Perhaps the multitudes of the world were always followers and not thinkers, but now it seems a blaring reality.  Most of us don’t think.  We follow, and worse, we persecute those who choose to.  Sometimes we even get together a gang of nonthinkers and ambush the thoughtful.  It takes inner strength to resist the pull to lose yourself in the distractions of life.  The world is always calling out to you to betray your drumbeat and play the rhythms of others or to buy this or that, to look a particular way or to not be an oddity by spending time alone to develop yourself, your art, your life, or what have you.

A definition of a cult is a person, philosophy, or activity regarded with extreme or excessive admiration.  Most of us regard the world with the highest esteem.  We allow it to impact our minds and never even go inside our own minds to do “fact checks” or common sense checks.  Only those who feel little love for themselves could so easily ignore the individuality that was given to them from such a benevolent and infinitely intelligent source. Inside we are as unique as a snowflake, crafted by the greatest Artisan of all, with the deepest love and joy that we should, like a seed, grow into this unique life form.  But who really even cares to notice this about themselves?  It is sad, really, that we harbor such self-hatred.  Or maybe it is fear that paralyzes us from pulling out of the glue-like muck.  We don’t love ourselves enough to overcome the fear and the looks and whispers from others as we defy the path of conformity. There may be as many reasons as people for opting out of being truly “them” in every moment that they hear that inner divine melody that is called “I”.  But for whatever reasons we choose to stray from our inner path, the depth of our betrayal is the degree of the souls distortion.

People argue over the big bang and the creationism theory.  Irrelevant. God loves drama, just check out outer space- She could have easily created the Universe leaving remnants of what scientists are calling the big bang.  Here’s what’s relevant. The intelligence, power and material for ALL of life existed at the infinitesimally small moment of what is called the big bang.  Even more relevant, do you really think that intelligence and power doesn’t still exist in every moment, including this one, since that first moment of inception?  And all the necessities (materials) for your life must exist now too. In other words, the big bang didn’t stop 14 billion years ago.  In every breath, in every nanosecond is an intelligence quietly waiting for you to take off your earphones and freakin’ listen.

t is far easier to create when we love ourselves.  Though much art that is considered genius is born from the inner pain of its artist, it is often born because of the desire to evict the pain and have it live outside of mind and body and onto the canvass, a sheet of music or computer screen.  The artist is hoping to alleviate her suffering when she "sings her heart out." But when she sings with a heart filled with love, it affects the world differently. We all know love begins with ourselves and cannot extend outward if it does not first exist within.  We may play games of denial by convincing ourselves and others that we love them when we don’t love ourselves, but we cannot exhale carbon dioxide without possessing oxygen first.  We cannot give to another what is not first within. And so we must all practice the art of self-love, and this will always translate into love for all of life.  In other words, when there is sufficient love within us, the presence of loves makes us incapable of hatred, indifference to other living beings, and the nature that surrounds us. Those who hate and despise, feel hate and despise inside their being, and they evict it, in hopes of finding relief. But evicting the self-loathing or despise leaves a hole hungry to be fed. Like the cigarette smoker who begins to over-eat because they didn't replace the abstinence with a more positive substitute, hate is merely replaced with disdain and harsh judgment.

hat is the direct way to transform ourselves and what we feel? Learning to love what is creates healing.  Instead of waging war on our weakness we find its tender energy beautiful.  We experience our anger and have compassion for its outrage and discomfort.  We notice our mean-ness and focusing on the closed heart, know its closing up is a sign it must be in pain.  Matt Kahn, of Truedivinenature offers his listeners the “I love you” meditation.  It’s a technique of focusing on your heart and repeating with heart felt sincerity, that you love it.  When we do this enough times, we feel inner tensions loosening. The places inside that are angry, hurt or that feel unloved, soften.  When these emotions and attitudes soften, like clay, they can be molded into new expressions and often align themselves without conscious effort. 

And so, we love ourselves into alignment, and we love others into alignment.  More often than not, findind a way to compliment a person who is misbehaving will have a more desirous effect than berating them. When we move through this world with an open heart, we feel Herculean, and the splendor we feel is beyond words.  It feels good to be loving, it feels powerful to be able to forgive.  It feels miraculous to see only beauty, and finding a way to love ourselves is the first step into the miraculous. 

When we are art, no era in time can fully accommodate our tastes and expressions.  Often the artist at heart can deeply appreciate nearly all genres of music and all styles of fine art.  They are the ones dating someone outside their religion, outside their race, outside the norm even.  The norms of life do not fully appeal to this kind of person. They may love both men and women sexually not because they identify as gay or bi-sexual.  Such labels mean little to the soul of an artist- it is the conformists that create labels out of a need to establish a “them and us” criteria.  But the artist may love both men and women and it is because they are so alive the love inside them has few if any boundaries. Maybe they will or perhaps they won’t ever physically express their love, but they often do have an attraction or appreciation for both genders. Even the political artist may appreciate republicans for one attribute, democrats for another, and independents for yet another reason still.  No one ideology can fully speak to their beliefs.   Artists are the iconoclasts.  Jesus/Yeshua was a true artist.  His company was the outcasts, he understood his religion so profoundly he painted outside its lines.  If we are to believe some of what was written, his best friend was perhaps a prostitute. But if not, at the very least, he cherished an apostle who was atypical- a woman.  Buddha, was an iconoclast, born to a royal family, wealth did not define him and could not hold hostage his passion to expand beyond materialism or even what was believed to be reality itself. For Buddha, reality was an illusion to transcend.

Every person celebrated by humanity was a work of art and like music, they treated the audience of the world to new experiences.  Their contribution was not innovative chords and melodies, but love, philosophies and what it is to live freely.  They were people who broke through social concepts with new fresh ideas of equality and reverence for one another.  Think of Abraham Lincoln , Martin Luther or Oprah Winfrey.  Their lives are works of art that transform our thinking, our souls and what we believed was possible.  They achieved what was thought to be impossible.  When humans live their lives as art, they are at first spectacles to be ridiculed or even jailed, like Nelson Mandela or Galileo, but if their potentials break through the barrier of the imagination to live in the world of flesh and bone, they then become super stars to be admired. But in the beginning mediocrity will always scorn genius, and if our genius is supported by a little to no esteem, as Emerson says, in the genius of others... "We recognize our own rejected thoughts." It takes audacity to unleash your art free of its mask.