Spiritual Art Blog - *Ed P

Islands and Bridges

This picture is progressing nicely. The basic composition with this layout is not too bad and there is a reasonable visual story which can be explored.

Free will and the two laws we need to know

Thought for the Week

Over the last two weeks we’ve been exploring our free will, why we have it and what part it plays in our ‘education’ as a Soul. We looked at Free will as part of God’s educational system and What God had in mind, when God gave us free will. Let’s look at some of the rules we need to be aware of, so we can make better decisions and balanced choices as we use our free will. 

Learn about love
The key reason we are here is to learn about love. We need to let love flow through us. We can love people, animals, things, places, our interests and our work. Love flows from us into these. This love sustains us, keeps us interested in life and the things we love. As the love flows from us into our world, it reflects back to us and our world becomes more loving. Because we give love we receive more love in our lives.

Unfortunately, not all of us have the same amount of love flowing through us. We each have a unique understanding of love, how we use it and how it affects us. We also have our free will, which we use with varying degrees of thinking and responsibility. If we use love as a basis for how we use our free will, our world will reflect that love. It also works the other way. If we use selfishness, anger, greed and/or lust as a guide for our free will, then that will reflect back to us.

Law of Karma
The rule operating here is karma. For every action there is a reaction. Every deed we do, will be done to us. Every action we take has an effect on those around us. People are affected by what we do and how we use our free will. To learn how our actions affect others, we suffer the same effects at another time. It may take minutes, hours, days, months, years or lifetimes for the reactions to return to us, but they do return.

One of the subtle issues with this law of karma, is that it can take lifetimes to feel the effects of our past actions. This means that in this lifetime we are bearing the effect of an action or series of actions we carried out on others lifetimes ago. This delayed reaction of karma can help explain why some of us are born with particular talents, difficulties, skills, challenges and gifts.

Our destiny in this lifetime
Whatever actions we initiated in other lifetimes, whether good or bad, they are the likely source of our destiny in this lifetime. Our life today is the result of all the experiences and actions we have gone through in previous lives. This can explain, why the people, things, attitudes, situations, skills and talents we have in this life, are with us.

Our destiny is largely organised by the karma we created previously, but we still have our free will. When we meet a situation, event or person, we can exercise our free will and deal with the circumstances or avoid it and try to put it off until another time. This can be where our free will is a curse. We are now putting off dealing with things until later. Our attitude to the circumstances becomes fearful. The next time it comes up to be dealt with it seems even more fearful.

What would love do?
Using love as a basis for all our decisions is one way of eliminating a build up of karma. If we look at a situation and ask, What would love do? Then do that, we are well on our way to living in an attitude of love. We are getting closer to heaven by bringing more love into our lives.

By living our lives according to love we can eliminate any karma being generated. If we don’t live by the law of love, we need to be aware that we will be creating karma. Karma is lessons in life we need to learn. Karma is not really something to be avoided, it is a necessary part of our education as Soul. 

Students of life
If we look at ourselves as students of life and we are now at university, this attitude can make our life/education a bit more fun. There are some hard lessons and some very pleasant ones too and at the end of this course, or lifetime, we will be graduating with a heavenly degree.

Enjoy your time as a student of life.

With lots of love


*Ed Parkinson

Healing Sounds – The Divine Name

News

Here’s something that may be of interest to you. I’ve often spoken of the HU song and how it can help balance us and reconnect us with our true self, Soul. Jonathan Goldman, a sound-healing pioneer, has produced a number of CDs and a book explaining his research into healing sounds. The sounds he produces are very similar to the HU song. 

On his website, on the SHOP page you can click on his CD albums and hear some of the sounds. Here’s some info from his website about Jonathan's brand new book:

THE DIVINE NAME: The Sound That Can Change the World
What if there was a technique for sounding the personal name of God that could change the world?
In this groundbreaking work, sound-healing pioneer Jonathan Goldman shares his incredible discovery of The Divine Name, a universal sound that, when intoned, can bring harmony and healing to ourselves and the planet. This name, encoded within our DNA, is the personal name of God, once found in the religious texts that link over half the world's population.

