Death is coming

The closer death creeps up upon me the less I am able to understand the reasons for life or living.

Yes I have experienced a close family member dying and unlike television it takes decades to handle such a thing. To think I am going to put my family through such a thing when I finally leave is more horrific to me than the thought of death itself.

My life was and is still a learning experience but when all said and done what am I to do with all this accumulated learning over my lifetime if I just die. There is no logic or reason to this.

Long ago I became aware that the God story that is sold to the majority is just a nice story to give mankind with a message of a basic layout of how nice life could be if everyone followed these ideas. Not many in life do and if one thinks about it the good and evil structures actually depend on each other. The good that can be experienced in life is only understood as good when there is it's opposite to compare it to. This is not rocket science only common sense in reality. I am not saying we need to experience bad but understanding in it is needed to appreciate the great things many of us can have in our lives. From birth to death there are many ways mankind helps his fellow man. How many ways can you help?


Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Astral Travel Or Astral Projection

By Conran Beecham

Astral travel is very interesting and more important concept. It is a complicated form of out of body experiences, researchers say. Definition shows, while astral travel or astral projection occurs, our astral body or spirits leaves physical body and wander anywhere in the universe seeking information. Once it completed mission, safely re enter to physical body and resume common bodily activities.

This phenomenon got wide attention because of religious supports from long back. In religious terms it knows as spiritual walking. However this phenomenon got enough scientific evidence today. Astral travel normally occurs when a body is about to death. Human soul will leave body and look down upon it when the physicians trying hard to save body.

Being a beautiful art it has been practiced among various religious people and the techniques are introduced to practice it consciously when ever they desire to do. Later their followers gave up the practice of that wonderful art and gradually numbers of people who can do the art is reduced.

Being a skill you too can practice astral travel. You need to set up a mental condition in which your astral body can leave physical body and come back after spiritual walking. But very first you need to set up a controllable subconscious mind. That is you should be able to direct your thoughts of sub conscious mind in a way your conscious mind desires.

You may also practice astral projection; you need not to have extraordinary skills to do so. Once you gained control over your both conscious and sub conscious minds and improve your concentration power, it is an easily achievable task. Calm and quite space is crucial for astral projection. Find out an ideal place for mediations that free from all external distraction diverts your mind. Spiritual or psychic activities do not occur in disturbed state of mind.

Once you have good mindset and focus, 50 % of the job has done. You need not to be worried about retaining of your soul back to your physical body. You have full control over your body and spirit while it wanders universe. Next step is concentration to attain the stage.

How to practice astral travel and enjoy out of body experience? Choose a place which can give you perfect calm and make sure that there is nothing to disturb you such sounds which distracts your concentration and deviate your attention. Better to close all light sources to your room. Lay flat on your bed looking up and lay your hands on both sides.

Close your eyes and take a deep breath. Fresh up your mind and convince it that your astral body is leaving your physical body. Gradually you will a kind of connectedness to darkness which surrounded you. You will feel certain images are flashing before your eyes. Focus on one of those images and brush aside rest. Tell your body your soul is about to leave. You may feel a kind of shivering. Don't over exited or try to stop it. Encourage it and keep on your focus on that objects before your eyes.

Don't get frustrated after your failed attempts. It is only possible slowly. Write down your experience in dream journal and understand improvement and hope for the best next time.

About the Author:

People Above 50 Years Of Age Turn Out To Be Happier Than Younger Ones

By Mitch Perril

You will be amazed to discover that life doesn't end after middle age any more. In fact the studies are indicated that the reverse is true. When you get to that age, scientists say, you may actually be happier than when you were younger. It's incredible, but it's true.

One survey in particular compared groups of people based on their sense of well-being. The study compared more than 300,000 people in the US and matched them up based on things like whether they were married or not, or whether they had kids or a job. Then it asked them a bunch of other questions. Well, it turns out that state of mind varies by age.

While things like worries tended to remain the same regardless of age, other qualities changes wildly over time. Stress and anger in particular went down over time.

