Celebrating the festive season for no reason

For Christians, Dec. 25 is more than just another religious holiday: It commemorates the birth of their saviour, Jesus. But Christmas isn’t just for Christians. Some evidence suggests that Christmas itself was merely a re-appropriation of the pagan festival of Saturnalia. Roman pagans first introduced the holiday of Saturnalia, a week long period of lawlessness celebrated between December 17-25. During this period, Roman courts were closed, and Roman law dictated that no one could be punished for damaging property or injuring people during the week-long celebration. The festival began when Roman authorities chose “an enemy of the Roman people” to represent the “Lord of Misrule.” Each Roman community selected a victim whom they forced to indulge in food and other physical pleasures throughout the week. At the festival’s conclusion, December 25th, Roman authorities believed they were destroying the forces of darkness by brutally murdering this innocent man or woman.

The New Testament gives no date or year for Jesus’ birth. The earliest gospel – St. Mark’s, written about 65 CE – begins with the baptism of an adult Jesus. This suggests that the earliest Christians lacked interest in or knowledge of Jesus’ birth date. In the 4th century CE, Christianity imported the Saturnalia festival hoping to take the pagan masses in with it. Christian leaders succeeded in converting to Christianity large numbers of pagans by promising them that they could continue to celebrate the Saturnalia as Christians. The problem was that there was nothing intrinsically Christian about Saturnalia. To remedy this, these Christian leaders named Saturnalia’s concluding day, December 25th, to be Jesus’ birthday.

Many who are excitedly preparing for their Christmas celebrations would prefer not knowing about the holiday’s real significance. If they do know the history, they often object that their celebration has nothing to do with the holiday’s monstrous history and meaning and say, “We are just having fun.”

So, for no reason other than that there is an excitement in the air over these Christmas holidays, I just love celebrating the festive season as thoughts turn to giving gifts to family, friends and loved ones. Who just doesn't love giving or receiving a gift? And all the weeks of preparations beforehand - buying gifts (while listening to beautiful Christmas songs in the mall), planning recipes, making or buying new Christmas decorations and ornaments, decorating the tree and finally, the placing of the gifts under the tree to be opened on Christmas morning - followed by a scrumptious Christmas lunch and family get-together. Absolute bliss!

The message of modern Christmas is one of peace, love, joy, prosperity and happiness, which can only be a good thing. What I don't understand is why this message seems so limited to just a couple of weeks of the year. Each Christmas and Easter, churches have to struggle to accommodate the extra crowds who show up for holiday services. While pews may be partially filled or even deserted on a Sunday over the summer, the holidays see a huge increase in attendance as the CEOs (Christmas and Easter Onlys) stop by.  Wouldn't the world be a much better place if we followed the message of love and goodwill all year round?

To me Christmas day is spending time with my family—sleeping late, opening presents, preparing and devouring the Christmas meal, sipping a beer, watching the inevitable holiday Law & Order marathon. Could I do these things at other points of the year? Sure—Law & Order is one of my year-round pleasures. But only at Christmas do so many of my friends and family also have time off, and only at Christmas can I see loved ones who have scattered across the country. Whether or not you believe in God, Christmas is a time of year when you head home or host guests, a rare occasion for the kind of togetherness that can drive you crazy, fill you with love, or both.

Do not stop questioning

“Man is a being with free will; therefore, each man is potentially good or evil, and it's up to him and only him (through his reasoning mind) to decide which he wants to be.” 

- Ayn Rand 

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Is our planet broken?

I came upon this quote on the internet - "People who pursue intrinsic values — self-acceptance, making the world a better place, helping polar bears — are much happier than people who chase popularity, money, and image."

What a general remark to make! I say, different strokes for different folks. There is nothing wrong with wanting to feel popular, it's a part of our human-ness, and there's nothing wrong with wanting money, it enables us to enjoy the good things in life and also to do a lot of good.

Not everybody is into making the world a better place or helping polar bears, although it is a noble thought. But cluttering our minds and lives with thoughts of 'saving the planet' serves no purpose and actually exacerbates the situation.

If you understand the principle of "what you think about, you bring about" you will realise that, thinking of our planet as being "broken", just enhances mass-consciousness of this fact and causes more 'action' of saving (the planet) which sets an on-going circle into motion of enhancing mass-consciousness and 'saving'.

Activism might seem like the answer, but the truth is, activism is fighting a losing battle. When GreenPeace heads out to stop the slaughter of whales, for example, they once again send out vibrations into mass-consciousness that something needs saving.

