Russell Brand An update on Covid-19 and the coronavirus epidemic…what has it revealed so far? How is society responding to it? What can be done? Subscribe to my channel here: http://tinyurl.com/opragcg (make sure to hit the BELL icon to be notified of new videos!)

By Maria Popova (brainpickings.org)

“How should we like it were stars to burn with a passion for us we could not return?” asked W.H. Auden (February 21, 1907–September 29, 1973) in “The More Loving One” — one of the greatest, most largehearted poems ever written. The son of a physicist, Auden wove science throughout much of his poetry — sometimes playfully, sometimes poignantly, always as a finely polished lens on the deepest moral and humanistic questions with which we live and for which we die. At the heart of his scientific poetics was the understanding that the eternal tension between knowledge and the unknown, enveloped in our ambivalent longings, is what makes us human.

Nowhere do these tessellated ideas and sensibilities come together more vibrantly than in his 1961 poem “After Reading a Child’s Guide to Modern Physics,” found in his indispensable Collected Poems (public library) and brought to life by musician Josh Groban at the third annual Universe in Verse.

Painting of W.H. Auden by astrophysicist Janna Levin

Following theoretical cosmologist and jazz saxophonist Stephon Alexander’s ardent case for the interbelonging of art and science, and reading to the background of an Auden portrait painted by astrophysicist, novelist, and poetry enchantress Janna Levin, Groban prefaced his reading of Auden with a remarkable personal story about his own great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather — a 17th-century German rebel astronomer and theologian, who allowed his scientific understanding of the cosmos to expand his spiritual life rather than contracting it with fear and dogma as the era’s church did — the same era in which Kepler’s revolutionary astronomy thrust his mother into a witchcraft trial.

Enjoy, and consider joining us in atoms for the fourth annual Universe in Verse, exploring the most fundamental question of existence: What is life?

AFTER READING A CHILD’S GUIDE TO MODERN PHYSICS
by W.H. Auden

If all a top physicist knows
About the Truth be true,
Then, for all the so-and-so’s,
Futility and grime,
Our common world contains,
We have a better time
Than the Greater Nebulae do,
Or the atoms in our brains.

Marriage is rarely bliss
But, surely it would be worse
As particles to pelt
At thousands of miles per sec
About a universe
Wherein a lover’s kiss
Would either not be felt
Or break the loved one’s neck.

Though the face at which I stare
While shaving it be cruel
For, year after year, it repels
An ageing suitor, it has,
Thank God, sufficient mass
To be altogether there,
Not an indeterminate gruel
Which is partly somewhere else.

Our eyes prefer to suppose
That a habitable place
Has a geocentric view,
That architects enclose
A quiet Euclidian space:
Exploded myths — but who
Could feel at home astraddle
An ever expanding saddle?

This passion of our kind
For the process of finding out
Is a fact one can hardly doubt,
But I would rejoice in it more
If I knew more clearly what
We wanted the knowledge for,
Felt certain still that the mind
Is free to know or not.

It has chosen once, it seems,
And whether our concern
For magnitude’s extremes
Really become a creature
Who comes in a median size,
Or politicizing Nature
Be altogether wise,
Is something we shall learn.

For other highlights from The Universe in Verse, savor Marie Howe reading her tribute to Stephen Hawking, Amanda Palmer reading Neil Gaiman’s tribute to Rachel Carson and his feminist correction of the history of science, Krista Tippett reading “Figures of Thought” by Howard Nemerov, Regina Spektor reading “Theories of Everything” by the astronomer and poet Rebecca Elson, and astrophysicist Janna Levin reading “A Brave and Startling Truth” by Maya Angelou, “Planetarium” by Adrienne Rich, and Whitman’s classic “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer.”

