Dear Friends of the Heart,
My name is Robert McIlwain. I live near Amherst, MA, USA, with my wife Michaela and stepdaughter Chelsea. My spiritual life with Julie Redstone is at the center of my life, and I am profoundly grateful for the Divine light and love that nourishes and upholds our life and all life.
There is an extraordinarily powerful yearning in my heart for peace in the world, peace with the earth, peace between all people and all peoples. Toward that end I dedicate my life, manifested in smaller ways perhaps at the moment, but with great potentiality and trust in the promise of the future of humanity led by God – the Oneness that Is - joined together in love and service.
I know that new ways of being with one another, of governance and commerce, of love and caring for all people and the earth, will come into being, and that we are moving toward this as individuals and as a planet.
I am part of an organization called Avenues of Peace , founded through inspiration by Michaela and Julie, and supported by a board of directors. The mission is profound and beautiful, and is connected with the recognition of our oneness as humanity and the call in our hearts to serve one another. Earlier this week we sent out the first Avenues of Peace Newsletter with great joy, and as a prayer for healing for the world. We will share more as our work unfolds.
I send love to each of you participating in this Network of Light, and the blessings of my heart for this new beginning.
Robert McIlwain
Pelham, MA
Saturday, June 27, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
One World Community - A Practicing Buddhist
I am a practicing Buddhist and, when I chant, I chant for peace and happiness to all sentient beings. I also chant for the healing of Gaia. Namaste.
Marie LeFebvre
Send comments here. Please include your location as well as your name.
Marie LeFebvre
Send comments here. Please include your location as well as your name.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
You Are Invited
Who you are and where you are.
It is as simple as clicking here.
Help strengthen the bonds that bring
light and love to the planet.
Monday, June 22, 2009
Holding Suffering in the Heart of Compassion
The question of suffering perplexes the human heart. How can we feel light and God and hold suffering at the same time? How can we hold it and not blame God? Or hold it and not sink into depression, despair, or anger?
There is a way, the way of non-exclusion, the way of love.
Non-exclusion is the path of truth. It asks us to look boldly at what is, both within us and within the world. It says that expanding wholeness and healing can only take place in the presence of honesty. It also asks us to not turn away from others because our awareness of their pain may bring us pain. It asks us to join with them and to find the means within ourselves to hold their pain in and with God as part of the Oneness.
The way of non-exclusion is the way of honesty. It is the way of abandoning denial, avoidance, withdrawal, rejection, and blame in favor of love.
Love that is held in God allows us to wrap pain in compassion. It allows us to cushion our response to it so that the primary response is openness and not rejection. A heart that is full of love can hold suffering. Instead of being submerged in the crying of others or of oneself, it is upheld by the inner assurances of love that there is nothing that cannot be borne where love is present. This must be true not only of one's own love but of God’s love as well. For pain always meets the question of "How can this be?" and "Why is this happening?" This is especially true when it is severe. Though there is often no answer to this question, in the presence of not-knowing one must trust the purposes of Divine love. One must also trust the capacity of one's own heart. Such trust cannot be fashioned out of the Will. It must exist as an experience of Divine presence and Divine goodness that comes through the deepening of one’s inner connection with the Source of life.
Love, both human and Divine, can hold pain in one of the many rooms of the heart. It does not drown in it because in each of the other rooms there is a source of light and of hope that uplifts the pain and allows it to just be. Where this is not true, then pain can become all-consuming. It can seem endless and impenetrable. It can feel like all that is.
This must be the goal, then - to feel both the pain and the light around it. In the presence of this light we are enabled to stand with others and to not leave them because it hurts too much. We are also emboldened to not leave a part of ourselves because that part hurts too much and we desire to seal it off from awareness. This common response to pain can be replaced by an openness to it, a willingness to hold it tenderly, a desire to embrace it with compassion. When these inner attitudes are in place, we are supported from within through the power of light and love to remain with whatever painful circumstance exists, holding it in the Oneness until it dissolves in the light.
There is a way, the way of non-exclusion, the way of love.
