July 21, 2003

From the Inside Out
THE POWER OF AFFIRMATIONS

Affirmations always work. Yes, whatever you positively think or visualize, you will focus on and, therefore, it will manifest.

For example: "I don't want to be poor."
Assumption: "I am poor."
Focus: "Poverty"
Result: Thinking about poverty, and
........... being in the identity of a poor person.
............The affirmation worked, but not in the
........... way you intended.

So we have learned it is better to phrase in the present, not future. Don't use "want" and similar words. Perhaps this makes a better affirmation: "I am rich"? But if you are rich, then this does not work because if you are rich then, of course, you've already attained being rich. If you aren't rich, it is a lie. Therefore, it doesn't work. There's got to be a better way... How about: "Suppose I am rich"? Suppose you have everything that being rich means to you. Imagine that this is happening. See yourself in that situation. Then slip into that image of yourself and see and hear and feel what it is to experience being rich.

It works now, doesn't it? It is true, it does not imply or state an undesirable state and it is in the present. At least in your imagination you are rich — you have felt what it is like to be in that wealthy identity and that is a resource you can apply. You've changed your frame of mind and your view of the world has altered for the better. When you have a positive vision that is real to you and genuinely something that you want and identify with, then creative energies naturally flow toward that vision. This is powerful stuff!

A counter-intention is something which we thought, in the past, was a means to keep us safe, or otherwise make our lives better. It might even be a simple negative thought, which we decided at a time of stress, and keep thinking unconsciously. Such counter-intentions could be ideas that our parents or our culture bombarded us with as a child and then these became habitual and out of our awareness. When you are affirming a positive intention it is therefore very helpful to recognize the counter-intentions or hidden barriers that you are creating at the same time. What is connected with your affirmation that you are opposing, or disagreeing with, suppressing or trying to forget?

It is important that you perceive the positive intention (affirmation) as an outflowing creation that meets barriers (hidden counter-intentions), rather than perceiving your affirmation as resisting or fighting an incoming opposing force. When these barriers are seen in a clear light, you can then just let them go, or if necessary, adjust your affirmation so there is no longer this inner conflict.

The right brain, which determines our feelings and hence motivation/action (that the Universe then mirrors through the power of Spirit), interprets our thoughts in terms of the underlying (subconscious) true feelings and, therefore, doesn't discriminate between conscious acceptance or resistance. It doesn't listen to a "not" or "never", that is a true observation, but more significantly, it interprets based on actual beliefs (at the level of feelings) that are stimulated by the concept of what is being consciously thought — it picks up on what most closely corresponds to the subconscious belief/feeling.

"I will not overeat" is an affirmation based on the feeling that you really DO want to eat a lot; so that's how it's interpreted — you really have acceptance of eating even though your conscious mind (left brain) is resisting that. The feeling of wanting to eat is actually stimulated by the affirmation, so you are likely to eat more. "I will eat what I want" would be more empowering, as it doesn't conflict with the inner belief and gives you the power of choice.

So the key issue is whether your affirmation is in alignment or conflicting with your deeply-held belief. That's the real reason why affirmations don't necessarily help, but may indeed increase inner conflict and serve to suppress the inner belief rather than resolve it. When you have uncovered the inner belief and genuinely discovered that it is FALSE — i.e., not rational ... not helpful ... not true ... not your own — then using an affirmation can help to keep in place the revised belief.

~ Peter Shepherd, Tools for Transformation

Free PDF Download (Adobe Acrobat) of Author's Book
Simply Click: Transforming the Mind

Yes You Can!
PLAN MEALS AHEAD & RELAX

I know people who cook a week's worth of dinners every weekend. They spend Saturday morning in the supermarket, the afternoon at the stove, and part of Sunday in the kitchen filling containers for the freezer. They NEVER wonder what's for dinner because it's already done.

While I'm not that organized, I do know that a little bit of planning goes a long way when I'm scrambling to make dinner on a Wednesday evening.

The following five tips will show you how to speed up dinners, and have more time to relax and enjoy life, by planning and cooking ahead.

1. Never make just enough vinaigrette. Store it in the refrigerator and use it to marinate swordfish, flank steak or chicken breasts, to coat potato chunks for high-heat roasting, and, of course, to dress a salad.

2. Never cook just enough rice or pasta. Never soak and cook just enough beans. Cook more than you need and freeze the leftovers in 1-cup portions.

3. Never cook just enough vegetables. Make hot green beans one night, green bean and red onion salad (using your vinaigrette) the next. Make corn on the cob one night, succotash the next.

4. Shop for the week. The most important part of planning ahead takes place in the supermarket.

5. You've heard it before, but it's still true: Double (or triple/or more) the recipe whenever you make chili, soup, spaghetti sauce, or stew.

