OK, let me clarify the title, which was used to get your attention.  I don't see anyone as being a sucker; we can sometimes behave like suckers, and I observe this in how people cling to hope.  Our behavior is just another teacher for us when we are aware.  It is not who we are.

Many of us learned that hope was some kind of virtue.  Consider the possiblity that hope may be one of our most love-draining distractions.  Though our dictionaries may not express it this way, our culture defines it as inherently including a sense of vanity: you may not get what you hope for.

And our culture uses the word hope to imply that some outside source is going to save you from whatever it is you think you do not want.  With your attention on your heart, please contemplate that.

Somebody else or some outside thing is going to fix the world for us?  Does this make sense to the heart?

We tend to look outside of ourselves for the very things that are best found within.  We hope that the next trip to India to visit the guru will save us from our anguish.  Maybe you deify the guru, forgetting that true oneness is all about accepting our divine equality.  We hope that the visit to the latest vortex of light will transform us. Maybe the next book by your favorite guru will fix you; the last one was pretty good, but somehow your life seems to be the same as it was before you read it.  Those words didn't fix you, but maybe if you read more of it....

While astrology, tarot and divination tools can be very helpful in giving you clues about the will of your heart, some folks rely so much on these things that they allow ego to use them as tools to avoid going in and being with and listening to the will and the wisdom of the heart.  Now is the time to wake up to the true loving power of the heart.

When we drink the 12-pack of beer, watch the mud wrestling on TV, or immerse ourselves in romance novels or other mind-numbing intoxicants, we do it in the hope that we will feel better.

If you are hoping that something outside of you is going to fix everything about your self and your world that you do not like now, you are feeding the egoic part of yourself that does not seem to exist except as you feed it.

It's interesting to note that the campaign themes that brought both Adolph Hitler and Barack Obama into power centered on the theme of hope.  I say that without judgement; it's just an observation, one of life's curveballs.

We tend to hope that our government or our religion will save us.  We hope that the government will bail us out, and that it will back off its behavior of bleeding the middle class, its torture of terrorist suspects, its insistence on fighting stupid,destructive wars.  We hope that there is some god who will save us from eternal torture, who will find some writers to give us some scripture that will not be so contradictory, who will deliver us into his heaven.

For a 9 minute video wake up call that includes a brief meditation on dragonfly medicine, click here.

We are just beginning to see that all these external institutions are simply mirrors for the ego.  The following is adapted from "TheWake Up Book," which I finished writing late last year:

How Most Religions and Our Governments are Mirrored by the Human Ego

(I am observing the following about false religions that feature a harsh God, eternal damnation or dogma that suggests “correct” belief makes the believer better or more worthy than others.  Only some of the so-called “minor” religions may be seen as uniting and empowering, so the following would not be referring to them.)

• Our corporotocracy government thrives on the promotion of war

• They give the illusion of freedom and choice while dedicated to virtual enslavement.

• They refuse to take responsibility for their actions, blaming something outside.

• They pretend to be great bearers of truth and justice.  In reality, their very existence is built upon hiding the truth from people as a way of maintaining their power.

• Religion takes simple things like Love and makes them appear complicated, attaching rules and conditions.

• Religious dogma and books (like governments’ laws) are purposefully self-contradictory and misleading.

• Both’s number one weapon is deceit.  They are imposters.

• They are centered in creating fear of condemning judgment by God or other “superior”, “more worthy” beings/authority figures

• All have stories that justify their existence.  Most of the stories, upon rational observation, are either simple fabrication, rewritten history, or clever lies.

• So far in our history, their apparent motto has been “Order Though Chaos.”   To maintain their apparent power, these institutions require us be feel weak and divided.  Internal reflections of each of these---government, religion, and ego---appear to fight with each other, fanning the flames of our inner battles as we engage in both inner and outer debate.  Much of the message contradicts itself, discouraging our reliance on reason and common sense as it encourages division and feelings of weakness or powerlessness.

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Hope is simply an anemic substitute for trust.  And we can choose to trust all of our experience as our teacher.  If the experience is easily seen as loving, it is easy to love back: the caress of the most desirable lover is easy to reciprocate.  And if someone is attacking you verbally without any reason, is it worth building your trust in yourself to simply respond with love or just calmly walking away?

Trust of self is only possible when one is truly willing to go within and get in touch with oneself.  In a world in which there is so much chaos and suffering, we are being asked to tap our inner courage to move through all the changes more gracefully.  It takes courage to move from the known--even when the known is so difficult--into the unknown, the unexplored.

And one cannot have courage until one is tested.  You don't build it when you are either feeling like a victim or feeling like every day is like a day at the beach.  Trust is the precursor of true courage.  And the paradox is that it takes courage to claim true trust, the courage to move beyond the the tired, old ways of living.  This is at the heart of what spiritual empowerment means.