Non-exclusion is the path of truth. It asks us to look boldly at what is, both within us and within the world. It says that expanding wholeness and healing can only take place in the presence of honesty. It also asks us to not turn away from others because our awareness of their pain may bring us pain. It asks us to join with them and to find the means within ourselves to hold their pain in and with God as part of the Oneness.
The way of non-exclusion is the way of honesty. It is the way of abandoning denial, avoidance, withdrawal, rejection, and blame in favor of love.
Love that is held in God allows us to wrap pain in compassion. It allows us to cushion our response to it so that the primary response is openness and not rejection. A heart that is full of love can hold suffering. Instead of being submerged in the crying of others or of oneself, it is upheld by the inner assurances of love that there is nothing that cannot be borne where love is present. This must be true not only of one's own love but of God’s love as well. For pain always meets the question of "How can this be?" and "Why is this happening?" This is especially true when it is severe. Though there is often no answer to this question, in the presence of not-knowing one must trust the purposes of Divine love. One must also trust the capacity of one's own heart. Such trust cannot be fashioned out of the Will. It must exist as an experience of Divine presence and Divine goodness that comes through the deepening of one’s inner connection with the Source of life.
Love, both human and Divine, can hold pain in one of the many rooms of the heart. It does not drown in it because in each of the other rooms there is a source of light and of hope that uplifts the pain and allows it to just be. Where this is not true, then pain can become all-consuming. It can seem endless and impenetrable. It can feel like all that is.
This must be the goal, then - to feel both the pain and the light around it. In the presence of this light we are enabled to stand with others and to not leave them because it hurts too much. We are also emboldened to not leave a part of ourselves because that part hurts too much and we desire to seal it off from awareness. This common response to pain can be replaced by an openness to it, a willingness to hold it tenderly, a desire to embrace it with compassion. When these inner attitudes are in place, we are supported from within through the power of light and love to remain with whatever painful circumstance exists, holding it in the Oneness until it dissolves in the light.
Post-Katrina New Orleans (One World Community)
For me, the photo (below) was, with the poetry I chose from the poet Nature Man’s work, to be what I felt an accurate portrayal of the feelings, depth of generational experiences, and ongoing cultural experiences of the community I have become a part of in post-Katrina New Orleans. I chose this particular verse of the poem not to inflict guilt but to to verbalize what I hear and perceive the African American community of which I have been welcomed into, to be speaking of, and feeling deeply within their hearts.
Whilst still living in the United States, it often feels in this area of the South - Louisiana, and in Mississippi - that I am in another time altogether. Yes, things look modern around me, but the energies of racism, old, old, racism that was practiced here first in slavery, then in lynchings, and Jim Crow laws, is still very prominent - now in more insidious and subtle ways. I see race based social engineering being practiced in the rebuilding of the city of New Orleans. One current example: the wealthy, predominantly Caucasian area of St. Charles Street is receiving recovery monies for Audubon Park, for new sidewalks, whilst in the 7th Ward in which I live, still looks of the early post-Katrina flood damage with empty gaping houses, torn up streets and sidewalks, empty schools, closed libraries, a lack of playgrounds, and children playing in front of mold ridden abandoned houses.
The reason I chose the particular verse that I did, is connected to the history of slavery here and the agony the people went through and continue to go through who suffer the greatest at the hands of injustice. Just this morning, at the African American Baptist church I attend with Nature, Pastor spoke with real pain in his voice about the racism he, his parents, and grandparents had to endure. How they were not allowed in the Woolworths to eat, or in the JC Penny Stores. As recently as 2005, when panicked African American New Orleanians tried to flee the city on foot from the rising flood waters, looking for food and shelter, they were met with guns at the bridges. People with guns, police and civilians, were trying to keep them out of their towns and forcing them back into the city. I have spoken with the man whose grandchildren were shot by the police for trying to cross over the Danziger Bridge during the flooding. 2 men died, one a mentally retarded man, and four were wounded. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6063982 This is the same man who tells me stories of his past, how when he went to buy his house in the Upper 9th Ward on the deed it said “not to be sold to colored people.” He fought it and then told me of what it was like to watch the Caucasian families leave the neighborhood when his family moved in.
