Source: Circular Time

The Judea-Christian view of time is that it is linear..therefore, it is consistent with a timeline…and so have created time that has a beginning and an end….This is how Western Europe and America have created their view of sacred ‘spaces or locations’. Their linear time view of the world has an ending,the final resting place or Heaven is where their culture defines Sacred locations…This idea that time has a timeline can best be seen in the Bible…For example, the world seen through traditional Christian eyes includes an interpretation of historic political and social events as the cultural views of history in that it is interpretable as God’s plan, which completes after Revelations and the second coming.

This view of time can have numerous impacts on Earth’s spirituality and land. It can be illustrated by the Western European tradition of colonialism and their need to ‘subdue the earth’. These terms are realized because of the feeling that ‘sacred space’ is elsewhere or in Heaven. This belief of the idea that the current location of Earth is inferior or flawed has led to the industrialization of the world and the new global market far cheap goods.

For traditional Native Americans, they conceive time as being circular similarly to the seasons. This view of time as a circle or a repeating process creates continuous unique outcomes that are infinite in possibilities. The circular view of time, if fully realized can do remarkable things to our modern concepts of time. For Example, a belief in continual or infinite time creates a calm refreshing feeling of ‘having time’. The opposite view could be epitomized by a man running to the subway station to catch a train. Alternatively, the idea of ‘Indian Time’, which is ever repeating, has quite interesting effects on the concept of location or space. The word space should not be thought of as outer space, but as an entire area that encompasses their life.

Again, this idea of Indian circular time or after a while the loss of ‘feeling’ of time creates unique bonds with Land, which can be seen in Native Americans sacred locations like mountains and lakes. Once, you lose the idea of time and think of location first, the land you live on becomes your life. This land is than passed from generation to generation. As more and more people live and die on the same piece of land without the thought of time- The location start showing patterns and symbols. these patterns and symbols can be seen by long term inhabitants of the land, which allow them to locate themselves within the concept of Nature.

The inherent feeling of connection to everything is felt by the circular thinker because Time has no meaning and location is the only consideration. This connection to space over thousands of generations, creates the spiritual experience in everyday life. These experiences are felt for thousands of generation in the same spot and patterns start emerging. As patterns emerge the characteristics of animals and plant life can be seen as patterns due to the connection to time and the communal understanding of the location.

Source: Universal Intelligence-By Albert Einstein

The harmony of natural law…reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection.

There is something about the universe — an elegant order in the way everything fits and unfolds, an inexplicable beauty in its living patterns, and the mysterious depth and expressiveness of it all — that reminds us of the brilliance we see in the works of great artists, scientists, engineers, and saints.

Christians see a higher intelligence they call God’s plan, or the will of God. Taoists see a higher intelligence they call the Tao, the Way of Nature. Meditative traditions speak of cosmic consciousness. Most indigenous peoples consider all of nature to be intelligent and alive. Scientists speak of natural laws — and some are now researching what they call complex, adaptive systems — systems that respond to the world around them, in ways that look a lot like learning. The whole process of evolution is clearly a learning process, a developing of new variations that work better, or work in new environments. Some people see evolution as the dynamic unfolding Great Story of the Living Universe and consciously celebrate and learn from it.

I bundle all these phenomena into one package and label it “universal intelligence.”

When I’m feeling esoteric, I might describe it something like this: We live in a sea of information, a web of interconnection, a field of what some Buddhists call inter-being — a dynamic state of interactive, resonant existential communion. There are universal patterns, powers and wisdom at the core of our being, and the universe vibrates with our every act and thought. What happens in one place and time is linked to everything else far more intimately than we could ever imagine. Synchronicities and analogs abound. Certain patterns keep cropping up: We see BRANCHES in trees, rivers, roads, fields of study, computer circuitry. We see CYCLES in planets, electrons, food chains, wheels, the flows of water and carbon through the biosphere, and the recycling bin. It is no accident that we use the word VISION to describe perception, imagination, insight and prediction. Patterns like these (branches, cycles, vision, etc.) are alive with useful meaning. At every level, the universe is rich with lessons and resonances as it in-forms itself, intimately co-being and co-evolving, learning and remembering. Intelligence is everywhere. There is information and wisdom here we can tap into. There are flows and textures and energies, resistences and assistances, that we can join and follow, or grow stronger and wiser wrestling with.

