1. Welcome to Issue #163 (August 2006) of MIND CHATTER, the e-mail newsletter of Centerpointe Research Institute: http://www.centerpointe.com. Mind Chatter is published once a month, on or about the 16th of each month. Please send Mind Chatter to a friend, and please send us your questions, comments, and suggestions. ................................................................................ 2. If you would like to unsubscribe, you can manage your account via the link at the end of this newsletter. (But please don't. We like you and we want you to stay.) ................................................................................ 3. In This Issue // MindQuotes (scroll to #5) // A few recommendations that may benefit you (scroll to item #6) // Feature Article Dream On... or, Where's my Surprise Button? by Bill Harris, Director (scroll to item #7) // Glowing Testimonials of the Month (scroll to #8) // Book Review (scroll to #9) Invisible Acts of Power: Channeling Grace in Your Everyday Life By Caroline Myss Review by Heather Self ................................................................................ 4. MIND CHATTER contains articles about: // How you create your life--and how you can stop unconsciously creating experiences and outcomes you do not want, and instead begin to create exactly what you do want // Personal and spiritual growth in general // Meditation (high- and low-tech) // Recovery from emotional trauma // Pretty much any other subject I get excited about and want to write about. After all, it's my company and my newsletter, and I can do whatever I want with it. So there. ................................................................................ 5. Mind Quotes There's always free cheese in the mouse traps, but the mice there ain't happy. --unknown He who conquers himself has won a greater victory than he who conquers a city. --Proverbs We all die. The goal isn't to live forever, the goal is to create something that will. --Chuck Palahniuk You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream. --C.S. Lewis ................................................................................ 6. Live long and prosper! Unless you've been living in a cave lately, you must have seen some of the recent news about the health benefits of meditation. It's everywhere... * An article published in the American Heart Association journal, Stroke, recently reported that meditation can reduce cholesterol buildup and the associated risk of heart attack and stroke. * And another study of the elderly found that meditation actually added years to their lives. * The National Institutes of Health reports that regular meditation reduces chronic pain, anxiety, high blood pressure, cholesterol, and cortisol (sometimes called "the stress hormone") production. * A University of Wisconsin-Madison study discovered meditation boosts brain function and the immune system. * A recent issue of the American Journal of Hypertension featured the results of a study showing a significant lowering of blood pressure in a group of meditators compared to a control group of people who didn't meditate. The study also reported a 23% decrease in usage of antihypertensive drugs between the group of meditators and the other group. * A Harvard study also concluded that regular meditation can reduce pain, lower blood pressure, and cut production of the stress hormone, cortisol. * The most recent study by The American Heart Association shows heart and artery health improved 69 percent in test groups practicing meditation. And this is just the beginning. Practically every time you turn around there's another study documenting and supporting fantastic health and wellness benefits of meditation. So, what's the quickest way to actually achieve these amazing benefits? If there's a downside to meditation it's this... Traditional meditation can take years, even decades to master. The Holosync Solution changes all that. Holosync uses advanced scientific technology to induce deep states of meditation virtually at the push of a button. Most regular users of Holosync report fabulous results in weeks rather than years. Try Holosync for yourself-for FREE! Click visit http://www.centerpointe.com/demo/ to get a FREE Holosync demo CD so you can see for yourself how this powerful technology can improve your life. Here's an even better idea. Go ahead and order Awakening Prologue (the first level of The Holosync Solution) and get started with the real thing. With our One-Year 100% Iron-Clad Guarantee, you can do so with no risk whatsoever. Use Holosync for up to a full year and enjoy all the powerful and lasting benefits this kind of meditation brings you. And if you decide that Holosync isn't everything we promise, simply let us know and you can return it for a full refund. It's just that simple. If you have any interest at all in increased health and vigor, increased longevity, lower blood pressure, peace of mind, and all the other great benefits of meditation, at least give Holosync a try. Remember you can get a FREE demo CD by going to +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ http://www.centerpointe.com/demo/ +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ And to learn all about the science behind Holosync, check out our extensive articles section here: ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ http://www.centerpointe.com/about/articles.php ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ** // ** Which of these big life