1+ day, 6+ hour ago (349+ words) I never used to think so. But a close friend recently called me absolutely thrilled about a holiday throw pillow he'd bought on sale (at 60% off, no less) for his sister for Christmas. The glee melted decades from him. I was quite charmed by his enthusiasm. It made me rethink the possibility that there is more to the spectrum of holiday anticipation than we often realize. Of course, we can also anticipate negative things. We are then flooded with fight or flight hormones like adrenaline and cortisol that may prepare us for survival but also cause us a bit of cellular damage in the process. However, at the holidays, we frequently have better things to anticipate, should we choose to frame our thinking in that way. What I find fascinating is that all the heightened consumerism, which is designed to…...

5+ day, 15+ hour ago (601+ words) DEAR BONNIE: How can I know if my loved ones are watching over me during the holiday season? I want to honor them and keep their memories and traditions alive. Thanks Ren'e DEAR REN'E: The holidays are a great time to reminisce about those you love. Watch for the signs that your loved ones are [] DEAR BONNIE: How can I know if my loved ones are watching over me during the holiday season? I want to honor them and keep their memories and traditions alive. Thanks Ren'e DEAR REN'E: The holidays are a great time to reminisce about those you love. Watch for the signs that your loved ones are close by. I have listed three different signs to watch for. Please remember your loved ones are always just a thought away and are never really gone. The holiday season…...

2+ week, 1+ day ago (291+ words) I believe we are made of two things: love and light. Perhaps that sounds like wispy new-age speak, but my personal sense of faith tells me that love is the directive force in the universe. Love is what informs the crafting of all that is. In this thinking, the atoms themselves have assembled according to the greater intent of something larger than they. And of light " science concludes that we are but light conforming into the appearance of matter. Everything we see is literally made of light. In fact, it's light reflecting off of light that we actually perceive with our eyes. Which are, of course, made themselves of light. Again, I believe we are made of two things: love and light. We are the literal intersection of science and spirit, but we pit these two ideas against one another…...

3+ week, 1+ day ago (561+ words) Multiple spiritual practices from throughout human history have pointed, each in their own way, to what might be thought of as a state of nothingness. Not always in such direct terms, but invariably they find their own ways to describe a state of being from which all possibility arises. In Christianity, the concept of kenosis understands the void as the emptying of Christ's divinity so that he could inhabit human form and surf the potential of human reality for our benefit. The Buddhist concept of sunyata, however, describes the void as the ultimate nature of reality. It is specific to point out that it is not a void of nothingness, but a dimension full of pure potential. Something each of us has the capacity to tap into. More specifically, it is described as something we are actually tapping into all…...