Athene

Zeus decides to who he had to give the place where Athene would be build.
Two one wanted it: Athene an Poseidon.
Zeus gave it to Athene, for this we westerns are so heady people, Athene was born from Zeus head.

And Poseidon?
Zeus had two brother, Poseidon and Ade.
Zeus is the head, Ade the belly; pity, with Poseidon we where surely with more heart.

Vervain

You must be, this little flower must be. And if he must be, all must be and must be nicely and perfect. Nobody must suffer, why it is cold? Why it is hot? There must be a mistake; why that one is rich, why that one is poor, why?
He suffers that other suffer, he suffers people do bad things and they end in jale, but why they are not in jale? Where is God that doesn't fix everything?! I can try.
Years later, when he is more old, he starts to understand that it's too heavy, too difficult to change how things go in the world. Now he can break down or sometimes he can feel that God way is not the same like his way was, the road is not a strict road, the road can bend and follow paths he did not consider at all and maybe life doesn't go on tracks like he tought, like he desired to fix everything, to complete the world like he wanted.

On God and us

The task of each of us is to to seek God
Leaving this to priests or to a church brings misfortune

Yin and Yang

We do not understand life
They abuse of a power that God has not given them.

Hercules and Antaeus

What do you think about Hercules and Antaeus and their fight Sheila?

Antonio del Pollaiolo

Hercules is a positive symbol, strength with intelligence, and no brute force like Antaeus.
This is exactly what happens in Tai Chi Carlo, what you do? You lift up the diaphragm to move the other energetically. Antaeus is a strong man, he must use the ground to be strong, what does a Tai Chi master with strong people? He lifts them up pulling up the diaphragm and inverting their ground polarity. So this is the ancient Tai Chi statement: lift several pounds with only some oz of weigh.
More deeply Antaeus is our external way of acting, our muscles and strength stupid approach to life, Hercules lifts to the sky his Antaeus part, he reverses it and wins in himself his ego side freeing his energy.

Where God stays

Hell and Heaven are in opposition, they are Yin and Yang, belly and head, are fighting one against the other; the church has brought on this fight with terrible effects on the mental health of the human beings for thousands of years. God can't conceive such a shame.

Dante puts the loved love of Paolo and Francesca in the Hell and his love for Beatrice in the Heaven. Both are no-loves, both are two faces of the same coin. Carnal, but full of sins feelings the first, ethereal and not lived the second.

"Amor, che a nullo amato amar perdona, mi prese del costui piacer sì forte...".

"Love, that doesn't forgive nobody loved, took me a so strong pleasure of him..."

It's interesting, who loves it's loved back, from
that we can deduce that who is not loved doesn't love. (that person).

Often happens that one "doesn't feel loved" or to think continuosly to one person

The place more forgotten in these thousands years of contrapposition between hell and Heaven it's the Purgatory, the heart. Nothing against head and belly, but if they are not connected with the heart they are only monsters and they bring us to wars and violence. Present human beings that seem to us so ugly in their ridiculous inveigh and stealing are only humans no more connected to the heart, infernals or heavenly sloppy beins.

Thinking always to a person doesn't mean we love her/him, only listening to our heart we can understand who we really love and understand who loves us.

Distance

You prefer he love you and stays with her or that he loves her and stays with you?
Where one stays with the body is no matter in love, the heart does not care.
Where stays the heart there is love and one heart doesn't care if the other is 6000 kilometers away from his body, he is always together with his/her beloved.

Your painting

New York 2010, Sheila Sanchez

You have no face,
too terrorized to have one,
crying in the night:
my beloved where are you???

You have one big ear,
my lips where once on the other one,
and then you kissed me;
your ear is asking:
why your lips are not here?
why we had only one beautiful kiss?
why you are not here to kiss me again?