Every activist vibrates, deep down from within their heart and soul, pain, anger, a feeling of helplessness and a desire to 'save'. This vibration, which is a feeling of what they DON'T want, goes out into the Universe and MORE of what they don't want comes into being.

The only way we can 'save the planet' is by everybody doing their little bit by leaving as light a carbon footprint as possible. By vibrating what we DO want. By living simply and by eliminating all but the essential, which turns chaos into peace. By each person taking responsibility for their style of life. It's not about money and living simply is not about believing that there is a shortage. The Universe is infinite in its supply of resources. Here we are, on the same planet that we've been on for more years than we have the ability to count. And just in the last 400 years, look at the difference in our economy. And it's the same exact planet. Nobody has been trucking in or piping in any resources from somewhere else. There are not more resources present today. Nor any less.

There is no shortage. And any attention to shortage of something wanted will always produce negative emotion within us because our guidance system is letting us know that we have strayed from our broader basic understanding of abundance and Well-Being. Whether we are focused upon the shortage of money—or resources—that feeling of decline is contrary to our broader understanding of the Eternal nature of our Being.

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Sometimes when you're in a dark place...

It really is true what they say, that every dark cloud has a silver lining. Sometimes when you're in a dark place, all you have to do is change your outlook, like seeing the glass half full in stead of half empty. The choice you make at this time will determine how you spend the rest of your life.

I know it has been said before, but every ending is also a new beginning. Every experience we have in life gives us the opportunity to take stock, find out what is important to us and to choose what to focus on. Every relationship we have, good or bad, teaches us more about ourselves, teaches us what is acceptable and what is not, teaches us where our boundaries are and how to set them. It also teaches us that you can't change people, shouldn't change people, and that we can only change ourselves.

So if you think you have been buried and that there's no chance of survival, know that you've actually been planted and that, by forging ahead, you will soon emerge into the sunshine and breathe in the wonderful air and grow strong again.

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She controls all the world...

from within her journal.

Let your journal be your voice.

Let your journal help you say what you need to say.

Let your journal teach you how to sing.

You can discover your truest inner dreams and wishes, and you can make this vision happen.

Let your journal help you find this.

Just play.

See what happens.

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Owning your story

If I do not want what you want, please try not to tell me that my want is wrong.

Or if I believe other than you, at least pause before you correct my view.

Or if my emotion is less than yours, or more, given the same circumstances, try not to ask me to feel more strongly or weakly. Or yet if I act, or fail to act, in the manner of your design for action, let me be.

I do not, for the moment at least, ask you to understand me. That will come only when you are willing to give up changing me into a copy of you.

I may be your spouse, your parent, your offspring, your friend, or your colleague. If you allow me any of my own wants, or beliefs, or actions, then you open your-self, so that someday these wants of mine might not seem so wrong, and might finally appear to you as right - for me.

To put up with me is the first step in understanding me. Not that you embrace my ways as right for you, but that you are no longer irritated or disappointed with me for my seeming waywardness. And in understanding me you might come to prize my differences from you, and far from seeking to change me, preserve and even nurture those differences.

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Our world is pointing toward an insistence on conformity

Our world is pointing toward an insistence on conformity, which is causing us enormous grief. It's what's at the heart of all of our religious battles, and religious battles are what are at the heart of all of our battles. In other words, all of our wars and global irritation with one another is over our determination to promote sameness. Our democracy insists that it's the only government that works. And every religion, (it's interesting to note) proclaims that it is the only one that works.

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Shoulda, woulda

The words, "I should have" must be banned from the dictionary! It's a totally useless exercise pondering on what you 'should have' done in the past. The past is gone, done with, cannot be changed and the best way to deal with it is to learn from it, embrace your mistakes and move on.

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How we spend our days

"Life is a joy filled with delightful surprises My life is a joy filled with love, fun and friendship. I choose love, joy and freedom, open my heart and allow wonderful things to flow into my life."

A Daily Affirmation

How DO we spend our days? Most of us are so busy working, watching TV, doing the laundry, playing taxi, shopping, visiting and whatever else it is that takes up our day, that we don't realise that, each day that has passed, each month and each year that has passed, designates the way we spend our whole life. And then we wonder where's the happiness? Where's the thrill? Where's the satisfaction?

It's up to us to create the happiness, the thrill, the satisfaction - if we spend our days creating these things, that is how we will spend the rest of our lives.

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Every man is free

A murder of crows and some inspirational words

Every man is free to rise as far as he's able or willing, but the degree to which he thinks determines the degree to which he'll rise. 
- Ayn Rand

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Believe in yourself

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In the name of the best within you...

