In this issue
PROJECTS
If you are interested in supporting the projects mentioned in this months newsletter, go to the websites below and register your name. You can be an active participant or just use it as a way to stay in touch with movements dealing with global consciousness.
NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS
July Retreat
"For those of you who have enquired about our Retreats and waited patiently for a definitive answer, we now have a date and location confirmed which is:
Monday, July 27, through Saturday, August 1, 2009 in Minnesota. The Retreat will be held at the beautiful Radisson Hotel and Conference Center in Plymouth, Minnesota. It is located fifteen minutes west of downtown Minneapolis and about 35 minutes from the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP).
Please see the Learning Strategies website to book your place on the retreat:
http://www.learningstrategies.com/Seeds/Retreat.asp
Embracing Freedom CD & MP3
Coming Very SoonThe recordings for ‘Embracing Freedom' (the follow-up to Seeds of Enlightenment) have now been completed. Embracing Freedom is due for release in May 2009.
Seeds of Enlightenment is currently available on CD or MP3 through our website at http://www.jeddahmali.com/store.php
Monthly Planetary Healing Meditations
Following on from the Winter Feast for the Soul meditations, I will be leading a monthly Planetary Healing Meditation through Talk Shoe, you can listen to the monthly meditations on the following webpage:
http://www.talkshoe.com/talkshoe/web/talkCast.jsp?masterId=41288&cmd=tc
Question & Answer Forum
"We have a Question & Answer Forum at jeddahmali.wordpress.com. I offer guidance, advice and direction on spiritual practice and discovery. If you need some assistance with your spiritual practice or discovery, we will endeavour to answer your enquiry within the week. All replies will be posted on the site (when we are unable to answer all questions due to high demand, we will post those that offer the most benefit to all). This is a wonderful way for others to learn from your enquiry, so if you have a question, please consider this avenue.
Till next time,
Jeddah
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Welcome
Welcome to our now bi-monthly Changing the Paradigm newsletter. Usually in each issue there is an article by myself or a guest writer in REFLECTIONS and one from The Great Brotherhood of Light, who are the masters that I work with, in MESSAGE FOR MANKIND. We also include a question and answer section, where we choose one or two of your questions each month and answer them for you. If you would like a question answered in the newsletter, please email it to info@jeddahmali.com and put NEWSLETTER QUESTION in the heading. And finally we have our NEWS section at the end where we announce courses, retreats and product launches. We hope you enjoy our newsletter. If you have a suggestion on articles or sections you'd like us to consider, please send them to info@jeddahmali.com and put NEWSLETTER SUGGESTION in the heading. As you go about your day, don't forget to smile, to be kind to yourself and others and (as my favourite sticker says) "Cheerful Whistling Permitted".
I am sending you all much love,
Jeddah
Interview with Jeddah by Master Kaye Lee
In this issue we are pleased to feature an excerpt from a recent interview hosted by the wonderful Master Kaye Lee.
The full interview will be on our website shortly as a downloadable transcript and audio MP3.
Kaye Lee is a Feng Shui Master and Advanced Meditation Practitioner. He has an MA in Law and Economics (University of Cambridge) and is a Project Renaissance Trainer; Ace PhotoReader; Trader; a Pioneer in Human Potential and Genius and a Consultant/Coach. Please see Kaye's blogpage: http://everythingjustis.blogspot.com/
From the interview:
Master Lee: I'm going to start with something fairly basic that really begs asking: what would you define Enlightenment as?
Jeddah: I suppose a phrase that I use a lot which comes closest to defining the mechanics of it is continuous conscious awareness, and I like the simplicity of that phrase because it's not mystical, it doesn't imply that you need to have a great big long evolutionary path to be in that state, it just simply says – just be conscious, just be conscious, just notice this moment. And if you can do that in each moment, your consciousness becomes continuous and what you are conscious of, of course, is awareness, your being-ness, that state of being which is eternal, it never rises or falls, it never fades, it just simply is. So if you can just be conscious of what is in each moment then you achieve continuous conscious awareness. Now I know there are Yogis and teachers and enlightened ones out there who would say: well, it's a lot more to it than that and talk about energetics and frequencies, the maturing soul and all of that kind of stuff. But I don't think we need to complicate it, I think we need to simplify it and then people would realize that it's not a place you go to, it's not something you achieve, it's not even the domain of spirituality, it is simply existence. It is the natural default setting of existence. So I think we need to demystify it and that's why I like that phrase.
