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12 Worst Ideas Religion Has Unleashed on the World

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Valerie Tarico, AlterNet
Waking Times

Some of humanity’s technological innovations are things we would have been better off without: the medieval rack, the atomic bomb and powdered lead potions come to mind. Religions tend to invent ideas or concepts rather than technologies, but like every other creative human enterprise, they produce some really bad ones along with the good.

I’ve previously highlighted some of humanity’s best moral and spiritual concepts, our shared moral core. Here, by way of contrast, are some of the worst. These twelve dubious concepts promote conflict, cruelty, suffering and death rather than love and peace. To paraphrase Christopher Hitchens, they belong in the dustbin of history just as soon as we can get them there.

1. Chosen People –The term “Chosen People” typically refers to the Hebrew Bible and the ugly idea that God has given certain tribes a Promised Land (even though it is already occupied by other people)...

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The Living, Breathing, Balancing Act of Life

The Living, Breathing, Balancing Act of Life

By David Gelfand

Guest Writer for Wake Up World

At the very core of our being, from the moment we’re born, it becomes apparent that not all things are like. There are good and bad, hot and cold, lazy and relentless, and so on. Life, from the moment we’re born to the day we pass, becomes a balancing act.

The concepts of choice, freedom and will power are what define our every move. We choose our destiny, define our action and live with the results. The beauty of a human being is that he or she has the capability to understand and analyze choices as they play out in life.

Balance, when demonstrated on such a grandiose and high-level approach, may appear daunting, confusing and uncertain. However, when broken down, balance can become much more manageable. When applied to our daily lives, balance represents the handle and organization of various elements within our lives, both internal and external.

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Bright flashes and sonic booms reported above the North Island, New Zealand

Bright lights and sonic booms in the night sky above North Island, New Zealand have been reported on February 11, 2015.

The event, which illuminated the sky and later shook doors and windows, happened around 22:00 local time (09:00 UTC). Descriptions of the light ranged from white and orange to green and blue.

Video courtesy of Josh Sherborne

Reports came from Auckland to Nelson, and the Coromandel to New Plymouth,  Stuff writes. Even people in Christchurch and on the West Coast witnessed the event.

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Snake Oil

Success is often a popularity contest, where one person holds a group of people hostage in their mind and imagination.
 
The mind is easily influenced by anything, or anyone, promising relief from the pain of existence.  Like frightened sheep, they will follow anyone claiming to possess the staff of authority, the price often clouded in deception, ignorance, and personal delusion.
 
We must be careful not to sell ourselves out to anyone offering the newest snake oil, or quick fix.

Namaste.
Robert and CJ

**If you enjoyed this post, please share it!
email Robert: robertcosmar@gmail.com
email CJ: cjheck60porsche@gmail.com

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7 Must-See Skywatching Events You Won’t Want To Miss In 2015

Each year that goes by, we get a spectacular new set of things to see in our skies. How exciting is that? Be sure to mark your calendars for these amazing celestial events.

April 4th, Total solar eclipse

You won’t see a moon in the sky on April 4th, but right around noon, the Earth will pass between the sun and the moon, triggering a total solar eclipse visible to the south Pacific, including Australia, Alaska and Japan. North America will see a partial eclipse. Womp womp.

July 30th, Jupiter and Venus.

On July 30th, Jupiter and Venus will be side by side in the night sky. This paring will be visible for only 7 days.

September 27th, Super Moon

North America, Africa and Europe will experience the spectacular super moon on September 27th beginning at 10pm.

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Here’s What Happens When A Kid Leaves Traditional Education

Logan LaPlante is a 13 year old boy who was removed from the traditional education system and became home schooled. Besides being home schooled, Logan was capable of tailoring his education to his passions and interests and was able to adapt the learning process to his style of learning, which traditional education doesn’t provide. Logan mentions in his speech that when he grows up, his plan is to be happy and healthy, not that he wants a certain job or career placement. During his TEDx talk in 2013, he spoke about how he hacked his education and how that is helping him achieve his goal of being happy and healthy.

