Call for Topics

What are you most curious about in terms of contemplating consciousness, spirituality or everyday human interactions?  Send me an email at jaiehart@gmail.com and I'll post your question (confidentially) and respond.

Blessings and have a great week.

Jaie Hart

A Time of Pure Flow

I’ve been at a loss for words much lately.  I’ve kept mostly to myself except for my daily interactions, going about my normal responsibilities and contemplating all I’ve taken in.  So many thoughts have I had that I cannot even begin to pull them apart just now to write them down to share them.  There will be times like these in our lives.  I call them  Times of Pure Flow or “Flow Times” and these are the times that we are wrapping up so much learning and there are so many connections being made with the little neurons within our brains from all of our experience that it’s almost too much to sort out the specifics of our experiences.

As I think about life lived in general, some words that come to mind are exasperating, frustrating, crazy-making, flustering, maddening, frightening, tiring, exciting, challenging, beautiful, magical, inspiring and more.  Whatever life lessons you have faced, I hope you’ve found something within you that remained so curious about what was before you that you met it head on with squared shoulders and a mind open and ready to learn.  Why?  Well, no matter what we face, if we can stand up straight, open our minds and well maybe our hearts too, square our shoulders and just get on with it, we might actually fare better than if we allowed fear or conflict avoidance get the best of us causing us to miss out on an important life lesson.  Although it seems like you can, you can't outrun a life lesson.  It would be like trying to outrun yourself.  How would you do that?

The collective of our experiences in life become the life lessons written in the book of our own souls.  What points do you most want indelibly etched within the time-space elements of your beautiful soul?  What do you want most to remember?  Is there anything you’d like to forget or that you maybe regret?  Maybe you missed the message or the most important point or aspect and might like to repeat the lesson again and will in another place with another face in time, who knows?  Our capacity for learning by living and experiencing our ever-unfolding consciousness is never-ending.  That is the beautiful thing about being human I suppose.

I think maybe for me the life lessons coalesced into knowledge sometime ago and I only just now realized what I’ve been learning and why.  What will I do with the information?  Well, take it to heart and keep it there for a while and then maybe share it when I can.  Such beautiful things have my experiences (even the harrowing ones) brought me that I am more than grateful. Is there a word for gratitude that is grateful to the nth degree?  Maybe we should make one up some time or if you know one, share it with me.  I’d have to say that even without the benefit of a specific word, that’s just how I’m feeling about now…infinitely grateful for experiences; frustrating ones, angry-making ones, painful ones, joyful ones, inspiring ones, enlightening ones and more.  “Every experience is like a box of chocolates,” a friend once said to me, "each one is intended to be savored."  I remember those words and consider all I have experienced.  I might not have agreed with the sentiment during a few lessons I learned but as I look back now, I see that I agree with the sentiment considering all of my life lessons collectively gathered neatly within my soul.  Every single one was actually for my benefit and not my detriment.  And So, It IS!

Life is fun like that.  Sometimes the most terrible things and terrible seeming people can end up being rendered that one thing that turned our lives on a dime into and toward a whole new and more rewarding direction.  Maybe we will learn just yet to be grateful for things not as they could be but as perfect as they already are even if we can’t yet see.  Blessings of joyful learning my friends.

 

© 2015 Jaie Hart (photo/words)

Do What You Love or Love What You Do

There must be something that you love to do among the things you really don’t love to do. Think about it for a moment. I think it is unrealistic to believe that you should only ever be engaged in the things that you love or you should be engaged not at all. That speaks to me of expectation and those only ever leave you flat in the end. So if you’re going to hold an expectation, why not level it out a little bit? I don’t mean to suggest settling for mediocrity. What I mean to suggest is that sometimes in life we will be called upon to do things we do not love to do and we will do those things out of a different kind of love or a need or for the purpose of a necessary obligation or responsibility.

If we do only those kinds of things, the things we do not love but must do, if we are not careful, pretty soon we’ll become a stressed out, burned out mess of a human being. Trust me, I know this song. One of the best things that you can do if you find yourself in this space of stress and frustration is to step back a moment and look at what you are doing and why you are doing it. Look very hard and find the tiniest sliver even of a reason that you are doing things because of love. If you are doing something at least in part out of love, true love, you can start to tear away at any stressful or frustrating feelings you may be having. Please understand that when I say love I’m going way beyond the limited definition most consider love in – such as the romantic realm where love seems to exist little if at all these days. I mean that love that transcends all because it is unconditional, alive and breathing and it always, always begins within you and there must be something or someone that evokes that in you.

If you haven’t found that kind of love in your life, well guess what? You just found your next life challenge. Should you decide to take up that challenge, you might find that beautiful unconditional love actually begins and ends with you. Spoilers! Sorry. Okay, no, I’m not sorry. We all need a little clue to guide us even if it sounds outlandish and unbelievable and well, in an article addressing a challenging topic such as this, a little help is really needed I think.

Another very important thing is to make sure you are taking care of yourself and are gentle with yourself every day and in every way. Respect yourself by making healthy choices in your life from your diet, to friends and associates and even jobs or hobbies and habits. Do some things that you love if you can’t love everything you do. That will help add some balance to your life and part of life is about balance in this world of polarities and dichotomies that we seem to learn best within. Just some food for thought beautiful dreamers. I hope that you make it a beautiful day.

