Spiritual Art Blog - *Ed P

The Wayshower

I continue to work on the picture The Wayshower. Here you can see the crowds in the Americas beginning to take shape.

The Life-force is talking to us

Thought for the week

Many of us go through life unaware that the Life-force, the Holy Spirit or the Universe is regularly communicating with us. We have never learned to see this but there probably have been many times in our lives when we did get a message. Have there been any times where you have just missed being in an accident or getting hurt? What about the times you accidentally bumped into someone who then became a good friend?

We are lead to think that we control our world but the evidence is there to say this is often not the case. There are influences coming from all the Souls around us, as well as the environment, our culture and history. There is also the Life-force itself which maintains and keeps our world moving. Life exists because the Life-force keeps it going. The Life-force or the Holy Spirit is like the soup we live in as we go about our daily lives, It is with us whether we recognise it or not.

Other people
The Holy Spirit regularly communicates to us through other people. These can be fairly obvious people such as a doctor with health advice, a policeman with a safety warning, a friend with relationship advice or even somebody unknown to us who gives us the information we need 'out of the blue'. People can be a messenger for Spirit for just long enough to give us a message or to spark our imagination to lead us to uncover a solution.

Intuition
Intuition is another way the Life-force talks to us. When we get a feeling to do something or go in a different direction, this can often be attributed to intuition. Our intuition usually comes from our higher self, Soul, which lives in the pure worlds of the Holy Spirit. It is directly in touch with the Life-force so Its messages are loving and pure.

How to listen
To get this to work we have to look at the Life-force as a force of love. Whatever our spiritual path or religion, in order to see and listen to the Holy Spirit we must look at Its messages as messages of love. It loves us and has our best interests at heart. It has a much better overview of our whole make-up, our emotions, our experiences, our wisdom, our failings, and what we need to learn. So when a new situation appears before us we can look at it with questions like, What will I learn here? What interesting things will I discover in this situation? What skills will I learn by overcoming this difficulty?

This kind of an attitude to the situations in our lives helps us tune into life and its messages to us. We now begin to get some understanding of the underlying reasons for the various people, situations and events in our lives. We begin to listen to the Life-force and work with it. Once we get into the habit of watching for Life's messages we can begin to go with the flow of life and allow it to lead us to the places, people and circumstances which are best for us. We are beginning to listen to the Life-force

Examples
Here are few examples of how the Life-force communicate with us:
A nudge to go in a particular directions.
A headline that catches our attention.
Words we hear which give us some insights.
Cash which arrives just in time to pay a bill.
Dreams that give us insights.
Ideas that arrive 'out of nowhere' with a solution to a problem.
A memory from long ago helps us sort out an issue.
A smile from a stranger or a friend.
A dog's friendly bark.
The warm sun on our body.
A cool breeze to cool us.
I'm sure you have many of your own examples. Click on Comments below and share how Life sent a message to you.

Wishing you a life of loving messages from Life.

*Ed Parkinson

For other way to tune into the Life-force visit the Spiritual Writings page by clicking here.

Life Force Quotes

The ECK (Holy Spirit) is the mainstay of life. Those who obey the spiritual laws of this divine force will naturally do the right thing in the right way. Most people are unconscious agents of this power. They do gain much by it, however, unconscious or not.”
Harold Klemp

“We are the living links in a life force that moves and plays around and through us, binding the deepest soils with the farthest stars.”
Alan Chadwick

“There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique, and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium; and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is, not how it compares with other expression. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open. No artist is pleased. There is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is on a queer, divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.”
Martha Graham

“We are the miracle of force and matter making itself over into imagination and will. Incredible. The Life Force experimenting with forms. You for one. Me for another. The Universe has shouted itself alive. We are one of the shouts.”
Ray Bradbury

“The true joy of life [is] being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one ... being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown to the scrap heap ... being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish clod of ailments and grievances.”
George Bernard Shaw quotes

“Faith is the sense of life, that sense by virtue of which man does not destroy himself, but continues to live on. It is the force whereby we live.”
Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy

“Life has its own hidden forces which you can only discover by living.”
Soren Kierkegaard

“I have to believe there's some other life force out there. I don't know in what form. But we can't have all these galaxies and universes without something going on.”
John Travolta

“Turbulence is life force. It is opportunity. Let's love turbulence and use it for change.”
Ramsey Clark

“What is a soul? It's like electricity - we don't really know what it is, but it's a force that can light a room.”
Ray Charles

“Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into friend.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.