Ego, like most of our governments and religions, wants you to stay stuck.  If you do not trust that what is unfolding is a more loving and harmonious world, then, at best, you are hoping that something outside of yourself might just save you, and you are also believing that maybe it wil not.

Collectively, this month will give us plenty of opportunities to make heart-based choices for loving trust.  Calm and trust will be two of the greatest assets you can have during the tumultuous times that I see going into much higher gear in the coming week.  Big wake up calls are coming from the Universe and these wake up calls will become more and more in our collective face starting this week.

As Gary Zukav has so eloquently pointed out, at all times you are coming from one of two orientations: either love and trust or fear and doubt.  If you are just hoping that everything will work out, that something outside of yourself is going to make it all better, you are sapping your own strength and forgetting to tap one of your most valuable resources: loving trust.

I'll let one of my favorite teachers, Yogi Bhajan sum it up for me: "Trust only comes when you trust yourself.  When you trust your dignity, you will always be dignified.  When you trust your love, you will always be lovable.  When you trust your beauty, you will always be beautiful. When you trust your greatness, you will always be great."

Please click on your pause button and maybe let that sink in.

Suggested keywords for the week:

Calm and trust.

All Love,

Carlo

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I have created many tools for those who see the value in unfolding their loving power. Many of these are included for free on this website, including over 40 very short inspirational videos.  The books, eBooks, and CD are designed to help you move along the spiritual path with more grace, calm and speed.

The question has come up so many times in the last year or so.  Given the strange and chaotic state of the world, people often write or speak of their frustration in not knowing what they can DO about the problems of the world.   What can YOU do about the mess the world is in?  An essay received via email today provoked the following response from me.  Here is that response.

Dear Suzy,

Good points are made in the essay you forwarded, yet the suggested responses to these realities fall short.  It is suggested there that we ostracize the bad guys, stand up and make a stink with our legislators, find somebody else to yell at or otherwise find ways to vent our anger at the nebulous system.  

These responses have been shown over and over again to be counter-productive.

We are in the middle of a revolution.  It is a revolution of consciousness.  It will not be won by taking up arms, by screaming in the streets or by any letter writing campaign.  The revolution will be won based upon what we are being, not just what we are doing.

As we choose to be the loving beings that we are at depth, the collective consciousness will suffocate egoic ignorance.

There are many more people in this world who are either innocent or well-intentioned than there are those who would like to control the world and usurp its resources.  We are being called to respond to the challenges of life with love, with a sense of unity, and with compassion.  Loving actions are a natural mirror for what is inside of oneself that one is willing to see and with which one is willing to identify.  (OK, read that last line again; it does make sense.)  The ultimate “key to the kingdom” is to identify with the heart and choose more and more consistently to reflect that knowledge in your actions.

This requires awareness, trust and courage.  Awareness is just the willingness to see what is in front of you.  Many today would rather hide, pretending that they do not see.  They hide behind alcohol, food, drugs, stupid television, sexual excess, or anything that will divert their attention from reality.  Trust and courage become more possible as one moves beyond avoidance, powerlessness and fear.  

We have been conditioned to be fearful and to have a sense of powerlessness.  This is how the dark or corrupt forces want us to be.  We are being called by a higher power to wake up.

Our system of government in the United States is broken and is beyond reform.   It will be replaced as a natural outgrowth of the revolution of consciousness.  No blood.  No marching in the streets required.

Still, the mind wants to know: what can we DO now?   What we do as individuals makes an impact on the collective.  So helping others to wake up is important.  We can wake up to the fact that most of our religions---ALL of the major ones---are spiritually draining of the collective called humanity.  It is time for us to dump these religions.  Any worthy religion unites and empowers.  The major religions of today do exactly the opposite: they weaken and divide.  So key number one in responding to the call of the day: Dump divisive religion now.  Believing in a very separate-from-you, schizophrenic god who damns and tortures those who break "His" rules is spiritually life-draining. 

Key number two is to commit to living a more conscious, loving and aware life.  Be willing to see what is in front of you and then more and more consistently respond to everything with love.

Key three: drop judgment.  If we are all indeed One, then judgment of another is judgment of Self, and hence self-abusive.   Exercise discernment and prudence about where and to whom you give your energy, but ix-nay on the udgment-jay.

Key four: Bless the so-called “bad guys.”   The corrupt who torture, enslave, poison and bankrupt us are just ignorant.  Send them your love, not your resentment or anger.  It is your love and your love alone that will win the revolution of consciousness.  And the result will be an era of harmony, one beginning sooner than many think.  

Key five:  See everyone and everything you experience as your teacher.  Their lesson is to love.   The most challenging of people and experiences are opportunities to choose a loving response.  As we more and more consistently do this, we raise our own---and the collective—-vibration; we raise our consciousness.

