Jason Mraz

I'm Yours by Jason Mraz

I'm yours. This is the official version on youtube. Follow the link.

This blessing by Henry Van Dyke was included in the funeral service for John Johnson who died Marh 19, 2011 in Asheville. John was an inspiration to many hundreds if not thousands of people because he embodied the spirit of true compassion which was strengthened by his own struggle with addiction. He died of cancer.

"I am standing upon the seashore. A ship at my side spreads her white sails to the morning breeze and starts for the blue ocean. She is an object of strength and beauty. I stand and watch her until at length she hangs like a speck of white cloud just where the sea and the sky come to mingle with each other.



Then someone at my side says, 'There, she is gone!'



'Gone where?'



Gone from my sight. That is all. She is just as large in mast and hull and spar as she was when she left my side and she is just as able to bear the load of living freight to her destined port.



Her diminished size is in me, not in her. And just at the moment when someone at my side says: 'There, she is gone!' There are other eyes watching her coming and other voices ready to take up the glad shout: 'Here she comes!'



And that is dying"



We know that even as we celebrate the life of a loved one here today, and mourn the fact that we can no longer feel there arms around us and feel sad that we have to say, "He is gone", friends and family were jumping up and down on the next shoreline shouting , "Here he comes! Here comes our beloved!"



Here are a few more favorite sayings that John used to quote:

• God doesn't love us because we are good. God loves us because God's good.
• You want to make God laugh? Tell her your plans!
• Happiness is a choice.
• Be the love.
• Life is but a series of ever increasing moments of NOW.
• There are no great teachers-only great students with great questions.
• Look around and ask yourself what is wanted and needed here.
• If it wasn't for good luck I wouldn't have any luck at all.
• Be the man your dog always thought you were. Anything worth doing is worth overdoing.
• There is something I don't know, the knowing of which could change everything.
• There is only love or fear.

Basic Human Rights

Hillary Clinton's important speech. 8 key points:

Tuesday's landmark speech from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton outlined the United States' stance on an "invisible minority" in many countries, as she put it — LGBT and gender-varyiant people. The full speech is available here, but if you're in a hurry, here are eight key points made during her address on global gay rights to United Nations member countries.


1. On the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

It proclaims a simple, powerful idea: All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. And with the declaration, it was made clear that rights are not conferred by government; they are the birthright of all people. It does not matter what country we live in, who our leaders are, or even who we are. Because we are human, we therefore have rights. And because we have rights, governments are bound to protect them.

2. On the Status of LGBT Rights in the U.S.

I speak about this subject knowing that my own country's record on human rights for gay people is far from perfect. Until 2003, it was still a crime in parts of our country. Many LGBT Americans have endured violence and harassment in their own lives, and for some, including many young people, bullying and exclusion are daily experiences. So we, like all nations, have more work to do to protect human rights at home.

3. Why Do Countries Need to Distinguish Gay Rights?

Some have suggested that gay rights and human rights are separate and distinct; but, in fact, they are one and the same. Now, of course, 60 years ago, the governments that drafted and passed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights were not thinking about how it applied to the LGBT community. They also weren’t thinking about how it applied to indigenous people or children or people with disabilities or other marginalized groups. Yet in the past 60 years, we have come to recognize that members of these groups are entitled to the full measure of dignity and rights, because, like all people, they share a common humanity.

This recognition did not occur all at once. It evolved over time. And as it did, we understood that we were honoring rights that people always had, rather than creating new or special rights for them. Like being a woman, like being a racial, religious, tribal, or ethnic minority, being LGBT does not make you less human. And that is why gay rights are human rights, and human rights are gay rights.

4. What Are Violations of Gay Rights?

- When a person is beaten or killed because of their sexual orientation, or because they do not conform to cultural norms about how men and women should look or behave

- When governments declare it illegal to be gay, or allow those who harm gay people to go unpunished

- When lesbian or transgendered women are subjected to so-called corrective rape, or forcibly subjected to hormone treatments

- When people are murdered after public calls for violence toward gays, or when they are forced to flee their nations and seek asylum in other lands to save their lives.

- When lifesaving care is withheld from people because they are gay, or equal access to justice is denied to people because they are gay, or public spaces are out of bounds to people because they are gay.

5. On Arcane Views on Homosexuality


Some seem to believe it is a Western phenomenon, and therefore people outside the West have grounds to reject it. Well, in reality, gay people are born into and belong to every society in the world. They are all ages, all races, all faiths; they are doctors and teachers, farmers and bankers, soldiers and athletes; and whether we know it, or whether we acknowledge it, they are our family, our friends, and our neighbors. Being gay is not a Western invention; it is a human reality.

