Free Events in Vancouver BC

If I had not attended the wonderful Deer Lake Symphony in the Park on two wonderful occasions, and the Symphony of Fire at English Bay on many occasions, I would feel very discouraged by my recent experiences of free events in Vancouver.

Last Sunday, it was the Nixon in China screening at the Vancouver International Film Centre and Vancity Theatre that I attended with my Vancouver savvy friend. It was a 3-hour documentary about Nixon's political career including the Watergate scandal, of course. My friend walked out before the screening was half over - I stayed until the intermission. Fascinating is how I would describe it because of my lack of past interest in politics, but "propaganda" is how my friend described it.

This Sunday I chose the venue, thinking that it could not be worse than the Nixon, but I was wrong. I chose to see the screening of Earthlings at the Vancouver Public Library. As their flyer suggested, it may be one of the most talked about films - I would go as far as to say "shocking" - I came out of the theatre wondering what to do next - the only answer is - sleep on it and see how I feel in the morning.

I may never eat meat, or poultry again in my life. But my friend has a broader perspective than I at this moment - she reminded me that human beings have been killing and eating animals and fish even before - the agriculture civilization came along. Animals kill other species for food, and sometimes it is not so pleasant to look at, but after watching how human beings treat animals - and of course the way we treat our fellow species, I sure prefer the way animals eat over the way we get our food.


One saving grace is my adventure to the library. During the 6 years of living in Vancouver I have never been in the spectacular building. The Roman style architecture looks like the Coliseum from the outside. The inside reminded me of the Toronto Railway Station with cafes and boutiques lining one wall and very high ceilings angled - lots of glass and leading to a domed ceiling allowing light in. I could only imagine how beautifully bright it will be on a sunny day.

My quest for free events has me out and about the city - and I am constantly reminded what a beautiful city Vancouver is.

I shared my recent idea for an upcoming adventure with my friend today - I would like to get dressed up and go shopping on Robson and down Granville to the upscale boutiques. I won't be buying, but I would like to try on clothes - pretending of course that I will be buying. I admit to loving upscale trendy fashion. My tendency is to purchase classic styles because they seem to stay in fashion for a long time, but to add a trendy belt or jacket is fun too.

So, we will see if it happens next weekend - it will take courage to pull it off - but I imagine it will be fun once we get going.

Can one ever reach emotional maturity?

Creating a website is a fascinating project - from every angle. SBI seems to have the formula for success and they certainly offer all the tools to make one's online business successful - whatever that means.

But writing content is the first and most important step. Writing content around specific keywords is not as easy as I first thought it was.

For example: emotional maturity is a keyword that has excellent value - good demand and good supply and ok profitability.

But when I started writing around that term, I discovered that to define it - the way I wanted to write about it - would make for very little content.

An individual cannot achieve emotional maturity and still live on this planet - unless one is enlightened.

I've been taught that we are all enlightened, and to BE in the world as an enlightened human being is possible in this lifetime.

But here is my dilemma. I tend to be a perfectionist - I want to present accurate information to my readers. I want to present material with which I am personally experienced.

I feel emotionally stable, but I still have a long way to go before my ego will be dissolved completely - which I define as emotionally mature - completely ripened. Plus I don't believe that in this lifetime my ego will be completely dissolved.

It isn't that I don't want to achieve that state of mind. In fact, since I have started writing this web page I am tempted to take myself off to a retreat for even greater spiritual growth.

However, I also want to - have a very strong desire - to go home and spend the rest of my life enjoying my grandchildren. It has been two years since I have been with them - and every day my longing gets stronger and stronger.

In that I feel I will be serving others - an activity that will open my heart and allow me to shed the last layers of egomania - its all about me, me, me.

Just in writing this blog, I am listening to my intuition - saying just relax and walk your talk - keep the desire to go home foremost in my mind and it will happen if I just get myself out of the way - don't worry about the money - it will come from unexpected places - I will get home to serve my family.

Amazing - I have just received a clear message - I can see where I was putting conditions on returning home - best location to live, fulfilling my desires of being near the water, near tango dancing, not too small, - no wonder I have lost hope - today I will stop with what is in it for ME.

So, it turns out that this keyword, emotional maturity, may be impossible to write about, but it sure contained a huge lesson for me.

thank you God.

one down one to go

Finally, my ezine registrants will receive a gift that at least a few may find of value - its tough trying to come up with something that pleases everyone - no surprise there.

But now I must write the body - I do prefer to keep the newsletter brief as well as valuable.

I have written as many benefits of meditation as I can think of - perhaps I should write about non-benefits - I just read a blog that included things against meditation?????

OK there may be one disadvantage to meditation - if you are not able to understand the teaching and desperately want to know how to meditate it can be very frustrating. But that is an easy problem to have. If you go to the doctor saying that my arm hurts when I lift it above my head - the doctor says, then don't lift your arm above your head.

My quick answer to someone who says they cannot learn how to meditate is then please don't try to learn this one - it is not like one size fits all - keep searching until you find the right meditation for you.