If you're looking for more wisdom on the Life-force visit the Spiritual Inspirations page by clicking here.

Do it with love

Thought for the week

If we want to make our lives a little easier we should do all that we can with love. Even the things that we don't like we should try and add a little love to them. It can only make things better. Let's think about it for a minute. If we do something with resentment we are not going to enjoy doing it. On the other hand if we do something with even a little bit of love, the task will be little more enjoyable. We'll be able to see something positive in what we are doing.

How do we love what we don't like?
How do we love what we don't like doing or the person we are with? Whatever we are doing must have a benefit to someone.
If it is cleaning something, it will look nicer or be in a better condition when we are finished the job.
If there is a pile of cloths to be ironed we can see that with our work we can make some people look smarter, cleaner and neater.
If we are doing a difficult job, we are making it easy for the next person.

Find the love
If we can find something to love in whatever we are doing, it will become easier to do. The love will brings us into a positive attitude along with feelings of fulfilment. Where we previously saw only difficulty we can now see some hope, benefit or goodness. The love that we discover brightens us and lightens the task we are doing. We actually get energy from the love we have discovered.

Is there something you really dislike doing?
Is there someone we dislike being with? How can we find love in someone we dislike? When someone mistreats us, it is often a reflection on how they were mistreated when they were in a similar situation to us. They know no better. When they were in our position they were treated like they are treating us now. They see their behaviour as normal. It is the only way they know. If this is true, they themselves must have had a pretty rough time when they went through the situation a we are going through with them now.

In that thought we can find a little compassion or sympathy for them. We can see where they are coming from. If their treatment of us is tough, they must have had similar tough treatment themselves.

The diamond in the dirt
We are looking for the diamond in the dirt. There is always a gem of knowledge, wisdom or insight to be discovered in whatever we are doing. Most people are not aware of the love that sparkles beneath the tasks they do. By looking for any benefit that our work will give to other Souls we will discover a little gem of love. By focusing on this gem it can brighten everything around it. If we can find enough of these gems in our lives we will have a life full of light and sparkles.

Wishing you a life of sparkling gems of love.
*Ed Parkinson

If you would like to uncover some other gems of love, visit the Spiritual Writings page by clicking here.

Insights into Love quotes

“When love comes, you're going to have to be open enough to accept it. It's very good to learn how to give love because it's the first step. But once you learn how to give love, there's something more important and that is how to accept it... Unless this is done, the full gift of love has not been received or enjoyed.”
Harold Klemp

“If grass can grow through cement, love can find you at every time in your life.”
Cher

“On a cloudy night, when nothing seems above, still, there is love. Always love. For something, from someone. It's never done. Never.”
Jeb Dickerson,

“What "love" is I don't know if it's not the response of our deepest natures to one another.”
William Carlos Williams

“At the touch of love, everyone becomes a poet.”
Plato

“We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love.”
Tom Robbins

“Love is not a matter of what happens in life. It's a matter of what's happening in your heart.”
Ken Keyes

“Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.”
Lao Tzu

“Love is the greatest refreshment in life."
Pablo Picasso

“Your fortune is misfortune if it is not Love.”
Silent Lotus

“What the world really needs is more love and less paper work.”
Pearl Bailey

“Love is how you earn your wings.”
Karen Goldman

“Love is a canvas furnished by Nature and embroidered by imagination.”
Voltaire

“While God waits for His temple to be built of love, men bring stones.”
Rabindranath Tagore

“Just because somebody doesn't love you the way you want them to, doesn't mean they don't love you with all they have.”
Anon

