Our own Carl Johan Calleman (my personal guru! lol) will be presenting at two conferences in June. These will be excellent opportunities to meet this amazing man and to discuss where the world is now and the full impact of the shift that has taken place. I’d love to make it to these conferences myself. But if you’re in the area, I’d recommend it highly.

The Evolving Consciousness Conference – Beyond 2012
is an international conference
in Tjome, Norway June 21-23. Please see:
www.evolvingconsciousnessconference.com.

and

Kongress Lebenszeit 2013 in Berlin June 28-30. Please see
http://www.creationxp.de/.

Carl teaches two courses for IMU—Understanding the Mayan Calendar and The Purposeful Universe. Both of these classes have changed the way I see the world and I recommend them highly.

Trailer

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Richard teaches the Hypnosis training at the International Metaphysical University.

PEOPLE YOU DON’T LIKE

We all have unresolved karma waiting in the wings to offer us a learning opportunity when the timing is right. This karma might be triggered by your reactions to another person, or maybe an accident, a health crisis, or a local, regional, or national event.

For this column, I’ll focus on other people generating an action or reaction within you.

When you were in spirit planning your earth life, you were very brave. You said, “Okay, this time around, I’m going to get together with ‘him’ or ‘her’ again. Granted, this didn’t work out all that well in our previous lives, but this time I have more awareness. This time, I’ll be cool.”

And now here you are, going through it with “him” or “her” again. Are you being cool?

Remember, everything you think, say and do incurs or resolves karma. And you have to factor in the motive, intent and desire behind everything you think, say and do.

As you already know, other people are mirrors. If you recognize and are bothered by their negative characteristics, the reflected traits exist in you. Negative mirror reflections often cause a “karmic opportunity” to surface so you can deal with it … learn from it … be tested by it.

Pema Chodron says, “If we were to make a list of people we don’t like — people we find obnoxious, threatening, or worthy of contempt — we would discover much about those aspects of ourselves that we can’t face. If we were to come up with one word about each of the troublemakers in our lives, we would find ourselves with a list of descriptions of our own rejected qualities. We project these onto the outside world.” (“Comfortable With Uncertainty” — Shambhala Press)

Pema advises, “be grateful to everyone.” Others offered you the learning opportunity to help you resolve your karma, so be grateful. Make peace with them. In so doing, you make peace with yourself, and you resolve karma.

Easier said than done? Of course. But if you accept karma/reincarnation as your philosophical basis of reality, it is only logical to be grateful to everyone.

Peace and Light,

Richard Sutphen

Today my (exchange) sister Maria emailed me this beautiful video that a couple made while traveling around Chile. They spent time in the Atacama desert in the North of Chile and then in Patagonia in the South of Chile. As you can see they are two very different experiences.

So yeah, I know this doesn’t have anything to do with IMU or with metaphysics. It has to do with the essential question that all of this is ultimately about, “Is it possible to be happy with this life?”  And so I decided to share. Perhaps it will move you as it has moved me.

It is beautifully presented and I have to admit that I’m a little bit envious. Interesting really because I’m on a similar journey myself as I venture out to explore the world. I’m currently in Mexico, spending 5 weeks, and having just spent a month in Chile in February (didn’t get to Atacama or Patagonia this trip however.) And I would LOVE to get back to Chile, should life make that possible. It is an exquisite country indeed.

The thing that is notable is that the journey has a different flavor when spent on your own versus spent with another person. Spending it on your own comes without restriction and without much in the way of compromise. It as opportunity to really get to know yourself and to trust yourself. It’s also a way to learn just how vulnerable and week you are. It’s hard to take anything for granted when you are on your own

In this video, you can see the glory of journeying with another person, especially in the throes of love. That too brings with it a flavor all of its own. It is rife with compromise and complications and it slows everything down. And yet it comes with an external reflection that can allow you to see yourself through the eyes of another. And it it brings a sense of safety. I gotta say, I don’t know if I would have what it takes to venture out into the Atacama desert on my own!

So anyway, I decided to share this even though it’s not an obvious choice. I hope that you enjoy it. I think it will inspire you. And if you are like me, it will fill you with a sense of longing that might just drive your life forward into creating your own story for tomorrow.

a story for tomorrow. from gnarly bay productions, Inc. on Vimeo.

I love this video. Once again Ted Talks provokes amazing ideas.

This information is invaluable and I’m amazed that they are offering it for free. Even more incredible, they don’t even require you to give them your name and address, they aren’t spamming you to death, and from what I can see, they don’t even try to sell you a ton of stuff as a follow up (though I haven’t listened yet and it could still be the case.)

Listen to the Natural Healing Summit entitled, “New Cancer Solutions” today. It just might save your life.

Do you feel called to be a healer? Check out the Holistic Healing program at the International Metaphysical University.