Healing eyes and ears meditation

This is the beginning of an healing meditation for the eyes and the ears.
You have to lay down, the nose in this position is like a mountain, the eyes are two lakes.
For the combination of this two elements you can read my post of two years ago: An ancient mountain, a young lake
There is water (energy) coming down from the nose, it flows to the eyes from both sides of the bridge in an energetic waterfall and goes directly to the internal angle of the two lakes. Stay still until you feel this flow, if you don't feel nothing, you need to repeat this meditation, every day for some minutes, one eye at a time, as long as you get it.
There is one other flow of energy coming from under the nose, from inside the mountain (this part is directly in touch with the heart); feel an underground river that springs out to the internal angle of the eyes, under the lake. Both flows, (the first one, the one coming down from the mountain, is connected to the belly) are two different types of energy and they mix here, at the inner angle of the eyes.
This flow of water (energy) then covers the eyes: feel the stream going in four directions, to the upper (North) and to the lower part (South) of the eye, to the deepest part (Nadir) and to the upper one (Zenith) of them.
Stay feeling this for a while. At the beginning you can work on one only direction, after on the couple of them, North/South and Nadir/Zenith, when you have little time feel all the eyes fully covered.
The stream continues going to the outer part of the eyes and here forms a big waterfall going down to the ears, but first the energy fills up the temples, an important acupuntcure point, stay here until you like, then follow the falling water that reaches the ears, opening them. The ear must always be open for the health of the person.
Let the water go inside and feel like the ears are dungeons under the earth level. You must go deep inside, so deep that both rivers rejoin in the middle of the head.
This is the first part of a very nice and healthy meditation my Guides gave me.

Crab Apple

If you think something is not ok, if you feel bad in yourself, if you have some problems in life, Crab Apple fix it and release the tension that causes that problem, so... it's an universal healer :) you can always take it, it puts every physical, mental and spiritual trouble in it's real state and heals them.
White-snow was locked in her house one morning and a old very ugly woman come to offer her an apple, White-snow took it and eat it and fall unconsciously, what that means Carlo in reality? Before she was afraid, she was afraid her mother in law could kill her for her beauty, she was split in two parts, the white and the black one, the ugly and the beauty one, the bad and the good one, everything in her was like that, she made that split, she chose to see beauty and so she had to see ugliness and at the end everything was terrible nice and terrible dangerous and what could she do if not close herself in the house? She eat Crab Apple and? and Crab Apple was not half poisoned, but her state of so illuminated consciousness fade away and she finally slept, she finally relax and let things go by there self, without seeing no more black and white with so deep cut between one and the other. All around though she was death, but was not so, she was in a new state, she was only relaxed and free, free to let her prince, (the Yang element) come to her and deeply kiss her and she was free to go with him for a new life, Yin and Yang now together for ever.

The idealism

There is no idealism in God, there is only peace in Him, peace and love. Why you need idealism Carlo, don't you have an heart? An heart that feels what is correct and what is not correct?
Do you see all the wars? All come from a sort of idealism, there are so many.
A person thinks and he arrives to a conclusion and that conclusion becomes like a law and must be fulfilled and this must be in the years, in hundreds of year. Religion are like that, some thinking are correct, maybe is a good thing to not eat meat, but this is not in Tibet Buddhism, why? Because they lived at 4000 meter in high mountains, its' cold, they have only meat, they can't kill them self for an idealism! Even that there are lot of people that can kill them self for stupidity... look New York ground zero, look kamikazes people...
Idealism comes from the ego, it's needed to support the ego and there are no bad and good idealism, there are all from an ego state, you follow your idealism and your ego inflates more and more and you become arrogant, you are the one, the right one, the chosen one, the chosen people, you are the best because you do correct, right... but all this is not worthwhile, it's only a waste of time and it's heavy, very heavy and God is not there, He is not near one ego following his idealism.
Follow your heart Carlo, every instant, in every situation, sense the correct answer for every moment coming, a wise person is always like this, he doesn't know before what is correct, what is wrong, he knows, smelling, touching, looking and feeling because every moment, every place, every person in life is different.

The two heart meditation

Center your heart with your loved one, they must be absolutely synchronous, and then let it beat and listen her/his beat, look her/his light that with yours becomes incandescent and breath, breath with her/him and become the all universe and your light, your beat, your breath fill every place, everyone, everything.
After rest in joy.

Men that kill women

Men that kill women

Yes Carlo, it's very sad and they kill their beloved, they kill who could help them to have a new life. These men feel great love and they think they are alone once their love is gone, it's not so, they can feel them, can love them even alone... suddenly their heart was for the first time full, full of light, full of joy and they think now they are alone, and no one will never fill them anymore. They start hating their loved, they only project the hate they have for themselves, the hate they always had inside that for a moment was hidden by the love they touched.
Carlo, love is everywhere, in every person, they don't understand this.

