Do you need a wilder, stronger sweetness?
. . . a sweetness that shatters illusions?
What you may need is a more curious and mysterious sweetness. A wilder, stronger sweetness. A sweetness that shatters illusions.
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ATTENTION!
Think of mindfulness as a form of "affectionate attention."
—Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn
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There is ecstasy in paying attention.
― Anne Lamott
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It's almost as if the poets are offering a religion of noticing things, or a religion of paying attention.
—Ada Limón
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Attention is the beginning of devotion.
—Mary Oliver
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CHOOSING WHICH OF YOUR THOUGHTS TO EMPHASIZE
Anne Lamott said, "My understanding is that you get to choose which of your thoughts to go with."
In other words, you can decide which of the thoughts and images that bubble up from your unconscious will be the ones you act on and identify as belonging to your intentions.
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HOW YOU INFLUENCE THE WORLD
Everyone influences the world in some way. No matter how powerless we may feel, each of us is a creator who continually churns out energy that bends and shapes our world and the people in it.
What is the signature of your effect? How do you change the environments you pass through? What magic, for good or ill, do you perform in the daily rhythm of your life?
I invite you to take inventory—and to fix any discrepancies between the mark you ideally want to make and your actual impact.
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THE GREAT ART
The Great Art consists of making continuous conscious effort to align our thoughts and feelings with the highest ideals we have thus far been able to comprehend.
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TURN YOUR FLAWS INTO VIRTUES Exaggerate your flaws till they turn into virtues Pretend your wounds are exotic tattoos Refuse the gifts that infringe on your freedom Shun sacred places that fill you with boredom Keep in mind it's bad luck to be superstitious The official story's always fictitious Pump up your karma with idiot laughter The promised land's here, not in some hereafter + We are searching for the answers so we can destroy them and dream up better questions + Use your third eye to watch TV Sing anarchist lullabies to lesbian trees Think with your heart and feel with your head Spit a mouthful of beer as far as you can Kick your own ass and wash your own brain. Make fun of your fears and heal your own pain Play games with no rules, save your own life Push your own buttons and be your own wife + We are searching for the answers so we can destroy them and dream up better questions + Plunge butcher knives into images of guns Forgive yourself of all your mistakes except one Commit funny crimes that don't break any laws Shock yourself with how beautiful you are. Tell jokes to clowns and cook feasts for chefs Sing songs to the birds, and kill your own death Mangle your anger, transform it to pleasure Change your name, steal your own treasure
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YOU'RE INVITED
I invite you to launch a new tradition or instigate a fresh trend or make a beautiful thing that will last for a thousand years. I'm talking about an amazing marvel or useful innovation or unique creation that will improve the lives of countless humans all over the planet for the next 40 generations.
Does that feel too ambitious? How about this: Launch a new tradition or instigate a fresh trend or create a beautiful thing that will last for the rest of your long life -- an amazing marvel or useful innovation or unique creation that will continue to teach and amuse you all along the way—and maybe a few people whom you will inspire, as well.
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THERE ARE NO RULES ABOUT HOW TO MEDITATE CORRECTLY
Buddhist modes of meditation are great! But there are many other ways to meditate, too—in fact, an infinite number. I agree with Christopher Bamford, who says:
"As a free deed, meditation is naturally individual, uniquely our own. It is where we most fully become ourselves. Its practice is also always individual. There are no rules.
"Just as every potter will elaborate his or her own way of making pots, so every person who meditates will shape his or her own meditation. No two people will do a given meditation in exactly the same way. The same meditation practiced daily will be different every time.
"Every meditation is experimental. One never knows what is going to happen. Improvisation is essential . . . Meditation is something to play with . . . There is no 'wrong' way of doing the meditation, except not doing it!"
—Christopher Bamford, Start Now!: A Book of Soul and Spiritual Exercises
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BE THE CHANGE YOU WANT TO SEE IN THE WORLD
Alan Watts wrote this section:
The startling truth is that our best efforts for civil rights, international peace, population control, conservation of natural resources, and assistance to the starving of the earth—urgent as they are—will destroy rather than help if made in the present spirit.
For, as things stand, we have nothing to give. If our own riches and our own way of life are not enjoyed here, they will not be enjoyed anywhere else. Certainly they will supply the immediate jolt of energy and hope that methedrine, and similar drugs, give in extreme fatigue.
But peace can be made only by those who are peaceful, and love can be shown only by those who love. No work of love will flourish out of guilt, fear, or hollowness of heart, just as no valid plans for the future can be made by those who have no capacity for living now.