Does Education Kill Creativity?

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$13,500 to Kill Sacred White Buffalo in Texas—Can This Be True?

American Indians across the internet are flocking to the website of Texas Hunt Lodge today—and not because they're planning a hunting trip. No, they're alarmed by a page on the site dedicated to the White Buffalo Hunt Package, which advertises a chance to kill a white buffalo for $13,500.

White buffaloes are sacred animals to the Lakota Sioux and other Native groups, and there aren't a lot of the creatures around. When one was born last year in Greenville, Texas, it was an occasion for much rejoicing. An article in the British newspaper Daily Mail extensively covered the naming ceremony of Lightning Medicine Cloud. That report said that "Lightning Medicine Cloud, whose name is also a tribute to a white buffalo born in 1933, named Big Medicine, is thought—in Lakota Sioux tradition—to be the third of its kind ever born."

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The 100 Best Zen Sayings and Proverbs of All Time

I’ve always loved the religious philosophy of Zen Buddhism, for many reasons, and one of those reasons is that just by speaking a few words, Zen masters are able to transmit tremendously important messages that are of immense value to all seekers on the path to spiritual awakening. Here you will find for yourself a collection of some (100!) of the best zen sayings and proverbs of all time, which will hopefully help you see yourself and the world with new, fresh eyes.

The Present Moment and Mindfulness

“This is the real secret of life — to be completely engaged with what you are doing in the here and now. And instead of calling it work, realize it is play.”- Alan Watts

“The only thing that is ultimately real about your journey is the step that you are taking at this moment. That’s all there ever is.”- Eckhart Tolle

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15 Things You Should Know When You’re Having a Bad Day

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The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance. – Alan Watts

A rough day at work, a big fight with your spouse, the loss of a loved one, a setback in your business, personal issues you can’t seem to get away from, the fight of addiction, and countless other challenges.

We all have different types of challenges, but we all have challenges.

We all have stresses, we all experience pain, and we all ultimately suffer in some way and at some point in our lives.

But this doesn’t mean that’s all there is. Life is2n’t some big dark ball of sadness and tough times. If you know how, you can completely transform your challenges into moments of great love, gratitude, and appreciation.

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The Ocean from Which You Arose

Perhaps this enlightenment you seek is your coming to the point when and where you realize what matters -- the merit of life itself on Earth, life and love, the Oneness of All Life. As you discover the Fullness of Love in its entirety, you know, once and for all, that your cup runneth over.

Yes, life and love matter, and they are inevitable. Life and love are soaring and unstoppable. And so it is. In life, you discover Life itself and the quality and abundance of love, the discovery of Self, the finding of Self and recovering of it, uncovering what was always there yet hidden from your view and the view of the populace. Now you are finding the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the bluebird of happiness in your own back yard, and God in Heaven, and you find that all is well.

As you arrive at this point, what uproarious laughter We, you and I, will have. We will roll on the floor. We will not be able to get up. We will not be able to stop laughing. You will see what has always been, and you will begin to discover your True Standing in the Universe.

For so long, while on Earth, each Child of Mine, including you, plays the part of a fool, a serious fool, a joker in a deck of cards, taking himself and current events with such seriousness and naiveté, perhaps a scholarly fool yet a scholar who is fooled, who fools himself and becomes one of the crowd on Earth, taking a fool’s errand as if that were the sum and substance of life when, all the while, Infinity stares him in the face.

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Unifying The Global Peace Movement – Challenges and Solutions

By Andreas Toupadakis, PhD

Contributing Writer for Wake Up World

Taking the Peace Movement from the Classes to the Masses

“Disobedience to be civil must be sincere, respectful, restrained, must be based upon some well-understood principle, must not be capricious and, above all, must have no ill will or hatred behind it.” ~ Mahatma Gandhi

During a successful career in industrial and classified-government positions, I quit my role maintaining nuclear weaponry, realizing that government scientific programs are only interested in developing systems of war, not peace.