The pain of racism runs deep here, a long opened wound. With President Obama in office, I perceive in the community a time where it feels safe now to speak out loud of the pain. I used to wonder at the anger of Malcolm X and the Black Panthers, and whilst I have no desire to follow in their energetic path, and prefer the path of Martin Luther King, Jr., I now understand, through witnessing the roots of the powerlessness and helplessness experienced.
Text of Poem:
Forge from the Land of Liberty
Forge from the Love of Liberty
Say wasn't it We that went through Slavery
Still We Living in Agony
In Dis Land of Liberty.
Photo: Johanna Raphael
Poetry: Nature Man (Albert Pierre)
Whilst still living in the United States, it often feels in this area of the South - Louisiana, and in Mississippi - that I am in another time altogether. Yes, things look modern around me, but the energies of racism, old, old, racism that was practiced here first in slavery, then in lynchings, and Jim Crow laws, is still very prominent - now in more insidious and subtle ways. I see race based social engineering being practiced in the rebuilding of the city of New Orleans. One current example: the wealthy, predominantly Caucasian area of St. Charles Street is receiving recovery monies for Audubon Park, for new sidewalks, whilst in the 7th Ward in which I live, still looks of the early post-Katrina flood damage with empty gaping houses, torn up streets and sidewalks, empty schools, closed libraries, a lack of playgrounds, and children playing in front of mold ridden abandoned houses.
The reason I chose the particular verse that I did, is connected to the history of slavery here and the agony the people went through and continue to go through who suffer the greatest at the hands of injustice. Just this morning, at the African American Baptist church I attend with Nature, Pastor spoke with real pain in his voice about the racism he, his parents, and grandparents had to endure. How they were not allowed in the Woolworths to eat, or in the JC Penny Stores. As recently as 2005, when panicked African American New Orleanians tried to flee the city on foot from the rising flood waters, looking for food and shelter, they were met with guns at the bridges. People with guns, police and civilians, were trying to keep them out of their towns and forcing them back into the city. I have spoken with the man whose grandchildren were shot by the police for trying to cross over the Danziger Bridge during the flooding. 2 men died, one a mentally retarded man, and four were wounded. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6063982 This is the same man who tells me stories of his past, how when he went to buy his house in the Upper 9th Ward on the deed it said “not to be sold to colored people.” He fought it and then told me of what it was like to watch the Caucasian families leave the neighborhood when his family moved in.
The pain of racism runs deep here, a long opened wound. With President Obama in office, I perceive in the community a time where it feels safe now to speak out loud of the pain. I used to wonder at the anger of Malcolm X and the Black Panthers, and whilst I have no desire to follow in their energetic path, and prefer the path of Martin Luther King, Jr., I now understand, through witnessing the roots of the powerlessness and helplessness experienced.
Text of Poem:
Forge from the Land of Liberty
Forge from the Love of Liberty
Say wasn't it We that went through Slavery
Still We Living in Agony
In Dis Land of Liberty.
Photo: Johanna Raphael
Poetry: Nature Man (Albert Pierre)
Saturday, June 20, 2009
The Fifth Dimension
There are different kinds of unity that live
within the human heart.
There is the unity of lovers who say
"I love you" and "I love you."
There is the unity of friends who say
"I am glad you are in my life."
There is the unity of families who say
"You belong to me" and "I belong to you."
There is the unity of souls who say
"I am with you always."
Now, a new kind of unity is descending
to the Earth.
It arrives from on high upon spirals of light.
It crystallizes in the heart as a new word
that must be spoken.
This word does not say "I" and "you"
for these are two.
It does not even say "we",
for these are two, also.
This new unity reveals to the deepest heart
that there are no longer two anywhere.
There is only one.
It says "You are me, beloved,
and I am you."
This is the voice of One.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Layers of the Heart
The ways of the heart are multi-layered, like the colors of sediment in an ancient stone, or like the layers of sky that contain mist, clouds, and sun at one location, all at different levels.