Master Lee: The question that arises from that is that it has been said before that enlightenment is about being present, and I couldn't agree more with that, however my experience with working with others on enlightenment when it's described in such a way, there is a tendency to say: ah, ok, I know what that is, and sitting from where I am when I sit in conscious awareness, it's fairly clear that they're nowhere near the enlightenment experience, if anything, the very thought that they understand it puts it further away from that, so, have you had a similar experience or is this different from what you have encountered?
Jeddah: Well certainly, if the mind is trying to understand enlightenment, then it's going to be perpetually flummoxed and these instances that you describe are where the mind is trying to take hold of it as an understanding before experience and so this is what the mind does, it separates understanding from experience. Conscious awareness joins understanding and experience, it achieves all of its understanding from experience, it achieves all of its understanding from present moment experience and so the opposite is true, so as you say, when the mind is trying to grasp this as a concept, how does that look as a concept without the attendant experience? Then yes, of course, it tends to separate you from the very experience you are trying to understand, absolutely.
Master Lee: I think that part of the hurdle that spiritual seekers have these days, (it's greater now then it was in the past because we have some fairly intellectual spiritual seekers) is that they won't jump into something unless they have a model of how that actually works, and that's beyond them, the enlightenment experience is beyond that. It is suggestive, I think, that many of the compassionate enlightened beings from now and before this time, have had experiences where they've come very close to death, Buckminster Fuller in particular comes to mind, and I suspect that part of the mechanism that opens up the enlightenment experience for them, is the giving up of the need to know. Do you have anything to add to that?
Jeddah:I would say absolutely, and it's not that the mind needs to be annihilated, I think too much energy goes into trying to stop the mind, annihilate the mind, fight with it, tackle it to the ground. Almost that the being goes into overdrive trying to legislate against the mind, you mentioned compassion, and compassion as we know arises from the heart and when the heart is active, when the frequency of the heart is active and energy is flowing through the heart, it has this tremendous ability to quieten the mind. And this is something you cannot know until you've experienced it, and yet it is so easy to experience it, so, for all of the effort that goes into quietening the mind,
I say, save your time, save your energy, simply open your heart. As the frequencies of the heart start to expand, they override the slightly slower frequencies of the mind and the mind is, I won't say numbed because that would imply that is goes into stasis, but the mind is uplifted, it is absorbed and those frequencies of the mind start to be imbued with the frequencies of the heart, and when that happens we're setting up - we're creating an alignment whereby the higher frequencies then have access into the mind, we start to think more elevated thoughts, we start to have more compassionate thoughts, more loving thoughts.
And the sense of separation, the thoughts which are very entrenched in separation - judgement, criticism, looking for definition, looking for identity, looking for intellectual concepts - these frequencies are the ones that are raised up, those that are looking for separation are raised up into some sort of union through the influence of those heart forces and as that happens the mind then ceases to be an agent of separation and can now start to work in alignment with our being and serve union. And this is a beautiful moment and from this point everything changes, this is really the beginning of the gateway into continuous conscious awareness and certainly the heart is the beginning of the gateway into maturing one's consciousness.
To download the full interview please go to the store page on Jeddah's website:
http://www.jeddahmali.com/store.php
The pdf transcript is free and the MP3 audio file is $10.00.
Questions & Answers (Q&A)
Leslie: Dear Jeddah,
I have been working and studying spiritual matter for approximately 12 years. I am not sure I know when my heart is open, I have tried many meditations to do just that but I don't usually notice the difference in how I feel. Can you tell me how to tell if it is open?
Love Leslie
Jeddah: Dear Leslie,
Every experience we have is made up of sensations which are a form of feedback as to what intention/thought/belief awareness is currently carrying out as per our instructions.
Every intention/thought/belief is shaping awareness which gives rise to moment to moment experience. When our heart is open, it is usually in response to a intention/thought/belief which has goodwill as its essence. This goodwill causes the energy flow through that centre which lead us to experience expansive sensations. These can be subtle or obvious. In your case it may be that they are very subtle. Or it may be that you are looking for 'something' to happen that the mind imagines should be happening and so you miss what is actually happening. There may also be unconscious instructions which doubt that it will work and therefore manifest the lack of experience instead of the experience you are consciously attempting.
Try recalling people/memories/thoughts that bring a sense of gratitude/appreciation and notice your experience. If there is a change in your experience at all, then this is the result of what you are presently holding in your being. Experiment with different intentions and notice even very small changes. You are designed in such a way that something will be happening. Start to notice what that is and that will allow you to find your way into what is possible.
And finally…remember to relax. There is nothing to achieve here. Genuine, sincere and innocent fun and enjoyment relax our being more than any specific spiritual practice.
Heartfully, Jeddah
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