—Alan W. Watts, The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are
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A SONG
Here's a song for you:
I want to be free in the mystery of love I want to be wild when the world begins again I want to wake up and listen Be in love with my life and death and I want you to be there with me I want all the children to have enough to eat I want all the angry men to destroy their own pain I want us all to be happy and crazy and safe and real I want everybody to be loved
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MORE PRONOIA RESOURCES:
Rare Singing Hummingbird Unexpectedly Rediscovered in Colombia Cloaked in Iridescent Blue and Green. https://tinyurl.com/595rmtff
Common Weed May Be ‘Super Plant’ That Holds Key to Drought-Resistant Crops. https://tinyurl.com/37vxp335
Mother and Daughter Become Co-pilots on Southwest Flight: ‘It’s been a dream come true’. https://tinyurl.com/yhvzea7p
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For a lot more pronoiac resources and ideas, read my book Pronoia Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings
Available at Bookshop.org: https://tinyurl.com/548hp8y8
Available at Powells: https://bit.ly/PowellsPronoia
Available at Barnes & Noble: https://tinyurl.com/PronoiaBN
Available at Amazon: https://bit.ly/Pronoia
A free preview of the book is available here: https://tinyurl.com/PronoiaPreview
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Please tell me your own nominations for PRONOIA RESOURCES: Truthrooster@gmail.com.
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Sign up here: Newsletter.FreeWillAstrology.com
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Art by Aramara
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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY
Week beginning September 1
Copyright 2022 by Rob Brezsny
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): "Now that I’m free to be myself, who am I?" Virgo-born Mary Oliver asks that question to start one of her poems. She spends the rest of the poem speculating on possible answers. At the end, she concludes she mostly longs to be an "empty, waiting, pure, speechless receptacle." Such a state of being might work well for a poet with lots of time on her hands, but I don't recommend it for you in the coming weeks. Instead, I hope you'll be profuse, active, busy, experimental, and expressive. That's the best way to celebrate the fact that you are now freer to be yourself than you have been in a while.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): In her book Tales From Earthsea, Libra-born Ursula K. Le Guin wrote, "What goes too long unchanged destroys itself. The forest is forever because it dies and dies and so lives." I trust you're embodying those truths right now. You're in a phase of your cycle when you can't afford to remain unchanged. You need to enthusiastically and purposefully engage in dissolutions that will prepare the way for your rebirth in the weeks after your birthday. The process might sometimes feel strenuous, but it should ultimately be great fun.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): As a Scorpio, novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky was rarely guilty of oversimplification. Like any intelligent person, he could hold contradictory ideas in his mind without feeling compelled to seek more superficial truths. He wrote, "The causes of human actions are usually immeasurably more complex and varied than our subsequent explanations of them." I hope you will draw inspiration from his example in the coming weeks, dear Scorpio. I trust you will resist the temptation to reduce colorful mysteries to straightforward explanations. There will always be at least three sides to every story. I invite you to relish glorious paradoxes and fertile enigmas.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Author Zadie Smith praised Sagittarian writer Joan Didion. She says, "I remain grateful for the day I picked up Joan Didion's Slouching Towards Bethlehem and realized that a woman could speak without hedging her bets, without hemming and hawing, without making nice, without sounding pleasant or sweet, without deference, and even without doubt." I encourage Sagittarians of every gender to be inspired by Didion in the coming weeks. It's a favorable time to claim more of the authority you have earned. Speak your kaleidoscopic wisdom without apology or dilution. More fiercely than ever before, embody your high ideals and show how well they work in the rhythms of daily life.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Capricorn novelist Marcia Douglas writes books about the history of her people in Jamaica. In one passage, she writes, "My grandmother used to tell stories about women that change into birds and lizards. One day, a church-going man dared to laugh at her; he said it was too much for him to swallow. My grandmother looked at him and said, 'I bet you believe Jesus turned water into wine.'" My purpose in telling you this, Capricorn, is to encourage you to nurture and celebrate your own fantastic tales. Life isn't all about reasonableness and pragmatism. You need myth and magic to thrive. You require the gifts of imagination and art and lyrical flights of fancy. This is especially true now. To paraphrase David Byrne, now is a perfect time to refrain from making too much sense.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): To be the best Aquarius you can be in the coming weeks, I suggest the following: 1. Zig when others zag. Zag when others zig. 2. Play with the fantasy that you're an extraterrestrial who's engaged in an experiment on planet Earth. 3. Be a hopeful cynic and a cheerful skeptic. 4. Do things that inspire people to tell you, "Just when I thought I had you figured out, you do something unexpected to confound me." 5. Just for fun, walk backward every now and then. 6. Fall in love with everything and everyone: a D-List celebrity, an oak tree, a neon sign, a feral cat.