Within one layer, we may find our hearts quite open to love, to share, to belong, to give.
Within another layer, we may find our hearts indifferent, detached, drifting - not connected to love's blossom, meant to be shared in each moment.
When we seek unity with others, we must seek it within all of our heart's layers - those that respond easily and those that have more difficulty being open. This is the way unity is created, and this is the way peace and harmony are created - through the more complete joining of hearts and the progressive melting of all separation and fear.
We cannot use words like 'love' and 'oneness' to represent how we feel unless we really feel that way. We may wish to feel that way and that is good. And we may feel that way in a part of ourselves, and that is good, too. But the oneness that calls to us at this time in human history is a oneness of the complete self - body, mind, heart, and spirit, each infused with the light and life of God - each vibrating in harmony with all others.
This is the calling, and we are already on our way as we reach toward it out of our own heart's responding. No limitation shall stand in the way, and all limitation shall dissolve more easily as we bring it into the light of awareness. In this way shall the Earth become one, as the layers of each heart become one in the Oneness of all.
Within one layer, we may find our hearts quite open to love, to share, to belong, to give.
Within another layer, we may find our hearts indifferent, detached, drifting - not connected to love's blossom, meant to be shared in each moment.
When we seek unity with others, we must seek it within all of our heart's layers - those that respond easily and those that have more difficulty being open. This is the way unity is created, and this is the way peace and harmony are created - through the more complete joining of hearts and the progressive melting of all separation and fear.
We cannot use words like 'love' and 'oneness' to represent how we feel unless we really feel that way. We may wish to feel that way and that is good. And we may feel that way in a part of ourselves, and that is good, too. But the oneness that calls to us at this time in human history is a oneness of the complete self - body, mind, heart, and spirit, each infused with the light and life of God - each vibrating in harmony with all others.
This is the calling, and we are already on our way as we reach toward it out of our own heart's responding. No limitation shall stand in the way, and all limitation shall dissolve more easily as we bring it into the light of awareness. In this way shall the Earth become one, as the layers of each heart become one in the Oneness of all.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
How to Send a Photo to Network of Light via Flickr.com
To post a picture on the Flickr/lightomega page for subsequent inclusion in the Network of Light, one needs to have or create a Flickr account.
The steps to follow are outlined here.
The steps to follow are outlined here.
What is 'Personal'?
Our sense of identity rests on an inner experience of who we think we are. For most people this changes in the course of a lifetime and over the course of many lifetimes. Significant among all other stages in this process of growth and learning is the step of realizing that one's biological and familial heritage no longer determines one's identity as much as the heritage of one's soul. This is the step of shifting from a 'personal' definition of self to a universal or planetary definition. Here, one becomes a citizen of the world and, indeed, of the universe.
Such a step signifies movement beyond 'personal' agendas, plans, and inner acts of will, toward union with Divine will which increasingly shapes all actions, thoughts, and intentions in harmony with a higher 'good'.
As we move away from karmic history altogether, we step into the light of a new identity as a creation of God, a child of the Universe. This is the place from which great healing can go forth from us toward the Earth, for our new identity links our emobdied self with the purposes of light so that all that we do and all that we wish to do is in alignment with God's love and desire to bless the Earth.
Looked at from the perspective of growth, it is not that one loses one's individuality, but rather that the meaning and purpose of our individualized life changes. This is the nature of becoming a sacred being - one for whom the spiritual is the foundation of the personal and of all that manifests as life upon the physical plane.
Such a step signifies movement beyond 'personal' agendas, plans, and inner acts of will, toward union with Divine will which increasingly shapes all actions, thoughts, and intentions in harmony with a higher 'good'.
As we move away from karmic history altogether, we step into the light of a new identity as a creation of God, a child of the Universe. This is the place from which great healing can go forth from us toward the Earth, for our new identity links our emobdied self with the purposes of light so that all that we do and all that we wish to do is in alignment with God's love and desire to bless the Earth.