Why man?

You ask me way man? a boy has a mother, she hated them... a girl has a father, if he hated them women will have a revange leaving men, for men is more difficult, they are less good to sustain pain, they react more violently.
When men are attacked by woman, every woman must think that these men had a mother, a mother that didn't teach love to their child. And in the culture men must be 'strong', woman no, woman can be gentle, a gentle men often is considered only a fool :(

The flowing water

A little meditation, good for everybody.
The water means the life, the flow is the time passing, to let oneself flow in the water is accepting that life flows and to be able to float in it, means we are free, without blocks, without looking for things that are not, that couldn't be; letting go we accept good things that will arrive in a natural way.
Laying down with closed eyes we feel a river more than less turbulent, we let ourself go in this river, the water doesn't wet, our back is under; now the current is moving and we with it, we remain listening it in a blessed state, and we let ourself brought away, if there is fear we take it off with softness, it never helps, it only dissuades. Slowly we understand that the flow, before strong, doesn't disturb us anymore.
Yes, in the myths, the hero or the heroin children, that where, symbolically, thrown in the water, are human flowing beings, for that they are heroes and the other no.

Over the sea, to the master

A jorney to the master

It's from 1988 that I travel to the master. Lot of years, often two times a year.
To reach him we have always cross the sea, weird, on not so weird, the Buddhist mantra, "Gate, Gate, Paragate, Parasamgate, Bodhi, Svaha" the sutra of the heart, tells us to cross to arrive 'over'.
First was the 'English channel', now is the 'mar Ligure'... some times I went to him with the train, you had to take the sleeping wagon to Paris, after the train to Calais, and from there the ship to Dover; arrived at London you where really arrived and... ready, ready the day after for this encounter... the airplane is a beautiful way to travel, beautiful is to fly to the master that teaches you how to do to fly, but at times is too sudden, one is already there and is already here back and the - small island with the master -, for most people is gone like is gone a mirage in the middle of a desert.

The ferry from Genoa is enormous, almost too big to listen to the rolling and the pitch of the waves while you sleep, there is not even, unfortunately, a rough sea.
The evening goes nicely with the company of a Swiss collegue met at the port, Tai Chi chatting, about teachers and other countries.
One wakes early, from the armchair the sun is rising; a quick coffee sitting at the cafeteria on the upper deck with the morning breeze and we arrive.
It's the day before the encounter, it's a day of absolute rest, of sweet doing nothing, of a walk long the still not summer shore, of writings on the notebook.
The alarm is obligatory, but never needed, one wakes up ready, Tai Chi dress, ummm, white stockings, switch off the mobile...
You walk the stairs, you leave the shoes outside, the colleague of the hour before mine recites the rhyme of his exam, On, Jai, Ban, Loi, absolutely concentrated, seems not seing you at all.
The master is at the phone, I walk to the terrace, I Kung number one, the view is powerfull, 240 degrees of sea, the isle of ..., rocks and colours... 'Carlo: Chi Kung two... it's the voice of the master... here, the colleague has finished and goes, I turn round, he is smiling as usual, bow and... unexpectedly he takes out two meditation cushions, I sit, he sits in front of me, some little explanation, direct as usual, I try... the pleasure to stay in meditation with him, in the silence of the enchantment... then he stands, he says: 'out, in front of a tree'. I paint to myself a beautiful tree...
we go out, down the stairs, he points to me a spot, I sneak in between plants, grass and bungalows, I sit down, he is a little bit further, hidden. I start, I'm between two florished and fragrant trees, one red and the other pink, I breath, I try the technique just learnt... time that has no time passes...
We stand together and we return up, we drink a drop of tea, then he shows me with some applications what was meditation, the Yin... I can't even touch him... the Yang... I fly lightly out of the door. It's my turn, omg, a little apprehenciation, a pair of doubts block the transformation between Yin and Yang, then it works and he: 'now! good, good :) '
At the end the bow, the smile. We will meet in the afternoon. I put quickly my shoes and I go back to my room to try again the emotion.