After I resigned, naturally I found myself in the activities of the world peace movement. During one of these early activities in the United States, someone came to me and asked me, “Do you plan to be arrested today?” For a moment I was lost, and I did not know what to answer. I thought being arrested for speaking out about what I believed was a possibility, but I thought it would be quite remote if not impossible. “No”, I answered in confusion.

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The Tao of Leadership

If you want to be a great leader, you must learn to follow the Tao.
Stop trying to control. Let go of fixed plans and concepts, and the world will govern itself.

The more prohibitions you have,
the less virtuous people will be.
The more weapons you have, the less secure people will be. The more subsidies you have,
the less self-reliant people will be.

Therefore the Master says: I let go of the law, and people become honest.
I let go of economics, and people become prosperous. I let go of religion and people become serene.
I let go of all desire for the common good, and the good becomes common as grass.

If a country is governed with tolerance, the people are comfortable and honest.
If a country is governed with repression, the people are depressed and crafty.

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Huge solar filament facing Earth

A huge solar filament is facing Earth today and, if it doesn't erupt, will continue to do so in the coming days. Stretched out, it would be more than 857 780 km or 533 000 miles long, which is more than 67 Earth diameters. 

Image below shows this filament as seen by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) on February 10, 2015. Since SDO shows colder material as dark and hotter material as light, this snaked visible line is, in fact, an enormous swatch of colder material hovering in the Sun's atmosphere, the corona. 

Filaments can float for days before disappearing, but sometimes they destabilize and erupt out in space, releasing solar material in a shower that either rains back down to the solar surface or escapes out into space, becoming a moving cloud which we know as a Coronal Mass Ejection, or CME.

GFP Newsletter - 2/10/2015

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The so-called education that goes on in the world prepares you only to earn bread. And Jesus says, "Man cannot live by bread alone." And that's what your universities have been doing - they prepare you to earn bread in a better way, in an easier way, in a more comfortable way, with less effort, with less hardship. But all that they do is prepare you to earn your bread and butter. It is a very, very primitive kind of education: it does not prepare you for life.

Hence you see so many robots walking around. They are perfect as clerks, as stationmasters, as deputy collectors. They are perfect, they are skillful, but if you look deep down in them they are just beggars and nothing else. They have not even tasted one bite of life. They have not known what life is, what love is, what light is. They have not known anything of God, they have not tasted anything of existence, they don't know how to sing and how to dance and how to celebrate. They don't know the grammar of life; they are utterly stupid. Yes, they earn - they earn more than others, they are very skillful and they go on rising higher and higher on the ladder of success - but deep down they remain empty, poor.

Education is to give you inner richness. It is not just to make you more informed; that is a very primitive idea of education. I call it primitive because it is rooted in fear, rooted in that "If I am not well educated I will not be able to survive. " I call it primitive because deep down it is very violent, it teaches you competition, it makes you ambitious. It is nothing but a preparation for a cut-throat, competitive world where everybody is the enemy of everybody else.

Hence the world has become a madhouse. Love cannot happen. How Can love happen in such a violent, ambitious, competitive world where everybody is at each other's throat? This is very primitive because it is based in the fear that "If I am not well educated, well protected, highly informed, I may not be able to survive in the struggle of life. " It takes life only as a struggle.

-Rajneesh

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Someone Asked The Dalai Lama What Surprises Him Most, His Response Was Mind Altering

You could say that the Dalai Lama is a pretty interesting guy, after all his stance on extra terrestrial life is quite interesting. During an interview the Dalai Lama was asked what surprises him the most, his response was quite mind altering.

“Man surprised me most about humanity. Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.”

Pretty striking and powerful stuff if you really take it in. Sure, it’s easy to read this quote and move onto another page or video or whatever we may be doing, but if you truly take the time to let this reverberate in your conscious mind for a few minutes, the true meaning and profoundness of what he’s saying will kick in.

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