Mozart on Love
"Neither
a lofty
degree
of intelligence,
nor
imagination,
nor both together,
go to the
making of
genius.
Love, Love, Love.
That
is the
soul of
genius."
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 07:19 PM | Comments (1)
June 27, 2009These Two Universes Walk Into a Bar
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June 25, 2009Problems Are Temporary
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June 24, 2009Wright Brain Thinking
OK. Break time. Park your left brain and get into your right. I mean Wright, as in Steven -- a truly funny fellow I once ran into while jogging on the streets of New York City.
If the following jams your mind, good. You've been thinking too much anyway. Like I said, it's time for a break...
"Everywhere is within walking distance if you have the time."
"I was a peripheral visionary. I could see the future, but only way off to the side."
"For my birthday I got a humidifier and a de-humidifier. I put them in the same room and let them fight it out."
"I bought some batteries, but they weren't included."
"I intend to live forever. So far, so good."
"I like to reminisce with people I don't know."
Continue reading "Wright Brain Thinking"
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Give Up Anger, Fear, Guilt, and Doubt
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June 21, 2009Entering the Sweepstakes
When I was a kid I used to enter Sweepstakes all the time.
Here's how it worked: I'd be flipping through one of my parent's magazines when I'd see a huge, double-page spread with lots of smiling people having just won a NEW HOUSE! or a LUXURY YACHT! or a FABULOUS VACATION FOR THE ENTIRE FAMILY!
I couldn't believe my eyes.
I mean, how difficult was this going to be? All I had to do was fill out that little magazine form or write "Burry's Chocolate Chip Cookies" on a "reasonable facsimile" 3x5 index card.
And the fine print said I could enter as many times as I liked. Dude, how could I possibly lose?
Continue reading "Entering the Sweepstakes"
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June 20, 2009Life Is Like a Pinball Game
Life is like a pinball game. Well, maybe not. But for the sake of the next few minutes, let's stay with the pinball metaphor. OK?
I mean, the whole playing field is tilted, right? And no matter how talented you are with the flippers, or how many bells you ring or lights you flash, that shiny, silvery ball eventually finds its way down that little black hole.
GAME OVER!
For some of us, this inevitable moment is like death -- the ultimate bummer. All those cool sounds and lights? The high score you spent so much time racking up? Gone. Gone. Gone. In their place?
Continue reading "Life Is Like a Pinball Game"
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June 19, 2009The Stillness After Maharaji Speaks
After great performers come to the end of a great performance, it is not uncommon for grateful audiences to give them a standing ovation. They clap, they cheer, they focus all their attention on the one who has just opened the door to magnificence. Think Pavarotti. Think Martin Luther King. Think anyone you've ever stood your ground for and loved.
What I find amazing is this is how Maharaji's presentations begin.
Before he utters a single word, audiences are on their feet, applauding. And when he's done? Pin drop silence.
Somehow, through his own unique alchemy of humor, wisdom, presence, and delight, he finds a way to bring everyone in the room to a place of perfect stillness... back to the very beginning -- where there is nothing left to do, but be.
Continue reading "The Stillness After Maharaji Speaks"
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June 18, 2009What You Are Looking for is Within You
"There is more to life than you can ever imagine. What you are looking for is within you and, if you want to find it, I can help."
-- Prem Rawat
Pretty simple, eh?
You're looking for something (peace, love, fulfillment) and there's this person named Prem Rawat (aka Maharaji) who says he can help you find it. Hmmm...
No charge, no club to join, no secret handshake.
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 08:59 AM | Comments (0)
June 16, 2009How Precious Life Is!
Watch this extraordinary video about an 11-year old boy who not only remembered a past life of his, but blew everyone away with hard-to-deny proof. Open your mind and your heart to the possibility.
And half way around the world: Unmistaken Child
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June 15, 2009Sweeping the Path
As a middle class American male with a healthy dose of resistance to household chores, the broom has never been one of my favorite tools.
While I've certainly appreciated its timeless design and universal appeal, the act of sweeping has always felt like somebody else's job.
