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Boudreaux the Baptist
Boudreaux, a Cajun highlander from Rapides Parish in central
Louisiana, was an older, single gentleman, who was born and raised a
Baptist, living in South Louisiana. Each Friday night after work, he
would fire up his outdoor grill and cook a venison steak.
Now, all of Boudreaux's neighbors were Catholic... And since it was
Lent, they were forbidden from eating meat on Fridays. The delicious
aroma from the grilled venison steaks was causing such a problem for
the Catholic faithful that they finally talked to their priest. The
priest came to visit Boudreaux, and suggested that Boudreaux convert
to Catholicism.
After several classes and much study, Boudreaux attended Mass... And
as the priest sprinkled holy water over him, he said, "You were born
a Baptist and raised a Baptist, but now you are Catholic."
Boudreaux's neighbors were greatly relieved, until Friday night
arrived, and the wonderful aroma of grilled venison filled the
neighborhood. The priest was called immediately by the neighbors
and, as he rushed into Boudreaux's yard, clutching a rosary and
prepared to scold him. He stopped in amazement and watched.
There stood Boudreaux, clutching a small bottle of water which he
carefully sprinkled over the grilling meat, and chanting. "You wuz
born a deer, and you wuz raised a deer, but now you is a catfish."
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Good morning on this beautiful weekend.
Thought you should be aware of this information....
A British company has finally developed a computer chip that stores music in women's breast implants.
Women are always complaining about men staring at their breasts and not listening to them.
These complaints are now at and end....
A girl asked a guy if he thought she was pretty.
She had heard enouph. As she walked away, tears were streaming down her face. The boy grabbed her arm and said .... Your not pretty, your beautiful. |
Staying in Your Own Business
This is from the book: "Loving What Is" by Byron Katie
Staying in your own business......
I can only find three kinds of business in the universe:mine, yours, and God's.(For me, the word God means"reality". Reality is God, because it rules. Anything that's out of my control, your control, and everyone else's control-( I call that God's Business.)
Much of our stress comes from mentally living out of our own business. When I think, "You need to get a job, I want you to be happy, you should be on time, you need to take better care of yourself ," I am in your business. When I'm worried about earthquakes, floods, war, or when I will die I am in God's business. If I am mentally in your business or in God's business the effect is separation. I noticed this early in 1986. When I mentally went into my mothers business, for example, with a thought like" My mother should understand me," I immeadiately experienced a feeling of loneliness. And I realized that every time in my life that I had felt hurt or lonely, I had been in someone else's business.
If you are living your life and I am mentally living your life, who is here living mine?Were both over there. Being mentally in your business keeps me from being present in my own. I am separate from myself, wondering why my life doesn't work.
To think that I know what is best for anyone else is to be out of my business. Even in the name of love it is pure arrogance, and the result is tension anxiety, and fear. Do I know what's right for myself? That is my only business. Let me work with that before I try to solve your problems for you.
If you understand the three kinds of business enough to stay in your own business, it could free your life in a way that you cant even imagine. The next time your feeling stress or discomfort, ask yourself whose business your in mentally, and you may burst out laughing! That question can bring you back to yourself. And you may come to see that you've never really been present, that you've been mentally living in other people's business all your life. Just to notice that your in someone else's business can bring you back to your own wonderful self.
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Does Evil Exist?
The university professor challenged his students with this question. Did God create everything that exists? A student bravely replied, "Yes, he did!" "God created everything? The professor asked. "Yes sir", the student replied. The professor answered, "If God created everything, then God created evil since evil exists, and according to the principal that our works define who we are then God is evil". The student became quiet before such an answer.
The professor was quite pleased with himself and boasted to the students that he had proven once more that the Christian faith was a myth. Another student raised his hand and said, "Can I ask you a question professor?" "Of course", replied the professor.
The student stood up and asked, "Professor, does cold exist?" "What kind of question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never been cold?" The students snickered at the young man's question. The young man replied, "In fact sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Every body or object is susceptible to study when it has or transmits energy, and heat is what makes a body or matter have or transmit energy. Absolute zero (-460 degrees F) is the total absence of heat; all matter becomes inert and incapable of reaction at that temperature. Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe how we feel if we have no heat."
The student continued, "Professor, does darkness exist?" The professor responded, "Of course it does." The student replied, "Once again you are wrong sir, darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light. Light we can study, but not darkness. In fact we can use Newton's prism to break white light into many colors and study the various wavelengths of each color. You cannot measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and illuminate it. How can you know how dark a certain space is? You measure the amount of light present. Isn't this correct? Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when there is no light present."
Finally the young man asked the professor, "Sir, does evil exist?" Now uncertain, the professor responded, "Of course as I have already said. We see it every day. It is in the daily example of man's inhumanity to man!. It is in the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil." To this the student replied, "Evil does not exist sir, or at least it does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is not like faith, or love that exist just as does light and heat. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God's love present in his heart. It's like the cold that comes when there is no heat or the darkness that comes when there is no light."
