Author Archives: Libby Maxey

About Libby Maxey

Visionary, mystic, funny, transparent: "I Am Liberty" draws the reader along Libby’s vivid journey toward embodying ascension while living a busy, normal life as wife and mother of three. She allows passage into the depths of a heart utterly surrendered to God, reveals extraordinary visions in stunning detail and exposes her human frailty with simple honesty.

Bhakti Yoga Retreat

Posted on by
2,401

This is my journal from a recent weekend retreat I attended. Throughout my entire spiritual journey I’ve attended just three retreats, this being the most recent. The first was at Mt. Shasta, presented by Dr. Susan Shumsky. It was an amazing experience, mainly because of Mt. Shasta’s majesty, good friends and the group meditations.

The second was a “Diksha” retreat presented by Sai Maa Lakshmi Devi and held near in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. This was an expensive retreat and it seemed to me that far too much of our money went toward flowers for Sai Maa. I was also bothered by the adulation and fawning over this woman who was (to me) simply a human being. I admired her numerous great accomplishments, but had no inclination to worship her! My attitude was not okay. Further, I was expected to bow down in obeisance to her handlers and their demands. I was quite rebellious. All in all, it was an interesting and enlightening experience, but not in the way I had expected. 

My experience with Amy Barnes and Gray Bear Lodge was not expensive, not far away and totally, unexpectedly delightful. In all respects, I was at liberty to be Liberty. Utterly refreshing, just as a retreat should be.  ~ Libby

Amy Barnes’ Bhakti Yoga Retreat

Gray Bear Lodge near Hohenwald,Tennessee

September 30, 2011, Friday

I left the house at 2:15, a little nervous about driving the distance but far too excited not to go. The day was gorgeous; ultra blue sky, cool 70° temps.Tennesseedoes not get any better than this!

Pleasant driving down I-65 to Columbia…and still how long to go? I continued from interstate to state highway to county road to country road to dirt road, passing through a couple of tiny towns with still-operating Mom & Pop stores and a few more that didn’t make it, past wealthy horse farms with manicured lawns and poor-but-proud farmsteads. There were two churches, both Baptist, having their annual tent revivals, chairs evenly spaced under awnings and banners proclaiming the news. The bumpy clay and rock road to Gray Bear Lodge didn’t even have a name, and couldn’t be located on Google Maps. You still had to know somebody to get the directions!

Up and up the final hill and there it is…ahh, Gray Bear Lodge…I spied the wide porch with a huge hammock and really long chimes…oh yeah. I’m gonna like this place! Driving around to the entrance, I was greeted by a very fine young man who asked my name and said “Welcome Libby! You’re in the stained glass room up there” with a smile and a wave of his hand, pointing out the vibrant window of “my” room. Seeing my bag in the back seat, he opened the back door and proceeded with “I’ll just take this up for you and Adam (co-host of Gray Bear) will show you where to park” as another hunk of a man showed up with a flourish and a dazzling smile. “Just right around behind that green Ford,” he grinned. I parked the car and left cars and travel and the rest of the world behind.

The lodge has a “no shoes” policy, so there is screened entry with a church pew for the taking off and putting on of shoes. I noted the bulletin board with the handwritten Bhakti Yoga Retreat schedule and some sign-up sheets, along with groups of shelves for shoes and other belongings.

From there, the loved-smooth rugged door opened on to a delightful riot of conversation, delicious cooking aromas and an almost other-worldly realm of barely-contained enthusiasm; a definite undercurrent of joy. Adam caught my eye and cocked his head and when I replied without thinking “the stained glass room” he burst out laughing and, seeming to spring across the space between us, said “this way, my dear.” He led me across the huge open room, up a spiral staircase, back across the huge open room on a suspended log hallway, through a large dormer room to the smaller stained glass room. Saying “take your pick” and giving a quick tour of the room (four twin beds in four corners!) Adam bowed namasté, eyes twinkling. Before I could thank him he had disappeared.

My bag was on the right-hand bed. I moved it to left-hand bed just because I could!

I wandered around the upstairs of the lodge to find the bathrooms (just two – we would have to be very cooperative) and see all the other bedrooms. There was sleep space for lots of people in the lodge, maybe 30 upstairs quite comfortably. There were also several private cabins available. At either end of the suspended log hallway were landings filled with hand-crafted spiritual goods like pottery pieces, jewelry and shawls, along with the books and CDs of visiting artists.

Downstairs, I wandered past the massive rock two-sided fireplace into the kitchen area to get some of the hot tea others were drinking. The rustic shelves above the tea-making stuff carried a hodge-podge of ceramic mugs and cups. Diann (co-host of Gray Bear) was writing the evening’s menu on the blackboard: red lentil soup, happiness salad with cilantro dressing and warm homemade bread. She turned and smiled with open innocence and I felt myself to be in the presence of an ancient Earth spirit reborn. A little bit stunned (am I still in Tennessee?) my mind flashed on the revival tents I had passed a very short time ago and I shook my head to try and balance things out!