improvements would you like to enjoy? [ ] I want more loving and fulfilling relationships [ ] I want to enjoy my successes rather then have them torn from my grasp at the last minute [ ] I want to be happier and more satisfied with my life [ ] I want to get rid of bad habits and adopt resourceful ones [ ] I know I could achieve a lot more with just a little bit of help [X] I want to create MY LIFE rather than live one that just happens to me I know that many people may have promised that they can teach you how to create the life you want. I promise you that I really can--and have for thousands of people. I've also arranged for you to be able to experience a sample of how I do it, FREE. So, here's a very special opportunity for you...something that can totally turn your life around. And, it could be worth a considerable amount of money to you, as well. Just for a moment, imagine: WHAT IF you could be IN CHARGE of what happens to you--including your feelings and emotions and other internal states, as well as your external results?... Wouldn't that be a lot better than waiting for life to "just happen," where you sometimes get what you want, and sometimes you get what you don't want? Are you willing to learn exactly HOW you can do this? For the last year and a half, I've been teaching three 12-lesson online courses called the Life Principles Integration Process, or LPIP, that teach you all of this, and more. I've received thousands of emails and letters from the people in these courses telling me how what they've learned has transformed their lives, even saved their lives. (You can see some of the comments people have made below.) So more people could afford the LPIP courses, and as an introductory offer, I'm offering them for an incredibly low $249 per course. And, if you sign up for all three, I'll give you the third course for FREE. This actually made each course $166 each, about $13.83 per lesson. If I taught the LPIP material in seminar form, it would probably take at least ten long intense days to teach each course. And with all the personal follow-up I include, I'd have to charge several thousand dollars per course for you to attend. And even at that lofty price, it would be worth it, I promise you. Not only that, there is an iron-clad money back guarantee on these courses. Take the course and do the homework, and if you don't think this is the most transformational experience you've ever had, I'll immediately refund your entire tuition. In other words, you have nothing to lose but whatever ways you have been automatically creating what you don't want in life. I will warn you, though. These LPIP courses are not your typical pablum-filled feel-good seminars where you feel high at the end but realize three weeks later that little if anything really changed. If you take these three courses, EVERYTHING will change--and, for the better. Your life will be transformed. You will have all the tools you need to be in direct control of your life--your feelings, your internal state, your external results, your behavior. And, you will gain a huge insight into who you really are, why you're here, and what life is all about. Plus you'll learn, step-by-step, the exact strategies, internal and external, used by the most successful people in the world to get anything they want. And, I'll show you how to make sure you use them and make them work for you. And, as I said, if you don't get what you want from these courses, for any reason, you can get a refund. I'm taking all the risk, other than your time investment in actually doing the lessons. If you're not serious about changing your life, if you aren't willing to do what it takes to operate at the highest level and really be happy, peaceful, and successful ALL THE TIME, this isn't for you. But if you're serious, if you're sincere, these three courses will utterly and completely change your life. Here's a huge and very unique benefit you'll get from these LPIP online courses: In addition to everything else, all LPIP course participants get unlimited email access to me for any questions they have about course content. I answer every one of these emails personally--no staff members are involved--and some of my answers, when necessary, are sometimes three, five, even seven pages long. I put everything into this course, because I really, sincerely want you to get everything I'm promising. You though, have a part in the success of these courses--in fact, a big part. I don't wave a magic wand over you and change you into a happy, peaceful, successful person in complete control of his or her life. I just tell you how to do it, and give you an easy way to make the change. Because I have such a huge personal time investment in answering all your questions, I want to make one thing very clear, though. Please DO NOT take these courses unless you're willing to do your part. I do not have the time to waste on those who aren't sincere and aren't willing to pay the price to create the internal changes they want. But if you ARE sincere, and you really do want to change your life, I want to show you how to do it, and I will take you, step by step, through everything you need to know. You CAN create an entirely new life for yourself, regardless of your past or present circumstances. You can read more about each course and what it includes, and even listen to a free preview lesson, just by visiting the url below: http://www.centerpointe.com/life/preview So please, go listen to the free preview lesson, and if you really are ready to change your life, enroll in this amazing courses risk-free. I look forward to having you in these courses and showing you that the possibilities for what your life can be really are limitless...regardless of your present or past circumstances. Just visit http://www.centerpointe.com/life/preview to listen to the free preview lesson and to take advantage of the old low price before we're forced to raise it on June 1st: ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ http://www.centerpointe.com/life/preview ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Be well. Bill ................................................................................ 