The professor sat down.
The young man's name - Albert Einstein.
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Subject: FOOD FOR THOUGHT
What I'm about to say will sound a bit pompous, but it's true. What
is coming could be the most important minutes in your lives. If you
could grasp this, you'd hit upon the secret of awakening. You would
be happy forever. You would never be unhappy again. Nothing would
have the power to hurt you again. I mean that, nothing. It's like
when you throw black paint in the air, the air remains
uncontaminated. You never color the air black. No matter what happens
to you, you remain uncontaminated. You remain at peace. There are
human beings who have attained this, what I call being human. Not
this nonsense of being a puppet, jerked about this way and that way,
letting events or other people tell you how to feel. So you proceed
to feel it and you call it being vulnerable. Ha! I call it being a
puppet. So you want to be a puppet? Press a button and you're down;
do you like that? But if you refuse to identify with any of those
labels, most of your worries cease.
Later we'll talk about fear of disease and death, but ordinarily
you're worried about what's going to happen to your career. A small-
time businessman, fifty-five years old, is sipping beer at a bar
somewhere and he's saying, "Well, look at my classmates, they've
really made it." The idiot! What does he mean, "They made it"?
They've got their names in the newspaper. Do you call that making it?
One is president of the corporation; the other has become the Chief
Justice; somebody else has become this or that. Monkeys, all of them.
Who determines what it means to be a success? This stupid society!
The main preoccupation of society is to keep society sick! And the
sooner you realize that, the better. Sick, every one of them. They
are loony, they're crazy. You became president of the lunatic asylum
and you're proud of it even though it means nothing. Being president
of a corporation has nothing to do with being a success in life.
Having a lot of money has nothing to do with being a success in life.
You're a success in life when you wake up! Then you don't have to
apologize to anyone, you don't have to explain anything to anyone,
you don't give a damn what anybody thinks about you or what anybody
says about you. You have no worries; you're happy. That's what I call
being a success. Having a good job or being famous or having a great
reputation has absolutely nothing to do with happiness or success.
Nothing! It is totally irrelevant. All he's really worried about is
what his children will think about him, what the neighbors will think
about him, what his wife will think about him. He should have become
famous. Our society and culture drill that into our heads day and
night. People who made it! Made what?! Made asses of themselves.
Because they drained all their energy getting something that was
worthless. They're frightened and confused, they are puppets like the
rest. Look at them strutting across the stage. Look how upset they
get if they have a stain on their shirt. Do you call that a success?
Look at how frightened they are at the prospect they might not be
reelected. Do you call that a success? They are controlled, so
manipulated. They are unhappy people, they are miserable people. They
don't enjoy life. They are constantly tense and anxious. Do you call
that human? And do you know why that happens? Only one reason: They
identified with some label. They identified the "I" with their money
or their job or their profession. That was their error.
Did you hear about the lawyer who was presented with a plumber's
bill? He said to the plumber, "Hey, you're charging me two hundred
dollars an hour. I don't make that kind of money as a lawyer." The
plumber said, "I didn't make that kind of money when I was a lawyer
either!" You could be a plumber or a lawyer or a business man or a
priest, but that does not affect the essential "I." It doesn't affect
you. If I change my profession tomorrow, it's just like changing my
clothes. I am untouched. Are you your clothes? Are you your name? Are
you your profession? Stop identifying with them. They come and go.
When you really understand this, no criticism can affect you. No
flattery or praise can affect you either. When someone says, "You're
a great guy," what is he talking about? He's talking about "me," he's
not talking about "I." "I" is neither great nor small. "I" is neither
successful nor a failure. It is none of these labels. These things
come and go. These things depend on the criteria society establishes.
These things depend on your conditioning. These things depend on the
mood of the person who happens to be talking to you right now. It has
nothing to do with "I." "I" is none of these labels. "Me" is
generally selfish, foolish, childish -- a great big ass. So when you
say, "You're an ass," I've known it for years! The conditioned self --
what did you expect? I've known it for years. Why do you identify
with him? Silly! That isn't "I," that's "me."
Do you want to be happy? Uninterrupted happiness is uncaused. True
happiness is uncaused. You cannot make me happy. You are not my
happiness. You say to the awakened person, "Why are you happy?" and
the awakened person replies, "Why not?"
Happiness is our natural state. Happiness is the natural state of
little children, to whom the kingdom belongs until they have been
polluted and contaminated by the stupidity of society and culture. To
acquire happiness you don't have to do anything, because happiness
cannot be acquired. Does anybody know why? Because we have it
already. How can you acquire what you already have? Then why don't
you experience it? Because you've got to drop something. You've got
to drop illusions. You don't have to add anything in order to be
happy; you've got to drop something. Life is easy, life is
delightful. It's only hard on your illusions, your ambitions, your
greed, your cravings. Do you know where these things come from? From
having identified with all kinds of labels!
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