As long as you have the divine right to choose freely, life can — and undoubtedly will — have its challenges.

Your conscious and unconscious freewill choices, combined with the conscious and unconscious freewill choices of others, can quickly carry you out of the flow and into some fairly undesirable situations. You may suddenly encounter rocks and rapids, instead of more calm and tranquil waters.

In those circumstances you may experience fear, sadness, disappointment, or anger. But believe it or not, underneath it all, there will also be . . . joy. Not joy in the typical sense of feeling elated in the moment, but the joy of your spirit — a kind of joy that embraces all of life and living . . . not just the peaceful parts. Read the rest of this entry »

I think it's reasonable to assume that those who regularly read our site's news and articles for inspiration and insight have grown more aware that we're currently undergoing a vital shift in consciousness, human development, and ecological adjustment of all of Earth's living species. It is not necessarily because we're experiencing or observing epic changes to our civilization and natural cycles; it's more of a deep instinctual knowing that many aspects of our lives cannot stay the same without us going through some significant growing pains. To put these looming changes to our existence into perspective, the global population is expected to reach almost 9 billion by 2050. This exponential growth will in turn lead to a more rapid depletion of natural resources with resulting changes in natural habitats and global climate, causing a loss of almost a third of the world's plants and animal species.

Exactly what does this projected path look like, how will it affect us, what are the signs we need to look for, and once we recognize the signs, how do we change the course we're on? Is it even possible to change the course? It's my objective in this series to address those questions and provide you with an idea of what's possible for a brighter future. Yet some of the answers can only come from within each of you as you are divinely guided toward the fulfillment of your own path of realization through all the future events ahead of us. Read the rest of this entry »

Industrial biotechnology has the potential to save the planet up to 2.5 billion tons of CO2 emissions per year and support building a sustainable future, a WWF report found.

As the world is debating how to cut dangerous emissions and come together in an international agreement treaty which will help protect the planet from potentially devastating effects of climate change, innovative ideas how to reduce our CO2 are very valuable.

A recent report published by WWF Denmark identifies the potential to be between 1 billion and 2.5 billion tons CO2 per year by 2030, more than Germany's total reported emissions in 1990.

Industrial biotechnology could help create a true 21st century green economy, the report states. Read the rest of this entry »

As most of you are well aware, this year I started offering Divine Flow Retreats here in Sedona.

The very first activity I offer in these retreats is a guided meditation on a Red Rock formation called Bell Rock. Many people believe that Bell Rock has amazing healing and energizing properties, and it is one of the most popular places here.

If you have spent any time in Sedona yourself, you probably know that it is not extraordinarily difficult to reach the higher parts of Bell Rock. However, without knowing the best way to ascend, you can easily run into a dozen dead ends, and repeatedly encounter crevices that cannot be crossed.

To make it easier for hikers to reach the higher vistas, the National Forest Service has placed piles of rocks called "cairns" to guide the way. When you travel from cairn to cairn, you are able to climb up Bell Rock in the most efficient and unobstructed way possible.

And so it is with the divine flow in your life. Read the rest of this entry »

Group photo in front of Clark University–Sigmund Freud, G. Stanley Hall, C.G.Jung; Back row: Abraham A. Brill, Ernest Jones, Sandor Ferenczi; taken September 1909

Begun in 1914 and never finished, Carl Jung considered it his most important collection of writings and artwork. But it was vaulted away in a Swiss bank in 1984 by family members who considered it to be highly personal in nature; many Jungians inquired about gaining access to his red-leather journal in order to better understand the famous Swiss psychiatrist, but were turned away. Hardly anybody has ever read it.

That's about to change when it becomes available through bookstores on October 7. Carl Jung's journal, now known as The Red Book, is a mere $195 retail (discounts are available through the large retail book outlets), but even with the discount the book still costs over $100.

Many inspired followers of Jung's influential thinking probably won't be bothered by the high cost for the chance of a lifetime to examine the inner life — to its farthest depths — of one of the most important modern explorers of the mind. Read the rest of this entry »

One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man,
Of moral evil and of good,
Than all the sages can.

- William Wordsworth

Regular contact with nature helps humanize us. We can know a sense of unity with all life by way of the sights and sounds of the natural world. This important spiritual element is often left out of discussions of why protecting the environment is a critical issue for our time.

If your hometown and home state are anything like mine, you know how much things have been changing. National parks are wonderful and important places of inspiration and heritage, but we don't live there. We are crowding nature out of our daily lives. Yet I believe that it is precisely here, at the borderlands and interchanges of our ordinary human activities with the natural landscape, that nature affects us most profoundly. Read the rest of this entry »

On the page of my website that is titled ABOUT THE AUTHOR, there is a sentence that says I am "a recovering control-freak."  Notice the word recovering.  It doesn't say recovered.

Yes, even though I am one of the world's foremost masters at living life in the divine flow (a great big smile and a wink go here), when something happens that "threatens" me, I am occasionally challenged by the urge to make a decision, or take an action, for the sole purpose of making me feel secure again. Read the rest of this entry »

Bees are truly amazing creatures, found in just about every region of the world from the Arctic tundra to the towering peaks of the Himalayas. About three quarters of more than 240,000 of the world's flowering plants rely on them to reproduce.

• There are more than 20,000 bee species in the world and, unlike the honeybee, most of them are solitary. They range in size from the 1.5 mm tropical stingless bee to the 40 mm long giant rock bee of Asia.
• They include mining bees, mason bees, leaf-cutter bees, carpenter bees, carder bees, masked bees, sweat bees and bumblebees.¹
• Most bees don't live in hives and are not communal. Instead, they nest in grassy hillocks, in burrows in the ground, under rock ledges, in trees and in rotten wood. Read the rest of this entry »

Flaxseed is one of those superfoods you've only heard about in the past decade. Flax, aka linseed, is not only a food staple but it's used to manufacture everyday products such as paper, hair care products, and fabric.

Now research shows that in addition to all the other health benefits it affords, consumption of flaxseed reduces cholesterol.

Recent findings by Dr. Xu Lin at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shanghai show that when participants underwent studies using flaxseed they experienced a reduction in their LDL — the "bad" cholesterol. The findings were compiled from 28 different past studies involving more than 1,500 participants. Post-menopausal women seemed to experience greater levels of reduction than men. The participants averaged one tablespoon of flaxseed per day. Read the rest of this entry »

Once again, wildfires have raced across parts of California, scorching the earth, and destroying dozens and dozens of homes. And once again, I saw television interviews with several families who lost their homes in these tragic fires.

It was nice to see that all of these people recognized that, in the largest sense, life is not about things. It is about love. And even though their houses—and all of the things in them—were gone, each of these families felt extremely grateful and blessed to still have each other.

The loss of one's home, however, is still a very real—and very significant—loss. And once again I think it is important to acknowledge that fact. Read the rest of this entry »