Silence The Ego…Summon The Soul
Posted by Michelle Moquin on January 13th, 2011
In light of yesterday’s memorial for the victims of Saturdays shooting in Arizona, President Obama gave an inspiring heartfelt speech. He summoned the souls of our nation to come together, honor those slain and injured, and become better people. Obama showed us why he is the president of the United States:
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Palin on the other hand summoned sympathy on her Facebook page. Palin showed us why she will never be president:
Sarah Palin: “America’s Enduring Strength” from Sarah Palin on Vimeo.
That’s all the blog time I’m giving Palin.
Back to Obama:
“I believe we can be better,” Obama said to a capacity crowd in the university’s basketball arena – and to countless others watching around the country. “Those who died here, those who saved lives here – they help me believe. We may not be able to stop all evil in the world, but I know that how we treat one another is entirely up to us.”
I believe those words. We can’t stop all of the evil in this world. (Of course, I could summon Madaline :) But as Obama says, “…how we treat one another is entirely up to us.” The question I ask is, “Will we? -Will we treat each other better?”
As much as I have HOPE, that people will do the right thing, the actions of people and even more so lately, the ever growing polarization of this country, is disheartening to say the least. And we’ve seen what the worst can be.
I would like to think and HOPE a tragedy like this will pull us together as a nation, and not for just a short time, but for the long haul. As Clarence Dupnik, the Sheriff of Pima County suggested, “Let’s do a little soul searching — and then let’s get to work.”
I would like to add to that statement: “Let’s silence the egos that spew lies, and rhetoric, and racism, and summon our souls, allowing our souls to speak, and be of service.” It is a big task I am afraid. We have our work cut out for us. I feel our country is in a state of emergency, and as much as I want it to turn around, the forces of the evil ego shouting “I am better than you are” are louder than I have ever experienced. Can we silence them and bring peace, prosperity, and equality to all? Obama has the power to inspire us, but it truly is entirely up to us to make the changes that we need for our country to be better for all.
Presently, I give the people of our country a big “F” for “F”ailure. Not because of Obama; to me he has done an incredible job. But because of those “F”ighting him…those who push “F”ear, those who wish him to “F”ail, all at the expense of our country.
Can “A”merica get an “A”? Can we make America be as good as Christina Taylor Green, the 9-year old who lost her life on Saturday, imagined it? I certainly HOPE so.
Before I end I want to say that my heart goes out to the families and friends of the victims. I am so sorry for their loss. Saturday was a tragic day for many. May they all rest in peace.
And on another note..to hear that Rep. Gabrielle Giffords opened her eyes for the first time gives me HOPE that she will pull through. I wish her strength and a quick recovery.
I also want to recognize the 20-year-old intern , and hero who refuses to wear the badge of “hero”, Daniel Hernandez for his brave actions towards Giffords after she was struck. In my eyes he is a hero.
****************
Readers: I reread my write from yesterday and I have to say…it almost bummed me out reading it. I HOPE I didn’t bum any of you out. Really everything is okay. And yes, I obviously still have HOPE for this country.
Sometimes my feelings just flow through my fingers, and since the flow has not been a go lately, I guess the floodgates opened, and you got what you got. Well…I have always prided myself on the free flow of the written word, for everyone including myself, so I’m not about to start censoring now. :)
Doug: I have to smile. Yes there were some “virgin” paths as you know. And I am proud for treading them. Thank you.
Lena: And that is all anyone can do. But together we can make a difference. God, that sounds so cliché. But I know you know what I mean. :)
Inca: thank you.
Anonymous: Oh yeah…now I’ll finally know who you are. :)
Tomei: :) My pleasure. Hmm…and this “place” is sanity in your eyes. I wish more sanity for you and yours in your “place”.
Jeromy: Hmm…that is an interesting view. Thank you.
Jimmy: Thanks. :)
Kent: I agree with you.
Peace out.
Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.
Gratefully your blog host,
michelle
Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)
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January 13th, 2011 at 5:45 pm
When will Obama learn that the Right doesn’t care about civility. They are only interested in being the ones in charge.
Any other opinion be damned, ridiculed, or snuffed out. The same goes for the originator of the idea.
Look at the facts. They lie about their intentions. They incite their followers into fear crazed hysteria, then deny they did or skate around the mayhem their nut cases cause.
Jackie
January 13th, 2011 at 6:25 pm
Michelle:
When you look at the outside world and what happens on your blog between the posters one can see the state of the outside world and your blog reflect statistically are about the same.
The only difference is that the anger can never spill over into violence on your blog since no one knows who the other is or can physically harm anyone over a dispute.
To me the ability to purge oneself of ones anger via dialogue without the fear of physical violence is sanity.