I explore this consciousness revolution in more detail in my new book, The Wake Up Book, that will be available starting this Friday at www.YourPauseButton.com  Without presenting anything dogmatically, the book guides  readers to discover their own truth by consulting the will of their hearts.  

Thanks for all the great work you do, Suzy.  You, too, are a “wake up artist.”
-
All Love,

Carlo Ami

P.S.  For a sneak preview of the book, please go to

http://www.yourpausebutton.com/books/the-wake-up-book/excerpt

Carlo Ami at Nighttime Lava Flow into the Ocean in Hawaii

A Rupture in the Rapture

The Book of Revelations as A Blueprint for Fear

If I were asked for a one-sentence sound bite on religion, I would say I was against it.

---Salman Rushdie

You remember Rushdie, writer of “The Satanic Verses,” a volume that so upset the Muslim world that his life was threatened for years.  He was virtually in exile as a result.  The notoriety of his experience shut the mouths of others who might have stepped up to point out the obvious in a more direct and succinct way: That the vast majority of all religion is designed to do the exact opposite of what it pretends.

Having studied religion for some time, this conclusion is something that I see as obvious.  When one with an open mind looks even briefly at the history of the Catholic Church, the virtual center of Christianity, the deduction of complete corruption is inescapable.   The problem is that so many who are tied to their religion are pre-disposed to defend it regardless of the evidence, regardless of the past, regardless of what it is doing right up to the present day.

There are certainly some worthy religions, ones that do what any true religion does: unite, empower and spiritually inspire its followers.  None of the major religions do this.  Instead, they promote the opposite: They divide us, weaken us and stir up fear.   The only reason that any of the big religions have survived is that people fear the percieved possible consequences of disengaging: the promise of eternal damnation and pain.

This article is all about fundamentalist religious silliness.   As we get closer to the “end times” date of December 21, 2012, the rhetoric and baseless fear-mongering seems to find new limits in the stupidity department.

Christians are asked to swallow the double-speak of an all-loving God who would eternally damn to a fiery pit those who would break His rules.  Muslims and Christians alike have been  told by this God that they earn extra points in the quest to avoid this hell if they kill non-believers.  The Christians over the last few hundred years have gotten mostly past the murder part but still insist on creating ministries to convert people all over the planet who never asked them for their guidance.  So much for love.

Again, from Rushdie: “Doubt, it seems to me, is the central condition of a human being in the twentieth century.

This, I offer for your consideration, is the central purpose of the big religions.  Their intent, their very purpose, is to fan the flames of fear and doubt.  Their kind words and their acts of mercy and charity are smokescreens for their core intent: to weaken and disempower people.  Part of this goal is met as their leadership and their followers fight each other about how they all should define or worship God.

The vast majority of all the wars fought in our history have been about differences people have had over how we should see God, what name we should use to address him, and what rules “He” wants us to live by.  All the rules and so-called holy scriptures have been written by men, not penned by some Almighty.  Over the course of two centuries, the empowering content of some of the early Christian holy texts has been gutted: too empowering.  If you take a look at what books have been expunged from the Bible as we know it today, you will see that it has been emptied of its most empowering content.  See the Gospel of Saint Thomas, discovered a half-century ago with the Dead Sea Scrolls and the amazing Gospel of Judas.

The Church hierarchy does not want its flock to be anything other than “sheeple.”

Now, as we approach 2012, more and more people are talking about apocalypse, the End Times.  They are quoting the Book of Revelations, probably the most perverted, fear-loaded “holy book” ever penned.  The consensus of Biblical scholars tells us that the bible was written in the latter part of the first century.  This means that, for over a thousand years, countless generations of Christians have been worried that maybe theirs was to be the generation that suffered the pain of apocalypse.

Consider the strong possibility, as I see it, that the Book of Revelations was written as a blueprint for the disempowerment of the Christian flock.  It was not written as a book of wisdom or truth or God’s word; it was written with the purpose of dividing, weakening and frightening.  If you look at how the world is responding to this book today, it seems clear that, so far, it seems to be fulfilling that purpose.

What we are being asked to do now is to see the foolishness of participation in divisive religion.  If we intend to live in a free world, that means that we speak freely.  It means also that we feel fully free to be completely aware of what we are experiencing and how we are interpreting it.  It means that some will be offended as one speaks her or his truth.  So be it!

We are being asked with more and more directness to drop the old, divisive, judging ways of being.  In doing this we embrace our commonalities, our spiritual connection with each other and our divine nature.  Part of the schizophrenic nature of much of Christianity is betrayed in these contradicting sets of dogma:  First, it is said, that God is in everyone and everything.  But wait, the clergyman says, you are separate.  You are unworthy.  You must follow these special God rules if you hope to get to heaven and avoid the fiery pits of eternal suffering.