7. Feature Article Dream On... or, Where's my Surprise Button? By Bill Harris In the last few issues of Mind Chatter, I've suggested that the common-sense idea of a separate you, a separate Self isolated from the rest of the universe, is an illusion created by your mind. What's more, I've also proposed that there are, in reality, no separate things of any kind, nor are there any separate events. That it looks that way to most people is the result of a certain way of thinking. In fact, I'm proposing that the entire universe is really one big interconnected system (you might remember my metaphor of a whirlpool from previous articles) and that any divisions, any categories, any separation of any kind, are created mentally. Such divisions, however, do not exist in reality. They are mentally imposed upon reality, and come from you and your way of thinking. Don't get me wrong. I'm not against the idea of dividing the universe into separate things and events. Not at all. There are many handy benefits to doing so. What I'm against is the belief that these separate things and events are intrinsically real. In other words, I'm suggesting that all separate things and events are something we make up. And thenexcept for a few remarkable individuals who have seen through the gamewe forget that we've done so. We create a division (again, in our mind) between two "things" the United States and Canada, for instance. We represent that division by referring to "the border" between themas if there was something there other than an imaginary line. Trust me on this. I've been there. I looked for it. There is no line. In fact, all divisions are just like the border between the US and Canada. Such divisions are sometimes a useful way to think about things, but still, they are merely conceptual. I demonstrated this with a number of examples, which you can go back and reexamine in the last couple of issues, if you like. The biggest division, however, the biggest separationat least from a human perspectiveis that of "me" and "not me" of imagining that we are something other than the entire process of the universe. When you think this way, you open yourself to many unpleasant consequences, including the fear that some "outside of you" will harm you, craving for something you "don't have," suffering over not getting something you want, and the biggie, fear of death. In fact, all negative emotions are consequences of this made up feeling of being separate. In contrast to the idea of separation, I introduced the idea that you actually are the entire universethat you are an aperture, or center, from which the universe can be aware of itself. If this is true, if you really are the going on of it all, then you are what some people call God. We also talked about the mystery of nothingness that lies behind ourselves, and everything else. You could liken this nothingness to the blank space behind the eyes, or the silence out of which sounds come, or the space out of which stars shine. This nothingness is often spoken of as God in Eastern religions, or in the mystical wing of Western religions. According to Eastern religions, that emptiness is your Self, which, again, is another way of saying that you are God. In our culture, saying this is considered as being either blasphemous, or insane. It's blasphemous because in our culture we see God as the Royal Monarch of the Universethe big boss. When someone in the West says "I am God," this "God is the boss of everything" view causes us to think they're saying that they are that boss, and that they are above everyone else. We see it that way, however, because we don't share the outlook of the Hindus, Buddhists, and Taoists (and, really, the mystical branches of nearly every religion), that everythingrocks, trees, animals, people, planets, stars, and everything elseis all God in disguise, and that everything is a center, an expression, of the whole thing. In the West we've not only thought of God as the boss, but also as the maker of the universe. If the universe was made, then that maker must be outside of the universe, and separate from it. In the East, however, God isn't seen as the maker, or as an outside agent, but rather as the actor of the universe. The world is rather seen as a drama, with God playing all the parts at once. As the great philosopher and author Alan Watts was fond of pointing out, this is connected to the idea of each of us as persons. The word person comes from the Greek word persona, the megaphone mask worn by an actor in Greek and Roman drama. Your persona, then, is the mask you wear, the role you adopt. But by a curious degradation of terms, this word persona has come to be thought of as the real person, rather than as the mask each person hides behind. This Eastern conception of the world as a drama is entirely different, and, as you'll