Looked at from the perspective of growth, it is not that one loses one's individuality, but rather that the meaning and purpose of our individualized life changes. This is the nature of becoming a sacred being - one for whom the spiritual is the foundation of the personal and of all that manifests as life upon the physical plane.
Monday, June 15, 2009
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Welcome to the Network of Light
One World Meditations was created in January, 2008, and since that time participants in 23 countries have been added to our mailing list, including:
United States, Canada, United Kingdom, South Africa, Australia, India, Indonesia, New Zealand, Brazil, United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Malaysia, Germany, Kenya, Switzerland, Puerto Rico, Ireland, Zimbabwe, Philipines, Italy, Slovenia, Israel, Chile
The "Network of Light" blog is a new addition to the offerings of One World Meditations. It's purpose - to strengthen the connections between us, to establish a greater feeling of unity, and to allow the higher frequencies of spiritual light being absorbed during the meditations to find their way more fully into the physical dimension.
Sharing in this blog can take place on two levels - through staying current with the articles, stories, etc. you will find here, and through offering your own selection of inspirational poems, stories, artwork, and descriptions of you and where you live. These can be sent to us via Comments at One World Meditations.org and they will be posted on the blog itself. If there is an image you want to share, you can send it to our Home Page at Flickr.com (See instructions below). Our purpose is to inspire and uplift, and at the same time to share the great beauty of spirit that exists on the Earth among the many souls that are reaching toward their own spirit.
Please join us. Share what touches or moves you. Let us know who and where you are.
May all beings be blessed by the new light now available on the planet, bringing hope, peace, and a new beginning for humanity.
Blessings, beloved ones - Julie Redstone
About Images:
You may send images to the 'Network of Light' by opening a free account at Flickr.com and including both your message and image in a comment on our home page. The process for doing this is described here. If you have trouble with this, please contact us using that same Comments form.
Updates:
Please note: A monthly e-mail will be sent to you with a list of articles that have been posted on Network of Light during the preceding month. If you do not wish to receive it, use the unsubscribe link provided. This will also remove your name from the OWM mailing list.
United States, Canada, United Kingdom, South Africa, Australia, India, Indonesia, New Zealand, Brazil, United Arab Emirates, Singapore, Malaysia, Germany, Kenya, Switzerland, Puerto Rico, Ireland, Zimbabwe, Philipines, Italy, Slovenia, Israel, Chile
The "Network of Light" blog is a new addition to the offerings of One World Meditations. It's purpose - to strengthen the connections between us, to establish a greater feeling of unity, and to allow the higher frequencies of spiritual light being absorbed during the meditations to find their way more fully into the physical dimension.
Sharing in this blog can take place on two levels - through staying current with the articles, stories, etc. you will find here, and through offering your own selection of inspirational poems, stories, artwork, and descriptions of you and where you live. These can be sent to us via Comments at One World Meditations.org and they will be posted on the blog itself. If there is an image you want to share, you can send it to our Home Page at Flickr.com (See instructions below). Our purpose is to inspire and uplift, and at the same time to share the great beauty of spirit that exists on the Earth among the many souls that are reaching toward their own spirit.
Please join us. Share what touches or moves you. Let us know who and where you are.
May all beings be blessed by the new light now available on the planet, bringing hope, peace, and a new beginning for humanity.
Blessings, beloved ones - Julie Redstone
About Images:
You may send images to the 'Network of Light' by opening a free account at Flickr.com and including both your message and image in a comment on our home page. The process for doing this is described here. If you have trouble with this, please contact us using that same Comments form.
Updates:
Please note: A monthly e-mail will be sent to you with a list of articles that have been posted on Network of Light during the preceding month. If you do not wish to receive it, use the unsubscribe link provided. This will also remove your name from the OWM mailing list.
Playing for Change
A beautiful concept - creating unity through music. The "Playing for Change" DVD has become popular in many places and portions of it can be found on YouTube. Here is a sample that can also be found along with other musical selections on the One World Meditations site.
Playing for Change - Song Around the World - "One Love"
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