Holding my tea in both hands, I headed toward the big porch with the hammock and chimes. Four others were out there sipping tea and chatting. It felt very easy and comfortable to begin conversations because the relaxed yet energizing air of Gray Bear was upon us all. Instant kinship seemed very normal here. A lovely woman from northern Alabama was in the giant hammock and to her giggling delight, discovered a rope attached that when gently pulled made the hammock swing. Suddenly happy children, we were all laughing with joy about taking a relaxing swing in the hammock. I’m sure I was not the only one who decided to try out the hammock as soon as it was available!

There was a bit of bustle in the large central room of the lodge as the low tables and cushions were assembled for dinner, and soon the dinner bell rang. Mouths watering because the aromas just got better and better, we gathered in the kitchen to fill our bowls and plates with the delicious organic vegetarian meal. The conversation was lively and friendships instant. There were no strangers in this place.

After our meal we gathered the cushions into a circle and Adam began the story of Gray Bear Lodge and to tell us what to expect. The lodge has a sauna and cooling pool, a swimming pool and a hot tub (all wood-fired), plus spaces for different types of massage and healing modalities. He told us about the land Gray Bear had just saved from clear-cutting; land that had a gorgeous waterfall. Diann was organizing a drive followed by a hike to the waterfall on Saturday afternoon and we were free to sign up. I decided to do so. But what he said next was astounding: he told us we were free. We were free to sign up for anything and everything; we were free to do nothing at all, not even attend the bhakti sessions we had already paid for. After dark, we were free to wear clothing or not in the hot tub and the sauna. We were freed of time; too, because he told us he would ring the bell shortly before every meal and every class time. Adam’s idea of freedom was most exhilarating. Adam and Amy gave a few more brief introductory remarks and we pulled on jackets and sweaters, found our flashlights and water bottles and headed to the “yoga room.”

Down the rocky path, we followed our flashlights to the “Path of Light,” a raised wooden walkway recently and lovingly installed, leading maybe a third of a mile down and then up numerous steps to the yoga room on top of another hill. The yoga room was a beautifully appointed, airy masterpiece of woodland perfection. Again, I felt disoriented as to place – can this really be here, in Christian fundamentalist land?

Each of us had our yoga mat and blanket already prepared, and each of us had our own little candle with our names on the lid. Like children, we compared candles and explored the room, with its high ceiling and windowed wall, beautiful gleaming wood floor and large altar space filled with musical instruments, drums and images and statues of Hindu gods and saints. Indian temple incense was burning, but unobtrusive. I was in bliss and we hadn’t even started.

We quieted and Amy began the sankalpa meditation. With great skill and obvious devotion, she wove her words into and out of the sound of the drone and Thomas’ equally skillful soft drumming. She asked that we consider our intention for the weekend and commit to it.

I already knew my intention. It had to do with a revelatory vision of about a year earlier, a vision that came in response to my heart-felt desire to help heal the mass consciousness of the world’s people so that we can overcome many messes we have created with our lack of awareness. Like Einstein said, “No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it,” so I knew this was a tall but necessary order. In the vision, I was literally knocked over by the massive bolt of Light and Sound which conveyed to my consciousness, “You will receive the consciousness of the Sun.”

When I have visions, it can take a good while to a) translate the vision into words so that I can at least explain it to myself, b) learn to accept it as true, because resistance is ultimately futile, and c) integrate the vision into my body/mind, so that I can act on it. At first, I was actively resistant, believing it to be completely impossible. But God is a mighty trickster and has infinity ways to grace-fully turn the screws until you shout to the Universe OKAY! Thy Will be done! The first thing that happened was an email from Exotic India, a website vendor of fabulous hand-crafted art and goods from India. The email was all about Surya, Hindu God of the Sun, and one of the products was an exquisite batik wall hanging which is now on the west wall of my bedroom.

The next turning of the screw was a book suggestion from Amazon.com for a truly obscure book written by a Hindu “nath,” sort of a high priest of Hinduism. Dutifully, I ordered Wings to Freedom: Mystic Revelations from Babaji & the Himalayan Yogis by Yogiraj Gurunath Siddhanath. The author faithfully practiced and recommended (wouldn’t you know) Sun-gazing for health and ultimate enlightenment. He said that to be a “solar initiate” is the highest calling.  To my astonishment, although there was quite a bit that was outside my all-American experience, nothing in the book was beyond my understanding.

The Sun began to call to me. Kind of haphazardly, I did begin the practice of Sun-gazing, even though everything in my upbringing said NO! Don’t DARE gaze directly at the Sun! Sun-gazing is done just at dawn and just before sunset, when the Sun is least powerful. You build up your eyes by gazing directly at the Sun for 10 seconds and add seconds each day. Don’t try this yourself unless and until you do the research, but Sun-gazing is a powerful, energizing experience. I can’t say that it has “done” anything to me or for me (yet) but like I said before, God has infinity ways about most of which we don’t and often can’t have a clue.

During the same time, I was (and am) working on my second book to be titled One Becomes One. My first book, I Am Liberty told of my visionary spiritual journey. In actuality, I Am Liberty was a 279-page prayer, answered in total when I met and married my husband Ahyh, who is more than a soul-mate: he is my twin flame. Long story short, I “met” him when doing a web search for images of God and sent my last review copy to him when he agreed to review it. He read the book in one sitting (to “get this crazy woman off my back”) and called me that same night, realizing that if I was in reality the person in the book, he was completely in love with me. We were married, sight unseen, six weeks later, and that story is how One Becomes One begins.