Special Note:
Do you have a picky eater in your home?
Find a recipe they'll eat by typing in what
ingredient to include, and what to avoid, at:
http://familyfun.go.com/recipes/kids/tool/pickyeater_tlp/

~ Irene Sax, Food Editor
House and Home.MSN

Photo: Webshots

In peaceful times, fishermen of Zaire trap fish in
the early morning with hand-woven baskets. An enormous semicircular bend in the 2,733 mile long Congo River delineates a central depression known as the cuvette. Around this densely forested section, which covers nearly half the area of the country, a succession of plateaus rise gradually to heights of over 5,000 ft in the northeast and southeast. Here, in the heart of equatorial Africa,
live the mountain gorillas on the forested slopes of extinct volcanoes. There are only 300 of these so human-like gentle giants left in the world. Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo) is the third largest country in Africa and crosses the equator in the north-central region.

LINKS
THAT SHINE

"Unsafe Home"

Source for toxic products found in your home.
Manufactures of common household products have not told us the truth about the dangers in using these products on a daily basis. This site's ultimate goal is to eliminate children's exposure to man-made toxic substances by ensuring everyone's right-to-know what is in their commercial products..
www.UnsafeHome.com



CLICK FOR MORE LINKS

Fascinating Facts
THE BULGE IN THE BURBS (Part 2)

For years, we’ve forgotten about our environment as a public health issue,” says Thomas Schmid, a public health researcher at the Centers for Disease Control. But at the turn of the century, during the time of Frederick Law Olmsted, who designed New York’s Central Park and many other urban parks across the nation, planners frequently used environmental design as a way to improve public health. “Olmsted designed parks, opening up the cities with places for fresh air and sunlight, and outdoor recreation,” adds Schmidl.

Today, problems that once only faced cities, such as congestion, are cropping up in suburbia, while some of the healthiest features of city living — their human scale, walkability and parks — have been engineered out. In pursuit of progress, perhaps, “we’ve engineered physical activity out of our lives,” says Schmid. In order to address the issue, the CDC’s policies increasingly support “re-engineering activity back into our lives,” adds Schmid. To that end, the agency’s Active Community Environments Initiative was started to promote walking, bicycling and greater accessibility between housing and transit options. The CDC is not trying to condemn suburban-style planning but find ways to improve community design by including health in the equation, says Schmid.

Not everyone favors promoting more mixed-use pedestrian planning or believes the rationale behind this new public health movement. “Now, instead of parents blaming fast-food restaurants for their kids’ weight problems, ‘smart growth’ groups are blaming the suburbs for our nation’s obesity and health woes,” writes Chris Fiscelli of the free-market Reason Foundation. “Some of the anti-suburb sentiment is downright ridiculous, not to mention highly unscientific.”

But, although their studies are as yet unpublished, researchers on suburban sprawl say they’ve accrued compelling data. Frank is finishing a study of 17,000 residents in different neighborhoods of Atlanta and is so far proving the hypothesis “that people living in more physically dense places weigh less.” And Reid Ewing, an urban planner at Rutgers University, has studied 200,000 people in 448 different counties across America and finds that, taking into account age, gender, race and diet, the “walkability” of the neighborhood is a significant factor when it comes to obesity.

At least one state is already acting to create new “active living” initiatives. In Michigan, home of Detroit — the Motor City — and a major obesity epidemic estimated to cost the state $8.89 billion a year, the state Department of Community Health recently held a conference called “Designing Healthy, Livable Communities.” At the conference, Gov. Jennifer Granholm presented awards to Michigan communities for points earned toward better suburban planning, including “pedestrian and bicycle safety and facilities” and “accessible worksites.” (The photo above shows Kensington Metropark in Milford, Michigan. "People love our trails because there's a lot of beautiful scenery," says park superintendent Dick Shafer. "Rolling terrain is everywhere, plus you can get off the trail and enjoy picnic areas, then get back on.")

~Francesca Lyman, YOUR ENVIRONMENT Columnist, MSNBC
Click here to read entire MSNBC Article

What is that smell when it rains?

Click for Answer

Laughing It Off
METAPHORS & ANALOGIES

Ever wonder what our kids are doing in high school? These are actual analogies and metaphors that were found in high school essays.

1. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

2. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

3. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

4. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM.

5. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.

6. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 8:00 p.m.

7. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at
4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

8. Even in his last years, Grandpappy had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.

9. She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs.

10. She was as easy as the TV Guide crossword puzzle.

11. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

~Contributed by Jim in Galena, Illinois

Untangling the Web

WHAT A SITE!

KaBLOOM!!!...
KaBloom! is great for flowers direct from
the growers and at BETTER prices, too.
.www.FlowerStore.KaBloom.com

COMPUTER-EASE

Back It UP!...
is a freeware backup program that saves in Zip format. You can back up files or folders and specify extensions that you don't want to back up. It also accepts command line instructions to control your backups from a batch file. Click Back it up! at top in left panel.

Photo: Joachim Herrmann /REUTERS


Beach-goers, with their territory marked...
by small walls of sand, enjoy the sunny weather at the beach of Travemünde outside the northern German city of Lübeck. The beach is one of the most popular areas of Germany's Baltic Sea coast. Travemünde arose out of a stronghold placed here by Henry the Lion, Duke of Saxony, in the 12th century. ~MSNBC