One knows going in that he/she can only rant and rave if it comes to that. But the benefit from not being able to exert physical violence upon another here is that one need not fear the same from another.
Sanity prevails because after the reading and or writing is done, one can only log out or shut down.
Thanks to you for giving us the absolute freedom to say what we please no one goes away feeling he couldn’t really say what he/she wanted to and how he/she wanted to say it because you would censor it, or require him/her to provide some sort of identification to say it.
When one enters your blog he/she is totally free to say what they wish to without fear of retribution. Sanity prevails because purging is possible if needed and fear is never present.
Where can one go in the outside world and say that with certainty? It is impossible because insanity prevails. Even 9 year olds cannot expect to be in it without harboring the fear that some insane attacker will cause them harm.
Your “I wish more sanity for you and yours in your “place”. was lost on the little girl. It only prevails on your blog.
Tomei
January 13th, 2011 at 7:01 pm
WHY SUCKING IN YOUR STOMACH HARMS YOUR HEALTH
Do you suck in your stomach? Or maybe the better question is, do you know anyone who doesn’t?
Many people mistakenly believe that holding their stomach muscles tight not only makes them look more trim and fit, but also helps them stand straight and tall.
But sucking in your stomach muscles makes it impossible to breathe correctly which in turn prevents you from having good posture.
Poor posture leads to a host of other problems, including a sore neck and shoulder muscles, poor balance, arthritis and injuries.
Indirectly, the shallow breathing that results from such a stance also can lead to anxiety and even lowered self-esteem.
I discussed all this with Steven Weiniger, DC, a chiropractor in Atlanta, former delegate to the White House Conference on Aging and author of the book Stand Taller — Live Longer.
According to Dr. Weiniger, better posture leads to better health all around. By learning to breathe deeply “into our bellies,” we can resolve many common health complaints.
Though that sounds like simple advice, many people find it to be quite a challenge!
If you don’t think this describes you, think again. Dr. Weiniger told me that most people believe that they are breathing correctly, but in reality, they are not.
So here is a three-step program to get you on your way to stronger posture and better health.
STEP 1: PICTURE THIS!
Before we get to proper breathing, you first need a realistic idea about the current state of your posture.
Here’s an easy way to evaluate your posture: Have someone take full-length pictures of you standing, facing front and facing sideways… and don’t try to stand “right” for this photo session.
You may be quite surprised by what your photos reveal. For example, many people lean to one side, a common problem that creates asymmetry and misalignment in the body.
What to look for: On the front view, draw a line from the center of your forehead to directly between your feet to see whether there is a difference from one side to the other.
On the side view, look to see if your cheekbones are further forward than your chest, which indicates a forward head thrust.
According to Dr. Weiniger, moving through your day with misaligned posture changes everything.
When you do this, your nervous system adjusts and adapts to your bad-posture habits, so that your crooked body begins to feel symmetric and normal to you — but it isn’t.
STEP 2: FINE-TUNE YOUR BREATHING
Now that you have a better idea of your true posture, we can move on to breathing. After years of holding in their tummies, many people have a tendency toward chest breathing.
If you’re not sure whether or not this describes you, Dr. Weiniger said that you can consider achy muscles in your neck and shoulders a good clue.
He explained that chest breathing requires muscles in these areas to do work that they are not designed for, so it’s not all that surprising that they’re sore by the end of the day.
Some good ways to evaluate your own breathing: Dr. Weiniger suggests placing one hand on your belly and the other on your chest as you breathe to see which moves more, belly or chest — that’s your default breathing mode. Your goal is to have belly breathing be your natural style.
Another approach is to ask someone else to watch you breathe and report on what he/she sees.
Ask someone to observe your breathing while you are lying down to see whether your chest and/or belly moves out when you breathe in.
What belly breathing feels like: Try this to get familiar with the sensation of proper belly breathing. Lie on your stomach, cradle your forehead on your crossed arms and slowly breathe.
This position locks the chest, thereby forcing breath into the abdomen — note how this feels because this is what you want to learn to do naturally.
STEP 3: REPROGRAM YOUR POSTURE
Now that you have learned about your posture and breathing tendencies… and you have experienced the sensation of belly breathing… Dr. Weiniger suggests the following exercises to help reprogram yourself to breathe deep into your belly throughout the day.
He said that if you make it a point to spend a few minutes on these exercises several times during the day, belly breathing — and stronger posture — will become instinctive.
Breathing Technique Exercise: In a seated or standing position, pull your shoulders back to expand your chest (lifting it toward the ceiling, keeping your head level and shoulders down) while holding your back straight.
Now breathe deeply into your belly — place one hand on it to feel the subtle movement. Take five breaths as slowly as you can. With practice, you will eventually begin to breathe this way without having to think about it.