“The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.”
Thomas Merton

“Love is the master key that opens the gates of happiness.”
Oliver Wendell Holmes

“I but know that I love thee, whatever thou art.”
Thomas Moore

“A heart that loves is always young.”
Greek Proverb

“The way to love anything is to realize that it may be lost.”
G.K. Chesterton

“You can give without loving, but you can never love without giving.”
Anon

“A man is not where he lives, but where he loves.”
Latin Proverb

“We picture love as heart-shaped because we do not know the shape of the soul.”
Robert Brault

“Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place.”
Zora Neale Hurston

“Sometimes it's a form of love just to talk to somebody that you have nothing in common with and still be fascinated by their presence.”
David Byrne

“A joyful heart is the inevitable result of a heart burning with love.”
Mother Teresa

“You don't have to go looking for love when it's where you come from.”
Werner Erhard

If you are looking for more insights into love, visit the Spiritual Inspirations page by clicking here.

Meeting Place

Thought for the week

This picture illustrates how we can use our imagination to go within ourselves to a place between earth and heaven. A meeting place where we meet our friends, our teachers, our enemies. A place where we can have an inner discussion with them to help us resolve or learn about anything going on in our lives.

It can be a challenge to get to this meeting place if we are stuck in the physical world. There are many hills to climb and and so many different paths to follow. Without a burning desire and a dedication to finding our freedom from this world, it may be impossible to find our way to this meeting place.

The stairs are there to help those of us still struggling with our mind which will look for some logical way of getting from here to there. The stairs also leads to a higher brighter heavenly place which we may wish to explore after we have finished our conversations.

The outlook of a child
At these meetings I see myself as a child. There are two reasons for this. One the people I am meeting are generally a lot wiser and more experienced than me, so I am like a child among adults. The other reason is because as a child I feel freer than as an adult. I don't have the cares or responsibilities of an adult in these inner worlds. I can freely and easily move to where I wish to go. It is a lot of fun and with the outlook of a child I am in a happy, carefree place.

An Exercise to resolve a difficult situation
One of the ways I use this meeting place is to help me sort things out in my life. A friend recently suggested this exercise to me as a way of resolving a difficult situation. She said “Meet the person you are having difficulties with in a safe non threatening area in your imagination. Somewhere you both can feel comfortable. Also invite your guardian angel or inner guide to the meeting place so that they can guide you and offer suggestions or solutions. You can do this in contemplation or ask your angel or guide to allow it happen in your dreams.”

Somewhere like the Meeting Place might suit this situation. She also had this insightful suggestion. “You can also picture your guide or angel with you when you actually meet this person in the outer material world. Your guide can bring love and wisdom to the meeting. You may get some insights into dealing with them in a better way”.

Stairway to heaven 
Another title for this picture could be Stairway to Heaven. Getting to the meeting place is a step in the right direction. By using our imaginations to go within, we are beginning to recognise our inner world and how it can benefit us. Once we get into the habit of going within ourselves, in contemplation on a regular basis, we will discover that we can find happiness there. Each visit to our inner meeting place will help us discover a new truth or insight. These insights give us a better understanding of our lives and how they work. We become more confident about our lives, we understand them better and we gain a little more happiness. Each time we contemplate and reconnect with our inner selves we are taking another step on the stairway to heaven.

Wishing you many fruitful insights from your visits to your inner meeting place.

*Ed Parkinson

If you are looking for a few more steps to get you to your inner meeting place, visit the Spiritual Writings page by clicking here.

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Heavenly Jokes

Instead of the usual list of quotations, I thought you might enjoy a few jokes instead.

Heavenly Jokes No. 1

A Few Questions for God 
A man dies and goes to Heaven. He gets to meet GOD and asks GOD if he can ask him a few questions.
"Sure," GOD says, "Go right ahead".
"OK," the man says. "Why did you make women so pretty?"
GOD says, "So you would like them."
"OK," the guy says. "But how come you made them so beautiful?"
"So you would LOVE them", GOD replies.
The man ponders a moment and then asks, "But why did you make them such airheads?"
GOD says, "So they would love you!"