Here’s a link to Jonathan Goldman’s Healing Sounds website. Enjoy.

Islands and Bridges

The idea being explored here is the progress we can make by exploring and discovering the inner elements of our selves. These inner elements being our emotions, our memories, our mind, our intuition and Soul the true happy part of ourselves. If we think of each of these elements as an island, we can set off exploring when we are ready.

What God had in mind, when God gave us free will

Thought for the Week
Last week we looked at our free will and how it is part of God’s educational system. If we look around us we can find examples of people using their will to impose what they want on others. They are using their free will to limit or eliminate the free will of others. From a human perspective, it looks like chaos. How does God see this? What’s the point of all this mess? 

Let’s see if we can get a glimpse of what God had in mind when we were given the gift of free will. At some point God became aware that there was a part of It that needed to realise that it was a part of God. This part was made up of billions of Souls slumbering sweetly in selfish stupor. These Souls needed training so that they could realise that they were part of God. They needed some form of education that could turn them from selfish sleepers into sparkling Souls.

Part of God

The human educational system or a system where we had a programme to follow would just produce a pile of very similar Souls. More like robots than individuals. This might be the system we see in plants and some basic animal forms. God wants a system that will help Souls realise they were a part of God. These Souls would be creative. In order for them to be creative, they had to have somewhere to practice. They also had to have free will, so they could do what they wanted, just like a God.

In God’s world everything just is. If we think of something, it is, it appears, we are in it, we are part of it. It just is, here and now. We are like Gods there. If we are unaware of what we truly are, we just go around in circles moving from one idea or concept to another. We are just satisfying ourselves with no benefit or love going to others. 

World of duality

We needed to be removed from that place of selfish satisfaction. We needed to go to a place where everything could be slowed down. When we made a choice, it took time to come into effect. We also needed to have two sides to every choice, so we could learn to make judgments on our choices. If it went too far in one direction it would swing back in the other direction until we got it balanced. 

So God created worlds with good and bad, up and down, left and right, hot and cold, etc., etc. In this world of duality, when we Souls make a choice, we can go either side of the balance. We have to learn to balance all our choices and decisions which we make in this world.

The rules

Next week we’ll have a look at some of the rules we need to be aware of, so we can make balanced choices. Being aware of these rules or laws will help us get a better understanding of life and how it works. We’ll then be able to work with it, with some idea of when we are going wrong or going in the right direction.

In the mean time, enjoy the journey.

With lots of love

*Ed Parkinson

Inspirational Mind and God Quotes

“I felt rather like the little girl in Our Town who gave her address as Grover's Corner, New Hampshire, America, the Nothern Hemisphere, the World, the Solar System, the Milky Way Galaxy, the Mind of God.”
 Stephen King

“I believe in the process, that minds that are closed can be opened. In the scope of history, the conversation continues to unfold, God's revelation is ongoing.”
 Paul Riofski 

“It is difficult to conceive of such a thing as a selfish or ungrowing Soul but interestingly enough, It wouldn’t serve anyone or anything except Itself. And so God sent Soul down into the lower worlds which had been created specifically for Its experiences”
 Harold Klemp

“You can hear the footsteps of God when silence reigns in the mind.”
 Sri Sathya Sai Baba

“Every child is a thought in the mind of God, and our task is to recognize this thought and help it toward completion.”
 Eberhard Arnold

“To the mind, God is a perfect criminal. He has done such a perfect crime by creating this world that mind cannot trace how He did it. That is why the mind always freaks out about God.”
 Prem Rawal

“Within my mind, I meditate on God. For me, this is like the enjoyment of princely pleasures.”
 Sri Guru Granth Sahib 

“You ask: what is the meaning or purpose of life? I can only answer with another question: do you think we are wise enough to read God's mind?”
 Freeman Dyson 


“Theology is a science of mind applied to God”
 Henry Ward Beecher

“The mind, in proportion as it is cut off from free communication with nature, with revelation, with God, with itself, loses its life, just as the body droops when debarred from the air and the cheering light from heaven.”
 William Ellery Channing