Breathing Focus Exercise: A good way to learn how it feels when your belly expands with your breath is to use a long scarf or stretchy resistance exercise band (such as Thera-Band, available at sporting-goods stores and online).
Grasp the ends of the scarf or band, elbows bent at your sides, and wrap it around your waist tightly enough so that it squeezes just a bit. Now take five breaths, consciously, pushing your belly out with each breath.
Breathing for Alignment and Balance: Using your best posture, stand on one leg and raise the other so that it barely touches or is slightly off the ground.
Take five deep, controlled breaths while striving to remain still. Observe how your body must readjust to maintain control of your balance, realigning and shifting your center of gravity with each breath.
This is not easy to do — you may find yourself flailing to stay upright, especially if your posture is off-center.
If so, try placing a finger on a wall for support, but touch the wall only as much as is necessary. Now repeat with the other leg off the floor.
Doing “balance breathing” two or three times a day helps improve balance and alignment, and over a few weeks, most people find that they can balance with greater stability.
So if you feel like your stomach sticks out, consider doing sit-ups to strengthen your abdominal muscles… or perhaps think about losing weight, because sucking it in isn’t the solution.
Instead, changing your posture in the ways Dr. Weiniger describes will create better health overall. You will be more stable, which will lead to a more youthful bearing, and less likely to take a tumble — all that simply by learning how to breathe from your belly!
Source(s):
Steven Weiniger, DC, a chiropractor in private practice in Atlanta and author of Stand Taller — Live Longer (BodyZone). He has served on the White House Conference on Aging.
January 13th, 2011 at 8:05 pm
Janet, your statements came alive when I read a Huffington Post article about a gun parts manufacturing company, Palmetto State Armory, in South Carolina who is selling an AR-15 assault rifle site with the statement “You lie” engraved on it.
Four things come to mind. ONE – The white boy respects no OTW. TWO – He will seek to make a profit from anything. THREE – Bigotry is the biggest motivator for the white boy when purchasing an item. If it disparages another race, it will be a big seller for hIm. FOUR – His small penis makes a gun the most important purchase to him, next to a super sized vehicle.
On this item you have all four.
“You lie,” was the infamous statement made by the asshole 2nd District Republican Congressman Joe Wilson form South Carolina. White boys have been kissing his ass ever since.
Image the uproar in this country if one of the those 43 other white Presidents had had a gun site with a similar etching made to be marketed to the public.
The owner and his company would have been run out of town by mobs with screens of “Unamerican, or treason.”
But since it is a white boy doing it to a black man, we hear the virtues of “free speech” banished by snickering bigots and whites who condone the actions of the more open racists among them.
The white media, like the huffington post, cooperate by not mentioning the name of the company. Yet, they freely speculate on how many will be sold when Obama visits the state.
As OTWS because we do not have the collective voting power of our white brethren, we are supposed to just suck up their insults.
I say if a white boy physically harms Obama, rioting is in order, but in their neighborhoods. Take one of those AR-15s with the site and take proper aim.
You need not look far, because I will most certainly be behind you. As Anonz has ofter implied, some things are worth dying for.
My take on that is how meaningful would your life be if you didn’t stand up.
If OTWS allow these creatures to get away with that followed by their self-serving rhetoric of “be calm it was only a nut case,” they will be raping your daughters in the street next.
It is not their “nut cases” we need to teach a lesson. It is the ones who look the other way while certain opportunists among them use racism and bigotry to rev up their nut cases to do what they do.
The white race supports or looks the other way at bigots like Joe Wilson. They reward them with wealth making opportunities, and political power. They do this while telling the OTWs how horrid their actions were.
Hypocrites! Yet, they will be the ones screening the loudest and evoking the name of God when we bring it to them. I say think “pay back is a bitch” and get on with the business at hand.
Robert
January 13th, 2011 at 8:21 pm
Robert, that’s as nutty as the loon who killed those six innocent people.
I’m white and not a racist or bigot. So why would I want some OTW or anyone else coming to my neighborhood shooting it up just because a white person harmed Obama?
Do the words “Law and Order” mean anything to you?
Get a grip man you are losing it and inciting your nuts on the fringe to do evil things.
Scott
January 13th, 2011 at 8:21 pm
Robert, I’m with you man.
January 13th, 2011 at 8:39 pm
Robert, I have not always agreed with your assessment of the state of white versus the OTW and I have never been able to accept the vitriol in your interpretations of the “white boy’s” action.
I will say I do agree with your assessment that America would not have stood for a gun manufacturer selling such a gun site if the President were white.
However, I find your solution to possible violence totally sick. I am a white woman. So am I to be shot because a nut who was white harmed Obama?
While I will not pretend that “Law and Order” is the same for whites and OTWS, I still think it is the only path civilized beings result to when a crime has occurred or is suspected to have occurred.
