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A free woman's voice opens as a flower to the sun.

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#Good resolutions are like babies crying in church.

12/27/2014

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Each year, as January first comes around, we have an opportunity to mark a new year; to change our behaviors, to strive for a better world.

Thinking about my own New Year’s resolutions, I came across this amusing yet poignant quote;

“Good resolutions are like babies crying in church.

They should be carried out immediately.”

Charles M. Sheldon

Shortly afterwards I found another meaningful quote,

“It has never been a matter of wonder to me that human resolutions are liable to change; one passion gives them birth, and other may destroy them.”

Antoine Francois Prevost

It is true, that resolutions depend somewhat on how dire the need is….; to lose weight, to stop drinking, to stop smoking, but unless we start them immediately, they often lose their urgency, and rationalizing sets in.

“I’ll start my diet next week, after we go out for a steak dinner on Friday… ,

 “ I’ll stop smoking, after I finish this carton of cigarettes..”

For myself, it is important that I truly want a result, and I have to remind myself constantly, either with messages on the fridge, or by asking my friends to support me in my goals.

I am going to start back to yoga, play my harp again, and strive to spend more time nurturing my relationships.

 I have all sorts of things I want to do, but I need to be succinct and realistic about how many I can achieve at once. It’s too easy to get back into old habits, just like a plough in an old rut.

The New Year can begin with a snow storm of white vows, and end with a drift of little white lies.

As Benjamin Franklin once said, “Be at war with your vices, and at peace with your Neighbors, and let every New Year find you a better man”

 
As for my global goals, I have many more worldly aspirations. 

But they are dependent on each and every one of us to achieve, through greater love, awareness and activism.

These goals might be best represented in a poem by the great Alfred Lord Tennison.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
      The civic slander and the spite;
      Ring in the love of truth and right,
      Ring in the common love of good.
Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
      Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
      Ring out the thousand wars of old,
      Ring in the thousand years of peace.




“For last year’s words belong to last year’s language.

And next year’s await another voice.

And to make an end is to make a beginning.”


TS ELLIOT

Happy New Year to you all!

And may your resolutions be "bloody, bold and resolute " :)
 
William Shakespeare
 

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#Peace and Goodwill towards men. #Sobering thoughts.

12/20/2014

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What does civilized mean?

I am beginning to wonder.

The horrors of last week’s Taliban killings of school children in Pakistan are an example of nothing less than barbaric evil.

Any religion or ideology that condones the killings of innocents is not part of a civilized world. We have not really evolved as a species.

 We are still committing crimes against humanity.

“God is great” they shouted, as they gunned down 121 school children and teachers, in a display of unbelievable carnage.

If this doesn't raise the level of anger towards religious radicalism, nothing will.

As Christmas approaches and many project the sentiment of “Peace and good will towards men”, it is hard to muster enthusiasm for celebration, when something like this occurs.

 It happens all year long, but at this time, it seems to have more impact on our human spirit.

Even a group of Christians in Peshawar have cancelled their usual celebrations to honor the grieving of their Muslim brothers.

Until we address our basic fundamental spirituality, not our religion, not Christianity, not the Muslim faith, not Judaism;

we shall not evolve.

We have not really evolved beyond our mammalian tendencies.  

Man has demonstrated this over and over throughout history.

We are certainly diversified in our beliefs and practices now and there are degrees of acceptance between us.

But there is a faction amongst us, in each of these divisions of faith and ideology, who behave in the most archetypical, primitive way.

 It is not just in the Middle East.

 The Nazi holocaust

The Chinese revolution in the 50’s

The Vietnam massacre in Mylai by American soldiers

Jim Jones in Guiana in the late 70’s

David Karesh in Waco 1992

The massacre of children in Norway in 2011,

911 and Al-Qaida

ISIS beheadings

Boko Harem kidnappings of young girls, and blood thirsty killings

The list goes on, but today, the smaller the coffin, the heavier the burden is to carry.

We can wish for peace.

We can rise into our higher consciousness.

We can pray, meditate, and mediate.

We can preach, and we can procrastinate.

But until we address this fundamental issue, we cannot evolve as a species.

We cannot say we are a civilized world.

 

 


 

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# Out of the mouth of Babes. A Christmas wish 

12/13/2014

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I woke up this morning after fretful dreams, anxious, and frazzled…. Christmas to prepare for, cards to address,  bills to pay, roof to fix, blog to write, etc. etc.

 I had composed a Christmas greeting card yesterday, with the message “Good will towards men”, for my Twitter followers. I had felt far too disillusioned and disheartened by the latest horrors of war and terrorism, to actually include “Peace and”, in the message..