One Becomes One, however, is more than a story of two people meeting in a wild synchronistic way – it is to be my visionary prayer for the entire world. “Without a vision, the people perish” (Proverbs 29:18) is a drum-beat verse throughout my body/mind. God’s people need not just my vision but thousands of visions that will not come from the level of mind that created the messes we’re currently facing. Writing this book calls for the consciousness of the Sun, and I know it. Profoundly.

Still, I am quite human and resist my purpose! So my intention for the bhakti weekend was to release all resistance and forms of resistance (procrastination, distraction, etc.) and all fears from all lifetimes that prevent forward movement and acceptance of the consciousness of the Sun. I will myself to be a solar being, capable of reaching for and bringing in YHWH’s vision for the people of Earth…and writing it all down. And when I shared what sounds (to most) like a ridiculous, arrogant intention out loud to the group, I could feel their hushed assent, something that is a revelation all by itself (am I still in Tennessee?)

 October 1, 2011, Saturday

The sound of the Adam’s bell awakened most of us, but I was already up and showered for the day, the one and only advantage of having hot flashes repeatedly waking me up!  Breakfast was scrumptious: savory Indian cereal, quinoa with cilantro, “happy” eggs, fresh apple juice, whole grain bagels…and I just remembered I still need to google the recipe for savory Indian cereal. Honestly, you should go to Gray Bear just to try this breakfast!

The morning’s bhakti yoga session began with deep, guided breathing, first in savasana (lying down, relaxed) and then in seated pose. Beginning with the base chakra and moving to the crown, beautiful Amy spoke with great knowledge and authority about the energy centers (chakras) and the Hindu mother-goddess traditionally associated with each, all while maintaining her hypnotic way of leading our deep, rhythmic breathing. Thomas Anderson’s tandem drumming perfection over the sound of the drone made the rhythm easy for even those who were beginners, and allowed me to fall into the vastness of my third eye almost instantly. Focused on the inner, the outer sounds of Amy’s voice, the drone, Thomas’ hands drumming and the breath sounds of my neighbors became one living pulsation.

I could feel the breath coming into my crown while physically entering my nostrils and traveling down my front body. Simultaneously, I felt the upward surge of energy/space in my back body, making way for the entering energy/air. Amazed, I felt myself to be breathing in and out at the same time.

Amy spoke of Shiva and Shakti and I could feel the cooling breath (ida) on the left side of my body and the golden smile of Shakti bloomed on my face, while at the same time I felt the warming breath (pingala) on the right side of my body (feeling split in half this way strangely seemed entirely normal) as the ash-covered and stern expression of Shiva was also my expression. I felt myself to be the balanced duality of Shiva and Shakti shown in Hindu statues and paintings for centuries, both male and female, both human and divine.

My human understanding heard Amy ask us to release our fears. In a nanosecond vision that made me laugh (out loud? I don’t know) I saw fear as a doorway to walk through. There were surreal flames surrounding the doorway, and as I walked toward it, at first I thought my inner vision was fractured, but then I realized the flames were a shimmering hologram that was disappearing as I approached!

Still talking about the chakras, Amy reached the third eye in her mesmerizing explanation/meditation. My focus was already there, and instead of the wondrous blue light I usually see, I saw a single, spellbindingly gorgeous eye. My third eye, completely revealed to me, floated unblinking in my awareness for a long, long time. Even though I realized I could do so, I did not take my inner gaze away from it.

The morning’s bhakti session continued with more yoga asanas; we sang the Gayatri mantra and an energetic song to Radhe. All the while my inner focus remained on the eye.

After another delectable and decidedly southern meal of blackeyed peas, kale and collards, sweet potatoes and cornbread, we were well and truly free to spend our afternoon taking advantage of the Gray Bear’s relaxing offerings or doing nothing at all. With just a little bit to think about and integrate, I decided to forgo the waterfall trip and spend some time alone in the sweetness of nature.

Taking a yoga blanket, I walked the raised wooden Path of Light toward the yoga room but took a detour to spread my blanket beneath a sycamore tree beside a little creek. The only sounds were nature sounds – no airplanes, no cars, no electric motors…nothing but birdsong and gurgling water, leaves rustling and little woodland creatures. The Sun was high in the sky and her light dappled the ground around me in ever-changing patterns. After a little Sun-gazing through the leafy canopy, I closed my eyes and listened to the sound of the creek water splashing over roots and rocks. The sound created an image in my consciousness of miniscule raindrops of ones and zeroes, like a constant shower of information flowing from God-mind, received by those whose minds are open and ready to receive.

I realized my immense gratitude for my darling husband, my family and friends. My daily life is lived in service to the purpose I share with my husband, to maintaining our home, our ministry and our business affairs, and I love my life. Today I serve my Self in gratitude to Amy and to Gray Bear for creating this opportunity.

Before the dinner bell rang, I saw my chance: the hammock was empty…for me! Ahh…

After another wonderful meal, the gathering dispersed to make ready for the evening’s festivities. Full of anticipation and chatting like old and beloved friends, we made our way back to the transformed yoga room. An entire Kirtan band was assembled on the stage/altar, with harmonium, drums, Amy’s guitar and a stringed instrument no Hindu has ever used in Kirtan – a banjo! We sang and danced and had a thoroughly inspired and wonderful evening, floating in Hari-Bolo! and complete bliss.