I am going to explain the difference between Fate and Destiny.  Fate is sometimes called Karma and Destiny is called Dharma.  We as humans, like all other living things, are a coded frequency in the quantum field.  If we do not change the epigenetic imprints in our frequency, we will follow the path of Fate.  Between conception to three years old, we form our neural networks.  We are fated to remain in these patterns, entering relationships with seemingly dissimilar people and finding out again and again that we fall into the same pattern after a few months or years.  We can come across the same kind of boss that doesn’t understand us or run up debts however high our salary is.  Without us realising, fate is repeating itself in our lives. When we experience energy work via breath-work and body-work such as in the Hoffman Process, Five-Element acupuncture and shamanic work, we can change our Fate into Destiny by clearing our coding.  We can journey and track destiny in which we heal and age differently.  Indigenous people do not believe we have to have a sealed fate with a certain genetic predisposition – they instead call it the healing of the ancestors.  They believe and experience that this coding can be altered with healing and the healing is often via plant medicine.  Through this healing we can re-inform our DNA and change our Fate.  If your grandmother was in the Holocaust you can change the trauma she experienced and passed down to you emotionally, physically and mentally.  We can grow a new body informed from a future we are manifesting with our intention.  This is true destiny. A note for now…. A lot of people have asked me, WHAT IS GOING ON AT THE MOMENT?!  In the big big universal picture a correction is going on driven by consciousness (which is us) as we are destroying ourselves and this planet.  Some people call consciousness God but really God is all of us creating frequency and that is the Tao.  The Tao is in the constant flow of opposites and if you understand that then you can understand in the big picture, that we are now being pulled in the opposite direction of constant societal expansion and economic growth.  In the smaller picture of what is around us is a climate of fear and fear creates more fear.  Too much fear keeps us in our reptilian flight or fight mode that occurs in the Amygdala part of our brain, which will also cancel out the feelings of love, togetherness, compassion and community that occur in the front of our brain, the Prefrontal Cortex.  While in this fight or flight mode we turn against each other, activated by fear.  This fear also makes us vulnerable to being controlled.  This control is an energy that forms part of a global agenda, feeding off imbalanced humans who have been taken over by fear.  I have experienced that these energy fields are not from this planet and have been within us for some time.  There is no way that despite the chemicals they ingested, that the Nazis could have behaved as they did without some form of hypnosis or control from this other energy.  Just think about that.  This energy and agenda feeds off fear.  If you can understand that we are all energy in the quantum field, you can perhaps understand what is happening.  The First Nation Cree people call this energy Wetiko. To understand this concept, read the book ‘Dispelling Wetiko’.  The most important thing to understand is that if we keep thinking that this energy is outside of us, we will feel powerless to change it.  This Wetiko is powered by our fear and we can do something about it by naming it, experiencing it and literally dispelling it from our space time reality.  It requires discipline, effort and a real understanding of love first for ourselves and then others.  We must all become Harry Potter, Luke Skywalker and Frodo Baggins who all understood that the only thing that dispels the fear is LOVE! This shadow energy would like us to be sheeple surrounded by a negative, empty culture, living on non-nutritious food, and have us constantly on our phones and computers, chipped and stuck, disconnected from each other.  The best thing you can do is move out of fear, act in a more generous loving way and move us into a collective frequency that will be a better destiny for us and our planet.  Laugh more, share more, give more. Love, Wendy. P.S. If you’ll be spending some time at home in the next few weeks, I have a reading list that might be useful for you.   Books by Dr. Gabor Mate https://drgabormate.com/books/ The Continuum Concept by Jean Liedloff https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/177/17778/the-continuum-concept/9780140192452.html Sex At Dawn by Christoper Ryan and Casilda Jetha https://www.foyles.co.uk/witem/health-wellbeing/sex-at-dawn-how-we-mate-why-we,christopher-ryan-cacilda-jetha-9780061707810 Books by Malidoma Patrice Some https://www.foyles.co.uk/all?term=Malidoma+Patrice+Some&skip=0 Books by Some Sobonfu https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=Some+Sobonfu&i=stripbooks&ref=nb_sb_noss_2 Caliban and the Witch by Silvia Federici https://www.foyles.co.uk/witem/lgbt-gender-studies/caliban-and-the-witch-women-the-body,silvia-federici-9781570270598 Books by Alberto Villoldo https://www.foyles.co.uk/all?term=alberto+villoldo Books by Mirella Ricciardi https://mirellaricciardi.com/ And finally, here are the links to my previous newsletters in case you missed them. > The Four Mantras > Transference > Our World Without Religion > Codependence > Gratitude > Codependence 2 > Monogamy

Copyright © 2019 *Wendy Mandy, All rights reserved.