Sipping on tea, I scrolled through Facebook to get some inspiration.

 I read about the families in Australia being forced by the government to sell their failing farms and once arable land to mining companies, with little compensation, leaving them destitute.

 It reminded me of the Chinese revolution in the fifties, under Chairman Mao, when land owners were robbed of their land and slaughtered.

I read about the latest beheading by ISIS and how the parents of the victim would prefer a picture of his face go viral, rather than the video of the gruesome act.

Then I saw a picture posted by a friend, and suddenly, I had found my inspiration.

 The picture brought tears to my eyes, not because of my sentimentality, but because of its’ sentiment.

 The picture was taken of a Letter to Santa, composed this week by a nine year old friend of mine called Rania.

She had painstakingly drawn and decorated her letter paper with pretty red flowers and a leaf vine, with a big decorated D, like a Gothic Majuscule, for Dear Santa.

 She explained at the top that

 “I’m using the same paper that Abraham Lincoln used”..

 And then she listed her wishes.

The first of her wishes was not for a doll, or a gadget, or anything that a little girl would usually wish for herself.

 Her first wish is for “ World Peace, and support for Gaza”

 Then she goes on to ask for “a little cover thingy for my dance shoes”, and a “Whole Foods mini cake thingy…”

What struck me, is that this is a nine year old girl, and because of the innocent directness with which she asked Santa for World peace and support for Gaza.

She had the courage to ask on paper for something that I shied away from yesterday.
She had the courage to do it in style; specifically, “in the style of Abraham Lincoln”!

I felt humbled, coupled with joy at the same time.
 Our little Rania; standing up for what she believes and wants.
And applying it in such style!

So now I have the courage to wish again, and to dust myself off, to put it in my blog, and tweet my message.

I enclose a copy of Rania’s letter, in the photograph below.
I hope you get everything on your list Rania ! 

Thank you for the inspiration!


%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
My updated letter 
Dear Santa / Father Christmas
My wish for myself, and for Rania, 


1. To live in a world of Peace, Love and Harmony, and support for Gaza
 
Thank you for being nice,
Susan 
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

(ps. I'd like to sell my book.... : )


%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
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#Change.We cannot direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails

12/7/2014

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At two years old, I remember my first sister being born, her strange little purple umbilical cord, and realizing that my life had changed.

I remember listening to the radio on the kitchen table and imaging a whole orchestra of little people inside.

 I remember listening to the BBC about the ‘Bay of Pigs” crisis, and being frightened, even though I didn’t understand it. 

I remember pulling on my Mother’s skirts to pry her away from her friend as she chatted cheerfully outside a store in the high street. It was growing dark, and I thought we needed to get home before the war started…
 I remember being frightened all that night, and thinking that the voices outside my bedroom window in Falmouth town were not drunken sailors staggering out of  the pubs and noisily tacking their way home, but soldiers fighting. The sudden loud bangs from cars backfiring were guns being fired, as the war began.

I remember when President Kennedy was shot, and the announcement came while my Mother was baking bread in the kitchen. She did not believe me at first, and had to come and listen to the news herself.

I remember going to the Fire station with my brother to see the fire trucks.  I remember while my brother was mesmerized by the naked ladies on the walls of their break room, the fireman sat me on his knee and sexually assaulted me. I remember him telling me as we walked all the way home, “You must never tell anyone, it has to be our secret.”

I remember our Father teaching us all how to sail, and how to duck the Boom as it swung to the starboard side, and then to adjust the rudder. I would look back into the wake, tighten the mainsail, whilst feeling the boat beneath me catch the water and cut smoothly through the waves.

I remember leaving home on my 18th birthday to become a nurse, and the huge challenges that I faced adjusting to a new life.

I remember the indescribable warmth and love in my heart when I breast fed my baby daughter for the very first time.

I remember where I was on 911

Each chapter in our lives has its mile stones.

Each change has an effect.

Each event takes its’ toll, but we have to adjust.

We have to grow. We have to learn.

We must open ourselves to change.


“Change is what I was born for

To look, to listen

to lose myself inside this soft world-

to instruct myself over and over”


(Mary Oliver)



And to quote Tony Robbins,

“Change is Inevitable

Progress is Optional “


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My book, the Moon of Compassion is now published and it is available for sale in itunes.   https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/the-moon-of-compassion/id892598396?mt=11

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    Susan Golden

    Born, raised and educated in Cornwall, England., Sue moved to America in 1981.
    After many years of life experience, her first bookof poetry for social change, is published. Available on iBooks.
     https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/the-moon-of-compassion/id892598396?mt=11

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