Internal note to self: get Amy’s Kirtan CD!

I was not alone in finding it utterly remarkable that a group of (mostly) middle-aged white people from the South can/would/did gather to sing Hindu Kirtan in Hohenwald, Tennessee, just about the most fundamentalist Christian part of the entire USA. But here we were, and yes we did!

 October 2, 2011, Sunday

As we gathered Sunday morning in the yoga room for another bhakti session, I sent my love to my darling husband while back at home he began the first Bible study around our new collaborative book titled The Future Testament, something we’re both quite  nervous (we’re still in Tennessee!) and incredibly excited about.

Meanwhile, Amy began our class by teaching the So-Ham meditation. We were all lying down in savasana. She explained that So, the in-breath, is Shakti, the enlivening force or movement, while Ham, the out-breath, is Shiva, the ground of all being. I felt my back body to be rooting into the Earth, little energetic rootlets actually reaching down through the floor into the ground beneath. My front body felt open to the atmosphere of spirit, free-floating yet still attached. Soon thereafter I was profoundly out of body and have not yet remembered what happened in my consciousness except to know that it was quite a while later when Amy re-awakened us to human consciousness and we circled our blankets to share our weekend experiences.

My sharing included a little of what I have written here about the doorway of fear, and I expressed my heartfelt desire to feel the freedom of Gray Bear every day of my life.

My truest bow of namasté to Adam and Diann for creating such a place.

Deep love and namasté to Amy Barnes, my sister in devotion. She is well-named Nandini, daughter of bliss.

People need to know

Posted on by
2,386

I awoke one morning in early September, choked with emotion and angry with compassion…my dream before waking was so much more than a dream, and it wasn’t just for me. It’s for you, too. It’s a story that must be reported, but one nobody is seeing because of the implications.

The banksters don’t want you to know. But people need to know. I needed to know. I needed a personal, visceral knowing.  ~ Blessings,  Libby

People Need to Know 

The image was gorgeous; the sun was rising and rays of light shot out over the white sand beach. Then the light changed, becoming muddled and foreboding. Panorama-fashion, the image zoomed around to a different viewpoint. My dream-state intuition was on high alert.

Right out there in the open, on the dew-covered concrete in front of the big Baptist Church, she laid curled up, cold and dead. She lay on her left side, a pool of congealing blood beneath her emaciated frame. Her eyes were closed and a slight smile remained on her lips. Her smooth skin said she was quite young. The tiny little girl wrapped in a sling made of a threadbare old sheet and held in her arms was also dead.

Her right hand gripped three sheets of yellowed notebook paper, words written in black ink, fading to pencil and back to purple ink near the end. Her final wish: to tell her story, “People Need to Know.” She wanted to awaken awareness and compassion. The chunk of bloodied green glass sharpened to an edge found near her body told the story of suicide, but her hand-written story told a starker truth: murder by “civilized” society.

As I gazed upon the image of God’s holy daughter, so hopeless she would choose to die, I realized I was dreaming. Simultaneously, my consciousness became hers and I watched her story play out as though I was in attendance at her life-review. I could feel emotional states wash through her; her feelings were mine and I felt them intensely; her anger and sorrow and shame, her mercy and forgiveness.

This is her story, conveyed in images and words and feelings.

I’m not using a name because my name doesn’t matter any more. I’m labeled instead. I am “the poor.” I became “the homeless.” I was “whore” and “lazy bum” and “drug addict” and “worthless” cruelly hurled through open car windows more times than I could count. But I always knew I was more: a mother, a daughter, an educated, respectable person. I was raised a Christian. In my hunger I saw Jesus in my inner vision. I relied upon him to be there, and he was. And guess what? Jesus won’t condemn me to hell for wanting to be free of the hell we were in, my baby girl and me. God loves me no matter what. It’s people who don’t.

My stomach muscles are beginning to relax. I didn’t know you could feel tension in your spirit, but I guess since I’ve been holding my breath, afraid of everything and everyone for such a long time, even my consciousness is taut and clutching. I’m beginning to be able to focus on one thing, slowly, luxuriously, instead of darting about furtively every waking moment and even in semi-sleep. You don’t get much real sleep when you’re homeless.

I’m a normal American girl, a regular good kid. I went to a community college and got good grades. That’s where I met my husband, who doesn’t have a name that matters either. When you don’t have money or power you don’t matter, and I learned that by the age of 23, even though my childhood, schooling and community never told me any such thing – they told me I was special and that I could do anything. I’m a white girl. I played in the band and my husband was an honor student: we were white-bread Americans.  I guess I should have gotten a little clue about how people really are when his family thought I was not the right girl for their son – they wanted a girl who was not only a member of their fundamentalist denomination; they wanted one who was a member of their particular church so they could feel assured I was “raised right.” In front of my face they discussed their assumption that I couldn’t possible be a virgin. They thought I was “uppity” and way too “worldly” for their son. Maybe so. (All through this I felt her hot tears and anguish over feeling betrayed by every adult she had ever known, and then all the anguish was extinguished in a soft, comforting pool of mercy emanating from her (my?) consciousness. So beautiful.) 

