Web Site Story (Musical)

Here's a concept for you to consider.

Our experience of the world isn’t what’s out there; it’s what we perceive to be out there. That means our reality can be quite arbitrary because we sense the outside world through filters. These filters exist beneath our conscious mind. Most people aren't even aware they're there. Yet they determine just what we perceive and therefore deterimine our reality.

We need these filters – we couldn’t possibly keep track of all the information coming in otherwise.

For example, if I asked you what your right foot feels like right now, you could tell me. It feels warm or cool or you shoe’s too tight or it’s comfortable or whatever. The point is you could immediately tell me. Yet a moment before I asked, you weren’t aware of your foot.

How did that happen? What changed? Is there a little switch in your brain that turned on the nerves to your foot when I asked the question so you could answer it?

No, of course not. The nerves in your foot, and everywhere else, send a constant stream of information to your brain. That information gets filtered out at a pre-conscious level unless you need it – I ask a question or you step on a nail.

The same thing goes on with all your other senses and perceptions. There's a flood of information coming in. Only a small bit that the filters pass along reaches conscious awareness.

This works at a higher level of functioning as well. This filtering is why, for example, you buy a certain make and model of a car and then start to notice all the other cars like it on the road.

I used to drive a green 1994 Intrepid. I still notice green Intrepids of that model when I see them.

The cars like yours were always there – it just didn’t mean anything to you until you had one of them. Before you bought the car, ones like it were filtered out. When you bought your car, your filter changed and you began to see them.

As I began, this means your experience of life isn’t as much determined by what’s out there as by what you perceive to be out there.

Here's something else: your perceptions may well be distorted by your filters.

A real life example of this is a lunch my brother Chris had with a client in New York. They had a lousy waiter. The client was convinced they received such terrible service because he was Jewish. He saw the waiter as anti-Semitic.

Chris just thought the waiter was a frustrated aspiring actor not at all into his job as waiter.

Which perception was accurate? Who knows? We do know that two men sitting at the same table at the same time with the same external events had different experiences based on their filters.

Also, we can be pretty sure that that lunch wasn’t the first time Chris’s client saw life through the filter of anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitism exists, but it probably doesn’t exist in as many places as he sees it. He might be able to improve the quality of his life if he adjusted his filter somewhat.

There’s a very effective form of psychological therapy called cognitive restructuring that does just that. It’s based on the premise that most emotional distress arises from distorted perceptions and that if you clear up the distortions, the distress goes away.

I’ll teach some cognitive restructuring techniques in future notes. For now I just want you to realize that these filters exist, that there’s a possibility they might be distorted, and, most importantly, that you can change them.

Dr. Bruce Lipton has a fun exercise at his talks. He has the audience select a pair of glasses with either green or red lenses. Then he shows a slide. Depending on which color glasses the audience member is wearing, they see either a friendly cottage and the word “love” or a scary haunted house and the word “fear.”

What they see depends on which set of filters they use. When they change filters, they change their experience.

Most of us develop our filters haphazardly as we go through life. We pick them up from family, the media, early experiences and any number of other sources. We never examine them for accuracy or usefulness.

Now you’re different. You know they exist. That’s the first step to taking control of them and using them to give you the life you desire and deserve.

 

"We Are The World", U.S.A. for Africa

There comes a time when we need a certain call
When the world must come together as one
There are people dying
Oh, and it's time to lend a hand to life
The greatest gift of all

We can't go on pretending day by day
That someone, somehow will soon make a change
We're all a part of God's great big family
And the truth - you know love is all we need

( CHORUS )
We are the world, we are the children
We are the ones who make a brighter day
so let's start giving
There's a choice we're making
We're saving our own lives
It's true we'll make a better day
Just you and me

Well, send'em you your heart
So they know that someone cares
And their lives will be stronger and free
As God has shown us
By turning stone to bread
And so we all must lend a helping hand

( REPEAT CHORUS )

When you're down and out
There seems no hope at all
But if you just believe
There's no way we can fall
Well, well, well, let's realize
That one change can only come
When we stand together as one

( REPEAT CHORUS AND FADE )

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To this day I just love to hear "We Are The World" - the melody is so simple but beautifully arranged and produced by Daddy Q. Okay, so it woud not hit the top 40 in the 90's, but re-produce it and replace the singers with those like Puff Daddy, R. Kelly, Mariah Carey, Madonna, etc, and chances are it's going all the way to the top! Here's a list of the singers next to their lyric from the 1985 version. . .

