Cruising the Stratosphere

There are so many things that are not worth the indescretions of the ego. This has most commonly come to light for me through conversations that I have had with my partner.
   The little ego struggles unrelented lead to displeasantries and emotional collateral damage that we would all like to avoid. "Is it worth it?", I ask myself. Nine times out of ten it is not. Let them win the argument. Let him 'win'. Let her 'win'. So what, who cares? Really, if you think about it, what is 'winning' anyway? Nothing. It's all in the mind. What do you get? A gold bar? No..., but one might think you would by the way we hold on to some of these ideas! It gets absurd! What we give up in this struggle is Peace. What do we get in return? The idea that we were 'right'. Wow. What a trade off. I don't think you can cash in anywhere just on the idea that you were 'right', except for the stock market. It's not just the peace that we forfeit because now there's all this energetic clean-up work to be done. To successfully repeatedly 'relent' requires a lot of inner self work in order not to backfire. It requires taking it all to a higher level like doing it for God or for your own higher evolution. You have to really be commited and really believe that though or that will backfire as well. I do believe that there are ' in between' responses that are neither acquiescing nor hammering out your point that are helpful. You can even reserve the right to 'plead the fifth' under special circumstances. That's a touchy one. The old tenet "Choose your battles wisely" goes a long way to the success of any relationship. I belive that whatever one's default mode of behavior is in one's relationship, it behooves one that it is walking towards peace, rather than away from it.

 S.T.C.

It's awareness in the little things that seem to have the most impact on outcome in day to day life.
  Awareness of the chatter and movement inside of yourself while relating with another. Awareness of the fact that you're actually not listening to what they're saying, but are instead off down the road thinking of what you are going to say next. Awareness of the fact that you don't actually agree with what they are saying, but out of politeness are not really going to let on to that.
  It's awareness that counts, not what you do with that discovery per se. What actually are you going to do with it anyway? Awareness is a light that can illuminate what has been in hiding. If you fight or struggle with what you find by turning on the light, where are you? In a state of conflict over What you find. How is that any good? So there must be freedom to look. Freedom to see what's there without internal judgment. Otherwise there's really no point to being aware in the first place.
  In Buddhism it is sometimes said that a good way to measure your 'progress' in your 'practice' of (internal) awareness is by how unattached you are to the prescence of thoughts of stress or bliss, or thought itself. Sometimes truth is often closer to the person who is not looking for it, than it can be to one who is seeking. It depends upon the state of the 'I' with it's wants and demands--it's greed for spiritual property, spiritual aquisition, spiritual 'enlightenment'. The motto for developing an awareness that is possible and usefull without turning negatively inward on oneself might be: 'not too lose, not too tight'.
  The is no owning of awareness. It is a free state. It is love-- non personal, total attention. It cannot be cultivated in the strict sense of the word, for that would require a 'cultivator'. Awareness is not an entity, but a state of consciousness either present or not depending upon the state of the mind. The mind talks to itself about cultivating awareness, but that is something entirely different. That is thought chattering to itself; the movement of the 'me'.
  The beauty of awareness is that you can at anytime watch yourself like a movie and discover For Yourself principles of Truth. These things bear themselves out as you have the patience, fortitude, and dedication to Look. There has to be love and acceptance of who you are on a deep level or the activity locks up and shuts down. You cannot Look And be Judgmental. What has brought you to the process of looking into yourself--a non accumulating self knowledge--must be stronger,more vital than any kind of resistance to what you find. The beauty of self awareness is that it can also help you to be Self(Higher self) reliant. There is great beauty to seeing yourself as you are.

  
S.T.C.

Here's a little interesting info. that I found out about the Portuguese water dog. It sounds like a good dog for a family with young kids like the Obamas, yet maybe a little much if you don't have the time and energy to dedicate to this pet. ://www.nydailynews.com/lifestyle/2009/04/15/2009-04-15_some_dos_and_donts_for_boor_any_portuguese_water_dog.html

  
S.T.C.

...are those funny things that are the writer's paint brush.
  ...are unique in that unlike a paintbrush, they can be used wrongly.
  ...are subject to other people's judgments.
  ...have started wars and have brought peace to chaos.
  ...are the pen's swordstrokes.
  ...unlike a paintbrush can be misunderstood.
  ...take an untold amount of abuse from their audience.
  ...have the power to soothe and console.
  ...have the power to raise ire.
  ...long to be free of logical consternation like the paintbrush.
  ...are the commonly misunderstood parishners of authors.
  ...are multicolored and textured tools disguising themselves as black. They are Brilliant in their Blackness!
  ...aaahH words. What tools of blessing you are.

  
S.T.C.

Thank goodness for the mercurial element of human behavior and life itself. Otherwise I think we would all crack up, fragment and breakdown due to the changes that take place in the events of living. Thanks be to process of evolving consciousness.
  I think that all the elements and states of matter that are mirrored in physical reality are in a way a necessary part of the human energetic makeup. We all need earth, air, fire and water inside of our beings as physical forces, but also as energetic resources in our living day to day. This is also true of the states of physical matter such as fixed, fluid and the changing nature from one to the other and back again. It is our flexibility that allows us to live fully in the face of Life's undulations, and steadfastness to an inner cause helps us survive these as well. It is also our belief and trust in the bottomline goodness and love upon which the Universe is built that keeps the door to our own House of Love open.
  The saint and the heretic are both needed in the Grand Process of Enlightenment and Experiential Enrichment that is the Soul's Journey. All 'states' are part of the Grand Design. The 'struggle' is just as much a part of this Journey as is the 'ease'.
  Stepping back you can see the Perfection of Spirit/God in the mechanics of the process itself. The learning, taking to Heart and implementation of the actual real life lessons for you and me throughout our life Is the Substance of the Evolving Universe.
  We tend to see things compartmentally for ease of understanding, yet it is these compartments that later get in the way of the same.
  Blessed be the universal spin of existence.

 S.T.C.