When you don’t have any money, it’s hard to find people who care. You mostly find people who are worn out and do their best not to care. They’ve got to be able to keep their jobs, so they go through the motions. They fill out the paperwork, pretending something will come of it. They call the next person and do it again. You’ve never seen dead people until you’ve applied for public aid. Dead eyes.

After I got my associate’s degree in pharmacy work, (which my counselor said would guarantee me a job) we got married and moved south for my husband’s career. In no time both of us had good jobs in our booming coastal town. It was 2007. I was 20 and he was 23. We had health insurance and birth control, because we knew we weren’t ready for a family. We were too naïve to know all the other stuff we weren’t ready for! We thought we were so happy, living the material life on our own now, going shopping, seeing movies, hanging around with friends and doing our jobs. My husband had a cool regional cell phone sales job and we had the latest technology. His company was purchased by another company, and suddenly his job was “consolidated.” I never knew consolidated meant over, but that’s what happened on Halloween day, 2009.

I didn’t know anything about leveraged buy-outs or financial markets or mortgage-backed securities. I had just turned 21. Really, does anyone know anything about how life really works when they’re 21? But from out of nowhere, these things changed my life. They started a dark domino effect that toppled too many to count…all nameless.

Two-thirds of our income was gone. We were completely embarrassed (my cheeks grew hot with embarrassment!) I never learned anything about budgeting money either. Growing up, my family never had to – we had plenty – no worries. We gave to the church and lived positively, so we were prosperous. They told me that was how it worked, and I believed them. My husband had been utterly coddled. I don’t know who his parents thought would take care of him…their church maybe? We figured out how to apply for unemployment, but that wouldn’t pay our mortgage, because yes, we qualified for a huge mortgage. Inexperienced idiots in a complex world, we faced the fact that we’d have to sell the house and move to an apartment.

A leveraged buy-out was what caused my husband’s job to be consolidated. The financial markets made their appearance in our lives when my husband’s 401K statement came in the mail. We thought it was worth about $10,000. We cashed a check for $797 and splurged on a chocolate bar after paying overdue bills. Even dead, I’m probably still on the hook for my college loans, and probably my husband’s too.

Next, our realtor’s news was not good. As in totally bad. That’s the mortgaged-backed securities part. (I had a nanosecond vision of her sitting in the library, reading issues of Rolling Stone to find out about the financial mess. A homeless guy told her that’s where she could find the truth.)

We stayed until the bank sent cops to evict us. Another family in our neighborhood was evicted the same day. By then I was pregnant but I didn’t know it. The day I found out I was pregnant with a test from my pharmacy was the day our store got the news that we were closing. I was pregnant because I could no longer use my husband’s better insurance, and my co-pay for birth control was $50. I was two days late getting my prescription filled.

Everything around us, our whole neighborhood, the wonderful new planned community where we had so proudly lived and shopped and worked, was collapsing.

My husband’s unemployment was over. There were no real jobs, and we were down to one old car. He worked some temps and odd jobs but he was really unable to take it. He started muttering, thinking his parents were right; that he had married the wrong person against God’s Will, like they said. I just don’t get how that attitude comes from Jesus. How is one person’s Christianity better than another’s? They were all invented by people. To me, loving your neighbor as yourself means we’re equals. Anyway, it was so hard to get through to him. I had unemployment and we applied for food stamps. We sold almost everything that we hadn’t already left in the house and moved to a tiny studio apartment that was month-to-month. We had to verify income to keep the place.

It was inevitable: one month we couldn’t verify any income.

We were now jobless and homeless. My baby girl born on the state’s welfare was four months old. All we had was what would fit in the car. My baby’s crib was a battered car seat from Goodwill. Now we didn’t have an address, but I could not have known what being without an address was going to mean.

Having an address is one of the keys to being considered a person.

Things have to be documented. Stuff has to be signed and returned on actual paper when you don’t have internet access. It was a rare luxury to get to the internet at the library. Usually the guard was standing there shooing the horrid homeless away.

It got really, really bad, and I had to be the one in charge. My husband was incapable, but at least his parents would accept him back. Not me. I was not welcome; I was the one to blame. He didn’t bother to tell them about our little girl. He begged for money from them and left us one day. He just didn’t come back. (This brought an emotional roller-coaster from despair to betrayal to abandonment…to softness and merciful forgiveness in a flash.)

I couldn’t call my family. All I had left was my Dad, and he’s been in and out of rehab since my Mom died. My brother, who only watches FOX and listens to Rush every day on the radio, could easily have been one of the ones who called me “whore” and “lazy bum” from his car window. There was no way I would call him.

I found what I thought would be a good place to park our home. It was between two vacant buildings, back behind a fence that was covered in vines. I looked for work, for food, for anything worthwhile, carrying my baby around in a sling I made from ripping up some old sheets. We didn’t have diapers so the sheets got pretty wet some days, but it was a really hot summer anyway. I didn’t have breast milk anymore but she didn’t fuss much. We were hungry, but we managed to stay clean because the beach was close. We used the bathrooms on the beach. Usually twilight was the best time. I wasn’t having periods any more, luckily.