“In the name of the best within you, do not sacrifice this world to those who are its worst. In the name of the values that keep you alive, do not let your vision of man be distorted by the ugly, the cowardly, the mindless in those who have never achieved his title. Do not lose your knowledge that man's proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads. Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it's yours.”

- Ayn Rand

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Teach me...

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The right to be rich

Whatever may be said in praise of poverty, the fact remains that it is not possible to live a really complete or successful life unless one is rich. No one can rise to his greatest possible height in talent or soul development unless he has plenty of money, for to unfold the soul and to develop talent he must have many things to use, and he cannot have these things unless he has money to buy them with.

It's Not About Money - It's About Gaining the Freedom to Become The REAL You.

A person develops in mind, soul, and body by making use of things, and society is so organized that we must have money in order to become the possessors of things. Therefore, the basis of all advancement must be the science of getting rich.

In learning about the science of getting rich, lies a deeper lesson, one not just of getting rich, but what kind of person you become in the process of getting rich. For the one cannot happen without the other.

The object of all life is development, and everything that lives has an inalienable right to all the development it is capable of attaining.

A person's right to life means his right to have the free and unrestricted use of all the things which may be necessary to his fullest mental, spiritual, and physical unfoldment; or, in other words, his right to be rich.

I shall not speak of riches in a figurative way. To be really rich does not mean to be satisfied or contented with a little. No one ought to be satisfied with a little if he is capable of using and enjoying more. The purpose of nature is the advancement and unfoldment of life, and everyone should have all that can contribute to the power, elegance, beauty, and richness of life. To be content with less is sinful.

The person who owns all he wants for the living of all the life he is capable of living is rich, and no person who has not plenty of money can have all he wants. Life has advanced so far and become so complex that even the most ordinary man or woman requires a great amount of wealth in order to live in a manner that even approaches completeness. Every person naturally wants to become all that they are capable of becoming. This desire to realize innate possibilities is inherent in human nature; we cannot help wanting to be all that we can be.

Success in life is becoming what you want to be.

You can become what you want to be only by making use of things, and you can have the free use of things only as you become rich enough to buy them.

To understand the science of getting rich is therefore the most essential of all knowledge.

There is nothing wrong in wanting to get rich. The desire for riches is really the desire for a richer, fuller, and more abundant life - and that desire is praiseworthy. The person who does not desire to live more abundantly is abnormal, and so the person who does not desire to have money enough to buy all he wants is abnormal.

There are three motives for which we live:

We live for the body,

we live for the mind,

we live for the soul.

No one of these is better or holier than the other; all are alike desirable, and no one of the three - body, mind, or soul - can live fully if either of the others is cut short of full life and expression. It is not right or noble to live only for the soul and deny mind or body, and it is wrong to live for the intellect and deny body or soul.

We are all acquainted with the loathsome consequences of living for the body and denying both mind and soul, and we see that real life means the complete expression of all that a person can give forth through body, mind, and soul.

Whatever he can say, no one can be really be happy or satisfied unless his body is living fully in its every function, and unless the same is true of his mind and his soul. Wherever there is unexpressed possibility or function not performed, there is unsatisfied desire. Desire is possibility seeking expression or function seeking performance.

A person cannot live fully in body without good food, comfortable clothing, and warm shelter, and without freedom from excessive toil. Rest and recreation are also necessary to his physical life.

One cannot live fully in mind without books and time to study them, without opportunity for travel and observation, or without intellectual companionship.

To live fully in mind a person must have intellectual recreations, and must surround himself with all the objects of art and beauty he is capable of using and appreciating.

To live fully in soul, a person must have love, and love is denied fullest expression by poverty.

A person's highest happiness is found in the bestowal of benefits on those he loves; love finds its most natural and spontaneous expression in giving. The individual who has nothing to give cannot fill his place as a spouse or parent, as a citizen, or as a human being.

It is in the use of material things that a person finds full life for his body, develops his mind, and unfolds his soul. It is therefore of supreme importance to each individual to be rich.

It is perfectly right that you should desire to be rich. If you are a normal man or woman you cannot help doing so. It is perfectly ,right that you should give your best attention to the science of getting rich, for it is the noblest and most necessary of all studies.

If you neglect this study, you are derelict in your duty to yourself, to God and humanity, for you can render to God and humanity no greater service than to make the most of yourself.

We live for the body,

we live for the mind,

we live for the soul.

No one of these is better or

holier than the other ...

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