City leaders in Oxford, Ala. have approved the destruction of a 1,500-year-old Native American ceremonial mound and are using the dirt as fill for a new Sam’s Club, a retail warehouse store operated by Wal-Mart.

Earth First News
May 18, 2013

A University of Alabama archaeology report commissioned by the city found that the site was historically significant as the largest of several ancient stone and earthen mounds throughout the Choccolocco Valley. But Oxford Mayor Leon Smith — whose campaign has financial connections to firms involved in the $2.6 million no-bid project — insists the mound is not man-made and was used only to “send smoke signals.”

“The City of Oxford and its archaeological advisers have completed a review and evaluation of a stone mound that was identified near Boiling Springs, Calhoun County, Alabama, and have concluded that the mound is the result of natural phenomena and does not meet the eligibility criteria for the Natural [sic] Register of Historic Places,” according to a news release Smith issued last week.

In fact, the report does not conclude the mound is a result of “natural phenomena” but says very clearly it is of “cultural origin.” And while the University’s Office of Archaeological Research does not believe the site qualifies for the National Register of Historic Places, the Alabama Historical Commissiondisagrees, noting that the structure meets at least three criteria for inclusion: its “association with a broad pattern of history,” architecture “embodying distinctive characteristics,” and for the information it might yield to scholars.

The site is also significant to Native Americans. The Woodland and Mississippian cultures that inhabited the Southeast and Midwest before Europeans arrived constructed and used these mounds for various rituals, which may have included funerals. There are concerns that human remains may be present at the site, though none have been found yet.

United South and Eastern Tribes, a nonprofit coalition of 25 federally recognized tribes from Maine to Texas, passed a resolution in 2007 calling for the preservation of such structures, which it calls “prayer in stone.” Native Americans have held protests against the mound’s demolition, and last week someone altered a sign for the Leon Smith Parkway that runs past the development to read “Indian Mound Pkwy.”

A local resident named Johnny Rollins told the Anniston Star how his Native American grandmother taught him that when she died he could “go to that mountain” to talk to her:

“It seems like it’s taking part of you away,” he said of the demolition. “I always felt I had ties to that there.”

 

Since the media began reporting on the site’s demolition, city officials have revised their storyand are now claiming that dirt from the mound is not being used as fill, despite earlier statements to the contrary. But eyewitnesses say they have seen workers hauling dirt from the mound to the Sam’s Club development.

“I mean really, I went there, saw the giant trucks deliver the earth straight from the mound to the construction site, and I still can’t believe what they are doing,” writes the seventh-generation Alabamian behind the blog Deep Fried Kudzu. She shared the photo above showing roads for construction vehicles now cut to the top of the mound and has other photos and her story of visiting the site at the website.

‘More prettier’ than an Indian mound

Deepening the development’s controversy is how the contracting has been handled. The force behind the project is Oxford’s Commercial Development Authority, a public board that uses taxpayer money to lure businesses to the area. The CDA owns the land where the mound is located.

Alabama law exempts CDAs from bid requirements, which means contracts can go to whomever the board chooses. A recent Anniston Star investigative series about the CDA  revealed among other things that the group has awarded nearly $9 million in contracts since 1994 but has taken bids for none of them.

The newspaper also detailed the financial ties between the CDA, firms it does business with, and Mayor Smith’s political campaign.

For example, the $2.6 million contract for preparing the Sam’s Club site went to Oxford-based Taylor Corp., with the money for that coming in part from the sale of city property to Georgia-based developers Abernathy and Timberlake. Taylor Corp. owner Tommy Taylor, who has received thousands of dollars in city contracts for non-CDA work, donated $1,000 to Smith in 2004 and $1,000 in 2008, while Abernathy and Timberlake donated $1,000 to Smith’s re-election campaign in 2004, the paper reports.

The Anniston Star also found that the CDA paid engineering firm Goodwyn, Mills and Cawood of Montgomery, Ala. $45,000 in engineering contracts for the Sam’s Club project, with part of that money paying for the archaeological study. The firm contributed $500 to Smith in 2004.

An Alabama Ethics Commission official said the relationships could violate state law “depending on facts,” but the mayor said he’s done nothing wrong.

Meanwhile, the controversy over the damaged mound’s fate rages on. After getting an earful from alarmed preservationists, Alabama Gov. Bob Riley (R) forwarded their concerns to the state Historical Commission — but said his office has no intention of getting involved. According to the National Institute on Money in State Politics, Tommy Taylor contributed $1,000 to Riley’s 2006 gubernatorial campaign, while Goodwyn, Mills and Cawood contributed $1,500.

For now, it appears Oxford officials are pressing ahead with the project. AsMayor Smith said in its defense, “What it’s going to be is more prettier than it is today.”