Heartbroken - 1

Heartbroken

Carlo, there is never separation, life is a flow, we need to stay in this flow, sometimes we enconter a person that in that moment has a riverber with us and there is love, this can stay, end, there is no time, no limits, but every lifeflow is different and when one riverber is gone we only need to accept it and let the other flow, we must not stop him/her, cause leaving flowing human beings is love.
We can leave our heart open, if we accept all this, there will be no pain and in some case the beloved could even be back because the flow wants that loves starts again.

Life is this Carlo, can be difficult to accept it, but this is the secret of love and happyness.

Daedalus: the maze, the wings

Daedalus was trapped in a maze that he himself built. The maze is our normal life, we do over and over the same mistakes, fighting others, being depressed after having followed stupid things, eating too much every day, or too little, searching happiness where we will never find it and then searching again, games that have no end, losing ourselves, awaiting death, bored and happy only when we have new things, new loves, new books, new songs. In eastern culture they say we are in the maze for so many lives and we go on and on without finding the way out.

Daedalus in this Greek myth manages to find a solution to escape the maze: wings, with wings we fly, we are free, with wing we can flow into our life, the mind is free, has no attachments and can follow moment after moment the winds and we can go where we must go lightly, happily.

Wings are always on our back, we can feel them if we try, they are always there. Some people arch their back so the wings disappear, they are slaves of their inflexible ideals, of their stiff thinking, they can even think that God wants what they are doing... no, God wants that we fly, God wants us to flow moment after moment in our life, following His signs; God doesn't want books where we must do all what we think He said we "must" do: death books... God is alive, moment after moment, instant after instant.
So wings are of angels, we are angels fallen down, we fell because we hid our wings, but the wings are still there, ready to open and the wings are on the back side of our heart, that opens to our spine. We think we love, but only with one part of our heart, the front part and loves end always sadly cause they block themselves; when we open our back side of the heart, when we have wings, our love is free to fly, moment after moment and has no end.
The Greek myth teaches us two things, one is to be careful to not melt our wings with to much fire, like what happened to Icarus, the son of Daedalus: if when we fly we get too full of ourselves, we lose our wings, we don't flow no more, we are in the ego, we forget that God makes us fly, we become gods.
If we fly too near the water our wings get wet and in this case we can't fly no more. Our emotions, water, overwhelm us; we are deep in anguish and we don't see no more the light, we think we are left alone to deal
with our life and we don't see any way out.

Why did the son die, what's the meaning of this? The son is Daedalus ego, he was still split in two, he was trying to get out of the maze, trying to leave apart is ego. The son was that part of Daedalus that felt for the first time to be so powerful and he tough he was himself the creator of this, so he tried to substitute himself to the Sun - this the meaning of Icarus falling down after he went too near the sun -, every time in life we try this, life is too hard, we do everything ourselves without asking help.
Daedalus only lost is ego because he manage to continue flying and not falling as usual into depression after the megalomaniac state of is son, in depression he would have touched the water and also in this case he would have lost his wings and would have been lost again in the maze, again in a state of death.
The maze is an illusion of our life, we have always had wings, they can never be cut, but we can hide them to ourselves and live an illusion.

Many people want a son not only like an act of love, but also to substitute God, the Father and Mother, in this case, Daedalus had one, his ego son.

Carlo Lopez

* what I mean for ego
Ego: ego is a construction of the mind, a part that build himself in a not natural way. a part that is not listening to our real feelings and acts only in a power way, (this causes suffering) a part that uses guilty to feel himself strong, a part that put himself in the place of God thinking that he (the ego) created himself.
We can say is the demon, a narcissistic self.
A dictator is an ego man cause he needs other people to be a dictator, he can't be 'himself' without going against other people.
Can also be a mother or a father that want their daughter becomes a doctor or a nurse, not letting her be what her life wants she will be, maybe a poet, maybe a worker; they "use" the daughter to gain power for them self (non necessary in a conscious way).
The ego must kill God cause he is god and made himself.
Church are an ego expression of human being, they use God to gain power, but they kill God, they create a false God, a projection of themselves, not an alive God.

An ancient mountain, a young lake

A mountain was there from ever, waiting and waiting; in this waiting time lot of water fall on him, wind whispered on him, lighting and thunder was over him. He moved a lot, stones always fallen, new caves come out, woods grew over woods.

