An Impatient Letter From God

The following was written by Bo Lozoff of http://www.humankindness.org in 1989 to address religious competition. Looks like we have come nowhere in 18 years. It’s a bit long, but worth the read. If his verebosity is too much please read the last three paragraphs anyway.

– – – –

Date: Eternity

From: GOD

To: My Children on Earth

re: Idiotic religious rivalries

My Dear Children (and believe me, that’s all of you),

I consider myself a pretty patient Guy. I mean, look at the Grand Canyon. It took millions of years to get it right. And how about evolution? Boy, nothing is slower than designing that whole Darwinian thing to take place, cell by cell and gene by gene. I’ve even been patient through your fashions, civilizations, wars and schemes, and the countless ways you take Me for granted until you get yourselves into big trouble again and again.

But on this occasion of My Son’s birthday, I want to let you know about some things that are starting to tick me off.

First of all, your religious rivalries are driving Me up a wall. Enough already! Let’s get one thing straight: These are your religions, not Mine. I’m the Whole Enchilada; I’m beyond them all. Every one of your religions claims there’s only one of Me (which, by the way, is absolutely true). But in the very next breath, each religion claims it’s My favorite one. And each claims its bible was written personally by me, and that all the other bibles are man-made. Oh, Me. How do I even begin to put a stop to such complicated nonsense?

Okay, listen up now: I’m your Father and Mother, and I don’t play favorites among My Children. Also, I hate to break it to you, but I don’t write. My longhand is awful, and I’ve always been more of a “doer” anyway. So all your books, including the bibles, were written by men and women. They were inspired, remarkable people, but they also made mistakes here and there. I made sure of that, so that you would never trust a written word more than your own living Heart.

You see, one Human Being to me — even a Bum on the street — is worth more than all the holy books in the world. That’s just the kind of Guy I Am. My Spirit is not an historical thing, It’s alive right here, right now, as fresh as your next breath.

Holy books and religious rites are sacred and powerful, but not more so than the least of You. They were only meant to steer you in the right direction, not to keep you arguing with each other, and certainly not to keep you from trusting your own personal connection with Me.

Which brings Me to My next point about your nonsense: You act like I need you and your religions to stick up for Me or “win souls” for My Sake. Please, don’t do Me any favors. I can stand quite well on my own, thank you. I don’t need you to defend Me, and I don’t need constant credit. I just want you to be good to each other.

And another thing: I don’t get all worked up over money or politics, so stop dragging My name into your dramas. For example, I swear to Me that I never threatened Oral Roberts. I never rode in any of Rajneesh’s Rolls Royces. I never told Pat Robertson to run for president, and I’ve never ever had a conversation with Jim Bakker, Jerry Falwell, or Jimmy Swaggart! Of course, come Judgement Day, I certainly intend to…

The thing is, I want you to stop thinking of religion as some sort of loyalty pledge to Me. The true purpose of your religions is so that you can become more aware of Me, not the other way around. Believe Me, I know you already. I know what’s in each of your hearts, and I love you with no strings attached. Lighten up and enjoy Me. That’s what religion is best for.

What you seem to forget is how mysterious I Am. You look at the petty little differences in your scriptures and say, “Well, if this is the Truth, then that can’t be!” But instead of trying to figure out My Paradoxes and Unfathomable Nature — which, by the way, you never will — why not open your hearts to the simple common threads in every religion?

You know what I’m talking about: Love and respect everyone. Be kind. Even when life is scary or confusing, take courage and be of good cheer, for I Am always with you. Learn how to be quiet, so you can hear My Still, Small Voice (I don’t like to shout). Leave the world a better place by living your life with dignity and gracefulness, for you are My Own Child. Hold back nothing from life, for the parts of you that can die will surely die, and the parts that can’t, won’t. So don’t worry, be happy (I stole that last line from Bobby McFerrin, but he stole it from Meher Baba in the first place.)

Simple stuff. Why do you keep making it so complicated? It’s like you’re always looking for an excuse to be upset. And I’m very tired of being your main excuse. Do you think I care whether you call me Yahweh, Jehovah, Allah, Wakantonka, Brahma, Father, Mother, or even The Void or Nirvana? Do you think I care which of My Special Children you feel closest to — Jesus, Mary, Buddha, Krishna, Mohammed or any of the others? You can call Me and My Special Ones any name you choose, if only you would go about My business of loving one another as I love you. How can you keep neglecting something so simple?