Heavenly Jokes No. 2

Reward for goodness
Three men died in a car accident and met Jesus himself at the Pearly Gates.
The Lord spoke unto them saying, "I will ask you each a simple question. If you tell the truth I will allow you into heaven, but if you lie....Hell is waiting for you.
To the first man the Lord asked, "How many times did you cheat on your wife?" The first man replied, "Lord, I was a good husband. I never cheated on my wife." The Lord replied, "Very good! Not only will I allow you in, but for being faithful to your wife I will give you a huge mansion and a limo for your transportation.
To the second man the Lord asked, "How many times did you cheat on your wife?" The second man replied, "Lord, I cheated on my wife twice." The Lord replied, "I will allow you to come in, but for your unfaithfulness, you will get a four- bedroom house and a BMW.
To the third man the Lord asked, "So, how many times did you cheat on your wife?" The third man replied, "Lord, I cheated on my wife about 8 times." The Lord replied, "I will allow you to come in, but for your unfaithfulness, you will get a one-room apartment, and a Yugo for your transportation.
A couple hours later the second and third men saw the first man crying his eyes out. "Why are you crying?" the two men asked. "You got the mansion and limo!" The first man replied, "I'm crying because I saw my wife a little while ago, and she was riding a bicycle!"

Heavenly Jokes No. 3

Bring riches with you 
There once was a rich man who was near death. He was very grieved because he had worked so hard for his money and he wanted to be able to take it with him to heaven. So he began to pray that he might be able to take some of his wealth with him.
An angel hears his plea and appears to him. "Sorry, but you can't take your wealth with you." The man implores the angel to speak to God to see if He might bend the rules.
The man continues to pray that his wealth could follow him. The angel reappears and informs the man that God has decided to allow him to take one suitcase with him. Overjoyed, the man gathers his largest suitcase and fills it with pure gold bars and places it beside his bed.
Soon afterwards the man dies and shows up at the Gates of Heaven to greet St. Peter. St. Peter seeing the suitcase says, "Hold on, you can't bring that in here!"
But, the man explains to St. Peter that he has permission and asks him to verify his story with the Lord. Sure enough, St. Peter checks and comes back saying, "You're right. You are allowed one carry-on bag, but I'm supposed to check its contents before letting it through."
St. Peter opens the suitcase to inspect the worldly items that the man found too precious to leave behind and exclaims, "You brought pavement?!!!"

Jokes from : http://www.ahajokes.com

Now that you've read a few jokes, you may like some wisdom which you can find on the Spiritual Inspirations page by clicking here.

Meeting Place

I didn't like the actual meeting place in the picture when I looked at it again. What I imagine when I go to this meeting place is a bright structure made of crystals where we can meet other Souls for discussion and consultations. This image is closer to what I see, the previous version in last week's post was a bit too big.

Life is change, let's change with it

Thought for the week

If we look at our lives today and compare it to where we were six months ago, a year ago, or even five, ten or twenty years ago, we can see things have changed. We are in a different place now compared to then and we have changed. Wherever we look we can see things changing. Change is something we resist and will avoid if possible because it is often uncomfortable and involves us making adjustments to our lives.
When we get to a particular position in life which we like, we get used to it and we don't want to change. However if we look around us we can see change happening everywhere. We need to be aware that it is constantly happening around us. It is a part of life. If we can realise this and accept it, it will be a little easier to get through some of the changes we meet in life.

Changes we can see
Here are some of the changes we can easily see happening around us:
Our planet keeps turning and changing day into night and again into day.
The weather changes each day
The food available to us changes with the seasons.
As we get to know people we discover things which change our relationship with them.
People change houses, jobs and locations.
Our work or job changes over time.
Our body changes as we age.

These are changes we can observe around us in our outer material life. We are also making changes within ourselves all the time. As we learn things about our work, our friends and family and things in our environment, we adjust our behaviour or reactions to suit our new insights. It is all part of our learning process.