But now, now he was ready! now all his sharpness was gone, all the narrow angles where gone. His hills where soft, was nice to walk on him, beautiful round curves everywhere.

The rain that started that night was gentle, fell like that for four months, the mountain was waiting for her, he was so pleased of her drops on the arid ground; the rain was happy too, now she had so many places to rest and stay, she could stop there, and she would have nurtured all the beings that where living on him.
One morning the sun was out shining on a new world, there was a beautiful lake everywhere, in the night the stars where shining on her.

Days passed, beautiful trees grew, strong ones could put their roots, animals found food and water everywhere.

One day a wise man come to meet the mountain; he look around smiling all the time. And then said to his disciples: look! this is how a sage must be! Look at this mountain, he waited so long to be complete! now every thing, every one founds peace in him. we can only learn from his patients and wisdom, now he has place in him for his lake...

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Mountain and Lake are two of the eight ancient Chinese “Trigrams”, Pa Kua, the base for the famous “I Ching, the book of changes”.

The Mountain (stillness), is represented by two Yin lines and one Yang line on the top, it comes from Hearth (3 yin lines) where the summit, the Yin line has changed in a Yang line.

The Lake (joy) has two Yang lines and a Yin line on the top (here the base line changes, from Water, cause water founding a base becomes lakes, seas).

The water needs a place to stay, to rest and settle down, needs a comfortable mountain that welcomes.

So Yin and Yang influence each other, the lake brings joy to the mountain, fills the nude rocks with trees and flowers, animals can live.

The mountain is our nape: must be like a mountain, still and high.
The lake is our face, must be open and full of joy.

In our normal life we have the mountain in front of us: all the blocking things of our life we put in front, our life becomes a mountain hard to climb.
We must change to the right situation: we stay on the mountain admiring the open spaces of the lake, in front of us.

But the story has a more deep meaning, a stiff mind is like a young mountain, nothing can survive on it cause it is too sharp, a wise person has much more "curves" in his character, other people like to search for his advices and comfort.

Sea

Was a beautiful day.

The sea was blue, splendid.

His heart was in turmoil, she was far away, at least 6000 kilometres, in an other continent
They where in love, and there on the beach he didn’t know what to do,
laying on the sand thinking of her, a book suddenly closed; yes some
music was helpful, was their music. Ah, those songs listened with the
earphones the nights passed with her, magic ones. The morning always
arrived too early.
That sea in front of him… A bath, ok, otherwise what was for a so nice sea?

Years ago a suddenly current was bringing him away, the anguish pass
through brought him to not have trust in himself and in the sea. Was
better to stay where the water was not so high.

This time however, at soon he was inside, her smile appeared and even her voice: Carlo, let you go!
Ah! Yes, was her, he had trust in her, he decided to arrive to the
buoy, the water was sweet, little more… afraid? No, why? He had learned
that fear was mortal, stiffen up, pulls down; her smile…

Two week passed in that way; now he was waiting the moment to go in
the water, he was welcomed by her smile and her sweet words; he swim
slowly, breaststroke for long stretches; the enjoyment was the
greatest, he was making love in the water, but she was the water, they
did it slowly, tenderly.

Now the sea was again the sea, no more for pulling him under, but for supporting him softly.

He left, the two weeks holiday there where over, he would have
always memories of them, but… but how in two weeks not a drop of rain
from the sky, always a mild breeze, the sea warm has he liked? Was
weird…

She was still smiling to him.

Carlo Lopez

Free

It's not easy to be free.
we always try to "jail" our life,
a family becomes always a jail,
work always become a jail,
games always become a jail,
love always becomes a jail.

At the beginning every one of these things seem so nice, so attractive.
And they are, it's how we spoil them, how for fear we "jail" them.

How many times do you see authors or comments of how it would be annoying to have a flat "peace" in our life? This is a trick of the mind, we always escape peace. We escape it by doing so many things in during out day and not a single minute for us, never: if we have nothing to do, we turn on the television, read a book, or post in a blog :)

In Eastern culture, once, meditation was important for the human being; meditation is a moment for ourselves, for having some peace, some deep joy.

