Most Commented Religion & Spirituality Blogs (1,491)

Two little old ladies were chatting over the backyard fence. The first one boasted, “I went out with old man Cain last night and I had to slap him twice.”
“To stop him?” asked her friend.
“No,” she giggled, “to start him!”
Something is always possible. One thing that you need is: rather than searching for a soulmate, become a soul, become more conscious. When love is unconscious it is only lust and nothing else — a beautiful name for an ugly thing. When love is conscious, only then it is love. But how many people are conscious? When love is meditative, only then it is love.
And a meditative love will attract a meditative love energy. You get only what you deserve, remember, neither less nor more. You always get exactly that which you deserve. Existence is very just and very fair. So if you are not getting a soulmate, it is not going to help to frantically search for one. Rather look in. You are missing something in you — you are missing love qualities. You are not tender, you are not sensitive, you are not conscious. And you don’t know how to give without asking anything in return. Your love is a demand, there is a condition to it. It is a kind of exploitation. You want to use the other’s body, and no woman is ever happy if she is used — she hates it.
Millions of women hate their husbands for the simple reason that they feel used, as if they are just machines for your s*xual lust to be relieved so that you can have a good night’s sleep. No woman can ever respect you if she feels she is being used. Each being is an end unto himself. Never use a woman, never use a man, never use anybody. Nobody is a means for your purposes. Respect — love is a sharing, it is not using the other, it is not trying to snatch something from the other. On the contrary, it is giving wholeheartedly for no reason at all, just for the sheer joy of giving.
And then suddenly you will find one day you have found someone with whom your energies are in harmony, in accord. And it is a beautiful experience even to find a single person with whom you are in accord. And here you can find many persons with whom you are in accord.
You can’t imagine my ecstasy, because I am in accord with all of my sannyasins, in deep accord, a tremendous harmony. Then love reaches its highest peak. It is no more s*xual, it is pure prayer. And when love is prayer, you have found the soulmate.
But if your love is lust you can’t find a soulmate, you can only find some woman’s body. And the body is not going to help fulfill your longing. You need attunement with the soul, with the inner being, with the interiority of the woman or of the man.

I have been single for almost 2 years now, and when I ended my previous relationship in January 2016, I was hoping to start dating within 3 months' time. I convinced myself that by then I would be ready. I started putting myself out there, I started seeking a new relationship while still full of anger, disappointments from my previous relationship. I was quite disappointed when the year ended while I was still single. I sought a relationship in every way possible. I stopped seeking God, and sought my husband. As the search continued, I was quite  disappointed with God. I was lonely, alone and miserable, and everyone knows that misery loves company.  I thought finding my husband would make me complete as I thought I would meet this special, perfect guy who would bring happiness to my miserable life. I wanted someone to fill the void that I had from my previous relationship, but little did I know that only God could do that for me.  Only God loved me that much to take my brokenness and exchange it for wholeness. I was determined that it was my boyfriend's or husband's duty to make and keep me happy.
 
 During that time, I prayed, fasted and did all a christian single woman could do, until few days ago when I was reading Matthew 6:33 which says "But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you"KJV. I have read this verse so many times before, but this time it was different. My eyes were opened to the truth that I needed to hear for so long. I also like Holman Christian Standard Bible which says "But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be provided for you". God promises to provide all these things while we seeking his kingdom and his righteousness.
 
I was seeking the creation instead of the Creator, I was seeking the thing created instead of the One who created it. My eyes were opened and I realized that I am not on this planet to seek a husband, or a relationship. My assignment on this earth is not to find my husband, but I had a bigger purpose and assignment. God further made me aware of the fact that I am a woman, therefore, I will be a wife someday and the bible says in Proverbs 18:22 "He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the LORD" NIV This means that I am to be found, not find. I am not an initiator, but a responder. I was so amazed by the fact that I spent 2 years of my singleness seeking my husband, instead of seeking the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and wait for God to give me all these things.
 
Being single is not easy, especially when everyone around you is getting married, engaged and you remain the only single friend they have, but I can guarantee you that should you seek the wrong things, you will find rest on the prostitute's lap. Look at what happened to Samson in Judge 16:19 "After putting him to sleep on her lap, she called for someone to shave off the seven braids of his hair, and so began to subdue him. And his strength left him".
 
God has allowed me to be in a place where I trust him more than I did 2 years ago, I am at peace, I am wise, I am better, stronger (spiritually). I am becoming a woman that I am proud of.  I am grateful for the closed doors, I am grateful for the potential husbands I met and prayed they would stay, I am grateful they never did. I am expecting my husband to be more what I asked for, I am expecting "...exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us" Ephesians 3:20 KJV. I am not putting my expectation on people anymore, my expectations are on the Word and the promises of the Lord.

“Love respects the other. It is a give-and-take relationship. Love enjoys giving, and love enjoys taking. It is a sharing, it is a communication. Both are equal in love; in a s*xual relationship both are not equal. Love has a totally different beauty to it.
“The world is slowly, slowly moving towards love relationships; hence there is great turmoil. All the old institutions are disappearing – they have to disappear, because they were based on the I/it relationship. New ways of communication, new ways of sharing are bound to be discovered. They will have a different flavor, the flavor of love, of sharing. They will be nonpossessive; there will be no owner.
“Then the highest state of love is prayerfulness. In prayerfulness there is communion. In sex there is the I/it relationship, in love the I/thou relationship. Martin Buber stops there; his Judaic tradition won’t allow him to go further. But one step more has to be taken that is neither 'I' nor 'thou' – a relationship where I and thou disappear, a relationship where two persons no longer function as two but function as one. A tremendous unity, a harmony, a deep accord – two bodies but one soul. That is the highest quality of love. I call it prayerfulness.
“Love has these three stages, and compassion accordingly has three stages, and both can exist in different combinations.
“Hence there are so many kinds of love and so many kinds of compassion. But the basic, the most fundamental, is to understand this three-rung ladder of love. That will help you, that will give you an insight into where you are, what kind of love you are living in and what kind of compassion is happening to you. Watch. Beware not to remain caught in it. There are higher realms, heights to be climbed, peaks to be attained.”