This is but a single example of the contradictory nature of the Christian scriptures.  Do you buy that stuff?  If so, isn’t it time to wake up?  The leadership of the big religions want us weak and fighting with each other.  They do not want us to understand that we have immense power, worthiness, and capacities for happiness, calm and abundance.

As we ride the now-rocky road towards a more enlightened society, a large part of the challenge that we are collectively facing has to do with loyalty.

At what sometimes seems like a snail’s pace, we are communally learning that we have misplaced our loyalties on many levels.

Many have suggested that we support our government’s decision to wage war on multiple fronts and to have over 369,000 military personnel at over 761 military bases our country has around the world.  In many of these countries, our presence is not welcome.  Some are uneducated enough to suggest that the so-called a major part of the collective problem is that lower classes of society are taking advantage of “the rest of us” and thereby draining society of its wealth and its heart.  There is a different, "truthier"  truth:  It is the ultra-rich who are feeding at the public trough and milking the financial resources of the rest of society.  The corporate bail-outs are just an example.

Some people confuse the idea of being loyal to their country with being loyal to their government.  It has been suggested that we must support our troops, stand behind our elected officials, our Supreme Court judges, our religions and our other institutions.  There are those who think that to waiver in such loyalty would be wrong.  They do not consider that the purpose of our institutions is to serve the people.   They represent us and we must be awake enough to require that they do so effectively.

Our most popular religions, our American government, and other institutions designed, supposedly to serve the people, are not doing so.  They betray us consistently.  It is time to wake up to this in a way that empowers us.  Responses of fear, anger, indignation, violence or hopelessness are not the ways to meet the challenge of realizing the thorough corruption of the kinds of institutions we would most like to trust.

Our out-of-control institutions are a lot like the human ego.  We identify with ego just like we have aligned ourselves with the actions of our governments and our religions.  As we come to realize that our governments and our religions do not truly represent us, we may also come to realize that our ego does not either.

Consider the other ways that the human ego can be compared to our United States government and all of the more popular religions on our planet.  Madness, fear, manipulation, greed and arrogance characterize the actions of these institutions.

Through non-response to our government’s torture of foreign and domestic prisoners, we act in approval of it.  Remaining quiet and resentful of the corporate bailouts, we weaken ourselves and give inspiration to those who want to continue taking advantage of us.

The leaders---from politicians to clergy---often act insanely, yet, like the ego they ask us to identify with them, encouraging nationalistic fervor and religious exclusivity that clearly divides and weakens their followers.  In a sane world, the purpose of any religion would be to unite and empower.

When policy or creed is questioned, our institutions are quick to point a finger elsewhere.  Like the irresponsible ego,  they are quick to spin it so that it looks like they are innocent and there is definitely somebody else to blame.  Collectively, when we have heard the spin often enough, we tend to believe it.

It all comes down to this: We are being challenged now to see the truth about our identity and about the true definition of power.   As we identify with the heart/soul, and as we recognize that our communal identity is all about loving connection with each other and ourselves, we will grow in harmony.

When we communally recognize that the exercise of power has nothing to do with manipulation, provoking fear, money corruption, coercion or deception, then the door will be open to a society in harmony.  The only real power is that which is based in love.

Most governments and religions, like the ego, pretend to be servants of the people while they promote a thoroughly corrupt agenda.

Like the ego, our institutions have fostered fear, division, feelings of unworthiness and powerlessness.  Rather than get angry about it, we are being challenged to respond with love, to recognize the power of unity, and to grow in our willingness to be loving, and to live in the knowing that we are all divine and equal.

Like the ego, the leaders of our governments and religions fight daily to keep that kind of knowledge from the collective consciousness.  Our institutions have become like the spoiled child who fears that their teething rings may be repossessed.  They mirror for us the insanity of the human ego that sees love and power as polar opposites.

It’s counterproductive to get angry, indignant, isolated or weakened for any reason.  Our corrupt institutions want us that way.

We pledge allegiance to a flag.  We sit dumb while our government steals from us and systematically dismantles our freedoms.  In the world we are heading for, our allegiance will be a loving one that has compassion for everyone, even those who have stolen from us and have abused us.  This is the path of power.

The time has come to build our love for ourselves and each other.  As we do this, the world will be saved from the artificial masters.  The world of love will appear when we are willing first, to see what is in front of us and then to collectively become willing to respond consistently all experience with love

Sure, it’s a radical solution.  But is there any other?

When we are willing to respond more consistently with love, the world will be much happier and calm.  Does that possibility entice you?  Or are you afraid of losing the egoic life where everything can seem so chaotic, angry, judgmental and oppressing?

Please click on your pause button and contemplate these ideas.