I’m not telling you to abandon your religions. Enjoy your religions, honor them, learn from them, just as you should enjoy, honor, and learn from your parents. But do you walk around telling everyone that your parents are better than theirs? Your religion, like your parents, may always have the most special place in your heart; I don’t mind that at all. And I don’t want you to combine all the Great Traditions into One Big Mess. Each religion is unique for a reason. Each has a unique style so that people can find the best path for themselves.

But My Special Children — the ones your religions revolve around — all live in the same place (My Heart) and they get along perfectly, I assure you. The clergy must stop creating a myth of sibling rivalry where there is none.

My Blessed Children of Earth, the world has grown too small for your pervasive religious bigotry and confusion. The whole planet is connected by air travel, satellite dishes, telephones, fax machines, rock concerts, diseases, and mutual needs and concerns. Get with the program! If you really want to help Me celebrate the birthday of My Son Jesus, then commit yourselves to figuring out how to feed your hungry, clothe your naked, protect your abused, and shelter your poor. And just as importantly, make your own everyday life a shining example of kindness and good humor. I’ve given you all the resources you need, if only you abandon your fear of each other and begin living, loving, and laughing together.

Finally, My Children everywhere, remember whose birth is honored on December 25th, and the fearlessness with which He chose to live and die. As I love Him, so do I love each one of you. I’m not really ticked off, I just wanted to grab your attention because I hate to see you suffer. But I gave you Free Will, so what can I do now other than to try to influence you through reason, persuasion, and a little old-fashioned guilt and manipulation? After all, I Am the original Jewish Mother. I just want you to be happy, and I’ll sit in The Dark. I really Am, indeed, I swear, with you always. Always. Trust In Me.

Your One and Only,

GOD

Dreaming

I have been in a bit of a mixed state lately. Hyperactive and yet still sleepy and at times lethargic. It’s weird but better than being depressed. Here are some disjointed images from a dream I just had while napping:

It started with heated words on my blog, me figuring the subject person would never read what I’d written. Then I find myself stowing away on his yacht, probably because of the woman who was with him. (She seemed to remain in at least the side of the picture, throughout this dream.) I am below in a cabin, and the two of them are right outside the window. I think I have a good place to hide and spy until a couple of friendly cats show put and start in with their routine. She starts to come down below to get a cat and I jump up to meet her half way so that we can talk without him hearing. When she comes around the corner and sees me she quickly draws her gun and my hands go right up. [I don’t like guns, never had. I had a locked and loaded one pointed at me IRL by the cops once and don’t want to repeat that ever again.] We have a brief and quiet what the heck are you doing here conversation. She gives me the nickel plated revolver and instructions to shoot the other guy if there’s a confrontation. I go back to my hiding place and tuck the gun into my shirt. I figure I should be ready so I try to cock the hammer and it makes a noise that he can obviously hear. The hammer won’t lock and makes 3 more loud clicks as it slowly comes back down. The whole time I have my thumb on the hammer I am terrified that I will shoot myself in the arm accidentally.

Now he’s on his way down and the scene shifts to me and her sitting at a table in the galley below decks. He comes storming in and I draw down on him first but fail to shoot. He draws and we are both aiming at each other’s head. [looking down that barrel at his head was so very unnerving and realistic] Frozen and unable to do anything, the standoff continues until someone (now there’s other people around too) says you should read what he’s written about you. She chimes in saying she has some of it with her now. I think she is nuts for giving him access to the blog, and wonder who’s side she is really on now. He is all too anxious to see this and lowers his guard. I know he’s gonna shoot me for what’s been written, but I can’t take preemptive action. She pulls out a greeting card kind of proof sheet. The card takes snip its of my blog and artwork to decorate a holiday card. He doesn’t see the truly offensive parts of the blog and looses interest in me and I become interested more in her and the holiday card. I propose that we become partners in marketing my artwork, and she just chuckles.

Now the boat morphs into a truck, and the guys I’m with are all friends. We are going home from a camping trip or something like that. Ron is driving and we are approaching a USA Space Shuttle on the launching pad. When we are only a few miles away from it the engines start to rumble. Ron, the most interested in the Shuttle, is dying to see, and drives into the weeds on the side of the road while trying to watch out his side window. The guy riding shotgun tries to help steer us back to the road but we come to a grinding halt and straight into a mud wall. The Shuttle never blasts off, at least with the minor car crash , I don’t notice any fireball in the sky. As we all stand around and assess the damage I feel the strong desire to ‘hug it out’ with Ron, and I begin weeping as we do.
– – – – dream over – – – –

I have been a bit emotional like that lately too. Crying at the sappy movies on cable TV and such. I haven’t see Ron in years, and he seemed a bit like a surrogate father in the last moments of the dream. Strange as my relationship with my actual father is very good, and we both can tell the other that we love them.