© 2015 Jaie Hart Photo/Words

So Tell Me Not About the Weather - But About How You Perceive It

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The quality of light is slightly different at 6:45 am when it’s already 79 degrees Fahrenheit than on a day that has started out at say, maybe, 60 degrees or below, I’ve noticed.  I’m not sure why that is.  Certainly there must be some scientific explanation that might serve as suitable enough a description to satisfy an inquiring mind such as mine? 

Alas, however, I am not a scientist but a philosopher and it is not may way to grab hold of scientific knowledge to tout it about but rather to take it in if and only if it might serve in some way to improve or challenge my understanding of a thing.  To describe my sunny observation of these hot days I have to go into a method of using the words inside of my mind to attempt to convey the richness of the hues, the golden ever so slightly rosy tint of silver everything seems etched in on the early morning of a very hot day and realize this scene and its accompanying set of associated feelings is not something we all notice very often if at all.  I notice it only because I am an early riser and I see this on every very warm day.  Sometimes my perception is accompanied by a neutral nonchalance while at others, a fair bit of trepidation as my mind runs simulations of the days' potential events and future potential resulting feelings.

We’ve been unseasonably hot with much humidity of late in my part of the world but I’m not really here to talk about the weather.  I’m here to talk about the human condition and leading up to that moment when we encounter something we just simply think we can bear not even one more single moment of.  What then do we do?  I suppose our individual environmental psychology might take over then and dictate how we will handle ourselves when the weather is so hot and we’re not used to it.  For many of us, we’re likely to feel quite miserable and no doubt that misery is likely to be shared with all in even remote proximity is some way.  Perhaps we are grumpy and frowning or elated and joyful with the warmth?

Unfortunate or fortunate as that may seem there is something I wish to convey in order for you to consider.  No matter what we face here, life on Earth is tenuous at best.  Our consciousness however, is not.  Many moons ago on a hot summer day I learned about consciousness in a different way and I’ll never forget what I learned.  The impact that learning had on my awareness has nagged me for nearly 20 years and so it is not so surprising I guess that I’m awake staring into the darkness, noticing the stars and the fact that it is still 79-80 degrees Fahrenheit at precisely 5:38 am and I’ve got a full day of yoga training ahead of me.

One thing I’ve noticed is that the mind is so very powerful as is our ability to perceive and make choices.  Although so much seems so involuntary, it isn’t.  Maybe we can’t instantaneously and miraculously change the weather in an instant but we can choose whether we feel good or horrible about it and in so doing, changing our experience and how the experience is written into the archives of the soul that bears witness to everything we experience here incarnate and beyond.  And through the soul peers the observer that holds nothing other than its drive towards existence in the absence of judgement…a curiosity or knowningness perhaps that regardless of heat or not, the individual is going to be okay no matter how he or she perceives, reacts or does not react to a thing or situation.   

When I look at the day ahead this way, It doesn’t much matter to  me whether it is hot or cold.  It matters to me that I learn to understand the data I take in consciously and sort out that taken in unconsciously and then choose my perceptions and experiences carefully.  I also think it is important that I consider well my own ability to help me see my own way home and I’m talking about the home inside of me no matter where I am or go or exist.  I exist.  Smiling at that, I leave you with wishes for a beautiful day.


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© 2015 Jaie Hart (photo/words)

 

The Right Premise- What is That?

Wow is life so very amazing! You may or may not agree and that’s perfect. Your perspectives as I have often written are the filtered through which you learn. Many a famous teacher has pointed out and rightly so that you can take two human beings and put them in the same situation and each is going to perceive it differently, oppositely even if they agree on the basic premises of the situation. In this example, say the two human beings are placed in a tropical rain forest.

Both agree that they are in a rain forest and so begin their perceiving from the premise upon which their perceiving is built. Each perceives then, his or her experience through the filters that have shaped their beliefs about how they view their experience. One may love the showers and the other may detest it. One may love the Earthy smells and sounds and the other may dislike it thinking everything is dirty and unclean. Who is right and who is wrong? How is one person’s perception right and another’s wrong when two perceptions collide even if they agree upon the premise from which they begin?

This is not an original idea. It’s an old one — A very old understanding of the way things work here. But, if you were to spend all of your time following the thread of the way things work here, there is something important you are going to miss, like your own life, for example. It is your life and you can choose to miss it and focus all your efforts externally in blame, seeking conspiracy theories or searching ancient truths to validate the premise from which you begin to project your own perception or you can do something else. You could just decide live.

If you are of an inquiring mind in terms of your own self-development, seek out the patterns and themes that have existed within your life. Your own life lessons will tell you every single thing you need to know – add to that the observer’s “feeling” within you (not read emotion as that belongs to the realm of the small “c” conscious ego). The Observer’s “feeling” is much more expansive and comes from an entirely different place and just from experiencing that place within you, you may realize you have many premises from which you exist and project into this world via your own beliefs about what you experience. Is your world like the rain forest? Is it like a barren desert? Is it like a tropical Oasis? What is it for you?