see, makes a lot of sense. When the Hindus say that you are God, they don't mean that you're the boss of the universe, but rather that you are the ground of being, the one energy of everything. Now, if you'll remember, in my last article, after describing the idea of Oneness (and, hopefully, convincing you that Oneness is much more real than the conceptually created separation you've always thought of as reality), I promised I would answer the Big Why Question, which could be stated in a number of ways: Why does all of this happen? Why do we think we're separate in the first place? If being under the illusion of separateness creates suffering, then why do we resist waking up to who we really are? And what about evil? What, indeed, is all of this all about? So, let's do a little thought experiment. Before we start, though, let me state that I'm not putting this forward as a scientific explanation of reality, but rather as a metaphor that may help you understand the answers to these questions. So pretend that when you went to sleep each night you were given the power to dream any dream you wanted while you were asleep. You could dream any length of time, and experience anything you wanted. You could even dream an entire lifetime in one night. If you had that ability, what would you do? Well, here's what I think you'd do. You'd probably start by dreaming of all the things you've always wanted: incredible riches, the most luxurious surrounding, the most sumptuous food, the most romantic love affairs, the best sex, the greatest amount of personal power, the highest level of personal abilities and talents, and so on. You'd indulge in every pleasure you could think of. You might do this, night after night, for several weeks, or even several months. But eventually, you'd get to the point where you'd done everything and experienced everything that you'd ever wanted to do, several times. And finally, at some point, you'd begin to run out of ideas. You might even begin to get bored. You might, then, decide to spice things up a bit. You might throw in a bit of danger. You'd have exciting adventures where you'd deal with challenging situations. You'd fight battles, climb mountains, rescue princesses (or princes) in distress, discover new countries, explore unknown territories. In various ways you would encounter and overcome all kinds of obstacles. And finally, just to make things more interesting, you might even get to the point where you'd decide one night to dream in such a way that you didn't even know you were dreaming. Then, to make it really interesting, you'd put yourself in some very interesting and sometimes dangerous situationsjust for the charge it would give you when you finally woke up. And, eventually, you might dare yourself to dream increasingly challenging situations, such as extreme poverty, disease, agony, and war. And then, when morning came, you'd finally wake up and say "Wow! That was really something!" So stop right now, and consider this: how do you know that's not what you're doing already? There you are, with you're whole messy life situation and all your complicated problems, sitting there reading this. Maybe this is the very drama you decided to dream this time. And, if you like it, great, but if you don't, what a surprisewhat a "wow" it will be, when you wake up. Look at it in a slightly different way. When we go to the movies, or to a play, we know it's an illusion. We know it's only a play, we know it's pretend. But the actors are doing their best to draw us in so that we become totally absorbed and forget that it's an illusion. They're hoping to have us on the edge of our seats, laughing, crying, grieving, anxious, horrified, or whatever. In the back of our mind, we know it isn't real, but to enjoy the play we voluntarily enter into a bit of self-deception. Not only are the actors doing their best to get us to lose ourselves in the drama, we also want to be taken in. So, imagine a situation in which you have, on one hand, the best of all possible actors (God), hoping to draw in the audience so that they forget that it's all just a play. Then, on the other hand, also imagine the best of all possible audiences (again, God), just hoping to be taken in by the show. What if this metaphor represents what the world is really all about? What if, in reality, we are all the many masks that the basic mind of the universe assumes, creating this drama of life, death, happiness, and sufferingand, everything elsethe one energy of the universe, playing many, many different parts. Let's link this back to the idea of being able to dream any dream. Why would the one energy of the universe do such a thing? Why would it play all of these partssome of which involve quite a bit of pain and suffering? Well, it's obvious, if you really think about it. If you were God, and you knew everything, and were in control of everything if you were everything, everywhere, forever, as I suggested in past articles you'd be bored to death. As Alan Watts used to say, a life where you knew everything and always knew what would happen next would be like making love to a plastic woman. Everything would be predictable, completely known, with no surprises. Who wants that? (I know, you're considering the idea.) Let's look at it from still another metaphorical angle. The object of our technology is to increasingly control the world, so we can push a button and get whatever we want, not unlike the idea of rubbing Aladdin's lamp and the Genie appears to grant our