artifacts of all of our past?

Can't blame the Dali Lama, I guess. Shaking hands with the devil might be more prudent than pretending he doesn't exist. What does this mean for a born again Christian who sees Buddhisms as anti-heaven, God and Jesus? Maybe G.W. just wants anyway he can come up with to be associated with something popular in this country.

I for one am in awe of the Dali Lama for not wanting to destroy China. He inspires people all over the world. I have to say, looking around, though, we're not doing all that well with his teachings. Wonder what he'll say to G.W. One thing for sure, it won't be, "Way to go buddy."
What I would say to G.W. would probably get bleeped. For now, I'm going to work on staying on the Gandhi side. Got any suggestions?

Doris Lesing Is Less than Impressed with Nobel Prize

Can't say that I'm not jealous. Someone could at least try to get my novel published. I gave up trying to get an agent and am writing a second tome, but at 88 Doris has been published for dozens of years. She says she got all the prizes and now kind of expects this one.

Seems like this is the way our global culture works. A lot for the few. She didn't even seem impressed with the 1.5 million dollars the prize would bring her. Said she could imagine all the letters asking for money she would get. I guess even being famous and making it to 88 doesn't necessarily mean she has become a mature adult as David Korten explains. http://www.thegreatturning.net/WNkorten.php One who sees their connection to all of creation and is fulfilled by sharing. Still I have to admire her disinterest in the publicity.

How are we ever going to make the Great Turning toward the world we want to live in?

Even Gandhi

"If I did not feel the presence of God within me, since I see so much of misery and disappointment every day, I would be a raving maniac." Gandhi, 1925.

Gandhi did such amazing work and he did it in the context of creating community. That is a life-long desire of mine. I'm beginning to see that we are all connected, all of creation, there is no real separation. It is expressed in the phrase "There is only One." That concept really keeps things clear.

Your spiritual presence is what we all need. We could start sharing with each other our individual connections to the divine however each one of us experiences that.

Make life a sacred sharing of laughter,stories of how we see spirit and how we are love in the world. I'm not talking about getting serious, just talking about directing our conversation through our sacred selves.

I woke up feeling disconnected today with my sense of direction skewed, but after centering my thought in "There is Only One," my peace returned and I am ready to discover the adventure of this day. Jude for Neighborhood UniverseCity.

Of Meteorites and Privately Owned Federal Reserve Banks

What I feel today after a week-end of watching the Zeitgeist Movie
and contemplating what might be happening at the meteor strike site in the mountains of Peru, I am thrown back to remembering my connection to everything through the one great god glue that holds us all together. It's not a concept or a dogma, just an inner knowing that communes and adores the love that created all of this, 13.7 billion years of galaxies, and a Universe that with the birth of humans can now be self-reflective. Humm. So that's what I'm here for, to see and be amazed and sing the praises of this beauty that wants to know itself so much, that she has risked the horror of humans. Oh what a blessing we could be. Movie makers, who are the self-consciousness of the Universe. Check out the work of physicist Brian Swimme .

What am I here for? To see the beauty of the Universe and praise. To speak the truth in love and rejoice at the freedom of living outside the "Spin." It's hard to know what the truth is in the swirl of so much mis-leading talk, talk talk. But deeper down in the recesses of what we have always know there is a part of each person that recognizes the ultimate truth of things. For now that is what I'm listening to. My ear to the ground my head in the clouds, my nose to the wind, I'm ready to know the TRUTH. Check out Neighborhood UniverseCity.

Thanks for listening. Jude

Thoughts

This quote came to me in a email today, which is why we don't have teachers at Neighborhood UniverseCity, but instead we have collaborators.

I have been asked many questions in my life about poetry, religion, life, and I have given precisely the same number of answers, but I have never, I repeat never, satisfied a single interlocutor. Why? Because all questioning is a way of avoiding the real answer, which Zen tells us, is really known already. Everyone is enlightened, but wishes they weren't. We all know we must love our enemies, and sell all we have and give to the poor, but we don't wish to know it. So we asks questions.
- R.H. Blyth

Collaborators participate in the learning, are learners themselves, not experts as if they held the keys, not everyone who attends. It's almost feels anti-American to refuse the idea of experts and embrace the notion that we all carry a rich enlightenment that only needs to come to our conscious mind.