“The power of God is with you at all times; through the activities of mind, senses, breathing, and emotions; and is constantly doing all the work using you as a mere instrument.”
 Bhagavad Gita

“If we dwell in spirit, or Soul, we are living in happiness, for Soul is a happy entity. It is seldom anything else. When the mind presses in on it too strongly, however, it withdraws and leaves the body under the tyranny of the mind.”
 Paul Twitchell

Diamonds

This is a picture I’ve been working on titled, Diamonds. The concept is to show rocks being turned into diamonds by going through a mining process of (from the top) crunchers, fire, spiral sorters, a maze and finally into water. All the elements are there but I don’t like the composition. It is all a bit confusing at the moment without any point of focus. I may leave this sit for a while to see if a better way of presenting it comes along.

Free will as part of God’s educational system

Thought for the Week
We spend a lot of time defending our free will so we can go about our lives as we wish. We can get a great sense of freedom by being able to do as we wish but if we are not careful of how we use it we can make trouble for ourselves. If we loose the run of ourselves our free will can cause us trouble and pain.

As soon as we begin to intrude or force our will on others, we are getting into tricky territory. We are now interfering in some other person’s free will. As children our parents taught us how to use our will by correcting us when we went wrong. It was their job to try and make us into responsible people in our society but that doesn’t always work.

Why didn’t God think of that?
If we didn’t have free will, we might be better off. If we had a learning or development course programmed into us and followed that, we might have a happier and more productive life. We could then proceed along the course, learning each module as we went through it. We’d learn what we had to and continually develop, hopefully into wiser Souls. That’s a lot like the way our educational system is set up. So why didn’t God think of something like that?

In our educational system, we get subjects, modules, projects and topics to learn, research and write about. If we are a good student we come out a little wiser than when we started. Unfortunately this system doesn’t suit everyone. Not everyone goes to third level education and some don’t even make it through second level. Some people work better with their hands, some are good with people, some are good building things and some are good with mental concepts and figuring things out.

As the variety of results from schools show, not everyone comes out the other end wiser and knowledgeable. The results range from top class honours to compete failures. Maybe God knows this and we humans are just finding it out now. 

God’s educational system
It seems God’s educational system involves giving us free will. Why? What have we to learn by exercising this free will? 

If we look around the world, or around our country, our town, our community or even our own family, we can find examples of people using their will to impose what they want on others. They are using their free will to limit or eliminate the free will of others. This can show up as bullying, abuse, imposing restrictive laws, jailing people, killing people and making war on other countries. Is this ‘educational system’ working?

From a human perspective, it looks like a disaster. We have mistreatment, abuse, robbery and murder happening in our communities, our country and our world. We have people using their free will to impose their wishes on others.

How does God see this? What’s the point of all this mess? Next week we’ll try and get a glimpse of God’s prespective on this educational system.

In the mean time, enjoy the journey.

With lots of love

*Ed Parkinson

Inspirational Free Will Quotes

“One of the blessings, and perhaps curses, of this world is that Soul can do what it wants to. It has free will."
 Harold Klemp

“God created the law of free will, and God created the law of cause and effect. And he himself will not violate the law. We need to be thinking less in terms of what God did and more in terms of whether or not we are following those laws.”
 Marianne Williamson

“Free will is an illusion. People always choose the perceived path of greatest pleasure.”
  Scott Adams

“What we call chaos is just patterns we haven't recognized. What we call random is just patterns we cant decipher. What we can't understand we call nonsense. What we can't read we call gibberish. There is no free will. There are no variables. There is only the inevitable.”
 Chuck Palahniuk

“Life is like a game of cards. The hand you are dealt is determinism; the way you play it is free will.”
 Jawaharlal Nehru

“There's too much tendency to attribute to God the evils that man does of his own free will.”
 Agatha Christie

“Man is a being with free will; therefore, each man is potentially good or evil, and it's up to him and only him (through his reasoning mind) to decide which he wants to be.”
 Ayn Rand

“The purpose of problems is to push you toward obedience to God's laws, which are exact and cannot be changed. We have the free will to obey them or disobey them. Obedience will bring harmony, disobedience will bring you more problems.”
 Peace Pilgrim