You chose it for your experiencing pleasure and even though at times there seems not one thing pleasurable about your experience the moment you stop applying pressure to align to your beliefs about who you should be, there will be a moment of clarity of feeling that comes from the observer within you. Pay attention to that. Taste that like it is the rarest most delicious dessert you have ever consumed and be grateful for it for you have just found your true self. And that is very likely part of your true objective and purpose here within this plane whether or not you’ve consciously become aware of your premise.

© Jaie Hart (photo/words)

Solar Return in Gratitude

One more turn

At the wheel of life

And so we go,

Each of us

On our own journeys

 Some in resonance

And some in dissonance

But each goes perfectly regardless 

Life is never without

Its ups and downs

But it is you who determines

The depths of the pain

Or the heights of elation 

Choose wisely my friends

For life is very much like the microcosm

Represented in this play we assume roles in here 

It's a great place in which

We endeavor to learn

Both inside and outside

The various firewalls

We create in his place

But what about the next and the next? 

So much have we to contemplate

But let us never forget

To enjoy the comfort of friendship

Or to ignore the disdain of the toxic

Life lesson teachers. 

Everything can be perfect

I dare say it is perfect

Even if it takes us

Our hindsight to see it

Much further down the road 

I thank you my friends

And my enemies alike

For it is your love

And your hatred

Two sides - same coin

That has taught me

All of these years past

And that will continue

In the years to come 

I am infinitely grateful

For your presence

In Gratitude and may you be

Forever blessed…

 

© 2015 Jaie Hart (Photo/words)

Grandma's Porch

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In just a few days’ time, I will have completed my 49^th year on planet Earth in our Milky-way Galaxy and will enter into the cycle of endeavoring to complete my 50^th year.  I’m quite thoughtful this time of year for many reasons and I’ll share something personal with you that I’ve shared near every year for the past 22.  My father died on September 14, 1993 just 15 days after his 48^th birthday.  When I had completed my 48^th year last year, it struck me with a great well of sadness that I would see more here in this beautiful world than my father had the opportunity to do.  Once again my soul is gripped with this thought and the emotion that comes so strongly with it.  Tomorrow would have been his 70^th Birthday. 

It is in tribute to my Father and his Birthday that I reflect here this morning.  I’m grateful that I knew him even for the short time I did.  The 22^nd anniversary of his departure from this plane approaches.  I’ve done somethings he’d have been so proud of.  So many moons ago, on a day like today or a night like the last, we’d have sat on Grandma’s porch and gazed at the stars contemplating the myriad theories and philosophies of existence, shooting stars, consciousness and our origins.  These are things I dearly love today.  From those very precious conversations while my mind was still so young and impressionable was born a true love of philosophy and a dire need for Marianna’s Trench deep conversation and continuous learning just to really feel goodness and true beauty of life.

There was nothing superficial about my father.  He was authentic, so very sensitive on the inside and so very strong on the outside.  He was so wise in so many unbelievable things that I was always awestruck by the thoughts in his head that he readily shared with me.  Life kept me so very busy in his last years that I never got the chance to tell him how much those conversations on Grandma’s porch meant to me.  I never got to tell him how much I loved his philosophical conversations.  He’ll never know that he was the impetus that drove me to continuously seek knowledge and understanding of everything under this sun.  Not that I know it all now for the further I go, surely I have discovered I know nothing but the fact that there is so much I have yet to learn.  But even that is a wondrous gift.  For in that mere understanding I realize I still have time to seek and to learn and to dig deeper into the heart of our existence and to share what I have learned as he so willingly and lovingly shared with me.

And all of this was born from so many childhood conversations when most thought I was too little or too young to understand.  At six years old we sat there on Grandma’s porch and watched the stars and talked about physics and astronomy.  At 9 years old we sat there and talked on hot summer nights about anything and everything in life.  At 12 years old we’d sit on the porch and watch the pouring rain, hear the thunder boom and roar and watching the lightning crackle across the sky with the excitement of two children where only one stood.  At 21 years of age, we’d share a beer and talk about the philosophy of anything and everything – from human behavior, to ancient astronauts, to astronomy and the many theories of our human origins.  I'd later in life learn that so many learned scholars know what my father intuitively knew.  My father never went to college.  He seemed to intuitively know everything about everything and I was so blessed to be his daughter.

In tribute I’d like to share some words just for him whether he sees them or not, I do know that he’ll feel them some how.  So, Dad, where ever it is that you are now – although my heart still aches from missing you and I can hardly see the screen on my computer to type this annual share in tribute to your life and to my complete gratitude that you existed for the short time you did here, I just want to thank you for the time that you spent here with me on Earth.  I just want you to know that I loved you above all else and that I deeply appreciate how difficult your life was but want to honor you for completing the toughest job of raising not one but two head strong kids pretty much on your own in the crazy world that we lived in.  You did a really great job and you were a really great dad.  You were and will always be like Superman to me (dad did love those comics).  Thank you Dad.  I love you and Happy Birthday.

 

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© 2015 Dr. J.L. Harter aka Jaie Hart (photo:  Google images edited by me)