Take 2 minutes for yourself, close your eyes , relax and open your body and ask for peace, don't do anything else. Communicate, this is essential. Who to communicate with? Choose what you prefer: in Tai Chi we can say energy. In a religion, they can call it God, Holy Spirit, Christ, Buddha, Maometto, Hallah, Shiva, Krishna. Oh, you can also try with your beloved! You will be surprised how powerful he/she is.
So, after you start to communicate, simply for ask peace and joy. (omg, afterward, don't feel guilty if you feel it! It's a trick of your mind to go back to your normal state.)

Carlo Lopez
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Peace and joy are not annoying. If one goes in them and is not afraid of them, they become greater and greater, like the sea.
Sheila in this beautiful poem describes very well this "endless sea".

"Free" (Because there really wasn't anything else I could name it.)

She woke up today
feeling like a dove,
dancing (flying)
and singing (chirping)
in the breeze over an endless sea.
Sweet freedom.
She wanted to write about it too,
but no words came.
Oh well, she thought,
I have this good feeling
and no one can take it from me,
no one can ruin it for me.
Even if it wasn't on paper,
or blogged about,
or written about in a diary,
or shouted of in the middle of an intersection,
she felt like everyone knew of it.
Who could miss such a brilliant light
shinning so bright within her
that it illuminated the earth with a far, far better light
than even the sun itself could provide.
A far, far better sight
than the constellations could ever hope of becoming.
Yeah, she felt that good.
Have you?
No? Then you should let it go.
What 'it' is, only you know.
Maybe it's whatever you think of when you cry,
or when you feel all hope is lost,
or whatever you think of when you feel it's your fault.
That's the 'it' you need to say goodbye to.
And when you do,
you can join me in song

by kind permission of Sheila “zaphi” Sanchez

Stock market

I don't understand why it must always go up?!

The sun goes up and down, the moon changes in the same way, the seasons are  a circle. Taoist philosophers called this natural process Tai Chi, Tao: Yin and Yang. All life is Yin and Yang, we get up in the morning (not all of us in the morning :), but we all get up and when we are tired, we lay down.

Life starts breathing in (Yin) and ends breathing out (Yang). For our entire life, we breath in and out, there is no exception: why must this be different for societies quoted in the Stock market?

I can understand if you buy, fixed, rent things, you give people your money, does not matter what they do with this money. You tried to help them and they give you back something, but why all the quoted societies must go up?
In Milano, 27% was lost (first graph), that means that the Mibtel, before, went up 27%, now it's evening, must go down.

The problem, I think, is that the going up is an illusion, a nice mirage for letting people put money in stocks, but at the end they loose money because who does the "joke" is the one that takes the missing amount.



Here are two interesting graphs of Milano Mibtel, the first looks horrible, how the line goes down! But it's an illusion, this is a 3 month projection. The second graph tells us more the truth, the Tai Chi movement, it's a projection of Five years.



One problem of not understanding Yin Yang stock market is that people get in panic and sell everything so the crack can be even worse; this is good for someone because if there is someone that looses, there is always someone that gains: this is called "Capitalism".

If you don't want to loose money, don't be afraid; if all are not afraid, there will be no panic and the Yin and yang of the "market" would be more soft.

Carlo Lopez

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Now a poem by Sheila, in this one we can see the desperation for not having understood Yin and Yang.

It Happens


Scream out to the city lights.
Yell out your feelings,
your thoughts,
your fears,
your wants,
your needs.
No one will listen, you think,
so you yell,
"I feel angry,
depressed,
screwed,
guilty!"
You have your hands on your head,
pulling your hair,
jaw tightly clenched.
Dropping to the floor on your knees,
you weep.
"Why are you angry?"
Has the city responded to your cry?
Though amazed and confused, you yell back,
"Life doesn't go my way."
"Why are you depressed?"
"Life doesn't go my way."
"Why are you screwed?"
"Life will never go my way."
"And how can you feel guilty?"
"I have done nothing to make life go my way."
"Do you think you are so important
and powerful
to be able to 'make' life go your way?"
A shiver runs down your spine
making your head shake up
and now you're staring at the sky.
You are not an almighty being.
Shit happens.

by kind permission of Sheila “zaphi” Sanchez