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Ten Thousand Grandmothers
Category Spiritual Activism
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Honoring Pope Francis: A Call to Protect Our Planet
On this Earth Day, Tuesday, April 22, 2025, I dedicate this post to Pope Francis, who passed away early Monday morning. He was keenly aware of the fragility of this planet and its inhabitants. He admonished us to change our ways of consuming destruction to conservation and preservation.
Though I’m not widely traveled, I’ve been blessed to live in vastly different environments. I was raised in the mild climate of Southern California, then lived thirty years in Oklahoma, where “the wind comes sweeping down the plain.” Later, I enjoyed the Spirit of Aloha for six years in the Hawaiian Islands. Currently, I find myself nestled beneath the protective arms of the redwoods in Northern California.
Now in my 70th year, I love Planet Earth more than ever–the sounds of creatures, whipping winds in branches, scents of roses, herbs and cut grass. And oh, the sights I’ve seen–majestic volcanic hills and miniscule shiny beetles. I’ve stood awestruck under the starry Hawaiian night sky, and huddled–praying–in an Oklahoma basement for the tornado to pass us by. Gaia energy rippled through me while swimming Hawaiian white-capped waves, jolted me through California earthquakes, and startled me as thunder crashed and lightning lit the Oklahoma skies.
Oh, what a wonderful world! And, how I want my grandchildren to thrive and bask in the beauty of nature. The Earth can be exploited, trashed, and destroyed. Or it can be protected, valued, and preserved. Each of us can make a small difference; collectively we can make a huge difference for the future of the planet. Or is it too late?
Well, I’m an optimist and a woman of faith. I believe there’s hope for the old girl, Mother Earth, yet. I’ve created this meditation to support and honor the planet.
Join me this Earth Day in honoring Pope Francis’ legacy to create a vibrant home for all creatures of the earth for generations to come.
(This meditation is also available on the Planet Meditations page and YouTube.)
Happy Earth Day ~ Dana
Spiritual Experiences That Change Your Life
Have you experienced a Near-Death Experience (NDE), a Spiritually Transformative Experience (STE), mystical experiences or simply have a spiritual curiosity? If so, you might want to know about Spiritual Awakenings International (SAI). Founded in 2020 by Dr. Yvonne Kason and Robert Bare, MPA, PHd, Spiritual Awakenings International is building a global network and community of individuals and groups interested in Spiritually Transformative Experiences. Dr. Kason’s career as a medical doctor was influenced by her dramatic Near-Death Experiences. In 1990 she became the first Canadian medical doctor to specialize her practice in the research and counseling of patients with diverse types of STEs. Too often people have been categorized as “crazy” and put on medications after sharing experiences that seem beyond the bounds of reality. While times are changing, many people still feel isolated and confused after STE’s. Spiritual Awakenings International offers a community-building forum and an educational platform. Experts and experiencers share their information and stories in a growing library of Zoom recordings. These are available for viewing at the SAI YouTube channel.
SAI CONFERENCE 2023
Each year SAI presents a two-day on-line conference with a variety of speakers and panels. Donations are requested to cover the costs, but registration is free. This year’s conference, SPIRITUAL AWAKENING: THE DAWN OF CONSCIOUSNESS is June 10 and 11. Participants must register for each day separately to receive the Zoom link. Suggested Conference Donation $50 to $200 – Donate Now!
Saturday, June 10 Conference Schedule
The Conference starts at 8:30 AM Pacific Time, which is 11:30 AM Eastern Time, 4:30 PM in the UK, and Sunday, 3:30 AM in Auckland, NZ, 1:30 AM in Sydney Australia.
(All times listed below are in Pacific Time – PDT.)
8:30 AM PDT – Meditation – Brian Sackett – “Connecting with Spirit”
9 AM PDT – Mark Anthony – “The NDE Zone: Connected by the Light from the Cosmic to the Subatomic”
10:30 PDT – Dr. Emma Bragdon – “How 20-40,000 Brazilian Spiritists Care for Individuals in Spiritual Emergency”
12 noon PDT – Supporting STE Experiencers Panel – Dr. Pier Luigi Lattuada “Transe-Cognition: For a Coherent Hermeneutics of Spiritual Awakening” & Isabel Clark “Hope and Support for Travellers Between the Worlds: The Work of the UK Spiritual Crisis Network”
1:30 PM PDT – Jyoti Ma – “The Spiritual Emergence of Mother Earth”
3:00 PM PDT– Dr. Lawrence Edwards – “Kundalini Awakening: Maps of the Journey“
4:30 PM PDT– NDE Experiencers Panel – Dr. Norma Edwards, Don Hoes, Dr. Louise Livingston, Lewis Brown Griggs
6:00 PM PDT – Spiritually Transformative Experiences/Consciousness Researchers Panel – Monique Rebelle, Dr. Danny Geren, Dr. Mona Sobhani, David Gerrelli
All events are 1 hour and 15 minutes in length, except the morning meditation that is 15 minutes long.