Our mind likes groves
Our resistance to change comes from our mind which likes things to run on a repeating basis. Our mind likes things to be the same so that it doesn't have to adjust its routines. Our mind likes to set things into groves so it goes through the same process every time. This can work well for tasks we need to repeat but it can make it uncomfortable when it comes to a time of change.
We can create changes too. We can decide to go in a particular direction with our lives. We do have our freedom of choice and by using it we learn how to make decisions and changes. Some of these can be major and some minor. We often make mistakes when we make changes but that is how we learn.

Turn life into an exciting journey
If we can develop a welcoming acceptance of change in our lives, we will be able to adjust to them as they arrive. If we take the attitude of looking forward to what changes life brings we turn our life into an exciting journey. With this attitude we get closer to living in the moment bringing with it a happier outlook and a more balanced attitude to life.

Try it. Take a few moments to contemplate on your life now and the changes happening around you. What changes are coming in your direction? What ones are you trying to avoid? Which ones are you looking forward to? Remember some of the most painful changes often help us move into a much better place. It can take time to realise this but with the attitude that ,life has a good reason for sending us these changes, we will adjust to them quicker and regain our happiness sooner.

Wishing you an exciting and changing life with love.

*Ed Parkinson

If you are looking for insights into change and life, visit the Spiritual Writings page by clicking here.

Inspirational Change Quotes

“Things change. After all, isn't change the very nature of life? Nothing is ever the same.”
Harold Klemp

“When we meet crisis and change in our lives, we have an opportunity. We can look for the blessings and personal growth the change brings.”
Mary Carroll Moore

"He who rejects change is the architect of decay. The only human institution which rejects progress is the cemetery."
Harold Wilson

"If you don't like something change it; if you can't change it, change the way you think about it."
Mary Engelbreit

"All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another."
Anatole France

"Change before you have to."
Jack Welch

"When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves."
Victor Frankl

"You must welcome change as the rule but not as your ruler."
Denis Waitley

"If you're in a bad situation, don't worry it'll change. If you're in a good situation, don't worry it'll change."
John A. Simone, Sr.

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

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."
Reinhold Niebuhr

"What can we take on trust in this uncertain life? Happiness, greatness, pride - nothing is secure, nothing keeps."
Euripides

"They must often change, who would be constant in happiness or wisdom."
Confucius

"Change always comes bearing gifts."
Price Pritchett

"Time is a dressmaker specializing in alterations."
Faith Baldwin

“The man who never alters his opinion is like standing water, and breeds reptiles of the mind.”
William Blake

“If nothing ever changed, there'd be no butterflies."
Anon

“It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.“
Anon

“Change may come to you in trinkets and I hope it adorns your life gracefully.”
Dodinsky

“To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly."
Henri Bergson

“What you have become is the price you paid to get what you used to want."
Mignon McLaughlin

“If we don't change, we don't grow. If we don't grow, we aren't really living."
Gail Sheehy

“Those who expect moments of change to be comfortable and free of conflict have not learned their history."
Joan Wallach Scott

“If you would attain to what you are not yet, you must always be displeased by what you are. For where you are pleased with yourself there you have remained. Keep adding, keep walking, keep advancing.”
Saint Augustine

“The bamboo that bends is stronger than the oak that resists.”
Japanese Proverb

“The devil could change. He was once an angel and may be evolving still.”
Laurence J. Peter

“It's the most unhappy people who most fear change.”
Mignon McLaughlin

“God grant me the serenity to accept the people I cannot change, the courage to change the one I can, and the wisdom to know it's me.”
Anon

“No two men ever judged alike of the same thing, and it is impossible to find two opinions exactly similar, not only in different men but in the same men at different times.”
Michel Montaigne

“Things do not change; we change.”
Henry David Thoreau

“Because things are the way they are, things will not stay the way they are.”
Bertold Brecht


Still looking for changes, click here to change to the Spiritual Inspirations page for more words of wisdom.