wishes. But eventually, just as with the dreams, after some time of having the Genie fulfill all your wishes, you'd finally get to the point where you'd say "Genie, surprise me." In one of his public talks, Alan Watts asks the audience to imagine God in the Court of Heaven, turning to his Vizier, and saying "Oh, Commander of the Faithful, we are bored." The Vizier answers, "But surely with your infinite power and wisdom you can find something interesting to do, some way of not being bored." And God, tired of knowing everything, would answer, "Oh Vizier, please give us a surprise." Resting in Oneness, knowing everything, having everything, knowing eternally that there is nowhere to go, nothing to get, and nothing to fear has its good points, but at a certain point it just might get a bit boring. At such a point, being surprised would have a certain appeal, don't you think? In order to be surprised, though, you have to "other" yourself. There has to be some element, some other being, or some part of the situation, that isn't under your control. In other words, you have to put yourself in the same position as the audience who wants to be surprised, even though they know the play isn't real. So let's say that sometime in the future we finally do get to the point where we have a button for everything, something we can push to fulfill every desire. Supposed that everything finally is under our control. Would we not want one additional button, the "surprise" button? Otherwise, life would be too predictable. It would have no juice, no zest. Dealing with the surprises of life is ultimately what makes life worth living. Now, just to be safe, we might want our surprise button to have a time limit: "surprise for 15 minutes." "surprise for an hour, a day, a year, a hundred years." Then, when the surprise has run its course, we'd be back in control. We'd catch our breath, and then, after a while, we'd want to push the surprise button again. You can see that there is a rhythm to this, and that it's one more variation on the on/off rhythm that I described earlier. In addition, this metaphor corresponds to the way, in the East, that Hindus see evolution and the course of time. In contrast to the Western view, where time is linear, Hindus see time as being circular. Instead of beginning somewhere "way back when" with a big bang, and then going along in a straight line until everything ends in the final judgment (after which things are pretty much static), the Hindus see time as going around and around, always coming back to the same place. The idea that time is linear is a deeply held idea that we really don't even think of questioning, but let's look at the circular view and see what we can learn from it. In the Hindu view, time and the world goes round and round, like a clock goes round and round, always coming around, eventually, to the same place. These rounds are calculated in what the Hindus call kalpas, each of which lasts for 4,320,000 years. (You'll readily see that the Hindus got the length of these time periods all wrong, but again, I'm not offering this as literal or scientific fact, but rather as a different way of thinking about things.) In Hindu thought, there are two kinds of kalpas, and these two endlessly alternate. The first is call the Manvantara, during which the world as we know it is manifested. The Manvantara is followed another period, also a kalpa in length, called Pralaya, during which the world is not manifested, and God is just resting in Oneness. These are The Days and Nights of Brahma, the Hindu Godhead. You could call them the "on/off" vibration of the universe. During the Manvantara, the period when the world is manifested, Brahma is asleep, dreaming that he is all of us, the multiplicity of things and beings, and everything else that's going onjust as when you were dreaming all those dreams we spoke of earlier. Then, during the Pralaya, which is Brahma's day, he's awake, and knows himself for what he/she/it really is. And then, once again, the surprise button is pushed, and it all goes around again. And, just as we would at first dream the most pleasant dreams, but then get tired of that and begin to add adventures and challenges, the Hindus think of the Manvantara (during which the world is manifested) as being divided into four periods. The first is the longest, the second a bit shorter, the third shorter still, and the last the shortest of all. These periods dividing each kalpa are called yugas, and they're named after the throws in the Hindu game of dice, of which there are four: the throw of four, the throw of three, the throw of two, and the throw of one. The throw of four is the best throw, like our six, and the throw of one is the worst. The first throw, the first yuga, is called Krita Yuga. Krita means "done," as in "well done" and this is the period where everything is perfect, The Golden Age. When this period is over, we get Treta Yuga, the throw of three, which is slightly shorter in duration than Krita Yuga. In Treta Yuga something isn't quite right. The element of adventure, of surprise, begins to appear. It's like a three legged stool is less secure than a four legged stoolyou have just a bit more chance of tipping over, of losing your balance. Then, finally, comes Vapara Yuga, the throw of two, which is still shorter. In this period, good and bad, pleasure and pain, are evenly balanced. Then, finally, we get to Kali Yuga, the worst throw, the throw of one, and the shortest of the four yugas. This is