Because I find it the solution to all of my problems, (oops an exaggeration - I could use some more money:) doesn't mean that others will - although at first when I began teaching - I sure had a different perspective. I mean that I actually thought my specific meditation would work for everyone.

We taught many students how to meditate in weekend workshops - and off they went at the end of the weekend relaxed and calm and very grateful. Some of the students kept in touch with us and came to our meetings, but the majority went off on their own path and I assumed they must be loving meditation because I never heard from them.

Surprise surprise, even though I offered to accept "free" "emergency" phone calls - any time of day or night, if doubt crept in about the effectiveness of the meditation, I received no more than three calls in the wee small hours of the morning. Does that mean they are still meditating and enjoying the tremendous benefits, or does that mean that they have totally given up on meditating?

How come it works wonders for me but not for others?

So, of course, my offer still stands - call me anytime and if you know Ascension and you are having trouble moving beyond your busy mind, just call me - anytime - two or three minutes and you will be back on track.

Now what will I write in my ezine that is already late this month?

I think I've got it...

I wanna be a travel writer

Just came across MatadorU - David Miller in Vancouver of all places - I recognized it in his photos -

He offers a course $350 - not feasible right now, but I have a hunch that I can begin to practice right here in Vancouver - getting ready to travel across the country to TO and family.

I wonder how many people would be interested to hear about the travel adventures of a senior. I will begin pretending I am a traveller here in Van, and write as if I am visiting - heck I haven't even seen all the sights here yet. What a wonderful way to capture my experience here in a diary/blog that my kids can read to their kids and grandchildren.

Hello, world I'm coming out.

Lexmark Printer Challenge

Today I take the bull by the horns and decide to finally deal with an annoying printer problem.

My Lexmark printer has become an annoying thorn in my side that I need deal with.

I know that it was inexpensive - that is why I bought it at Future Shop. All I wanted was to print black and white - but it included color so I thought oh well, perhaps there will come a time I will want color.

Never after 2.5 years have I wanted it, and it started causing me grief as soon as the first black and white cartridge ran dry. In all I have purchased about 6 B&W cartridges - not bad.

But Lexmark now notifies me that I need a color cartridge every time I print something. Then when the color cartridge ran dry, it asks me everytime I print if I want to recycle - and it stops the printing process so I have to begin it again.

I do recycle and I do not want color - so I decided to go right to the horses mouth and request how to disable these non-features.

After registering for tech help, and completing their forms twice I get a response giving me three choices of $$$ amounts to pay - really!!!!!

Not one of the choices is no payment at all - why should I pay anything to stop their pesky advertising - that is like spam to me - unsolicited advertising in my face every time I want to print.

Not only that - I discovered by ignoring their advice to run out and get a cartridge before the current one dries out and leaves me stranded the cartridge lasts a very long time - I have thrown money away by not waiting until the cartridge was actually dry. Stupid me!

A Future Shop sales guy gave me a great little tip - he said to turn off the printer between print jobs because it stops the ink from drying out in a cartridge - wonderful tip - now my cartridges last even longer.

I will never buy another Lexmark product again - it is not worth the time wasted in repeating the print function twice to print a simple page and the distraction that takes me from my work.

Waiting now for an answer from Lexmark customer service - I doubt I will receive one because I told them I will never purchase a Lexmark product again.

So, this has been my "get it off my chest" exercise and now I will resume PEACE AND JOY.

What's next?

I love life! I enjoy the choices that pop up - the diverse directions offered.

Being in transition could be worrisome if I let it - but frankly I feel exhilarated.

Making the right choices seems to be a non-issue - because whichever direction I head will be a new learning experience for me - that seems to be my driving force - always the new kid on the block.

In 4 hour phone conversation last night my friend invited me to consider my options - what do I want to do? What would fulfill my desire for a learning adventure?

Just naming them all - and there are so many things I want to do - I feel very fortunate. How can anyone ever get bored with life?

Tweaking my website and adding new content is my current interest - although I feel it slipping out of compulsive-obsessive mode to a normal "job" - thing is I'm not yet getting paid for this job.

I may be flogging a dead horse - but I am still convinced that monetizing possibilities may exist - heck I haven't even moved into that stage to my web site building program. SOON.

On that note, I'm off to look for ideas to create inbound links.

Life Questions

Waiting!

Waiting for my next step in my evolution. Curious yes, worried no. I have become accustomed to the gap between one stage in my life and the next.

I give myself permission to play around with whatever comes to mind - I may tweak web pages; I may read books; I may go out and socialize; or catch up with little projects on hold until just such a time as this.

The material coming to my attention is so fascinating - and it seems to be pouring in - almost too quickly for me to keep up with it - so I make choices - what to read, what to listen to, what to watch, every one of them perfect for the unfolding of what is to be.

Bruce Lipton's new book Spontaneous Evolution is out - about the evolution of beliefs.

I listened to a video interview on Conscious Media Network - he gives the clearest description of the evolution of civilizations from animism to now; lays out the perennial questions of life - where did we come from; how did we get here; how can we make the best of what we know and have?

Interesting how his information ties into the book, Secret Societies and symbolism passed down through the ages; AstroFlash; Jack Whyte's historical fiction books about the Knights Templar and King Arthur.