I have found two other notions that keep me dis-empowered and fearful. One is that there is not enough to go around; two that I am separate and isolated. I don't believe either of those things, but they are very prevalent in western culture and have been re-enforced by the negative way that I see what happens around me.

When I stay conscious I know that my thoughts don't jive with my deep beliefs and I change my thought. Which takes me to the power of thought for creation. I don't know what the experts say, but in my experience what I think I'll get is what I get. It's that simple. I am a creator, born from an ever expanding creative Universe and I create with my thoughts. For me that means watching my thoughts and changing thoughts that are not consistent with what I know is true.

HOW'S THAT FOR A THOUGHT OF THE DAY? Later, Jude

Empowerment

President Bush and our military leaders want to keep risking so many of our children that it boggles the imagination. What kind of nation has killing as it's main foreign policy. Our children are the children of Iraq as well as American sons and daughters sent to kill.
What happens when our leaders pretend to listen, but are so severely corrupt that they can no longer hear our voices is that we begin to feel helpless. Lies and fear are the tactics, depression and despair are the results.
A big goal of Neighborhood UniverseCity is to empower each other with knowledge, passion and faith in ourselves and in the power of the Universe. We need to see the lies, but beyond that we need to know what gives us power to create the world we want to live in. Our dreams teach us in a universal language, indigenous groups maintain knowledge, methods and wisdom that can show us how to live in harmony, and thousands of people are beginning to learn how to cooperate with each other, the earth and all of creation.
The single most empowering message is that we are not alone, nor are we poor and powerless.
We are connected, full of creativity and power. Let our reconciliation with the rest of creation begin. Take heart. Jude from www.neighborhooduniversecity.com

COURSES ARE STARTING

Please go to www.neighborhooduniversecity.com

Check out the schedule, Bios of the Collaborators, Courses offered, etc.
We're launching in a big way this Fall. There are two sessions and some
amazing subjects. See you in class.

It's Happening

Developing NUC has taken longer than I hoped, but still it is happening. By Sept. 15th or sooner we should have classes in Salida and by January we hope to have them on-line. This month I'm developing all the background information, gathering and training finding good space, and signing up learners. Stay tuned.

New Ideas

Our ideas are flowing. We want to be a community, a place where people live, love, create nurturing work and keep on learning. Haven't heard much from out there. Would love ideas, comments, support, anything constructive.

More to come soon. Keep the love flowing.

Jude

UnFolding

Like life, this concept is unfolding. We would love to hear your suggestions and ideas. For now we will not be offering more classes until the Fall. Stay tuned. Summer is a time for communion with creation, at least it is in these beautiful Colorado mountains.

I'm running a movie theater learning the other end of film. Believe me, small theaters are heroic in what they accomplish. It's nothing like the audio visual stuff we got in school. The projectors are floor to ceiling and are hooked up to some Platters that are about 5 feet in diameter. It's been challenging. All of life is a classroom, but this has been a challenging as graduate school at least for the first month.

For now I'll leave you with this Rumi quote: Feel yourself being quietly drawn by the deeper pull of what you truly love.
- Jelaluddin Rumi

Jude

Opening Neighborhood Universe City

Some classes we hope to offer this summer are:

SAVING THE WORLD WITH MUSHROOMS

BUILDING FOR LIFE: Building a Home in Harmony with the rest of Creation.

RUMI AND THE MYSTICS: Ancient Instruction for a Living Community.

INTRO. TO PERMACULTURE: Cooperation with Creation.

GREEN GOVERNANCE: Rights for All of us, not Just Humans.

POETRY AND THE COSMOS: Why Poets are Killed and Imprisoned in Revolutions.

SACRED FILM MAKING 101: Overview of Our most Powerful Cultural means of Storytelling.