Forget relationships and learn how to relate. Once you are in a relationship you start taking each other for granted – that’s what destroys all love affairs. The woman thinks she knows the man, the man thinks he knows the woman. Nobody knows either! It is impossible to know the other, the other remains a mystery. And to take the other for granted is insulting, disrespectful. To think that you know your wife is very, very ungrateful. How can you know the woman? How can you know the man? They are processes, they are not things. The woman that you knew yesterday is not there today. So much water has gone down the Ganges; she is somebody else, totally different. Relate again, start again, don’t take it for granted. And the man that you slept with last night, look at his face again in the morning. He is no more the same person, so much has changed. So much, incalculably much has changed. That is the difference between a thing and a person. The furniture in the room is the same, but the man and the woman, they are no more the same. Explore again, start again. That’s what I mean by relating

India is not just a geography or history. It is not only a nation, a country, a mere piece of land. It is something more: it is a metaphor, poetry, something invisible but very tangible. It is vibrating with certain energy fields that no other country can claim.

For almost ten thousand years, thousands of people have reached to the ultimate explosion of consciousness. Their vibration is still alive, their impact is in the very air; you just need a certain perceptivity, a certain capacity to receive the invisible that surrounds this strange land.

It is strange because it has renounced everything for a single search, the search for the truth.

In these pages, we are treated to a spellbinding vision of "the real India," the India that has given birth to enlightened mystics and master musicians, to the inspired poetry of the Upanishads and the breathtaking architecture of the Taj Mahal. We travel through the landscape of India's golden past with Alexander the Great and meet the strange people he met along the way. We are given a front-row seat in the proceedings of the legendary court of the Moghul Emperor Akbar, and an insider's view of the assemblies of Gautama the Buddha and his disciples.

In the process, we discover just what it is about India that has made it a magnet for seekers for centuries, and the importance of India's unique contribution to our human search for truth.


Beautifully illustrated with photos of some of India's most sacred places, India My Love is a mystery tour with me as guide and storyteller. In its pages we are taken on a journey through India's "golden past," and into its haunting presence. Along the way we are introduced to beggars and kings, wise men and fools, lovers and warriors, artists and scholars, and learn how each of them has contributed to the rich tapestry of mysticism and mystery that makes up India's unique contribution to our human search for truth.

I have been lying awake at night...my mind racing. Trying to be productive, trying to stay focused. I had invested so much emotionally that I would start trembling and sweating just thinking about it. Then...the news broke, and my deepest fear became reality....

Rob Gronkowski has officially retired from football!!!

NOoooooooooo!

I was about to reply to some of the messages in my previous blog, then realized I needed to write a whole new blog instead.

Many Polynesian languages similarities. Honestly its a variation of all our languages put together. So it comes to no surprise for me.

An example NZ Maori would say Aroha with its basic meaning, love. But it's extended meaning is Breathe Desire, which is the breath of light, shared from one person to your loved one an intimate transfer of sharing breaths.

So the Hawaiian people say Aloha which for them means Hello, I believe. Our vowels are definitely the same in pronunciation.

And imma take a wild guess that Wahini means woman because we say Wahine.

The All Blacks (rugby players), do what is called a Haka, and in no way is it a dance. In the old days Haka was performed as a pre-emptive to war between two tribes. Its why the Haka is feared in a certain country, because in the WWII our people marked their faces and performed a Haka before the coming battle.

Now getting back to the tribes performing the haka, it was designed to see who was the most fierce or the violence they were going to inflict on their enemies, and if one tribe found the other overwhelming I believe the weaker tribe would make a more peaceful resolution. Our race to put it simply were quite a violent race.

However if they were even in ferocity during the Haka, the battle was still going foward, especially after being insulted from the opposing tribe. Because that's what haka was designed to do. To insult and determine the strongest before a battle.
The poking of the tongue is to let them know what they would look like after been struck.
The eyes being enlarged represents the fear of the opposition before they die as they see the last strike of their life.
Every act is to instigate a war, or subdue the opponent. The Poi as you will see in performances were originally weapons that were made of flax and rocks, a weapon for women. And believe me when I say they were quite deadly with them.

But nowadays its more for perfomance, a friendly rivalry between tribes, they have Junior and Secondary competitions, as well as adult performances where they do an entire brackett. Then they have District competitions.

So in future keep in mind a Haka is not a dance, only if they sing, its then a dance. But when they start shouting at the top of their lungs. its a haka. We also have a national haka that the entire country knows or knows of called Ka mate, Ka mate.



One of my favourite performances about 15 years ago


I chose this ropu(group) because they had a great intro song, it also shows you their bracket, or order of the general performances for ropu. Important to note they are using a real weapon in their performances known as a taiaha, highly dangerous in a group performance, will be used only by professionally trained maori. For most though its quite normal and natural with hours of practice.


This was an awesome challenge/ counter challenge. They are different schools even though they had the same colour gear. The boys on the right also perform the national haka. Unrehearsed too.




Thanks again for reading my blog

After 20 years now between being on MD and CS, there is only one person here who even knows my first name. And she isn't telling anyone. I'd say that's a pretty darn good record of secrecy.

Do you people believe all of us human beings from first to the last will gather and face creator for our deeds of our entire lives on earth? :