6. On Religious Doctrine and Gay Acceptance

It bears noting that rarely are cultural and religious traditions and teachings actually in conflict with the protection of human rights. Indeed, our religion and our culture are sources of compassion and inspiration toward our fellow human beings. It was not only those who’ve justified slavery who leaned on religion, it was also those who sought to abolish it. And let us keep in mind that our commitments to protect the freedom of religion and to defend the dignity of LGBT people emanate from a common source. For many of us, religious belief and practice is a vital source of meaning and identity, and fundamental to who we are as people. And likewise, for most of us, the bonds of love and family that we forge are also vital sources of meaning and identity. And caring for others is an expression of what it means to be fully human.

7. How Laws Push Progress

In many places, including my own country, legal protections have preceded, not followed, broader recognition of rights. Laws have a teaching effect. Laws that discriminate validate other kinds of discrimination. Laws that require equal protections reinforce the moral imperative of equality. And practically speaking, it is often the case that laws must change before fears about change dissipate.

8. Clinton's Message to Gays Around the World

And finally, to LGBT men and women worldwide, let me say this: Wherever you live and whatever the circumstances of your life, whether you are connected to a network of support or feel isolated and vulnerable, please know that you are not alone. People around the globe are working hard to support you and to bring an end to the injustices and dangers you face. That is certainly true for my country. And you have an ally in the United States of America and you have millions of friends among the American people.

Morning meditation

Changing Habits

Like a turtle we carry this shell around which announces our arrival. The shell is made up of habitual behaviors. We are hardly aware of it because it has become associated with who we think we are. It has become fused to our identity.

Like a force field, it affects the immediate surroundings and to a certain extent determines the quality of our experience in those surroundings. I know this to be true because I have experienced how something as simple as smiling can dramatically affect my interactions and general experience of life. Things just seem to go smoother and often it feels as though the universe is arranging itself around a positive axis for me.

Once I experimented with this in the Atlanta Airport, a very busy place. While listening to the 7 universal tones on headphones I just sort of wandered around aimlessly. It seemed as though people could almost feel the positive vibration through me, and they were quite friendly and accommodating in response to this energy I was putting out.

If we want a new shell, one that will allow the universe to arrange itself in positive ways for us, then we need to change some of those negative habits; replace them with positive habits.

Here are a few habits worth changing:
1. Always having the last word
2. The need to be right
3. Reluctance to show joy or smile
4. Seeing seriousness as more worthy than playfulness
5. Reluctance to be silly and playful
6. Paying too much attention to the outcome and not the process or intention
7. Being bi polar instead of omni polar (seeing the points in-between)
8. Judging
9. Being critical instead of inquisitive
10. Expecting people to understand you

My 2 Moms

Watch and reflect on the question: What defines a family?




To read the article follow the link


http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/12/06/a-tale-of-two-moms-a-teenage-son-and-a-video-that-wouldn-t-die.html?utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=cheatsheet_morning&cid=newsletter%3Bemail%3Bcheatsheet_morning&utm_term=Cheat%20Sheet

Morning Meditation

Many of my friends are turning 60! In fact we just celebrated Jane's 60th and I will turn 60 in a few months as well. Visiting family have already passed that milestone. We are all getting older. Often in my men's group (where everyone except me is 60+) our discussions turn around the fact that life as we know it is speeding up toward the end of the road.

So that tends to focus the mind on the question "How do I want to spend my remaining moments? What is important now?"

It seems to me that I have spent my life polishing the mirror of ego, making it conform to some idea of what is admirable from an external perspective. And from an internal perspective, much of what is deemed admirable has been shaped by society. For example, much effort and thought have gone into comparing myself to the physical ideal put forth by the culture, which is a struggle since rising to the level put forth by the culture is not achievable by most. I am often left feeling inadequate or defective somehow. One never gets to arrive at that destination! That target is always moving and never quite achievable.

So now I am surrounded by this somewhat crumbling matrix of scaffold holding up the ego. And it seems to me an increasing folly to think in terms of keeping up the effort of maintaining this scaffold. The more sensible approach is to begin dismantling it bit by bit until it no longer exists; until the true immutable nature of pure mind, pure soul is revealed.

I vow to look carefully at how ego obscures the true nature of pure mind and prevents me from living in the moment, which diminishes true happiness by externalizing the idea of perfection.

We Are The Many

A voice for the 99%