Another emotion, sadness, also went down after age 50, though the patter didn't change a whole lot. In general, though, happiness tended to decline until the age of 50, after which point it seemed to increase.

The ladies had a slightly different experience. That went from higher stress levels and worries and sadness, but they also went to the happier place after the age of 50. The patterns tended to be equal across the genders which makes the genders equal no matter what the people have to say.

One of the things that the study really puts a lead pin inside of is the notion that you really have to examine your feelings, whether it is sadness, happiness, worry or stress. Also you might be happier for some reasons.

Researchers indicate that perhaps old folks know better how to keep themselves in check when it comes to the emotions that they have and use. Others who are not so smart, do not, and that is why they fail.

The end point comes down as a thick wall of satisfaction for the old folks. They know where they are and how to be happier for it. They don't sit around cursing the dark, but rather, they light a candle.

Of course, nothing is so simple. We cannot confirm or deny that happiness starts at 50.

About the Author:

Sunday, August 8, 2010

History Of The Spiritual Use Of Mushrooms

By Dr. Markho Rafael

People have used mushrooms as spiritual tools for at least 7,000 years. Thats the age of the oldest preserved records, cave paintings left by the historic San Peoples in Tassili of southeast Algeria. Images depict what has been interpreted as masked, dancing medicine men holding mushrooms in their hand; presumably of the awareness altering variety.

Tassili is located in an area that today is an uninhabitable mountainous desert. But in ancient times, the climate was wet, allowing not only humans to live there but also cattle, and even crocodiles. The San Peoples were culturally tied to other tribes across the desert, from Chad to Egypt, maybe even Greece.

The Greek Eleusinian Mysteries - spiritual initiation ceremonies - date back to 1,600 B.C. and for two millennia it was the most important spiritual initiation ceremony of ancient Europe. Many scholars believe the ceremony employed the use of mind-altering mushrooms. With participants such as Plato and Aristotle, the influence of the Eleusinian Mysteries on the formation of western culture cannot be underestimated.

Later Vikings are known to have consumed limited amounts of the today much feared poisonous species Fly agaric (Amanita muscaria). Ironically, they appear to have used it to overcome fear through religious rituals in which they danced and ate mushrooms before fearlessly going into battle.

It may not have been an admirable type of spirituality practiced by this warrior culture but it was none-the-less part of their religious practices whatever we may think of them. Siberian shamans are also said to have used Fly agaric in their spiritual practices to help them talk to their gods.

In a controversial book titled Soma: Divine Mushroom of Immortality by R. Gordon Wasser, Fly agaric is even attributed as the source of the Vedic juice called "soma" - a liquid described to have been used in ancient Hindu religious practices, and said to be bestow divine qualities to the soul of the consumer, even immortality.

(Note: Make no mistake, Fly agaric - Amanita muscaria - is poisonous and can also be confused with other deadly species. Consumption for any reason is completely discouraged.)

Meanwhile in the New World, spiritual ceremonies using mind-expanding mushrooms were likewise performed. The earliest written record stems from between the 13th and 15th centuries, a text known as the Mixtec Codex. The Mixtec Gods were often engraved wielding mushrooms.

In spite of the fact that the Mixtec people of central Mexico self-professed to use spiritual mushrooms in their religious ceremonies, western scholars still questioned it in a characteristically condescending fashion.

American botanist William Safford argued that peyote buttons were mistaken for mushrooms, while other scientists insisted that the Mixtec culture really did use mind-expanding mushrooms in their religious rituals.

Raging on until the early 1930's, this debate finally got settled when amateur anthropologist Robert Weitlaner got invited to view a Mixtec religious ritual including the mind-expanding mushrooms.

Two decades later, R. Gordon Wasser and his wife Valentina Povlovna were the first white people to participate in a Velada (mushroom ceremony). This religious ceremony lead by shaman Don Aurelio was described by Wasson in a 1957 Life Magazine article, which became the spring-board for public awareness of mind-altering mushrooms.