the period where the negative, the painful, the evil principle dominates. Finally, at the end of Kali Yugaso goes the myththe universe is destroyed. Shiva, the destroyerwhich sounds ominous, but Shiva is actually the destroyer of the illusion of separationdoes a dance called the Tandava. Fire and lightning come from his every pore, and in this moment of cosmic death the entire universe is destroyed. This destruction, however, is the waking up of Brahma to who he/she/it really is. This myth elegantly demonstrates the role of evil in life, and does so in a much more sensible, more rational, more compassionate way than the Western Judeo-Christian view. If you look at the universe as we do in the West, where the Supreme Being has created everything for his pleasure, and then allows all of His creatures to undergo suffering and tormentcancer, poverty, concentration camps, torture, disease, death, and so on, not to mention all the emotional pain humans experiencehow can this possibly be justified under a system where a God created it? Or, worse, perhaps no one created it, and it's all meaningless, and there's nothing to do but give up. But what if this isn't it at all? What if it isn't a system where God created us and then shows off his justice by rewarding some and punishing others? What if it's a system where God is playing all the parts, where all the roles, all the feelings, are all being played by God? What if God is the victim and the victor, the good and the eviland all of it is done for the surprise of it, for the adventure of it? What if, just for the fun of it, God plays hide and seek with Himself, by pretending to be separate, pretending to not be eternally safe, eternally powerful? And remember: if you don't like the dream you're dreaming, you can always wake up. What would that be like? Next time, then, we'll talk about waking up, and what that might be all about. Be well. Bill Harris ................................................................................ 8. Glowing Testimonials and Letters I am thrilled with the process. I always feel so good after listening to the CD's. I relax into them [the meditations], for the most part. Sometimes my muscles twitch and I want to do other things, but I keep on going. I work 2 hours from home, so by the time I get home, have dinner, and get some laundry done, I'm pooped. I'll put my headphones on and many times fall asleep during the process. It doesn't seem to hurt anything, and I wake up feeling charged up and ready to go. Believe me, when you drive 4 hours a day, getting up at 4 am and feeling bright eyed is a rare experience! Lately, I've amazed myself with the way I can wake up and feel ready to go. I've been a long time investigator of this type of program, and believe I purchased an earlier version of it many, many years ago but never got to really put it into practice the way I do now. I'm an energetic healer, a student of everything, a meditator, Reiki master and teacher, as well as an RF technician in Motorola...I'm creating the life I want each day. This past year has been wonderful, and I'm looking toward a bright present and future...Thanks so much for this program. --Dawn ** I just wanted to let you in on some of the really remarkable gains I have had since beginning the Holosync program over a year and a half ago. For one, I have changed careers and life focus and am happier than ever before. The most surprising gain I have had is in the area of creativity, however. I decided last June (after using Holosync for a year) to start doing some kind of artwork...After getting started drawing in earnest last June (2004), I quickly progressed with my skills to the point of freaking out my family. My sister began to insist I must have had a stroke!...By September I was juried into the most prestigious group of Portrait Artists on the web...At this point, I am considering making a new full-time career in art. Pretty amazing. Thanks for your product and the very cool work you've done! --Molly ** I felt it was high time I contacted you to let you know how I was going. Over the last 10 years I have struggled constantly with an overwhelming compulsion to gamble on the pokies. I have constantly been juggling my finances to get me through from one pay to the next and have put myself more and more into debt by increasing credit card limits etc. Two years ago I was put on anti depressants to try to get some control in my life but found that after a short while I was back in the rut - and now dependent on anti depressants to boot!! On top of this I have tried hypnotherapy, been to a psychologist, joined in Gambler's Anonymous sessions, seen a counsellor, engaged the help of family and friends, cut up all my cards, refinanced my loan and still I got nowhere - I couldn't walk around with more than $10 in my purse because I knew that I would be drawn into one of the many venues that I frequented. Needless to say, having disclosed this addiction to my friends and family and yet failing to succeed in all the attempts to stop, my depression was getting worse and worse and I was lying to everyone, including myself! Then my life changed. Whilst home for Christmas my mother asked me to read your introductory pack and listen to the CD, wanting my opinion on whether she should join. She had recently learned to meditate but was finding it difficult to get to where she needed to be. I knew the minute I started reading this that I had to give it a try for myself! I have been on the program now for 7 weeks and am staggered at the results. I have absolutely no desire to gamble - I can walk past my usual haunts and not even notice the signs. I can even walk around with money in my purse and not feel compelled to spend it in any way. I feel totally liberated. I set my alarm for 5.30am so that I can fit this very important part of my life in. Even my husband has noticed the change in me. I am better able to deal with the stress of my new job and have set up systems to manage my workload better and to ensure that nothing falls through the cracks. I can't wait to progress to my first custom made level. All I can say is THANKYOU, THANKYOU, THANKYOU. --Geraldine ................................................................................ 