This belief radically changed for me one fine Spring day in 1980. That was the day I got word that my teacher, Maharaji, was coming to visit the house I was living in -- a funky old dwelling on Detroit Street in mile high Denver, Colorado.
Clearly, my housemates and I weren't ready. The kitchen was dirty. The bathrooms were a wreck. The lawn needed mowing. Mucho stuff needed to be done.
My task? To sweep.
Continue reading "Sweeping the Path"
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VIDEO: The Perfume of GodThis is absolutely stunning, exquisite, buoyant, alive!
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June 14, 2009TPRF Awarded 4-Stars for Excellence
The Prem Rawat Foundation (TPRF) has just been awarded a 4-star rating from Charity Navigator, America's largest independent evaluator of charities.
According to Charity Navigator, "Receiving four out of a possible four stars indicates that your organization excels, as compared to other charities in America, in allocating and growing your finances in the most fiscally responsible way possible."
Congratulations to all the fine folks at TPRF for their commitment, integrity, and high standards of service!
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 07:09 PM | Comments (0)
June 12, 2009Lao Tzu Speaks
"The foolish man
is always doing,
yet much remains to be done.
The wise man does nothing,
yet nothing remains undone."
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June 08, 2009Words of Peace Global.org launched!
This just in! A beautiful new website, www.wopg.org, featuring the message of Prem Rawat (aka Maharaji) has just been launched.
Elegantly designed, easy to navigate, the site has something for everyone: excerpts of his talks set to music, webcasts, Words of Peace TV listings, photos, news reports, downloads (video, audio, music, print), updates on humanitarian initiatives, poetry, interviews, info about The Keys, and a very cool photo gallery of people who've attended Maharaji's events.
There's also a great feedback feature that allows you to offer suggestions about the site and/or vote on other people's suggestions.
Here's how the site describes Prem Rawat...
Continue reading "Words of Peace Global.org launched!"
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June 06, 2009Love Is Simple
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June 05, 2009Knock Knock Knocking on Heaven's Door
As I write this, I am sitting in the home of my 94-year old father, in West Palm Beach, Florida. His house is new, but his body is not. "Like a worn out car," he tells me ten minutes ago as he sorts through his evening pills, looking for just the right combination to help him make it through the night.
Riding on the fumes of my own imagined immortality, I'm sitting at his kitchen table, cotton swabs, like yarrow stalks, everywhere.
His oxygen comes from a machine, his caregiver from an agency. He tells me the same stories I've heard a hundred times before, but tonight I do not interrupt. He needs to talk... and I need to listen.
Continue reading "Knock Knock Knocking on Heaven's Door"
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Being Shown the River Where the Fish Are Swimming
It has been said that it is better to teach a man to fish than to give him a fish.
So true.
And yet, how much better would it be to show a man the river where the fish are swimming?
This has been my experience of what Maharaji does.
If you're thirsty, he takes you down to the river where the cool waters of life, filled with all those fabulous fish, are flowing.
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 12:50 AM | Comments (0)
June 04, 2009The Paradox Supreme
Here is the paradox supreme:
What you want you have
and what you have you want.
What you call the path
is merely the way to this understanding.
Do not worry about the next step.
You have already taken it.
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 08:56 PM | Comments (1)
June 02, 2009The Joy of Heckling
If you talk to a thousand people who are (or have been) students of Maharaji, you will get a thousand different impressions of who he is and what he does. Your guess about the accuracy of their perceptions is as good as mine.
But if you really want to know the answer, you will need to have your own experience, while being mindful of the words of Anais Nin, "We don't see things as they are, but as we are." Allow me to be more specific.
ACT 1
When Maharaji was 16, he married -- not to an Indian woman chosen by his parents, but to a 24 year old American stewardess. This troubled some of his devotees -- especially those who had chosen celibacy as part of their path to enlightenment. How could Maharaji get married, they reasoned. Marriage was so mundane... such a distraction... so unspiritual. And so, when Maharaji said "I do," a bunch of these folks said "I don't" and split the scene...
