My father was the first boss. Thank God I got over it. Boss is the knob that opens the door ;))

My mother treated us five kids with independence. Like no rules, no projected expectations, other than to display good manners. I think we discovered we are our own boss.

Hello Mohammed,

I find that the most demanding master I have come across is my own mind/personality....it is always....give me this, do this now, I want this YESTERDAY, boy, what are you some kind of a turtle...you move so slow..you make me wait...I do no like to wait...I am in a hurry, I am busy, I have important things to do...are you going to dress me in that? don't you have anything better for me to wear? I am hungry, I am tired, I am bored, I am waiting????????

yes, really, my mind/personality....was much more demanding than even my toddlers.....ruth

You got me thinking about my childhood. We kids were naturally good students. We were naturally well behaved. So, having five kids, it was undoubtedly an unconscious decision on her part, to let us go our way; and in a small town where we never used to lock the door at night. She set an example though. Of filling up the bookcases, cooking, and decorating, painting and writing, and, being Catholic, trying out Jehovah Witnesses for a while, causing my sister hysteria. :)

You are your only master.
Who else?
Subdue yourself,
and discover your master.
--the Buddha

Mohammed,

The "music of the spheres" is the true Master. Where does that music reside? In someone else? Someone with money, fame, looks? The music of the spheres goes deeper than that. Let's tune in and dance even as systems around us crash. The music isn't going stop because of human greed or pettiness. The music is always present to lift us up and show us a new path.

Trish~~

Aloha Mohammed

We are a funny and very young species. We are all learning self referral from projections. It is only when I identify the pecking order of I am that I am that is, does the projection disappear. It all goes back to: wherever I go my consciousness creates that place and when I leave there nothing is there. This can only be done successfully when a servant. I loved the movie The Kite Runner. The servant's son truly had the best part, but of course he was every part in the story.
love patty

Dear Patty,
You got me thinking philosophically about two contrary ideas. Wherever I go my consciousness creates that place and when I leave there is nothing there. I've heard something like that discussed before; that we create in the moment our own perception, I guess, just as our bodies and mind are created in the moment by past karma.
The contrary thing, I was thinking this morning, is that the grocery store is always there and may be full of animosity and hate and agitation. But each week we go back to get our groceries, even though our own agitation has been removed in the meanwhile.

Quietly the sage through the village goes, comes to mind.

But I know the two are true and cannot seem to reconcile the mystery.

neckache stomachache endless pain of being human

never good enough never enough in one way and always too much in another way

who says this?

i am always just exactly right in every way for what i am going through

self-discipline? nice

on #7: I think yogic meditation slowly removes the karmic propensities of the individual. So that the duality perceived becomes the constancy of oneness. So the scholarly argument over duality or oneness of reality are both essentially one and the same.

Aloha Sherry

#9 I agree in essence it is not to throw the baby out with the bath water. I love the question Deepak asked at the first unity.fm online radio interview, Do you think your breathing or being breathed? If you think your breathing try to hold your breath. Collectively we live in a world of perceptions and the world is inside of our selves. Every point as every other point is the center point. Because we are fractals we will only see part of the picture, only retreating within with the information to be reenergized coming out again and again with our perceptions enlarging to be more inclusive...

love patty