Your suggestion is just as racist as those that prompted you to utter it.
Are you really asking for a race war in America? That is what the white bigot wants because he thinks he has the numbers to win. He figures that whites like me will be forced to accept his leadership because we will be in fear of losing our lives.
Frankly, I fear he is right.
So who’s the smart one now? Go start a race war that the “white boy” couldn’t do on his own.
Send this country back 200 years. We white women will suffer with you because as soon as the white man has all the power again, he will regulate us to second to him as he did before the Civil Rights Movement.
If that happens, my only sin will be to have been born a white woman. How is that different for yours being to be born a black man?
Dialogue, command sense, justice, and respect for life is the only answer.
Carol
January 13th, 2011 at 8:41 pm
Tomei, I think it is as close to spilling over as it can get.
January 13th, 2011 at 8:47 pm
Here are more scare tactics by that Hunt creep to push up the price of gold.
=======================
Dear DailyWealth Subscriber,
Do you own gold? If so, do you store it in a safety deposit box in your bank?
The folks at Personal Liberty warn: “Never, ever keep gold or cash in a bank safety deposit box!”
It’s all part of an in-depth report they’ve just put together on “Surviving a Global Financial Crisis and Currency Collapse.” If I were you, I’d take a look at it immediately.
It gives you guidelines on what to do to survive a stock-market wipeout… bank closures… hyperinflation… currency collapse… and even government surveillance.
Take a look at the details here.
Sincerely,
Brian Hunt
Editor in Chief, DailyWealth
======================
Notice how he sneakily implies that the government is watching you if you are saving gold. This is the stuff that makes loons like Loughner think the government is monitoring their every movement.
And as Robert implied they do it for money.
Mike
January 13th, 2011 at 8:54 pm
Oh, and just so you know this creep brian hunt is not only pushing his lies and scare tactics under the titles of editor in chief of the Stansberry & Associates and The Daily Wealth, he is also editor in chief of Ta Ta, The Growth Stock Wire.
And guess what story and fear he is pushing there. You guessed it how buying gold will enable you to survive when the US economy collapses.
And Ta Ta, the savior comes from the same state as the loon who bought his lies Arizona.
=====================
Dear Growth Stock Wire Reader,
For the past few weeks we’ve been telling you about the devaluation of the U.S. dollar and how it will lead to massive inflation and the collapse of the U.S. economy.
But what we haven’t told you is that an Arizona man named Christopher has found a way to profit from this.
You might be shocked when you hear the details of this man’s life. He left America in the ’70s and has been living in various countries around the globe ever since… discovering new ways to make money that have made him and his followers an absolute fortune.
Like how he turned $10,000 into nearly $700,000 through a unique global currency investment or how he turned $650 into $650,000 by purchasing a group of rare coins when he was still in high school…
Today this man’s incredible talent as earned him a cult like following in over 100 countries and has made him an estimated $50 million.
I ask that you listen to his story. What he has to share will likely change your beliefs and save you from the collapse of the U.S. dollar.
You won’t be disappointed. Click here to listen to his story.
Sincerely,
Brian Hunt
Editor in Chief, Growth Stock Wire
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That title should read Liar in Chief.
Mike
January 13th, 2011 at 9:01 pm
With the latest hype in gold, it is important for investors to know all the facts.
The weakening dollar has led to the rise in gold prices and currently gold is the monetary unit which other currencies are being valued.
Some financial analysts and advisers are recommending reallocating funds from investments such as stocks, bonds, CDs and mutual funds into tangible assets that do not rely on the stock market.
But before you reallocate your money into gold, consider the following points.
Gold is being pushed by fear and a bad economy…
inflation and TV marketing. Ten years ago the ratio between silver, gold and platinum was 17 oz. of silver to 1 oz. of gold and 3oz. of gold to 1 oz. of platinum.
That ratio had stayed pretty static for over 50 years. Today, the ratio is 59 oz. of silver to 1 oz. of gold and 1.2 oz. of gold to 1 oz. of platinum.
Fear, government spending and heavy marketing by TV gold resellers has pushed the perceived value of gold very high compared to silver or platinum. The rule is to buy low and sell high.
Gold is at an all-time high. Will it go higher?
Probably, but at some point it will turn and when it does, its value will likely drop very fast.
If you have gold or you are thinking of buying gold, you need to follow the economy very closely. Watch for a noticeable improvement in the business sector GDP, new jobs, end of government bailouts and end of spending.
This is when gold may start dropping. Gold has served in this role for thousands of years, but laws created by governments that have grown too big to put this role in doubt today. Gold Confiscation is still on the books.
January 14th, 2011 at 9:35 am
[...] Jackie: You brought up “civility”. This one’s for you. [...]