Three days ago I found a cash job – two days working at a festival on the beach. I would be able to eat and buy more formula for my baby. Just this tiniest bit of good news was enough to fill me with hope. The first morning I left my daughter with another homeless mom who promised to look after her for me.

The work was disgusting and demeaning because of the drunks, but during one short break I got to eat some greasy food. I drank a coke for the first time in months. When I retrieved my daughter it was well after dark, so I gave my friend half my tips. She cried.

The next day started out and went the same as the day before. The festival’s greasy food wouldn’t stay down though, so by the end of the day my stomach was clutching. I was really hungry. Walking toward the place where I left my baby, I felt the most awful dread. I ran.

Did you know there are wild people living in the cities? Feral boys and girls, never raised. Did you know?

I didn’t.

Two wild boys raped my daughter that day. They tore her up. My friend was in shock, shaking, horrified, her eyes black saucers in her gaunt face. The wild boys got her son. He was dead.

My baby girl was alive, but I knew she was slipping away. She looked deep into my eyes, seeking some understanding, I guess. The soul does shine through your eyes, because her soul was smooth and calm, but questioning. I had nothing. Nothing. I didn’t know the why of anything. Nothing about my life was the way they told me. Nothing at all.

I gave my friend all the money, every cent, and took my daughter down to the water. We washed away the day in the cool night water and she even smiled a little. I pray she was numb, God. I pray her little body and mind were numb. She was very weak and wouldn’t suck. I wrapped her in a clean sling from my backpack. The baby slept and I sat under the light of the moon and wrote, sitting at a picnic table at the beach. My hunger-dulled brain thought writing about everything would be therapeutic for me; would fill me up somehow. It’s funny how the mind works. I had a black pen and used it until it ran out of ink, then a pencil stub until it was too dull. I found a purple pen near a trash can and finished my story the best I could. It did fill me up, in a way.

People need to know what is happening. People need to know.

When I finished, we headed home. I don’t know why I wasn’t afraid any more. I just walked as if I owned the road, like nothing could hurt me now.

Our car had been towed.

I stood there looking, and a plan blossomed complete in my mind. I had sharpened up a pretty piece of green beach glass and had been using it as my knife and scissors. It was in a battered plastic box of stuff that wouldn’t fit inside our home. The box was there; the glass was where I left it. I opened the sling to see my girl. Her tiny face was so relaxed. She was barely breathing.

Resolutely – and believe me, I never knew resolute like this before – I walked to the Baptist Church on the street by the water. Hundreds, maybe a thousand people drive by there every day. The cadence of my footsteps kept saying “people need to know.” People need to know the effects of the immoral crimes committed by big business. Humans are not ready to be self-regulating. We need guidelines, rules and regulations until power and greed are no longer seductive.

Somehow, I felt free already, but maybe when I prayed for my baby to be numb my prayer was for me, too.

I sat down on the concrete steps, still warm from the day’s sunshine. There was no point in checking the door: churches aren’t open any more. You can’t call them shelters. I turned the sling around and looked at the angelic face of my flesh and blood. She was gone. I nuzzled her still-warm skin, smelling her, touching her, and whispered my love.

With the sling holding her close, at first I just pushed hard against the skin of my left wrist with the rounded side of the green glass, then turning it quickly I sliced through the veins. It was much easier than I thought it would be. Dropping the glass, I picked up my story and held on tight. I sighed, closed my eyes and whispered like a mantra “people need to know.”

My consciousness was once again looking at the physical scene of the crime, and I saw her spirit rise up from the crumpled heap of body. Her eyes looked directly into mine. She bowed slightly, smiling, and said “I thank you for hearing me.”

I sat straight up in bed. My dream-consciousness stayed and remained mingled with hers. I saw her newly-radiant face. Her glowing, angelic baby daughter sat laughing with delight on her lap. She placed her hands together over her heart and conveyed honor and blessing with her eyes. “Now people will know,” she smiled.

I am her reporter, first on the “scene” of something people need to know.

Jubilee!

Posted on by
2,328

The world is one mixed-up muddled-up place. We have problems galore and few solutions. The solutions we think we have are the subject of left-wing, right-wing name-calling and blame-gaming. Most of our collective problems have one source: greed. The love of money, it turns out, is indeed the root of all evil.

God had an idea we humans would act like this, so way back in the time of Moses He laid out a practical plan to deflate greed and maintain compassionate economic fairness. He even made it enticing and the Jews considered it a high holy-day (holiday) with feasting and merriment. But even Jews don’t practice it today.

I think God was on to something. I think it’s time to ACTUALLY trust that our Holy Parent might know a thing or two and give His plan a chance.  Let’s Jubilee!  ~ Libby

The Jubilee Atonement

Atonement gets plenty of attention in the Bible. “The Bible’s central message is atonement; that God has provided a way for humankind to come back into harmonious relationship with Him.” (Baker’s Evangelical Dictionary) The atonement is the entire purpose and subject matter of A Course in Miracles. Atonement for one’s deeds is a central tenet to the teachings of Alcoholics Anonymous. At a much-publicized recent gathering inTexas, Rick Perry (whether you like him or not) called for a “day of prayer and atonement for a nation in crisis.”

Do you even know the meaning of the word?