I’m back, is anyone listining?

I stopped writing cause I’ve been playing lots of poker.  Just on-line, play money (thinking about going to the casino on Friday for the nooner tourny) but lots of tournys and ring games in between.  Still playing a lot, but I’m mixing up my hobbies now. 

Surfing the net to new places lately, computer problems still nag (I need a fresh OS), painting in watercolors more often, shopping for my first digital camera, taking a photography class, to name a few. 

 I just seem to have big projects jumping at me.  And then the paranoia kicked in a couple of weeks ago.  I upped my Risperdal and added Trazodone because I wasn’t sleeping enough ( and now I”m up typing this at 3AM [I guess I’m still not out of the woods yet]).  I stopped the Trazodone about a week later and now Risperdal has gone up another 1/2 mg to a total of 2.5 mg per day.  Depakote still at 1500mg daily. 

I’m still here…..

So sorry I haven’t been posting. I have 14 minutes before my next poker tournament starts on Party Poker so let’s see what I can whip out in the next couple of minutes. Most of my time has been spent on on line free poker tournaments. At least three of them a day. I’m sure I mentioned the win a couple of weeks ago, and last night I made the top 18 on an Absolute game with about 1400 seats. I have only played a few (less than 6) tournaments on Full Tilt. I just seem to blow-up big and soon when on F T. Now that I have been playing much better, I should try this style on F T to see if it is successful over there.

The other big draw on my time the last weeks has been watercolor painting. I have done a couple of good paintings, but don’t know how to finish a couple. They started good, but I was trying to make the trees abstract, and I don’t like them with the heavy detail that will become the gazebo. I did a nice first draft of a sunset picture with a sailboat sillouet. That one is gonna be good, but I’m sure that the other one of the SD Bay Bridge will be much more popular. I need to get…… tournament is starting now, later.

PS i placed about 300 in this one.

Mood Crash seems to loom

Even though I’m getting lots of stuff done everyday, but it takes so much out of me. I go out and run one or two errands, and I have to come home and have a nap. I still get in a couple of hours of poker everyday too. I have been playing tournaments at Absolute Poker and Party Poker and even won a Friday night 4000 seat play money game at PP. I have made the final table, by folding like a madman a few times in the last year, but this is the first time I had a handle on my tables and the chips to do the work. 4 hours 10 minutes of hard playing for something like 30,000 play chips that could be easily won in a single had in the ring games I usually play on PP.

 

I’m rambling. Which brings me to…. I haven’t been posting. I think this is an indicator of eminent mood change too. I have been playing on line poker until I drop and flop in my bed. Late at night is the hour I have mostly used to write these posts. I often time edit times of postings so there are many more that were done after 2 AM. Anyway, things seems good, I’m keeping busy, and taking care of business.

Poker in the park

I forgot to add poker to the last post. I played poker in the park today. There were 18 players for the freeroll. Winners of the pot luck contest got playing cards. It was a timed event after we messed around with eating for so long. Blinds went up big and fast. I had hardly played a hand and was getting short, before I was forced to start stealing blinds. Then when time ran out I had to go all in on the last hand to try and get enough chips to win, but all I had in the pocket was 2-6. Needless to say I did not win, but that 90K donation to our table winner let her win the overall chip count of all players remaining in the game at the end of play. I had fun and meet a good new group. The problems with them are stakes are too high ($35 with add ons and re-buys usually) and they have a $5 rake for the setup. I don’t know if I will play with them anytime soon.

60 Minutes brings up a question, (and more poker)

First off, I know that 60 Minutes on CBS has been known for distortions of facts to fit story lines they choose.  That being said,  they had a Muslim man who was active in recruting British Muslims for terrorist activities.  When he questioned his handles about justifications for his actions, they recommended ‘re-programing’.  He was offended and left the fold (at great personal risk) (I  doubt going on 60 Minutes will make his old friends happy either.)  He was looking for religious leaders to teach him God’s plan, and they did not have answers.  So listening to this led me to the question,  

Why do the Muslim leaders brainwash the population to be hateful and murderous of other faiths?  —   An answer has come to me while I type but it does not justify anything, merely slight mittigation.  What I realized was this,  the United States Millatary brainwashes all of it’s members in what we call boot camp.  The blind acceptance of authority that is required in the Millatary heiarchy for the high pressure and time constraints that armed conflict brings.  I know it’s tough, I know you need troups to follow orders without question or discussion.  Brainwashing is quick and effective, both sides use it to create killers, and it leaves the survivors of brainwashing a mess in the years following their service. 