Out of 60 Psilocybe species, 25 are known to contain the mind-altering compounds psilocin (unstable) and psilocybin (stable). The two species Psilocybin caerulescens and Psilocybin mexicana are believed to be the ones used by the Mixtec. Although Psilocybin cubensis is now more common even in America, it is believed to have arrived with the Europeans.

Spiritual mushrooms have been illegal in most of the world since the 1970's because of their potential misuse as recreational drugs. Only in The Netherlands were fresh Psilocybe allowed to be sold until less than a year ago.

But after a 17-year old French tourist killed herself by jumping off a bridge after consuming Psilocybe mushrooms, the Dutch parliament voted to ban all sale of so called "magic mushrooms." The ban took effect on December 1, 2008. The use of consciousness-altering mushrooms in spiritual practices is now officially history.

About the Author:

Saturday, August 7, 2010

Going Through The Pain By Writing By Way Of The Tremendous Grief

By Leon Henderson

36 months ago, I started crafting a fiction for tweens, Belle in the Slouch Hat. It is a story about a young girl who looks for revenge after her brother was killed while in the Civil War. I purposely started the tale for my grandchildren; and I needed something to fill an emptiness in me due to the losing my beloved mother, and another special woman during my life. They died within two months of one another.

Anytime someone we love dies, we need to grieve; there is no way to avoid it. Everyone must go through the sorrow and heartache in their own individual way. My plan was penning.

After losing those I dearly loved, it felt like something was barring my suffering and preserving me through the cruelty and despair most typically associated with death. To this day, I do believe it had been the Holy Spirit helping me through the single most difficult times during my life. You many decide to call it different things, but I believe it was the Holy Spirit. Ultimately after that, the reality of the deaths set in and I had no choice but to go through the next phase of losing someone you cherish, the grieving process.

At the age of sixty-one, I sat at my computer; I started to write, and I started to heal. I started out writing a novel without the full awareness of what I was engaging in. I didn't stop to bear in mind how many hours in which I would so willingly give to it, nor did I stop to think there was a correct way of doing it, all I know was I had to write. Sometimes it was down-right physically, mentally, and emotionally painful; other times, I felt drained of every once of energy in my body. Occasionally, my sense of meaning and my most treasured beliefs about life were challenged.

There was clearly hardly any schedule for when I needed to finish; and no one could determine to me when it could be finished. It required a lot of time; not a day, not a month, not one year, but two full years.

Except for the primary three pages of my book, I didn't come with an order, or a plot ot follow, I just wanted to write. I even built a imaginary barrier around me and didn't want anyone to realize what I was writing, except my better half.

The more I wrote, the greater I wanted to write. Writing gave me an outlet to cry, to laugh, and have a journey. Unknowingly, I had fashioned my own support group with the individuals within my story. For me, it had become a secure setting to share my emotions and thoughts and process my tremendous grief. I also found a way for me to commemorate those I loved.

About the Author:

The Seven Deadly Sins: An Interpretation And Historical Analysis

By Mallory Nocks

Ever since early Christian times, the Seven Deadly Sins have defined the most sinful spiritual crimes a Christian could commit. They have been utilized to teach the Christian masses and to point out that human beings are prone to sin according to the Bible. Although the list has changed over time, the final version of the list that everyone is familiar with includes wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy and gluttony.

The modern concept of the Seven Deadly Sins can be linked all the way back to the fourth century and is based loosely on seven things that "the Lord hateth" according to the Book of Proverbs. According to the Bible, pride, lying, murder of the innocent, a wicked heart, causing mischief, acting deceitful and encouraging people to not get along are all acts that God finds contemptuous. Because pride is the only sin both lists have in common, it is probable that the Seven Deadly Sins were based on this number but the specific sins evolved with time.