Atonement can mean ‘the making of amends or reparation for an offense of injury; satisfaction.’ It can mean ‘the reconciliation between God and people,’ often seen as the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ. In Christian Science, atonement means ‘the exemplifying of human oneness with God.’ Charles Fillmore, founder of Unity, defines atonement as “reconciliation of God and man through Christ; the uniting of our consciousness with the higher consciousness.” We have our atonement through Christ, and for this purpose Jesus demonstrated “the way.”

The word actually defines itself: at-one-ment, perfect reconciliation between you and God, united in consciousness as one mind, fully becoming the Christ by following for yourself, in your own unique manner, the way, the truth and the life of Jesus the Christ.

Tragically, the pure idea of atonement became attached to the ancient image of blood and gore: the sacrifice of animals on the altar to God, which morphed into the son of God being the blood sacrifice that would atone for all of us…Please – blood sacrifice is not what atonement is about. Atonement is about humility and renunciation of whatever it is that separates us from God. It’s time to detach old, grotesque ideas from your understanding of the atonement. Surely we’ve grown up enough to realize that blood sacrifice isn’t the way to God!

Atonement = At-One-ment. Not separate: whole.

Oneness with Source, the Creator of All-that-Is, the cosmic Father-Mother.

One with all beings and all beingness.

Yom Kippur

Translated as the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur is the holiest day of the year for Jews. Even Jews who do not otherwise observe Jewish holidays observe Yom Kippur, much like secular Christians observe Christmas and Easter if nothing else. Yom Kippur happens in the early fall, the final day of a week-long celebration beginning with Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year. The intervening days are called the Days of Awe, ‘awe’ meaning humility before the awesome power of the Almighty. Yom Kippur, atonement, is commanded by God in the Law of Moses as a day of being humble before God as a people. The Jews of the Old Testament sacrificed a bullock (male calf), two goats and a ram or lamb on the altar of God in atonement for the sins of the people. The rituals were elaborate and followed to the letter. What most people don’t know is that animal sacrifice was common among hunter-gatherers way before sacrifice was written down as a ritual in the Old Testament writings, so perhaps God was simply using an already-ancient custom to symbolize a spiritual truth…

Yom Kippur is approached with fasting and prayer and rest. It takes serious personal reflection to commit to the Day of Atonement because this is a time commanded by God for personal forgiveness: everyone forgives everyone else for all slights and harms and misdeeds and misperceptions. After the ritual of personal forgiveness, the Jewish congregation speaks together three times: “May all the people of Israel be forgiven, including the strangers who live in their midst, for all the people are in fault.”

We need atonement, for all the people are in fault.

The Jubilee Year

Every 50 years (give or take) on Yom Kippur, the joyful shout of trumpets announced the Jewish year of Jubilee. The Jubilee year was actually a two year period of magnified atonement, restitution and restoration, during which even the land was left uncultivated so that the earth herself could rest. Debts were cancelled, slaves were emancipated and land that had been sold reverted to the former owners. Woo hoo! The Jubilee was a time of joyous introspection, rest, renewal and celebration. The Jubilee year is actually a command from YHWH given to Moses on Mt.Sinai for the benefit of the Israelites, an extension of the idea of the Sabbath, the seventh day of the week during which Jews were commanded to rest and focus on their God YHWH. The Jubilee year allowed God’s people and their land to rest and begin again, liberated from the bondage of debt or slavery. You can read all about it in Leviticus, Chapter 25.

YHWH was trying to establish a systematic program of forgiveness for the people, a kind of re-set button to prevent the extremes of poverty and uber-wealth we see in the world today. YHWH was offering us a gift of profound grace with His command, teaching us to extend the concepts of times for activity and rest, forgiveness and humility into all aspects of our lives, including the life of our earth, our families, communities, and even nations. Sadly, the practice of Jubilee generally died out during the Babylonian captivity of the Hebrew people, and there is no longer any agreement about when the next actual jubilee year might be.

However, it is becoming very clear: if we do not act voluntarily to forgive debt (use YHWH’s system), the human-created greed-machine system will do it. With violence.

Let’s declare a Jubilee Atonement!

Atonement is a matter of consciousness, not time – so any time is the right time. What if we simply declare the Jubilee RIGHT NOW? Since the Jews haven’t called it in centuries, we could begin a Jubilee that lasts until “Israel [Israel means ‘he who wrestles with God’ or in other words, me and you!] is cleansed from all guilt of fornication and uncleanness, pollution, sin and error, and dwells with confidence in all the land, and there will be no more a satan or any evil one, and the land will be clean from that time for evermore.” (Book of Jubilees)

Part 1: Debt

What would your life be like if you were not a slave to debt? Romans 18:8-10 (NIV):

“Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for he who loves his fellowman has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “Do not commit adultery,” “Do not murder,” “Do not steal,” “Do not covet,” and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no harm to its neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.”

Like it or not, St. Paul’s view in Romans is quite similar to the Muslim view of debt. The longest ayah (book) in the Quran is the ayah of debt. Muslims are strongly encouraged to buy only what they have money for, agree to a fixed price and avoid interest. Muslims believe that people in debt speak lies, break promises and will find it difficult to enterParadise.

What would your life be like…no mortgage on the house or loan on your car(s), no credit card bills, the IRS off your back, no medical bills or college loans, no payments to parents or friends or poker buddies, nothing owed to the title loan company…

Did you feel a sense of longing? Do you feel like it would be easier to love yourself, love your family and even love the world without the stress of being a slave to debt?