There comes a time when we heed a certain call (Lionel Richie)
When the world must come together as one (Lionel Richie & Stevie Wonder)
There are people dying (Stevie Wonder)
Oh, and it's time to lend a hand to life (Paul Simon)
The greatest gift of all (Paul Simon/Kenny Rogers)

We can't go on pretending day by day (Kenny Rogers)
That someone, somehow will soon make a change (James Ingram)
We're all a part of God's great big family (Tina Turner)
And the truth (Billy Joel)
You know love is all we need (Tina Turner/Billy Joel)

( CHORUS )
We are the world, we are the children
We are the ones who make a brighter day so let's start giving (Michael Jackson)
There's a choice we're making we're saving our own lives (Diana Ross)
It's true we'll make a better day just you and me (Michael Jackson/Diana Ross)

Well, send'em you your heart so they know that someone cares (Dionne Warwick)
And their lives will be stronger and free (Dionne Warwick/Willie Nelson)
As God has shown us by turning stone to bread (Willie Nelson)
And so we all must lend a helping hand (Al Jurreau)

( REPEAT CHORUS )
We are the world, we are the children (Bruce Springsteen)
We are the ones who make a brighter day so let's start giving (Kenny Logins)
There's a choice we're making we're saving our own lives (Steve Perry)
It's true we'll make a better day just you and me (Daryl Hall)

When you're down and out there seems no hope at all (Michael Jackson)
But if you just believe there's no way we can fall (Huey Lewis)
Well, well, well, let's realize that a change can only come (Cyndi Lauper)
When we (Kim Carnes)
stand together as one (Kim Carnes/Cyndi Lauper/Huey Lewis)

(REPEAT CHORUS AND FADE )

Awesome remote-control airplane freestyle routine ...

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http://librivox.org/

Sitting the Trot:

The sitting trot- dreaded by all riding students around the globe! Why? The trot is the most animated and jarring of all the horse’s gaits, and riders usually “post” or purposely rise and fall in and out of the saddle with the horse’s rhythm so as not to get bounced around.  But the sitting trot is an important, advanced skill and important to develop as a rider.  It is challenging because most riders tend to want to stiffen up in order to try to hold themselves still and upright in the saddle.  This is actually counter-productive and will make you bounce more because you are stiffening up against the horse.  What a rider must learn to do is relax into the saddle, go with the horse’s motion, and allow the horse to carry you along, bumps and all.

It’s always amazing to teach rider’s to do the sitting trot. At first, many are tense, as I mentioned above, and are self conscious about getting bounced, so they don’t breathe, they tense their entire bodies and therefore they do get bounced!  I tell them that they must trust me on this one, they must breathe, relax their muscles from head to toe, sink deep into the saddle, and then I see a smile spread across their face! It really works! When you accept the gait for what it is (bouncy!) and are prepared to go with the motion of the horse, not against it, you and the horse will truly move as one.

Life is like doing a sitting trot on the bounciest horse imaginable!  When we try to fight the inevitable bumps that come along in life it tends to make things harder.  We can’t stop life from happening.  When we fight against the natural way of the universe, that’s when we get bounced out of the saddle!  The key is to accept that life is a bumpy road, relax into the flow of the life, and when we can do that then we can sit out the toughest bumps of all!  When we move as one with the natural flow of the energy of the universe we can go amazing places.  Stiffening up against the innate way of life will keep us stagnant.

Your challenge today is to accept that you are already saddled up and mounted on the bounciest horse in the stable of life and that your riding instructor has told you that today’s lesson is the sitting trot.  Learn to relax into the trot, relax into the bumps, and you’ll be carried gracefully along, moving as one!

Claire Affleck
Claire Affleck Training website

The Chinese use two brush strokes to write the word ‘crisis.’

One brush stroke stands for danger; the other for opportunity.

In a crisis, be aware of the danger - but recognize the opportunity.

 

~ John F. Kennedy