Peace March in Hollywood

Peace March in Hollywood
I went to the peace march put on by ANSWER in Hollywood today. I had plans to sell all my peace sign t-shirts there before the march started. I was sure that people would be crowding around hoping I had more. Well short story short, I sold only one. I just didn’t engage people. I got a few compliments on the design as I walked through the gathering for an hour before the march started. I had a shirt on, one slung over my arm, and a backpack with the first 2 dozen. One guy suggested to his girlfriend that she try to steal the sample while I was on a cigarette break. I saw the whole thing. I guess they both liked it, but I didn’t approach them and even give them a chance to buy one. Some kind of salesman I make. I would say that there were at least 3000 people there and the march went well. The one thing I noticed was that when someone with a megaphone tried to get a chant going not many people were joining in, not even in whispers. At times I felt like I was alone in my car on a crowded freeway, just following the herd. These were the people who came out at noon on Saturday, and that’s the limit of their participation. Some were really into it, drumming, dancing, chanting. But most wore an anti-Bush or peace symbol shirt, and donated a dollar for an ANSWER picket sign or had made their own sign to carry. It showed me of these highly motivated anti-war people, they are not at all a powerful force. The fault is my own, and because of that I’m probably projecting my own misgivings on the crowd. I guess that I can’t be mistaken about the lack of bodies there, I was expecting many more.

Poker Tournament #2

I found a $10 home game that runs a couple of games a day. I think they play everyday, but they didn’t seem to want to let on to it in front of me or something. The host’s inflection when talking about what to do on St. Patrick’s day sounded strange to me. It was just the way he said, maybe I’ll get a game together, sounded funny. I know I’m the sucker in the room, and I didn’t let them bully me too much, but I really hate it when people talk in blatant code in front of me.

Each pot I would limp in on, one of them would put in a big raise. I lost a few big blinds like that so I folded many hands I would have liked to see a flop. I wait for a pair and limp then call the 4x raise. Two over cards on the flop, I hesitate with my eyes on the flop and check. He, on my immediate left, bets 6x and I fold quickly. He put me on 5-5 as it was my first pot, and he made a point of announcing it was my first flop. I thought that was a bit rude, but whatever. There was a lot of talk about who had what that last hand, and even some cards folded face up on a showdown. They made it a very friendly game, but they forced me into tight mode and that allowed me to win a big pot from the big blind when I hit the top of the junk that flopped.

Even though we had a non playing dealer, who is in training, I noticed two short pots. I was in seat one so the guy on my left was quick to remind me to post the BB when it came around and I hadn’t posted, then he shorts an ante later. They had announced that he would steal chips from a pot if you give him a chance too, even if it was a quarter, and that’s just what he shorted the pot. I mainly didn’t say anything because I thought it was the dealer’s job, and I was just shocked when she just raked in the bets without counting the chips. A bit later there was a short stack all in and a side pot. That took a minute to get all counted out. Another problem is the payout. Top three get paid ( 7 , 14 , and 59 I think ) that is a little bit heavy on first place. I think 2 nd place usually gets half of first and 3 rd gets half of 2 nd. Whatever the payout scheme, I had asked after the first KO if it was winner take all and they told me top three and gave me the break down. I instantly had objection the the breakdown, but didn’t mention it. So that means third place you lose only $3. I think that third should break even, but at $10 a game, I’ll give them ten games before I complain about that. With such a split between 2 nd and first I was amazed at how quickly it went, when they started very close in chip count, when heads up started. The host was the winner, and was table captain most of the game.

Anyway, I came in 4 th so the payout didn’t make any practical difference to me. Man …. money on the line and I don’t speak up. What will it take for me to stand up for my rights. I still haven’t called Dawn to let her know what all went behind my quiting that job. Anyway, I won a few pots, I think I did well folding when bet into after the flop. The guy on my immediate left was really pushy when we were in pots together, but he did that to everyone.

Should I call?

So the thought finally poped into my head yesterday that maybe it’s time that I call my friend Dawn and see how she is getting along since I quit working for her. I will certainly make it clear that I won’t be working for her again, but I would like to remain friends. I am worried that she will soon be asking for favors again if I make the call, but I do want to tell her that I hope that she is alright.