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In my book, A Collection of Wordstreams (published on Kindle in August 2010), I explore the emotional search for love and romance, longing and loneliness, as well as the joyful and trans-formative experience of intimacy. I also write about the spiritual experiences of exploring inner and alternate dimensions, and potentials for individuals to use these trans-formative connections with transcendental realities to become channels for creative and compassionate expressions that can bring positive changes to the world.
As a writer, I want my writings to celebrate life in all of its different facets and dimensions. I want to encourage the search for meaning in the natural cyclical rhythms of life. I want to encourage people to explore inner gateways into alternate, spiritual realities.
I want my poetry to be challenging, to spur the reader to break old, stale patterns, to entertain new possibilities in life, to be willing to search for and embrace change and transformation that will enable one to become more whole and be able to experience life more fully.
Many introductory books on astrology offer definitions for the basic symbolism of astrology without telling you how these definitions have been determined. If you are going to be able to use astrology in a personal and practical way, you have to understand the interconnective patterns behind the symbolism. If you are truly going to learn to “think astrologically,” you have to understand how the pattern of cyclical development applies to human behavior and potential.
Why is Aries associated with assertiveness? Why is Cancer associated with emotional sensitivity? Isn’t Pisces also associated with emotional sensitivity? What is the difference between the emotional sensitivity of Cancer and of Pisces? Why does Mercury symbolize our rational mind and Jupiter our abstract mind? Why does the 7th House symbolize general social relationships and the 8th House symbolize intimate one-to-one emotional sharing?
One purpose of this book is to explain how the basic symbolism of astrology is based upon the cyclical processes. Another purpose is to give you the ability to translate astrological terminology and symbolism into concepts that you can apply to your personal development.
1. Personal Willpower & Freedom 7. Social Awareness
2. Personal Physical Needs 8. Intimacy/Shared Emotions
3. Personal Rational Thinking 9. Shared Beliefs & Knowledge
4. Personal Emotional Security/Home 10. Responsibility to Society
Home & Family Career
5. Personal Creativity/Self-Expression 11. Social Progress & Altruism
6. Personal work / Physical healing 12 Spirituality & Transcendence
This 12-sided model of life emphasizes that all sides of life are equally important and necessary to the health and well-being of an individual and, in larger terms, of society. Each individual is challenged to first acknowledge that these 12 different sides exist, and then is challenged to acknowledge that they are all equally important and necessary. Then the individual is challenged to acknowledge where his/her biases are in relation to the other sides. These are the first steps in being willing to recognize other points of view and to be able to accept other points of view. More important these initial steps allow individuals to find ways of working together with others and finding common agreements.
Different individuals will gravitate to different sides of life more naturally, and will want to express the value of their orientations. This positive need to express the value of a specific side of life becomes negative and destructive when other sides are not seen as valuable or necessary for existence.
Omar Akram
I Muvrini
Allison Russell (Solo, Birds of Chicago, Po’Girl)
Pink Martini
A GOOD AND JUST SOCIETY
A good and just society seeks to serve all of its citizens, as well as respecting and caring for the well-being of people and life forms existing throughout the world.
A good and just society cares for and seeks to not destroy the natural environment not only in which it exists as a nation or community, but throughout the world , and other realities that may exist.
A good and just society does not bestow or allow privileges to be hoarded by a few at the expense of other people, society as a whole and the natural environment.
A good and just society seeks to provide public education to all of its citizens from preschool through higher education. The focuses of this education should not be to teach to pass tests, but to encourage “critical thinking, historical knowledge and a love of learning in each child.”
A good and just society seeks to make sure that no citizen goes without basic needs of shelter, food, clothing and health care.
A good and just society seeks to keep all of its citizens informed through media, while free, is not monopolized and controlled by concentrated wealth and power.
The term, democracy (or representative democratic republic) is a positive form of governing of, by and for the people, not for the elite and wealthy. The founders of our constitution believed that the greatest threat to democracy was concentrated wealth, and sought to put safeguards to keep democracy in control of the general population. But over the past two centuries at various times the wealthy have succeeded in undermining the U.S. democracy at the expense of the well-being of the working and middle classes. In the 1930, Franklin Roosevelt was able to pass the New Deal, which provided among other things, a safety net for workers and others in the general population. Since Reagan, many of the key safe guards, regulations and safety net social programs have been either removed or reduced in scope and funding. Currently, we are facing one of the worst inequities in income between the wealthy and the middle/working classes, and we are facing reduced funding for social programs, climate control, public education, health care, housing, etc.
We need campaign reform to resolve these issues, and to get us back to being a good and just society.
Musings of Mann 