Beginning around the early fourteenth century, European artists of the era incorporated the seven deadly sins as a popular theme in their works. This shift in art sparked Catholic culture to pay more attention to the Seven deadly sins, creating a mnemonic "SALIGIA" which was based on the first letters in Latin of the Seven Deadly Sins. Again, the concepts and definitions of the Seven Deadly sins have evolved as time has passed, once including sorrow and despair, extravagance, and vanity. Dante Alighieri's famous poem "The Divine Comedy" was hugely responsible for popularizing and spreading the idea of the modern list we know today.

Specifically, lust is defined as the act of excessively focusing on sexual thoughts and desires. Christian priests believed that this love of others would render love and devotion to God secondary. Gluttony can be defined as overly indulging of anything to the point that it's wasteful. For Christians, gluttony is dangerous because it is associated with greed, or withholding from the needy. Greed is a sin of excess however; specifically it applies to excessive pursuit of status, money and power. For Christians, greed entails placing worldly objects and desires above following God's word and may involve other sinful activities like betrayal, bribery, hoarding, violence, or theft. Sloth is regarded as a sin of laziness and indifference and therefore is seen as less serious than the other sins, because it involves omission rather than going out of one's way to commit evil acts.

Wrath is described as a very risky sin due to its associations with hatred and anger. These emotions might provoke violence, revenge, and grudges that can last for centuries. Envy is similar to greed because it could be characterized by an insatiable desire. However, greed is associated with material possessions, where envy usually applies to more general things. Additionally, when a person feels envy, they resent the other person that they are jealous of and wish harm to them as a result. Finally there is the sin of pride, which, throughout history has been considered the most heinous sin and the source from which all other sins arise. It is specifically defined as putting yourself above God, ignoring the good work of others, and wanting to be more important and attractive than others. Most importantly, in the legendary story of Lucifer, it was his pride that caused him to fall from Heaven and to subsequently transform into Satan.

About the Author:

Friday, August 6, 2010

Bring Abundance And Prosperity In Your Life

By Asan Khan

Life throws windows of opportunities to every one's life every day; the people who can identify and enter through those windows can bring abundance and prosperity in life. There is no point in scaring about life and finding fault in something to hide your failure.

If you are with a powerful mind you can bring abundance and prosperity in your life. There is no point in scaring at the shore of life and scaring at the complex world. Then how? Million dollar question, come let us see.

Abundance and prosperity is all about utilizing full value of your life. Understand windows of opportunities that appear in front of you and react to it with most positive manner being a world class optimist. You should build such a good attitude within you. While becoming abundant, you will be able to understand your deep values and apply it in all parts of your life. Your life will get extreme prosperity if you are meditating and talking to your soul daily.

The best way to bring abundance and prosperity in your life is to reach your mind to psychic stage where you will be able to perceive useful information and tastes lying dormant within your subconscious mind. Once you gain total control over your body and mind, you may able to manifest your goals, success formula and behavioral traits in your mind.

To bring abundance and prosperity in your life you need to set up your mind to flow in a way you wish. Human mind has two integral parts that is conscious and sub conscious mind. Subconscious mind is the epicenter of power and all great men are learned to use it. A lot of thoughts are passing through our mind every day but the fact is that most of them are same as yesterday and there will not be some thing new.

Find some time to four big letters 'Play'. Adults became more deteriorated because they forgot importance of spending some time to be silly. In your childhood, remember, you had played a lot and enjoyed your life than ever because your mind was not destroyed, you would forget all unfortunate thoughts within a blink of time playing or being silly. So, take a short leave from all your official works and plan to visit your favorite sports club. And play. Your life will find back abundance and prosperity for sure.

When you wish for something and your desire is true and genuine that will definitely carve in your subconscious mind. If it is not that much true that will simply lie in your mind uncared. The thoughts in subconscious mind always will compel you to action, if your mind is true nothing can prevent you from action, if your action is genuine nothing can make hurdles in front of you to pull back from success.