I simply assume that there is an order that is larger than us, which has its own logic and direction which we are not in charge of. If this is true, then working against this higher power will demand more effort than working with it, and will generate little, if anything, of lasting value except learning — which is always available — and sometimes catastrophe. This would suggest that we subjugate ourselves to this higher intelligence. However, experience suggests that we can, to a certain degree and with great caution, manipulate this higher intelligence for our own ends — which we do through science and engineering by applying natural laws and through religion by praying. But natural order is complex beyond our capacity to know fully, and if our manipulations are at all arrogant — presumptuous that we know what we’re doing — we will likely end up creating a mess like the Sorcerer’s Apprentice. A third — and, to me, more satisfactory — strategy than total submission or manipulation is to respect, befriend, cooperate with and creatively move in harmony with this infinitely powerful and complex intelligence, to the best of our ability.

Humility is, naturally, an excellent place to begin in our efforts to cooperate with universal intelligence. Humility in this case simply means an honest appreciation of our own limitations and a real respect for the ancient and awesome wisdom of the greater intelligence(s) in which we’re embedded. Humility means starting from a place without arrogance, with flexible certainties, a place of respect, curiosity, wonder and willingness to learn — in every situation we can manage it.

“Letting go” is another part of cooperating with universal intelligence — being unattached to outcome, realizing we’re not in control. Not being in control doesn’t mean that we don’t have a significant role. Indeed, our influence is part of what shapes the unfolding of whatever happens next. But that is influence, and not control — sometimes more, sometimes less, and always participatory, not unilateral. (This also means leaving behind blame and shame and reconceptualizing responsibility as our [or another's] actual role in events in which all of us have roles. Taking responsibility for the past would mean consciously acknowledging that what we did — whatever we did — played a role in what happened. Taking responsibility for the future would mean consciously choosing a role and playing it out as best we can, knowing that we are only one of many players.)

In what I experience as my best times, I feel more like a conduit for a larger, all-inclusive intelligence, or like my life is an active part of something larger that is trying to happen. When I’m in that state of awareness, there is a sense of being guided. It isn’t so much that I’m told what to do in so many words (although that has happened occasionally, too), but rather that I can feel when I’m “on track” or “off track.” It is a gut feeling that what I’m doing is the right thing (or not) at this time. Often it is more than a feeling of “being in the flow,” but an apparently objective fact. Ideas, resources, opportunities, and other openings inexplicably appear in ways that facilitate rapid progress in a particular direction — as if someone or something were clearing the way for me.

Source: Industrial Ecology

Industrial ecology had its roots in the insight that industrial systems parallel natural ones in many ways: the streams of manufactured stuff running between companies, extracted from the earth and emitted in new combinations can be measured in terms of inputs and outputs regulated by a metabolism of sorts. In this sense industry, too, can be seen as a kind of ecosystem, one that has profound effects on every other ecological system. The field includes topics as diverse as estimating CO2 emissions from every industrial process or analyzing the global flow of phosphorous, to how electronic tagging might streamline the recycling of garbage and the ecological consequences of a boom in fancy bathrooms in Denmark.

Industrial ecologists – along with those at the cutting edge of fields like environmental health — as the vanguard of a dawning awareness, one that may well add a crucial missing piece in our collective efforts to protect our planet and its people. Imagine what might happen if the knowledge now sequestered among specialists like industrial ecologists were made available to the rest of us: taught to kids in school, easily accessible on the Web, boiled down into evaluations of the things we buy and do and summarized as we were about to make a purchase.

Whether we are a single consumer, an organization’s purchasing agent, or an executive managing a brand, if we knew the hidden impacts of what we buy, sell, or make with the precision of an industrial ecologist, we could become shapers of a more positive future by making our decisions better align with our values. The methods for making that data known to us all are already in the pipeline. As this vital knowledge arrives in our hands we will enter an era of radical transparency.

Radical transparency converts the chains that link every product and its multiple impacts — carbon footprints, chemicals of concern, treatment of workers and the like — into systematic forces that count in sales. Radical transparency leverages a coming generation of tech applications, where software manipulates massive collections of data and displays it as a simple read-out for making decisions. Once we know the true impacts of our shopping choices, we can use that information to accelerate incremental changes for the better.

Source: Hermit Musings (author)

Scientific research discoveries often fascinate me; they can get me to meditating upon our world and how it came to be. It often leads me to speculation about the message. Of course, the species that the majority of scientific studies focus on, and is endlessly fascinating, is us: Homo sapient.

