1. Welcome Notes
2. Article – Reflections on Our World
3.Words of Wisdom

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1. Welcome Notes

Dear Friends,

This will be a different kind of newsletter given all that has
happened and is happening in our world. I believe we cannot
solve our world's problems by coming from our logical thinking
alone so I have been seeking the wisdom of my heart and soul
and it is from that place, that I write to you today. Please forgive
any disjointedness you might notice. Clarity does not come
easily at a time like this.

I, along with all of you, watched with horror and shock as the
events of Tuesday unfolded. I was at once struck with nausea
and profound grief. My mind, body and spirit were reeling with
the enormity of what had happened.

My heart goes out to all of those directly effected ñ those who
lost their lives, those who lost loved ones and the courageous
people who are working night and day searching for those who
might still be alive beneath all of that rubble. My heart also goes
out to those of us who were perhaps not touched directly, but
traumatized non the less, by witnessing the horror inflicted upon
our fellow Americans. My heart goes out to our leaders who
must make the most difficult of decisions. My heart goes out to
the frightened Islamic Americans who are being threatened and
to the innocent people worldwide who may be harmed by the
reverberations of all of this.

As I grapple with trying to integrate and make some kind of
sense out of all that has happened and is yet to come, the one
thing that keeps coming up for me is "If you're not part of the
solution, you are part of the problem". I do want to be part of the
solution! But, what is the solution? I don't presume to know
the answers but I do have a lot of questions. Some of them are:
How can I help? What do I know at the deepest level of my
being? What does my Soul want from all of this? What does
nature have to teach us about how to respond to this? Is this a
wake up call? What are we supposed to wake up to? We are all
asking our Higher Power (I use this term to be inclusive rather
than exclusive) for help, but are we listening for the answers?
What has caused these people to hate us so much? What have
we done to make them fear us so much? Beneath hate is fear.
What would love do now?

I would like to share, in this newsletter, some of the things that
have been coming up for me.

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2. Reflections on Our World

There is something deeper going on here that we need to address.
Although we are each unique individuals, at our deepest core, we
are all one. What affects one of us, affects all of us.

It strikes me that our world is like our body and a part of our
body is attacking the rest. Are the terrorists like a cancer in our
body ñ cells that are growing out of control? What are the toxins
that have caused this? How is our attacking them like how we
attack cancer with chemotherapy? Chemotherapy not only kills
the cancer cells, it kills many of our healthy cells ñ that's why it
makes us so sick. Have we been neglecting a part of our body?
What other parts of our body are we neglecting? How can we
release the toxins and bring healing into our world? What toxins
are we feeding into our body? How can we stop that? How can
we take care of all of our body, our world, so that it takes care of
us?

We must contain and remove the malignancy before it
metastasizes to our critical organs. But, in so doing, we must
take great care to not cause further harm to the rest of the body.

We must strengthen our immune system. With a strong immune
system, we are self-healing organisms. Given the right
environment ñ one of nourishment, nurturing and love, our
bodies heal themselves. Plants and animals thrive in the right
environment. We thrive in the right environment. Our body, our
world is in pain. It is crying for change. What in our
environment needs changing? It's time for us to look at what's
working in our world and do more of it and look at what's not
working and change it.

We have many other malignancies in our body ñ crime, domestic
violence, children killing children, child abuse, destruction of our
eco-system and racism just to name a few. All cancers that
threaten to destroy our body ñ our world.

We declare war on anything that threatens us. War on drugs, war
against cancer, war against crime and war on poverty. Are these
wars solving anything? Are we winning these wars? No, we are
not. Will we win the war against terrorism? Or will waging war
cause the malignancies to grow larger? We need to ask ourselves
these very important questions.

Typically we treat the symptoms instead of working to uncover
the underlying cause. We must slow down and look at what we
can learn from all of this. What can we learn from those parts of
our body that have gone awry? Only when we can uncover the
root causes can we solve the problems and prevent them from
happening again. We need to be willing to listen ñ fully listen to
what these malignancies are trying to tell us.