The first only step to bring abundance and prosperity is train your subconscious mind in a way you directed to think. Some intellectual exercise, meditation and toga etc will help you to increase your concentration power. Practice meditation every day, relax your mind and avoid unwanted thoughts and try to develop a kind of divine connectedness to the world around you. All these thoughts and efforts will up your mind with tremendous energy to unleash your potential to abundance and prosperity.

About the Author:

Coping With Despair By Writing Through The Great Pain

By Everett Mcdonald

Several years ago, I started composing a fiction for tweens, Belle in the Slouch Hat. It is a story about a young girl who wants revenge after her brother was killed while in the Civil War. I consciously started the tale for my grandchildren; and I needed something to fill an emptiness in me because of the losing my beloved mother, and another special woman during my life. They died within two months of one another.

Every time someone we love dies, we need to grieve; there is no way to avoid it. Everyone must experience the sadness and heartache in their own individual way. My course of action was penning.

Once losing those I treasured, it felt as though something was blocking my hurting and safeguarding me through the cruelty and misery that comes with death. To this day, In my opinion ıt had been the Holy Spirit helping me through by far the most difficult times during my life. You many choose to call it different things, but I believe it was the Holy Spirit. Shortly after that, the reality of the deaths set in and I had no choice but to endure the next phase of losing someone you cherish, the grieving process.

At age sixty-one, I sat at my computer; I started to craft, and I began to mend. I started out writing a novel devoid of the full understanding of what I was getting into. I didn't stop to think of how many hours that I would so willingly give to it, nor did I stop to think there was a correct way of doing it, all I know was I had to write. Sometimes it was down-right physically, mentally, and emotionally painful; other times, I felt drained of every once of energy in my body. Occasionally, my sense of meaning and my most treasured beliefs about life were challenged.

There seemed to be no time-line for when I needed to finish; and no one could specify to me when it would be finished. It required considerable time; not a day, not only a month, not one year, but two full years.

Aside from the primary three pages of my book, I did not come with an order, or a plot ot follow, I just needed to write. I even built a imaginary barrier around me and didn't want anyone to realize exactly what I was writing, except my better half.

The more I wrote, the more I want to to write. Writing provided an outlet to cry, to laugh, and also have an adventure. Unconsciously, I had shaped my very own support group with the personae in my story. For me, it absolutely was a safe place to express my emotions and thoughts and sort out my grief. I also found the best way for me to commemorate those I loved.

Any time someone we love dies, we need to grieve; there is no way to avoid it. Everyone must undergo the sorrow and agony in their own personal way. My avenue was writing.

Just after the loss of those I cherished, it felt almost like something was hindering my agony and preserving me from the harshness and hopelessness that comes with death. To this day, I really believe it was the Holy Spirit helping me through one of the trying times during my life. You many decide upon to call it different things, but I believe it was the Holy Spirit. Eventually after that, the reality of the deaths set in and I had no choice but to undergo the next phase of losing someone you love, the grieving process.

At age sixty-one, I sat at my computer; I began to compose, and I began to get well. I started off writing a novel minus the full knowledge of what I was stepping into. I didn't stop take into account the amount of hours that I would so willingly give to it, nor did I stop to think there was a correct way of doing it, all I know was I had to write. Sometimes it was down-right physically, mentally, and emotionally painful; other times, I felt drained of every once of energy in my body. Occasionally, my sense of meaning and my most treasured beliefs about life were challenged.

There was hardly any schedule for when I needed to finish; and no one could specify to me when it could be finished. It required a lot of time; not just a day, not only a month, not one year, but two full years.

Except for the primary three pages of my book, I didn't provide an order, or a plot ot follow, I just wanted to write. I even built a imaginary barrier around me and didn't want anyone to realize just what I was writing, except my better half.

The more often I wrote, the greater I desired to write. Writing gave me an avenue to cry, to laugh, and also have a journey. Unknowingly, I had created my own, personal support group with the characters within my story. For me, it had become a safe setting to share my feelings and sort out my tremendous grief. I also found a means for me to commemorate those I loved.

About the Author: