Welcome to your newsletter.
I hope you have enjoyed a healthy, happy and abundant week.
Your newsletter is shorter than usual today, and, as you will have noticed, published somewhat later.
When I woke up today It was been a beautiful sunny, perfect Spring day today, so I was moved to go out and enjoy, before returning to write your newsletter.
In my corner of the World, on this small but very beautiful, unspoilt island, Spring is very much underway. Cherry Trees bursting with beautiful pink blossom, hedgerows carpeted in delicate yellow Primroses, as well as numerous other flowers and plants of all shapes, sizes and colours.
The Bluebells are awaiting their turn to soon provide their own carpet of colour, turning once luscious green fields in to acres of bright blue carpet.
A few weeks after that it will be the turn of the wild Orchids.
These glorious Expressions of the Divine are here to be Appreciated, Experienced and Loved, as a valuable and powerful reminder of the Infinite Abundance of the Universe of which each of us is an infinite aspect.
Alas, most people in the World today still choose to focus upon the material things, which, although thought of and treated as real never are real, but instead a major origin of ever increasing misery, particularly over the last 100 years or so.
It is on this very subject that we will focus this week. Materialism is a progressive, subtle but very insidious trait of humanity, but one that can be reversed once it is recognised.
This Week:
1. Foxit PDF Reader
2. Misery and materialism
Foxit PDF Reader
I would like to thank newsletter member Carol for sending me a message suggesting an alternative to the Adobe Acrobat Reader for viewing PDF files such as this newsletter.
As I mentioned in previous newsletters, Adobe Acrobat Reader 9 does not, unlike previous versions, seem to allow for the clicking of links.
This alternative to Adobe Acrobat, is Foxit Reader, which has numerous features that even Acrobat Adobe does not have, as well as loading all PDF files very quickly indeed.
And Foxit Reader will properly allow for the clicking and opening of web links.
After thorough testing, I can recommend downloading this free but excellent PDF reader software, which can still be safely installed and used alongside Adobe Acrobat Reader.
http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/reader/down_reader.htm
If you are reading this newsletter on your PC through Adobe Acrobat you may need to either copy and paste the above link, or type it in to your browser address bar manually.
If you are viewing this newsletter online, the link should open normally.
Enjoy, and thanks again to Carol for bringing Foxit Reader to our attention.
Misery and materialism
It is ironic that many people associate the ever accelerating onslaught of "consumer technology", "vanity products" and "convenience products" such as mobile phones, flat screen TV's, iPod's and numerous other gadgets as "progress", while decrying the lifestyles of 50 years ago as "primitive" or "old fashion".
But of course this depends entirely on the perspective of the observer.
The people of 100, 1000, 2000 years ago would probably regard the twenty first century as an absolute nightmare.
50 years ago, when the first "TV Sets" appeared in their large bulky boxes housing a small, flickery, wavy 12 inch black and white screen, people thought how fortunate they were to own such amazing innovations, that enabled them to "view" events all over the world, and kept entertained, while their parents and grandparents "had to make do" with a "valve radio" box, with its large speaker grill and protruding dials.
But in those days, those "fortunate enough" to own such a modern valve radio would sometimes wonder how their own parents and grandparents ever managed without mains gas or electricity or a car to go and do their weekly shopping.
The same trends and attitudes have been evident over the past 30 years or so with the rise of the "desktop computer".
I have been involved with technology, particularly computers, for well over 30 years, starting with the very first recognisable desktop computer, which was then called a "Micro Computer" which is how "Microsoft" was name. Micro Computers" were so named due to their tiny compared to the then massive "mainframe" computers that filled entire rooms, fully air conditioned and atmospherically regulated, and managed by whole teams of engineers, programmers, systems analysts and others.
The PC you are reading this newsletter on probably has more processing power than many of those old "mainframes", many of which did not even have a monitor back then.
I well remember when the first hard disk - known as a "Winchester Drive" - was launched to great fanfare. It was housed in its own external box, which was larger than a PC, and featured a massive 10MB of storage. Now 1TB hard disks are the norm - 100,000 times as much storage on a fraction of the size and thousands of times faster.
Every day a seemingly ever increasing onslaught of the very "latest and greatest" products, in just about every area you can think of, is foisted upon eagerly waiting consumers, often with so much hype that on the official "launch day" shops stay open to midnight, just so you can be one of the "lucky few" to part with your money first.
Not just technology and gadgets either.
Every day it seems a TV advert announces the very next generation of "beauty", "anti-aging" or other vanity oriented "system", guaranteed to make you look younger, glossier, shinier, more natural, less wrinkly etc, often claiming to include components, systems and formulas that sound so impressive that they surely must work.
But are all these "ultra modern innovations" a blessing or a curse?
Does this ever increasing choice, modern "conveniences" and advancing technological innovation ultimately translate to true happiness?
Not far from where I live there is plenty of evidence that suggests not in the form of homes and even an entire village that have been "frozen in time".
A house I recently visited a house a few miles where I live had recently been bequeathed to the government heritage trust by the owners, who had no descendants. The trust has taken over the care and management, exactly as it was left. The owners
had shunned all "modern conveniences" including electricity, to maintain the lifestyle they had always known and loved.
Walking in to the house was like walking back in time, with everything as it was a hundred years ago. Food was grown in the garden, their was an orchard, bee hives and many other sources of home produced food and other materials.
All washing was done by hand before being hung out to dry.
As the house had no electricity supply, as it became dark lanterns and candles were lit. In the winter there would always be a pile of wood to burn on the fire for warmth in the family living room, every other room remaining cold, not enjoying any form of heating.
During the long winter nights, the entire family would gather around the piano and sing lots of songs together in the light of the log fire before amusing themselves by reading books under candle light, while the children played happily with their board games.
Now to people of today such an "existence" would be considered to be very primitive. If you lived in a cold climate, you can imagine the whole house except for that one family room being freezing cold, including all the bedrooms, and getting up in the morning to a layer of ice on the inside of the windows? These people did, as did most in their day.
But yet the records of this family show that they were extremely happy - most certainly much more so than the family of today with all "modern conveniences".
When I was a child there were no games consoles, TV's and DVD layers in the bedroom, and certainly no computers or Internet. At night I either read library books or watched the family black and white TV with its two channels. Yet I was very happy.
Daylight hours would be spent outside among the beauty of the countryside or down by the river. To me this seemed like heaven - and was.
The village "frozen in time" near where I live consists of small two roomed stone cottages with thatched roofs. The centrepiece was the "wall unit" which was full of all pottery and metal ornaments collected and passed down over many generations.
Each cottage grew its own food and cut peat to burn on the fire in winter. There were local blacksmiths and other trades, where services were exchanged for food.
Entertainment for the children was mostly a local game similar to a "hoop and stick".
But again - records of the time show that all these people, with no gas or electricity, or mechanical conveniences of any sort, no manufactured games, no musical instruments were generally extremely happy.
Why?
Simply Because life was very simple and above all close to nature. Growing their own food, they appreciated the miracle of being able to do so.
The people of that village, and many like them, also greatly, appreciated the beauty of nature and the changing seasons with which they were very close, and had plenty of time, especially during the long dark nights of winter, to reflect on the meaning of life.
Contrast that idyllic lifestyle to the crowded materially driven concrete world of today, and it is easy to see why people of 200 years or so ago where happier, more "grounded" and closer to nature and the Divine. They would never exchange their lifestyle for "modern" life
Yet people of today, in their materialism, would perceive those days gone by as being basic, "primitive" even "squalid".
Even now there are many tribal cultures living naturally as their ancestors have done for many generations, and are far happier than those living in the cities, with the pressures of family, peers and society, keeping up appearances and latest trends, technologies and vanity products.
The last few centuries, in many respects have not represented progression, but regression in most the ways that really matter.
If we take an objective look at the consequences of these exponentially accelerating trends increasing technology and choice, it immediately becomes apparent that so called "modern living" is not all what most people believe it to be.
Billions live their lives striving only to be seen to seen as being as "good" or better than their neighbours. Such people always feel the need to own more, bigger and better visible possessions so they can appear the "wealthiest resident in the neighbourhood".