How is this tragedy so different than the everyday horrors we
visit on one another and ourselves? When we strike out at one
another in anger ñ spouse against spouse, parent against child,
neighbor against neighbor, race against race, religion against
religion, we kill with our words. Each time we say something
hurtful to another person, we kill a bit of their spirit. Each time
we beat up on ourselves with self-negating thoughts, we kill a
part of our own spirit.

I heard that the release of some new movies is being held off as
they are violent and we've had enough real violence. Why are
our movies so violent? Why do we want to assault our senses
with such violence?

We have seen the best and worst of man this week. Let us call
on the best of ourselves. Our hearts have been broken open. Let
us keep them open to one another. Let each of us pay attention
not only to our world, but to our own sphere of influence ñ those
things that we can do something about - our own piece of the
environment, our own relationships, our own communities. Let
each of infuse love into and heal our own little corner of the
world. Let us focus on loving and blessing each person we come
into contact with. We all want to help and we can. There's so
much each of us can do. This is an opportunity to create a better
world. How do we do that? One step at a time. Let us be
healers and bringers of the light into this time of darkness. Fear
and hate destroy ñ only love heals.

Questions to ask yourself: How can I be part of the solution?
How can I reach out with loving-kindness today, tomorrow and
the next day? What are the gifts that I have that can be brought
forth to help heal the world?

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3. Words of Wisdom

"All truly wise thoughts have been thought already thousands of
times, but to make them truly ours, we must think them over
again honestly, till they take root in our personal experience."
--Goethe

"What did Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. possess that was
capable of transforming nations? They had "soul force" ñ a
belief that no force can overpower love in action. Your soul, too,
can be trained as an agent of change."
--Mary Manin Morrissey

"Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects
revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a
method is love."
--Martin Luther King, Jr.

"I do dimly perceive that whilst everything around me is ever
changing, ever dying, there is underlying all that change a living
power that is changeless, that holds all together, that creates,
dissolves, and re-creates. That informing spirit is God. And
since nothing else that I see merely through the senses can or will
persist, He alone is.

And is this power benevolent or malevolent? I see it purely as
benevolent. For I can see that in the midst of death life persists,
in the midst of untruth truth persists, in the midst of darkness
light persists. Hence I gather that God is Life, Truth, Light. He
is Love. He is the Supreme Good."
--Mahatma Ghandi

"If you do not go within, you go without."
--Conversations With God

"A human being is a part of the whole that we call the universe, a
part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his
thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest ñ a
kind of optical illusion of his consciousness. This illusion is a
prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to
affection for only the few people nearest us. Our task must be to
free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of
compassion to embrace all living beings and all of nature.
--Albert Einstein

When Jesus told us to cast our nets into the deep (Luke 5:3), he
was telling us there is a deep part of ourselves that is eternal; it is
part of God-our immortal soul. Ask: "How well have I loved?"
Loving others is our purpose for living.
--Mary Manin Morrissey

"And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with
the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to
the eye."
--Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince

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Until we meet again, remember to:

Count your garden by the flowers,
Never by the leaves that fall.
Count your days by golden hours,
Don't remember clouds at all.
Count your nights by stars, not shadows.
Count your years with smiles, not tears.
Count your blessings, not your troubles.
Count your age by friends, not years.
--Author Unknown

Blessings to you and yours,

Sharon

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Sharon Demarte is a Life Success Coach. She coaches individuals
by telephone and Internet, helping her clients close the gap
between where they are and where they want to be. Her clients
come from all walks of life: small business owners who are growing
their businesses, professionals who are growing their practices,
people in all kinds of life transitions and those who just want a
more balanced lifestyle. She works with people of all ages, from
the young who want to get a good start in life to the Too Young
To Retire – those who are the age of customary retirement, but
choose to go on to yet another career.

She works best with people who have a strong desire, a willingness
to take action, and are motivated to increase the quality of their
lives – sometimes even in difficult situations.

If you are a person who wants more out of life and would like to
explore the possibilities of partnering with Sharon as your coach,
please contact her by email: sharon@sharondemarte.com ; or by
telephone: 206-938-1867.

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Copyright © 2000, 2001 all rights reserved. Permission is granted
to reproduce, copy or distribute One of a Kind News so long as
this copyright notice and full information about contacting the
author is attached. The author of this newsletter is:
Sharon L. Demarte, M.A.