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LOVE YOUR LIFE!
How's your fight for freedom going? Are you making progress in liberating yourself from your unconscious obsessions, bad habits, and conditioned responses? Are you turning out to be the hero of your own life?
For assistance and inspiration, tune in to my EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES.
Go to https://RealAstrology.com
Register and/or log in through the main page.
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The cost is $7 per sign online. (Discounts are available for bulk purchases.)
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The cost is $7 per sign. (Discounts are available for bulk purchases.)
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"Your expanded horoscopes get more personal and intimate with me than some of my closest friends. Thanks for the loving reflections."
—Ari Schlectman., Ann Arbor, MI
"When I listen to your audio 'scopes, my free will lights up."
—Alex Denares., Los Angeles
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PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): A blogger who calls herself HellFresh writes, "Open and raw communication with your partners and allies may be uncomfortable and feel awkward and vulnerable, but it solves so many problems that can't be solved any other way." Having spent years studying the demanding arts of intimate relationship, I agree with her. She adds, "The idea that was sold to us is 'love is effortless and you should communicate telepathically with your partner.' That's false." I propose, Pisces, that you fortify yourself with these truths as you enter the Reinvent Your Relationships Phase of your astrological cycle.
ARIES (March 21-April 19): In his poem "Autobiographia Literaria," Aries-born Frank O'Hara wrote, "When I was a child, I played in a corner of the schoolyard all alone. If anyone was looking for me, I hid behind a tree and cried out, 'I am an orphan.'" Over the years, though, O'Hara underwent a marvelous transformation. This is how his poem ends: "And here I am, the center of all beauty! Writing these poems! Imagine!" In the coming months, Aries, I suspect that you, too, will have the potency to outgrow and transcend a sadness or awkwardness from your own past. The shadow of an old source of suffering may not disappear completely, but I bet it will lose much of its power to diminish you.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20): In his poem "Auguries of Innocence," William Blake (1757–1827) championed the ability "to see a World in a Grain of Sand. And a Heaven in a Wild Flower. Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand." According to my reading of the astrological omens, Taurus, you are primed to do just that in the coming days. You have the power to discern the sacred in the midst of mundane events. The magic and mystery of life will shine from every little thing you encounter. So I will love it if you deliver the following message to a person you care for: "Now I see that the beauty I had not been able to find in the world is in you."
GEMINI (May 21-June 20): "The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time," said philosopher Bertrand Russell. I will add that the time you enjoy wasting is often essential to your well-being. For the sake of your sanity and health, you periodically need to temporarily shed your ambitions and avoid as many of your responsibilities as you safely can. During these interludes of refreshing emptiness, you recharge your precious life energy. You become like a fallow field allowing fertile nutrients to regenerate. In my astrological opinion, now is one of these revitalizing phases for you.
CANCER (June 21-July 22): "My own curiosity and interest are insatiable," wrote Cancerian author Emma Lazarus (1849–1887). Inspired by the wealth of influences she absorbed, she created an array of poetry, plays, novels, essays, and translations—including the famous poem that graces the pedestal of America's Statue of Liberty. I recommend her as a role model for you in the coming weeks, Cancerian. I think you're ripe for an expansion and deepening of your curiosity. You will benefit from cultivating an enthusiastic quest for new information and fresh influences. Here's a mantra for you: "I am wildly innocent as I vivify my soul's education."
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Blogger Scott Williams writes, "There are two kinds of magic. One comes from the heroic leap, the upward surge of energy, the explosive arc that burns bright across the sky. The other kind is the slow accretion of effort: the water-on-stone method, the soft root of the plant that splits the sidewalk, the constant wind that scours the mountain clean." Can you guess which type of magic will be your specialty in the coming weeks, Leo? It will be the laborious, slow accretion of effort. And that is precisely what will work best for the tasks that are most important for you to accomplish.
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Homework: What bold dream may not be beyond your power to achieve? NewsletterFreeWillAstrology.com
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Contents of the Free Will Astrology Newsletter are Copyright 2022 Rob Brezsny
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Did you write the poem at the beginning about virtues? If you did, I think it’s freaking brilliant. Move over, T. S. Eliot. I have a new favorite poet.
So sweet as if I've climbed into a honey bee nest and have stayed so long that the bees are now charging me rent.