March 15, 2020 (sourceofsynergyfoundation.org) Dealing with the Coronavirus Deepak Chopra on Facebook Live Deepak Chopra discusses good principles for staying healthy and more. “Let us see this adversity as a time of reflection and a time to come together to help each other and to be there for each other.” We don’t respect the ecosystem of existence, which includes all living beings. Life depends on the balanced food chain, which humanity has ruined. So watch your diet, and watch your daily rituals of good sleep, stress management and movement. This is an opportunity for us to create a completely healthy lifestyle.  “We must respect life. If we think of life as sacred, if we think of life as divine, then this challenge will only make us stronger.”Click Here to View  See Deepak Chopra’s Facebook page for his series of videos on the coronavirus.Virus as OpportunityBy Joan Borysenko, Ph.D. Virus as opportunity. Rush, worry and stress are the pandemic that will persist long after the virus recedes. So instead of getting panicky and stocking up on a month’s worth of toilet paper and margarita mix, remember to invest in rewiring your brain and nervous system for calm, healing, and yes- optimizing your immune system. How to do that? Take a deep breath and relax. Maybe meditate for 20 minutes. Do some yoga or chi gong. Listen to music- really listen. Lift your eyes to the sky and watch the clouds. Whatever you do, do it with mindful attention. Savor the hot shower. Enjoy raking the yard- feeling how your muscles move, listening to the sounds, enjoying the swelling buds. And above all, don’t waste that rare and precious cookie by thinking about something else when you eat it. Mindful activities elicit the relaxation response, the body’s counterbalance to the stress response. The fight or flight response won’t help you out run the virus. But when you relax, the parasympathetic nervous system comes online. It creates a “rest and digest” response, which invites the body’s self-healing systems to ramp up. This helps to create resilience to the virus. Remember that 80-90% of illness is caused or worsened by stress. You might recall that I’m a medical scientist, with a doctorate from Harvard Medical School. I was one of the pioneers in the field of psychoneuroimmunology – how the mind affects immunity. So, take the opportunity the virus is providing to be curious about how you could rush less and be more present in your life. You can help your body resist infection, and enjoy life more in the process! Nurture yourself with regular sleep (go to bed and wake up on a schedule), eat organic whole foods, surrender yourself to music, meditate, and take advantage of life’s goodness with more ease and grace. Did you know that the human brain is hard-wired for negativity? It’s a survival thing. My friend, psychologist Rick Hanson says that good stuff is like teflon and bad stuff is like velcro. Every time you savor something good, you actually begin to rewire your brain for happiness and resilience. So let’s foil that famous negativity bias!! Please join me and Gilah to learn about the tools that will put you in the best shape to shake off viruses, welcome spring, and enjoy the feast of life. https://gracefull360.com Or join me and Dr. Gilah for Self-Healing in Santa Fe, May 6-10. Go to http://joanborysenko.com for info about both programs. Meanwhile, enjoy the photo of the sunset reflected in clouds at our house in magical Santa Fe, NM. HOW TO TAKE THE FEAR OUT OF THE CORONAVIRUS – March 6, 2020 Let’s talk about the coronavirus and how best to approach it realistically while improving overall health, peace of mind, and enjoyment of life. In my 8-min video above, you’ll find some valuable tips about how to reduce stress, stay optimistic and maintain wellbeing.Coronavirus: Do Not Fear the BogeymanBy Dr. Bruce H. Lipton, PhD, March 10, 2020  Dear Family of Love and Seekers Everywhere, The world is currently gripped in fear of the scary coronavirus.  Let’s first get one fact clear: If you have ever had a cold or flu in your life, odds are that it was the result of a coronavirus infection. Yes, coronaviruses cause colds.   But, we are being programmed with the belief that this particular cold virus is “deadly.” This fear has shut down concerts, conferences, and major public events all over the world. The fear has led to quarantines and closing down of international travel. It has even led to a major scarcity of toilet paper in Australia, where concerned citizens emptied the shelves of this commodity in anticipation that they will be walled up in their homes with this infection.   