There will be a 15 minute break between events.
Sunday, June 11 SAI Conference Schedule
The first English event begins at 10:00 AM Pacific Time, which is 1:00 PM Eastern Time, 6:00 PM in the UK, and Sunday, 5:00 AM in Auckland, NZ, 3:00 AM in Sydney Australia.
(All times listed below are in Pacific Time – PDT.)
8:15 AM PDT – Spanish Music: Roxana Río
8:30 AM PDT – Spanish Panel: Ana Cecilia González, Francisco Valentin, Dr. Ingrid Honkala, & AJ Parr
10:00 AM PDT – Dr. Jeffrey Long – “Evidence of the Afterlife: Groundbreaking New Findings from the Largest Study of Near-Death Experiences Ever Reported”
11:30 AM PDT – Dr. Yvonne Kason – “Kundalini Awakening: A Universal Key to STEs & Expanded Spiritual States of Consciousness”
1:00 PM PDT – Spiritual Emergency Experiencers Panel – Sean Blackwell, Dr. Ann Berger-Knorr. Mariam J. Saleh Esq., and Ellen Drummonds Curtis
2:30 PM PDT – Anne Archer Butcher – “Miraculous Dolphin Rescue from Shark Attack – An Amazing Mystical Experience with Dolphins in the Atlantic Ocean”
4:00 PM PDT – Rob Schwartz – “Discover The Real Meaning of the Life You Planned BEFORE You Were Born”
5:30 PM PDT – STE Experiencers Panel – Dr. Jean MacPhail, Althea Watson, Kristin LeMaster, Dr. Sha’alah Ivory
Events are 1 hour and 15 minutes in length, except the morning music that is 15 minutes long.
There will be a 15 minute break between events.
Visit Conference Website
Read all about the speakers and various offerings at the Spiritual Awakenings International Conference 2023 website. Registration for each day is required to receive the Zoom links. Cost is free, but donations are requested and appreciated.
Oh Say, Can You See??
September 11, 2021
I’ve been grimly ignoring the pull to read stories about the 20th anniversary of the 9/11/2001 events. Sure, I remember where I was when I turned on the TV to watch the second tower come down in real time. I remember Peter Jennings saying, ”Oh. My. God.” But, I didn’t want to go there today. It’s been a beautiful day. I went to the Farmer’s Market, bought gorgeous fruit, took a walk at the park. And yet….
A strange malaise has hovered over me all day. I felt weepy and forlorn. Just tired, I told myself. Get over it. Go to bed early, I said. But tonight, it finally rose into my consciousness—I’m part of the collective sadness of the heinous anniversary. The day the unthinkable happened and the world entered a very dark road we still walk. For the twenty year perspective reviews all that came after. First, the initial destruction and bewilderment of the plane crashes and immediate losses of life.
But what came after was insidious and perhaps more evil than the initial event. The US embarked on aggressive wars in foreign lands against undefined enemies. We invaded Iraq on a fake quest for ”weapons of mass destruction” and chased Saddam Hussein into a hole in the ground. Then quickly executed him.
Our young men and women responded to the call to “defend freedom” to die along the hot dusty roads and villages of Iraq and Afghanistan. The war machine cranked out millions of dollars for guns, tanks, and weaponry. Faceless CEOs lapped at the American war trough. A generation of America’s finest died or came home missing limbs from ied’s and terrorized by Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The recent ignoble retreat from Afghanistan insures a legacy of hardship and misery for the allies we left behind. Good luck with all that.
Excuse me if I’ve gotten just a little jaded about the kindly intention of the actions of the United States government. Pardon my skepticism at the words uttered by the powers-that-be. I’ve been through Richard Nixon, Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, and the surreal Trump years. And sorry to say Uncle Joe Biden appears to be taking suppression and government control to even greater heights. At this point, I’m frankly pissed off, to put it delicately.
And yet, for the human race, I have hope. For despite the ugly revelations of the Old Guard, I see people striving toward mental and spiritual freedom. The Native American Water Protectors are rising up, finding their long-forgotten power. Women strain against eons of control and debasement. Racism is exposed and denounced. Climate change is kicking our butt. We’re still on a wild societal roller coaster ride. But I think we are beginning to realize we are all in this together.
We live on a small planet. What happens in a market place in China quickly fans across the globe. Social media puts us in instant contact with fellow Tik-Tokers two continents away. The basic desires of humanity for family, shelter, security and peace unites us all.