A recent example: the results of a British study identified a key region of our brain which encourages us to be adventurous creatures. It seems as if we humans are sometimes inclined to go after an unfamiliar option—rather than choose a habitual one—particularly when we sense the reward might be greater. Our life may sometimes seem as if we generally trudge the old, familiar path, day after day, following the same safe steps we’ve taken many times before. But if a new, unknown path presents itself one day, we can feel an urge to check it out.

The British researchers say that this propensity for taking a risk may have provided us with an evolutionary advantage over competing species. Those of our ancestors who were willing to take the chance to explore new territory may have been rewarded with a more beneficial environment or found a new and more nutritious food source. They prospered and passed those inquisitive genes on. (Of course, some made bad choices and perished, but we don’t know about them.)

Several million years ago, when our hominid ancestors were forced down out of the tropical trees by a changing climate (which killed off many of those trees), an adventurous spirit helped us to adapt better than our cousins who timidly clung to the few remaining trees. (Chimpanzees are still up there.) When living conditions in various parts of the pre-industrial world became wretched a couple of centuries ago, an adventurous few folks struggled to reach America. Many of them prospered. (And isn’t that what drives oppressed folks from Latin America to brave the hostile unknown and attempt to migrate to the US today?)

The British researchers found that when we choose the untried, take that risk, and find a prize awaiting us for our gamble, we are also rewarded by a release of pleasant neurotransmitters such as dopamine. This can create a feedback process that makes us desire even more. The scientists feel that this can explain why re-branding of familiar products keeps consumers coming back for more.

Evolutionary advantages, however, can sometimes be a double-edged sword. A particular trait that provides an advantage—in the way of making a species more fit—can sometimes lead to too much success. Locusts, finding a plentiful food supply, will exponentially increase their numbers until the source is gone and their population crashes. Has Homo sapient become so successful that we are overrunning the earth, crowding into every niche, bloating our numbers to the point that we’ve become unsustainable—and about to cause our own crash? Is our propensity for adventurousness gotten us into a dangerous runaway situation? Can we learn to find a balance between our dangerous adventurousness and stagnancy?

Source: Flow Therapy

Water is the basis of all life and that includes your body.About 75% of the body is water. The blood fluid, of a person weighing 150 pounds has about 10 lbs or 5 qts of water and is 92% water; red blood cells = 65% water, white blood cells = 70% , general body cells – 80% , protoplasm = 75% , saliva (about 3 pts, daily) = 99%, gastric juice (1-2 quarts daily) = 99%, skin perspiration (1-5 pts. daily) = 99%. lungs use up to one quart; kidneys use 1-2 quarts,; brain is 85% water, nerves 75%, heart=75%, lungs 75%, liver 70%, kidneys = 80%.

Water is the body’s solvent; it is the medium of all chemical activities in the body, which are many. Water is the medium of exchange of all life-giving supplies from one point to another until they reach the cells , and of all wastes from one point to another until they are removed by excretion. Without water, the blood could not move.

Water is the lubricant of all moving parts. It is the regulator of body temperature. The body cells are “water-cooled!” Violent exercise continued for 26 minutes would generate enough heat to coagulate the albuminous substances in the body–similar to cooking the white of an egg– unless this heat were promptly released. The cells are surrounded by water and thus are “water–cooled!”

When there is there is a deficiency of water, the process of elimination will continue, but to do so the blood and tissues will be robbed of some of their water content. This will hinder their normal procedures. If this continues, it may lower blood pressure; headaches , tiredness, and other conditions may result. Constipation may develop. Kidneys , lungs and pores will be hindered in eliminating waste from the body and so the wastes will accumulate all the way back to each cell, and the inside of the body becomes like a stagnated pool.

If one loses all of the stored glycogen (blood sugar) , all of the reserve fat, and even half the body protein, the life is not in danger, but 10% of the body’s water is serious, and a loss of 20-22% of the body’s water is fatal. A person deprived of water will die in 60 to 80 hours.

Psychologically, in going with the flow you strive to always be like water and remembering that water is gentle, and yet it is powerful.It can be still or in motion.It can absorb.It can go over, under, around, and through things.It can dissolve things, float them, or float atop them.It can become hot, cold, heavy, light, invisible, and solid—it can even vaporize.It is formless, and it can adapt to any container.

To be sure, going with the flow of water is embedded deep in our nature. It’s about interrelating with life at the highest possible level and putting our attention on those things that fuel our deepest Self in a world that is ever-changing.