“God is not willing to do everything, and thus take away our free will and that share of glory which belongs to us”
 Niccolo Machiavelli

“You must believe in free will; there is no choice”
 Isaac Bashevis Singer

“One of the annoying things about believing in free will and individual responsibility is the difficulty of finding somebody to blame your problems on. And when you do find somebody, it's remarkable how often his picture turns up on your driver's license.”
 P. J. O'Rourke

“You may fetter (chain or shackle) my leg, but Zeus himself cannot get the better of my free will”
 Epictetus

“Everywhere the human soul stands between a hemisphere of light and another of darkness; on the confines of the two everlasting empires, necessity and free will.”
 Thomas Carlyle

“An artist is forced by others to paint out of his own free will.”
 Willem de Kooning

Viewpoint

For a larger view click on the image above

Thought for the Week
This picture, Viewpoint, illustrates the multiple angels we can view life from. From our physical viewpoint we are striving for happiness and love, or a return to heaven. From soul’s viewpoint our physical world is a minor event in our exploration of ourselves and the worlds around us. From an overall viewpoint we see that both aspects help us develop as a stronger, more experienced and wiser being.

Our physical viewpoint
If we look at life from our physical viewpoint we see a constant struggle to stay alive, be safe and be happy. We can see a light ahead in the distance which lights our way as we seek out the goal of love, happiness and wisdom. As long as we are here in the physical world we will always have to deal with keeping a balance between the good and bad, the ups and downs, the hard and soft, the bright and dark, and all the other dual elements of life. 

Soul’s viewpoint
From Soul’s viewpoint, our physical existence and this lifetime, is of minor interest. This lifetime is just one of hundreds. From its viewpoint it can see all our past and future lives. We are on a quest to explore ourselves, discover who and what we are and our place in the whole of life. We are discovering what we have to offer the world, what service we can provide and how we can help the Souls in our worlds.

From the overall viewpoint we are alive in this moment. We are in this ocean of life swirling around us. Depending on how we look at our selves, we can be struggling or we can be comfortable in the knowledge that we are in the correct place for our development at this moment in life. 

Overall viewpoint
If we can switch our viewpoint from our physical worlds, to this overall viewpoint, we can begin to connect with our true selves, Soul. We then begin to connect our physical lives with our inner lives. We begin to see the light of Soul brighten our lives. We gain wisdom and love and a better understanding of how life works.

To connect with our inner selves we need to take time to explore our inner worlds. We need to contemplate or meditate. The HU song is a proven way of making progress in exploring our spiritual side. If there is a method you that works for you, then use it. It can open a new viewpoint to your life.

*Ed Parkinson

Inspirational Viewpoint Quotes

“From the viewpoint of absolute truth, what we feel and experience in our ordinary daily life is all delusion. Of all the various delusions, the sense of discrimination between oneself and others is the worst form, as it creates nothing but unpleasant”
 Dalai Lama

“There are things I can't force. I must adjust. There are times when the greatest change needed is a change of my viewpoint.”
 Denis Diderot

“Let go of your attachment to being right, and suddenly your mind is more open. You're able to benefit from the unique viewpoints of others, without being crippled by your own judgment.”
 Ralph Marston

“Sometimes only a change of viewpoint is needed to convert a tiresome duty into an interesting opportunity.”
 Alberta Flanders

"Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself."
Leo Tolstoy

“It takes only one person to change your life...you”
Ruth Casey

“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.” 
Mahatma Gandhi

"Every person you meet knows something you don't, learn from them."
H. Jackson Brown
   
“People are not disturbed by things, but by the view they take of them.” 
 Epictetus

“View life as a continuous learning experience.”
 Denis Waitley

“There is nothing insignificant in the world. It all depends on the point of view.”
 Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

“A truer image of the world, I think, is obtained by picturing things as entering into the stream of time from an eternal world outside, than from a view which regards time as the devouring tyrant of all that is”. 
 Bertrand Russell

Viewpoint

At this point I’ve changed the stonework on the castle in the bottom left and added the water swirls. It is now getting closer to something I’d be happy with.