I can’t control my government, but I can embrace what is in my sphere of influence and give it my highest regard. Whether it’s through my time and energy with my family and friends, positive acts in the community or even creating something on my blog or YouTube channel to raise the collective consciousness, I’m giving it my best shot.
This world is what we make it. Let’s learn from the lessons of the last twenty years. We can do better. We can be better. I know we can.
Bright Blessings— Dana Taylor
When It Gets Real
by Dana Taylor
9:02 am of April 19, 1995 is forever etched into my memory. My cozy home in an Oklahoma City suburb suddenly shook as if, well, a bomb had gone off. Which indeed, it had. The walls, floors, and offices of the downtown Murrah Building blew to smithereens. Dozens died, including babies in the day care center.
(AP Photo/Bill Waugh, Flle)
A whole city of individuals was suddenly pulled together in a mutual cataclysmic event. The rose colored glasses of thinking we lived in a safe place were ripped off. Disbelief morphed into collective grief. Everyone experienced their own revelations as the days and weeks unfolded. Personally, I developed a sense of empathy for victims of random violence I had not known before. I’d lived a protected life, free from the horrors of war and chaos. When I read of bombs going off in foreign cafes or a suicide bomber destroying a wedding, I couldn’t identify. Those things happened far away. They were more like stories in movies. Not real. Suddenly I felt the reality of instant, random death and calculated hate. Real shit.
Fast forward twenty-five years. The global pandemic. It’s not just some disease in some foreign country affecting people who don’t speak my language. No, it’s here. It’s now. It’s real. Real shit.
And then this Memorial Day, it really hits the fan with the murder of George Floyd. The event is a perfect storm of people locked up and FED UP. Throw in some anarchists, stupid Tweets, and rage. Cities across the US and the world explode.
So, what to make of this? I’m sure sociologists better educated than I will analyze our collective psyches. But to me it seems the message clear: we are all in this together.
Disease and violence isn’t just something that visits other people in other lands. They are part of the human experience. According to the soothsayers, channelers and assorted spiritual teachers, we are in the opening decade of The Awakening, an appropriate moniker. A very rude Awakening indeed. This is all a slap in the face. And yet, so necessary. Wake up! Wake up to white privilege and racism. Wake up to global annihilation. Wake up to ugly truths and well, more of that, real shit.
What to do? Play the blame game? Point the fingers? Hide in our homes and watch Netflix? Of course, there are no easy solutions. Yet, common sense tells me if we are all in this together, then we all have to play our part. This is a watershed moment. As individuals we make choices that ripple into our families and communities. No one person or organization or government is going to “save” us. We have choices. We can pull together for the greater good, one person at a time. Or we can further devolve into fighting factions. Which will it be?
There are certainly compelling arguments for doom and gloom. The chaos will continue. The wake up calls have just begun. But, we live on a planet of free will. We make the decisions that set the course of our individual lives. Collectively, we make decisions that set the course of the nations. It’s time to learn from the past, but not repeat it. Time to break the patterns, tear down the old walls, come up with fresh ideas.
Despite the headlines and upcoming uninspiring election choices, I see hope in younger leadership emerging with better ideas for the global community. Complacency is not an option. If enough people can meet the chaos with kindness over fear, with peace over destruction, we can witness positive, compassionate changes in our societies.
It took a while, but after the Oklahoma City bombing, community leaders came together in a cooperative manner. A beautiful memorial now sits on the site of the destruction. The decaying downtown area was reimagined and revitalized.
Planet earth can also be reimagined and revitalized. It will take courage and compassionate action. No one is exempt. We are all in this together.
Bright blessings–
Dana
Let America Be Great When…
by Dana Taylor
Let America be great when
we unite in love, not fear
when we see each face as a person dear
Let America be great when
land is held sacred with respect,
not an expanse to strip, rape, and wreck
Let America be great when
people love people more than a gun,
when crowds come together not in protest, but in fun
Let America be great when
girls enjoy freedom and emotional victory
when #MeToo becomes a sad, bygone history
Let America be great when
Black is simply beautiful
When diversity of colors is totally cool
Let America be great when
people can follow their hearts to love,
when no courts destroy human rights from above
Let America be great when
animals are recognized as sentient creatures,
when their heads are not displayed trophy features
Let America be great when
food is safe and water is clean,
when city streets are friendly, not mean
Let America be great when
everyone has a place to sleep and nest,
when the homeless are given space, dignity and rest
Let America be great when
drugs no longer lead to suicide and addiction,
when our youth grow in strength, not affliction
Let America be great when
art and creativity are encouraged and nourished,
when new ideas help communities grow and flourish
Let America be great when
we cease to worship destruction and war,
when we finally embrace peace and say,
no more…..
no more….
no more….
copyright Dana Taylor @ 2018, All Rights Reserved