How this will play out for me - I know not yet.

What feels right is to find ways to contribute to the restoration of our planet to the ways of the civilizations which honored Mother Earth, Father Sky and lived harmoniously with nature.

When we are happy, the cells in our body are happy and harmonious. When we look at how our bodies work, we can see how to create harmony in the world.

It is our belief systems that create the civilization's way of being - there are many folks today putting forth ideas to restore us to honoring nature - and the idea that we are one with spirit and nature.

That may or may not save us from extinction - there has to be a letting go of old institutions that are self serving - and there is so much resistance to that.

Perhaps my website is the perfect "evolving" vehicle to contribute to those ideals.

After all, conscious easy living now is all about that. We must consciously be aware of how we tend our beautiful gardens - our gardens within, and without - to live in peace and harmony.

Happy New Year - 2010 Will Be A Blast!

There will be no resolutions made this year - actually I haven't made them for several years.

One reason they are usually lame and usually broken not long after.

Yesterday an email came to me from a friend with a link to AstroFlash, http://www.handclow2012.com/astroflash.htm, - a website about astrology.

Normally I read my horror scopes for fun - but lately I have noticed some that have hit the nail on the head - could astrology be a valid guide to easy living?

Hmmmmm! AstroFlash

At any rate, Barbara Hand Clow says that January 1st is not the beginning of the new year. In fact making news years resolutions is not a good idea. Spring Equinox, around March 21 is the best time to do that.

So following my natural tendency to believe everything until proven incorrect (most people call that naive), I may give this some more attention.

I am also reading a book (non-fiction) called Secret Societies and although it is a bit dry for my liking, it reinforces many suspicions I have about religion and its symbolism. Fascinating - and leading to what - who knows?

I am enjoying my life tremendously now, and will continue to do so in every moment.

The horror of being scammed

I was hit by a spammer - an email sent out to every one of my over 200 contacts that asked them to help me by sending money to me in Essex, UK.

Of course, I didn't know about it until I tried to get into my Yahoo account and found myself locked out. I can't remember which came first - perhaps I received a phone call from a friend asking if I was alright.

Was I really in the UK stranded without ID and credit cards and cash to pay my exorbitant hotel bill.

I had seen this same request for help many months before this happened to me. And although I did not have spare cash to send to my acquaintance, I did call her. Receiving no reply to my message, I then looked for her Facebook profile - finding nothing relevant, I decided that if she was indeed in trouble, then she would more than likely go to her family for support - not to me.

I spend quite a bit of time trying to recover my Yahoo email account - answering security questions, but one of the answers - that I had set up my self, of course, I could not remember so I had to figure out a way to recover this information.

A book written by my father's cousin - a family tree type of book - sitting on my bookshelf was where I finally found the answer.

Account recovered - I discovered all of my contacts had been deleted (or lifted by the spammer). Yes, I was ready to pommel her/him. It boggles my mind why any human being - or how any human being even thinks about doing this. Anyway I guess the world is abundant in people with distorted thinking - heck my own thinking is distorted much of the time too.

So without email addresses, it is hard to communicate with that many people - most of whom probably do not even remember who I am - I had that same account for many many years - one of the security questions asked by Yahoo - why would I even need to remember the date that I opened the account! Now I know.

So then I went to my gmail accounts - Still can't believe that my primary gmail account was locked as well - and the security questions asked by Google also ask for dates - most of which I had also forgotten - I try to guesstimate but no such luck - I have been totally locked out - again with very important contact information.

Frustrating does not begin to describe my feelings - I felt completely helpless and amazed again about the minds of human beings to create such havoc in someone's life.

So, thank God for my ability to restore peace and calm in my life - all credit being given to my regular practice of meditation. Yes, I had very low moments but was quickly able to restore my peace - because frankly, nothing is more important than my peace.

I lifted email addresses out of my Yahoo email messages before I finally closed the account. So I was able to send them emails from another account - gmail. I apologized for the inconvenience caused to them.

Weeks later I received a phone call from a friend who I hadn't heard from for quite a while. Long story short, she had received the request for help - was preparing to send me the money, until her husband did his research and with a number of back and forth messages to the scammer, drove the "B" away because he lacked the required information to legitimately receive the funds. Thank God!

This criminal is still at it and a friend told me last night that people throughout the Fraser Valley have had been scammed.

I feel saddened by this, and another non-fraudulent advertising scheme I got caught up in - these folks at DazzleWhite have been collecting money from people through VISA - because they did not read the fine print in the Terms and Conditions. Hours of my time have been spent canceling charges on my account - with the wonderful help of VISA - and although the $$$$ amount has not been exorbitant - the transactions are in very small amounts so at first glance at your statement - they are hardly noticeable - if you are like I was - not thorough enough.

Have I learned lessons? OH YES! - never will I allow my statement to go unchecked before I make my payment.

Both these inconveniences have been tests by the Universe - to show me that I have choices - pain and suffering - or inner peace. That is freedom, and I am even more consciously aware and grateful for my ability to choose peace in this moment.