9. Book Review by Heather Self Invisible Acts of Power: Channeling Grace in Your Everyday Life Caroline Myss (C) 2004 Free Press ***If you would like to read more about or order this book click here: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0743272129/centerpointer-20 So often in our personal search for who we are and where we are headed we feel alone. Sometimes as we discover our newfound sense of self and power we begin to wonder how we can wield it and use it to better someone else's life. So often it's the little things that count in helping someone else, but how do we know what exactly those little things are? In Invisible Acts of Power, Caroline Myss (Sacred Contracts and Anatomy of the Spirit) speaks on the power of grace and generosity in making our spiritual paths just a little less lonely. By drawing from over 1,200 letters, Myss uses examples from everyday people in both ordinary and extraordinary circumstances that show how easy it is to receive the help we need--and how easy it is to miss it if we're not being mindful. The more open we are to how our prayers can be answered--or how we can act on our own intuition for what someone needs, the less often we will be filled with regret and loneliness. The more we give, the more we receive. And the more we allow ourselves to receive, the more we have to give. Accepting grace into our lives requires us to know where to look, and to be open to what we find. Otherwise, it passes us by. Our prayers are always answered, however the timing and the method by which the answers come occasionally fall outside of our expectations, and so we either completely miss them or are so greatly surprised by their form that we don't accept them. This is how we continue to feel alone. Myss is careful to point out that when we remain focused not getting what we want, we often miss what is right in front of us. And what is right in front of us is often exactly what we need (which really is exactly what we want). Keeping ourselves convinced otherwise is easier. We open to grace through our intuition--the little voice that directs us to smile at a stranger, hold open a door, or perhaps put an arm around a perfect stranger on a bus. By being mindful of what our spirit and bodies are telling us, we can learn how to read what other people need and how to give it. We also learn what we need and how to both ask for and receive it. Myss reminds the reader that generosity abounds in ways both small and great. She calls generosity "an expression of our spiritual maturity". There are four individual stages of learning generosity, according to Myss. Each chakra, the seven main energy centers of our body, plays a part in how to listen to our intuition and how to pick up on what a person needs. Each chakra has a "voice" that speaks its own code of grace, generosity and intuitive listening. By paying attention to what our "heart" is saying or what our "gut feelings" are, Myss shows us how we can create little miracles in people's everyday lives. These little miracles don't have to be dramatic or romantic or theatrical. They can be anything from a smile to a kind word. In this way we can open ourselves to the grace and sense of placement in a greater whole - the way we want to serve others. "All forms of service essentially empower a soul," Myss states. "Remind yourself that you can provide this power in many ways: encouragement, hope, kindness and a nod of approval." Even the smallest of gestures can be huge to someone else. By empowering someone we absolutely do not take away from ourselves. Instead, we add to the power and grace we long for, and create new and wider paths of generosity to flow back to us. "In a sense," Myss states, "we ourselves become embodiments of invisible acts of power when we respond naturally and automatically with love, compassion and kindness to the people around us." Finding this book was one of many synchronicities I've seen happen in my time at Centerpointe (and likely a personal example of creating what I needed by focusing on what I wanted!). I hadn't realized that I was searching for a way to create more grace and empowerment in my life, for myself and for others, but when Invisible Acts of Power quite literally fell off the shelf and to my feet at the bookstore, I realized it was the very book I needed. I highly recommend this wonderfully uplifting, simply-written book. Myss' strength in making a seemingly difficult task seem quite simple shines through her no-nonsense and yet thoroughly loving prose. Her Invisible Acts of Power is one of many "secrets" of personal success revealed. ***If you would like to read more about or order this book click here: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0743272129/centerpointer-20 =//=