How do we stay encouraged & positive?

Thought for the week

When we are going through a tough time we need to take time for ourselves, a quiet time so we can recoup our energies and escape to a better place. Where is this better place? It is within us. It’s in our imagination and it can bring real benefits to us.

How can we do this? No matter how tired or beaten we are by our current circumstance we can use our imagination to go to a better and a happier place. If we can take five or ten minutes, at any time that suits us, we can use that time to reconnect with the happier part of ourselves. Here are a few techniques:

Use our memories and our imagination
Let’s close our eyes and take a few deep breaths, exhaling slowly. We should try and quite the mind. With our inner eye we look at the point between the eyebrows and see if we can see an inner light. We can also listen for an inner sound, a sound coming from within us.

Now, in this quietened state, in our imagination we can look for something that warms our heart, something or someone we love. Feel the love that flows from us to them. If it’s a person or animal let’s begin to talk to, play with or just enjoy being with them. We can use our memories to generate the scene from a happy time in the past. We can also use our imagination to generate a scene we can enjoy now.

Sing a holy. positive or encouraging word
Another technique is to sing a holy or positive word like a mantra. Alleluia is a good one. We could break that down into its original parts of Allah and HU. Both are names for God. HU goes way back in time and has been used by saints and masters for thousands of years. It still works today and it can help us move to a more positive place when we sing it.

It’s best to take time to sing HU, so that we can listen to any inner sounds it stirs within us. With our eyes closed we may see some light on our inner screen. If our thoughts tend to ramble as we sing HU, we can guide our thoughts to someone or something we love. We can move our attention from the thing we love, to the sound and to the light. We are now moving from one positive thing to another. We can take rests from singing HU but continue watching and listening inwardly.

Take time to remember the experience

When we come out of our contemplation we should take time to remember the experience we’ve just had. Take time to enjoy the feelings of happiness and love we have just experienced. By doing this we the blessing of the happiness and encouragement into our lives.

Sing a happy song
Another technique is to sing a happy song. A song that brings a smile to our face. Always look on the bright side of life, from Monty Python, does the job for me. Here’s a video of it:


If you have a technique that encourages you, we’d love to hear it. Click on the word ‘Comments’ below and share your ideas. Thank you.

* Ed Parkinson

Inspirational & Encouraging Quotes

“But if we stop to count our blessings, to realise how much we do have and be grateful for it, then the heart is kept open to love and all the gifts that love brings, including the possibility of healing”
 Harold Klemp

“I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavour.”
 Henry David Thoreau 

“Excellence encourages one about life generally; it shows the spiritual wealth of the world.”
 T.S. Eliot 

“Don't wait for something big to occur. Start where you are, with what you have, and that will always lead you into something greater.”
 Mary Manin Morrissey

“Everyone has inside them a piece of good news. The good news is you don't know how great you can be! How much you can love! What you can accomplish! And what your potential is!”
 Anne Frank

“If one dream should fall and break into a thousand pieces, never be afraid to pick one of those pieces up and begin again.”
 Flavia Weedn

“If you're going through hell, keep going.”
 Winston Churchill

“It will be alright in the end. If it’s not alright, it’s not the end.”
 Anon

“Problems are only opportunities with thorns on them.”
 Hugh Miller

“Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it. . . . It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more.”
 Erica Jong

“Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so you shall become. Your vision is the promise of what you shall one day be; your ideal is the prophecy of what you shall at last unveil.”
 James Allen

“Even if I don't reach all my goals, I've gone higher than I would have if I hadn't set any.” 
 Danielle Fotopoulis

“The world is more malleable than you think and it's waiting for you to hammer it into shape.”
 Bono

"In a full heart there is room for everything,and in an empty heart there is room for nothing." 
 Antonio Porchia

"Miracles happen to those who believe in them." 
 Bernard Berenson


"It is always too early to quit." 
 Norman Vincent Peale

“Always look at what you have left. Never look at what you have lost." 
 Robert H. Schuller

“Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do.”
 Mark Twain