Life for these people is often extremely stressful because every time a neighbour purchases a lawn mower, they immediately feel compelled to go out an purchase an even bigger, more powerful and noisier lawn mower, or anything else that can be displayed around the outside of their home as a mark of wealth and social status.
If they cannot achieve this for some reason, they feel "inferior", "inadequate" and even "socially embarrassed", sometimes not daring to "show their face" until their "situation" has been rectified.
Such people are invariably in debt - often considerable debt and will sacrifice daily living needs to maintain the illusion never being able to pursue activities that genuinely makes them happy.
It is impossible it seems to even switch on the TV these days without being bombarded with adverts for the latest and greatest technology, vanity, and "must have" products.
Every time a person succumbs to one of these products, they switch on the TV the following month, only to find even "better" alternatives" from other "vendors" or that the "latest and greatest" product they purchased the month before is now "obsolete" because there is now a newer, even better version, offering even more "benefits".
"Vendors" know that "consumers" are obsessed with purchasing the latest and greatest "things" at all costs, and will "fall for" anything that appeals to vanity and the Ego, and the ongoing obsession to own only the latest and greatest possessions.
There is an increasing trend among vanity products to give totally fictitious names of chemicals and compounds, "new discoveries" contained within the "secret formula" of the product. These names are always designed to sound most impressive, leading the "consumer" to believe they are using the very latest and greatest discoveries, but in reality are often substances that have been around for years in one form or another.
Vanity product vendors also know the obsessions of millions of people to appear younger, more "beautiful" and more "desirable", creating a seemingly endless array of vanity products claimed to "make you look younger" or "more desirable" or "well presented by comparison with "co-workers" and so on.
These days you can purchase "products" to "fill in your wrinkles", "cover your grey hairs", "make your hair shinier", "make your teeth whiter", "make your skin more tanned" - giving the impression of taking luxury, exotic "holidays in the Sun" - and so on.
All these products target the Ego, the major aspect of which in these cases is vanity.
Are "consumers" of these "products" happy?
Not usually.
Many fear TV adverts lest a bigger, better or more advanced "product" has been "launched", with even more "features" and "benefits" than the one they already have, compelling them to "go out and buy" the latest and greatest version.
The "vanity business" is massive, trillion dollar industry, existing only to take advantage of the obsession of billions of people to appear younger, more beautiful and more desirable.
From a Spiritual Evolution perspective this is known as "body identification" or "body ID", and, with the Ego, is one of the first barriers to Evolution that needs to be confronted and reconciled.
Those focusing on acquiring increasingly more material things at all costs remain totally, oblivious to the truth that we are already Fully Inclusive Expressions of Source and therefore All that Is,
Anyone can experience anything that can possibly be imagined simply by Expressing from The All in to Conscious awareness where it may be experience and enjoyed.
The dark forces, seeking only power and control over humanity, are taking advantage of and encouraging materialism, vanity and Ego as instruments of control, with the objective of "dumbing down" humanity, especially as the Great Awakening progresses, and increasingly more people wake up to their true Divine Nature, realising the material world for what it really is.
These dark forces know only too well, that once a person awakens, they can no longer be effectively controlled.
The truth is though no human can be controlled unless they allow themselves to be controlled through material desires, vanity and the Ego.
There is always a choice.
The choice is between misery and materialism or the joy, bliss and freedom of within.
The true path of freedom, happiness and Spiritual Evolution lies firmly in remaining close to, and appreciating the Expressions of the Divine, not the "products" of humans.
The only true focus is within - not on the latest gadgets, technologies and vanity products.
So if you feel that you do not have as much as someone else, or can afford as much as someone else, then rejoice in what you have, for it is you that is truly blessed. And remember, 50 years ago it would be you who would be considered the wealthy one.
Until next week, at the normal time.
In Love and Light,
Adrian.
http://www.ourultimatereality.com/our-ultimate-reality-the-book.html
http://www.scienceofbeing27lessons.com
http://www.ourultimatereality.com
http://www.ourultimatereality.com/forums
http://www.ourultimatereality.com/science-of-being-paperback.html
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