Could you be able to relieve others of their debts to you? What about those loans to people you know will never pay you back? Could you actually forgive your debts and debtors?

The ladder of debt forgiveness could extend higher and further: what if all banks forgave all loans and every loan the banks owed was also forgiven, all the way up and down the line? Could it work? What if theUSgovernment forgave all loans to states and cities? What if every country forgave loans owed by other countries? What if we all just declared do-overs?

What if we actually had the courage to use God’s system, the Jubilee Year re-set button?

As I write, a hopeful sign that people are getting the message has emerged: there is a movement in theUnited Statesto boost the economy by forgiving all student loan debt.

But don’t wait. Everything begins at the level of you and me. Robert F. Kennedy said “Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation… it is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is thus shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”

It’s up to us to do what we can do. If someone owes you money and you are doing okay without it, forgive the debt! Suggest the forgiven party to ‘pay it forward’ and forgive another’s debt. Can you feel the healing potential inherent in this idea? Can you feel the ‘pay it forward’ sweeping around the globe?

Part 2: Forgiveness

Can you forgive? When you’re keeping score or holding a grudge, you keep yourself and the other in bondage, attached to the past and unable to move on. Forgiveness offers freedom from bondage to the past. Did you just think of someone? Forgive! Remember, all the people are in fault, including you. Expand your mind and think of more you could forgive. Maybe you could forgive your ex for being such an ass. Maybe you could forgive your parents or your neighbor or the guy who cut you off in traffic. Maybe you could forgive your former boss for laying you off when he had no choice. Maybe you could forgive the politicians or the media or the terrorists or the Wall Street bigwigs or the corporatist manipulators…this forgiveness thing can (and must) be extended: religions must forgive other religions, nations must forgive other nations, races must forgive religions and nations – none of us are free when we live in bondage to our communal past, to ancient hurts and out-dated ideas.

Our deep desire is the perfect freedom of being forgiven. But real, lasting forgiveness has another requirement.

Part 3: Humility

The alcoholic knows the drill: Alcoholics Anonymous makes sure of it. Just like the alcoholic, we all need to make amends or reparations to be deserving of forgiveness. We need to humble ourselves, apologize and come clean before the person we harmed. Humility is not the American way, but it is Yahweh. It is the way of the Christ. Jesus humbled himself and became a servant to humanity and remains so. The Pope needs to apologize to abused children and Catholic parents and American Indians and Africans and Jews to make the Catholic Church deserving of forgiveness. The United States of America needs to apologize to Iraq and Afghanistan (among others) for bombing their women and babies and calling it collateral damage. We need to apologize to Mexico for demanding their money-producing crops and their people for low-wage employment and then punishing them for answering our calls. BP and Exxon and hundreds of other corporations need to apologize for having so little regard for the earth and for humanity. Wall Street and Congress need to apologize for creating such a financial mess. We need to see remorse and shame and responsibility to be able to forgive.

Humility is cleansing. It purifies the soul. Humility restores relationships, from the individual to national to global.

Part 4: Sacrifice

“What is the real meaning of sacrifice? It is the cost of believing in illusions. It is the price that must be paid for the denial of truth.” (A Course in Miracles)

In the spirit of the symbolism of the Hebrew blood sacrifice, I pray:

Holy YHWH, I offer myself upon Your altar of at-one-ment. I accept your gift of grace. My offering to You is my stubborn bullish nature. I offer my dual goat nature, my arrogant ego and my shadowy scapegoat. I offer myself as the lamb, humbled, cleansed and purified. Together with Jesus the Christ I atone for the sins of the world. I apologize for us all, YHWH. I choose to see through the illusions. I will not deny the truth. Father-Mother, forgive us for we know not what we do. Amen

As above, so below

Isaiah 47:11 says “But evil shall come upon you, which you will not know how to charm away; disaster shall fall upon you, for which you will not be able to atone; and ruin shall come upon you suddenly, of which you know nothing.”

Disaster has befallen us for which we are not able to atone. Ruin is upon us and we certainly seem to know nothing. We need God’s wisdom. We need God’s inspiration. Albert Einstein said “A new type of thinking is essential if mankind is to survive and move toward higher levels.” We need You, YHWH.

Take heart! A Course in Miracles says “There is no order of difficulty in miracles. One is not “harder” or “bigger” than another. They are all the same. All expressions of love are maximal.” God (by any name) can do this “save the world” thing – all He asks is that we follow His system.

American Indian prophecies point to the current human predicament, and all agree that by a return to the ways of “the people,” our Earth and humankind will not only survive, but thrive. As a culture, “the people” do not share our concept of personal ownership or possession. One practice that is common to almost every American Indian nation is called a “giveaway,” and if you attend a powwow or any other ceremonial event, you may witness a giveaway. Giving is central to being an American Indian, a way of giving thanks, bestowing honor, teaching about relationship, distributing goods for the survival of all and for maintaining balance within the community.

Sounds like the American Indians lived a heavenly life of giving and receiving. I’m for returning to the ways of “the people.”

Until then, why not try God’s cosmic re-set button?

Let’s be free.

Let’s Jubilee!