Dave's Blog

Monday, May 17, 2004 7:57:25 AM 

Pessimism is not realism.  I recently read an article where the 
author compared the attitudes of optimists with those of 
realists.  The only problem with that was his description of 
realists was not a true description of realism.  He was 
describing pessimism.  This is not a binary world.  Realism is 
often taken to mean seeing the world as it really is, and 
of accepting whatever is found to exist.  Both optimists and 
pessimists claim to be realists.   

What is real?  Is dualism real?  Stocks will move up or down; 
this was declared a certainty in a seminar I attended last year.  
This year the news is full of articles on "how to make money in a 
sideways market."  Sideways means neither up nor down.  

    I burn a candle with two wicks  
    Oh, what a pretty light 
    One end will move before the other 
    Will it be the left or the right?  
    -- Doji Marubozu 

We all live in the same world.  The world that created street 
urchins also created billionaires.  I enjoy reading of people who 
start with $5 in their pockets and then proceed to create great 
institutions and to become multimillionaires.  It does my heart 
good to know that success does not have to come from inheritance.  
What makes the millions for the millionaires?  Pessimism?  
Realism?  I have to believe that it is optimism that works for 
them.  They create according to their worldview, and in their 
worldview they see opportunities for success.  Opportunity 
doesn't make the man, man makes the opportunity.  


Friday, May 14, 2004, 9:18:53 AM

Weight is health.  Rather, the optimum weight yields the optimum 
health.  Margaret and I saw this principle very clearly 
illustrated in the photos we culled from my past lifetimes.  We 
saw pictures of relatives when they weighed a little, and we saw 
pictures of relatives when they weighed a lot.  Margaret noticed 
that lighter people have a different energy about them.  I 
noticed that lighter people were more attractive.  I also noticed 
that in general the heavier people were older.  That made me 
pause.  Rev. Elouise Oliver says there's no such thing as age.  
She puts conscious energy into controlling her weight and keeping 
fit.  Bijan also spends time in the gym, wins body-building 
championships, and doesn't age.  Laboratory rats that are 
"underfed" live 50% longer than rats that are allowed to eat all 
they want.  

This morning Margaret and I discussed the idea that we weighed 
less when we met each other.  We were both divorced, and we were 
both attractive.  Hmm ... after we were married we stopped 
working out and started gaining weight.  I notice that other 
people in my life also lose weight when they are single and gain 
weight when they are in a relationship.  What is behind that 
behavior?  Marketing and advertising, perhaps.  Light weight is 
strongly associated with looking good, which is strongly 
associated with attracting mates.  Why doesn't marketing and 
advertising promote light weight in married couples?  Are the 
advertisers forgetting that long, healthy lives are also 
valuable?  

I believe the grieving process after a separation is a natural 
biological function, the purpose being to lose appetite, thus 
lose weight, thus attract the next mate.  As a couple, perhaps we 
could go to the gym together!  We could play with the equipment, 
look better, and attract each other!  We could be our next mates!  
Plus we could live longer and healthier! 

My inner world creates my outer world.  Ernest Holmes says it's 
simple.  There's no great unfathomable mystery that takes years 
to master.  It's very, very simple.  Sometimes my inner world 
creates my outer world in very simple, direct ways.  No 
intervening assist from the Universe is required to take my 
thinking about my health and weight and translate it directly 
into how I feel and look.  That's an internal, hard-wired 
connection.  


Monday, 10 May, 2004 2:19:11 AM 

I am studying Catherine Ponder's Open Your Mind to Receive with 
Margaret's Prosperity Salon.  This week's chapter is "Your Gift 
of 'Nothing but the Best.'"  In it Catherine notes that "it only 
costs a little more to go first-class," and I can remember saying 
that first class costs no more.  An article in Business Week, 
May 17, 2004, goes even further.  Titled "First Class Steal," it 
states that there are now routes on major carriers that have first 
class seating actually priced less than coach.  Larry Armstrong 
describes a fare on American Airlines that cost $540 for coach 
and $518 for first class.  This reminds me that everything I know 
is old information, and that I have to be receptive to new 
information to take advantage of opportunity.  Psychologists call 
the misapplication of old knowledge to new areas "negative 
transference," and I see that negative transference also applies 
within familiar areas.  

This week I have seen new junk e-mail.  Four messages have 
arrived with the subject line "Expect Nothing but the Best."  I 
believe the Universe has set up a big flashing billboard for me.  

    "It is a funny thing about life; if you refuse to accept 
    anything but the best, you very often get it."  
    -- W. Somerset Maugham


Tuesday, May 04, 2004 11:30:09 PM 

Walking on fire changed my perspective.  Tending the fire changed 
it even further.  One evening, as Margaret led the workshop in 
the conference room, I quietly watched the fire burn from a 
four-foot stack of blazing wood to a one-foot mound of glowing 
coals.  The air was warm and clear, and I found myself communing 
not only with the fire, but with the moon and stars, the singing 
frogs in the pond, the egret that dropped by to see what was 
going on.  The fire was just one point in an infinite universe, 
and it was the point to which I was devoting my attention.  It 
burned evenly and tamely, firing a hot jet straight up for the 
first phase of its life.  Standing before the 15-foot jet, I was 
fascinated.  The wood burned evenly and fell straight down.  
There was no need to prod, no need to straighten out or smooth 
the coals and ash.  The fire tended itself.  

Sometimes I would think there must be some way to speed up the 
process. Then as I would take a piece of wood and place it on top, 
it would fall apart into coals and filter down into the mound.  
The fire really was tending itself, and I became aware that the 
first virtue of the firetender is patience.  Margaret came out 
to check the fire, and it looked like it would take about a half 
hour longer to coal than our original estimate.  In the calm air 
the wood was burning more slowly than it would in a breeze, and 
we both learned more patience.  

    "All things happen in their own time according to their 
    nature.  Patience is living in the now and knowing that all 
    is unfolding in perfect harmony."  
    -- Julia Flynn 

I take this new awareness into my daily life.  As the limo driver 
cuts across lanes, as the freeway traffic slows to a standstill, 
as the needs of my client ask that I hurry up and wait, I focus 
on the serenity of knowing here and now that all is well, and 
that everything will happen when it needs to happen, and not a 
moment sooner or later.  I let go of the need to control, and 
become less a surgeon and more a midwife.  

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