Continue reading "The Joy of Heckling"
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May 30, 2009In Plain Sight
This 3D animation, by Joel Metzger, is quite lovely -- a simple story that communicates the basic need we all have to discover what often seems hidden from sight. Joel worked on this project for a year and "would love to see everyone expressing their best discoveries in their own medium." Well then, what IS your medium? And how can you use it more effectively to help make visible that which often seems hidden from sight?
Plain Sight from Joel Metzger / JoelM3DM on Vimeo.
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May 28, 2009VIDEO: He Is My Teacher
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May 27, 2009Off the Coast of Love
My wife tells me I should pay more attention to details --
the house, the car, the lawn --
there's a thousand things, by sunset, that need to be done.
She's right, of course, it's true.
If only I wasn't floating
three feet off the ground today,
caught in the updraft
of a single gaze from you,
spinning like a thousand cyclones
off the coast of love.
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 07:33 AM | Comments (3)
May 23, 2009You're Right!
There is a scene from Fiddler on the Roof that has taught me more about life than most holy books I've read.
In it, two men are arguing over the age of a horse. When they see Tevye, the town milkman/sage, each begins passionately pleading his case.
"Tevye!" blurts the first, "I've been cheated! Last month I bought a horse from this sorry excuse for a man. He told me the horse was six, but it was 12!"
Tevye listens carefully, strokes his beard, nods his head, and smiles. "You're right!" he says.
Continue reading "You're Right!"
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May 22, 2009What is Waiting Within Us
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May 20, 2009MAHARAJI IN AMAROO: May 1
(Excerpts of Maharaji's talk, as recalled by two World Wide News Reporters.)
"In Australia, sometimes on the land, the Milky Way is very visible at night. Looking at this vastness, one could feel very insignificant; all those questions come rolling in about how small you are in comparison to these galaxies."
"Even the Earth, itself, is tucked away in some small corner of space, way outside the Milky Way, and billions of stars and galaxies."
"You, though, are not small. No, no, you are a part of this creation... and to feel how connected you are to all of life and how that light is not bound by form, but suffuses throughout, connecting to the energy that is at the heart of all existence."
Read the complete World Wide News report Download file
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May 19, 200958 Seconds of Remembrance
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May 17, 2009The Art of Seeing the Invisible
See that FedEx logo to your left? What do you notice? Letters? Colors? Height? Width? Shape? Probably. But if that's all you see, you are missing something -- something essential.
Take another look. Do you see an arrow? No? Look again. More specifically, look at the space between the "E" and the "x". The white space. See it? Cool, huh?
The first time someone pointed this out to me, I was astounded. Something that was there, for years, had been completely invisible to me.
FedEx's savvy logo designer, Lindon Leader (Leader Creative), had embedded an arrow in the "negative space" to subliminally indicate a message -- forward movement -- but I had never seen it.
Such is life...
Continue reading "The Art of Seeing the Invisible"
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May 16, 2009Maharaji in Auckland, New Zealand
This just in. Hot off the virtual press. Coverage of Maharaji's May 9th event in Auckland, brought to you by the newly launched World Wide News Pool. Download file
A few excerpts from Maharaji's talk:
"What if we bypassed all fear, all excuses, and fully accepted that power in our life? What would happen if we did that?"
"Do you have real passion in your life? If you don't, you are missing something. Longing cannot just be a 'hood ornament.' It has to be real. It has to be deeply felt and permeate right through you. This longing... is the magic... the beautiful dance of the quenching of the thirst."
To subscribe: worldwidenews@1207.dk
Heart of the Matter poll
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May 15, 2009The Heart of the Matter eBook Poll
Dear Lovers of Life,
In an effort to get the content of the Heart of the Matter into as many hands as possible, I am in the process of producing a FREE, downloadable ebook version of the blog (140-160 pages). Woo woo!
Response to The Heart of the Matter has been very positive since it's launch 13 months ago, but there are still lots of people who have never seen it. For them, having a "Best of The Heart of the Matter" in their hands or a pdf file to view may be all they need to dive in.
Towards that end, I am requesting 5 minutes of your time to respond to this online poll. Your feedback and ideas will go a long way towards helping me spread the word. Thanks!
Posted by Mitch Ditkoff at 04:05 PM | Comments (0)
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