First, how deadly is this version of the virus? Yes, there have been corona-related deaths reported with the statistics suggesting that ~2% of the infected population dies. Wow! That number is almost 1% more deaths than are attributed to any conventional flu the world experiences.  What is misleading is the fear that everyone who carries this virus may die from their cold. This is simply untrue! The health of almost all the victims of this coronavirus was already compromised before they were infected.   For example, the following information was provided by the news in regard to the 6 patients that died of the virus in the state of Washington last week (I added the bold print): Washington State Six people have died in Washington and health officials have identified 18 cases. Four of the cases in King County were linked to the Life Care nursing facility in Kirkland. More than 50 residents and staff at the facility are being tested. The deaths announced Monday, according to health officials, included: – A male in his 70s, who lived at LifeCare. He had underlying health conditions and died Sunday. – A female resident of LifeCare in her 70s. She also had underlying health conditions and died Sunday. – A woman in her 80s, who was already reported as in critical condition at EvergreenHealth, died Sunday. – A Snohomish County resident at EvergreenHealth also died but details of that patient have not been given. Two previously reported deaths included a man in his 70s who had underlying health conditions and had been a resident of LifeCare. He died at EvergreenHealth on Feb. 29. The other was a man in his 50s with underlying health conditions. He was admitted with serious respiratory issues and tested positive for the virus. He died at EvergreenHealth Medical Center in Kirkland. As emphasized in this report, the health of all those that died with the coronavirus was already compromised. Healthy people get cold and flu symptoms, while those already sick and near death’s door may experience the “Grim Reaper” when infected by the virus. True, sick people are more vulnerable to the virus; healthy people really have nothing to fear.   As presented in The Biology of Belief, stress is responsible for up to 90% of illness, including heart disease, cancer and diabetes. When an individual is in stress, the release of stress hormones (e.g., cortisol) shuts down the immune system to conserve the body’s energy for running away from the perceived stressor, that proverbial “saber-toothed tiger.” Stress hormones are so effective at compromising the immune system, that physicians therapeutically provide recipients of organ transplants with stress hormones to prevent their immune system from rejecting the foreign implant.   The conclusion is clear: The fear of the coronavirus is more deadly than the virus itself!   The media (perhaps in conjunction with the pharmaceutical industry) is compromising people’s health using the fear card! This is the result of negative thinking (the nocebo effect) which is the complete opposite of the placebo effect manifest through positive thinking! If you make efforts to stay healthy, with good nutrition, exercise, taking vitamins and supplements, and more importantly, avoiding stress (e.g., the “fear” of the virus), even if you do get infected with the virus, you will likely only end up with a cold and/or slight fever.   If you are someone with a compromised immune system, it is supportive to surround yourself with loving family and friends, nature, and positive thoughts as well as any other nutrition and vitamins that you may already be taking for your health and wellbeing. Following your intuition about what is best for you is key! The point here is that no matter who you are and what your state of health, you will only benefit from steering clear of the fear and supporting yourself in whatever way feels best to you.    Please remember the truth of quantum physics, the most valid of all sciences on the planet: Consciousness is creating your life experiences! Are you being conscious of disease … or of health? Wishing you all Health, Happiness and Harmony.Coronovirus Information BoardCourtesy of Jon Ramer  To View, Please Click Here or on the Image Below https://trello.com/b/dnEGT11t/coronavirus-information-board Jon says: “Spread Compassion, not the virus!”A Message from the CoronavirusJeff Vander Clute, 8 March 2020Photo by Фтещт Нфтлщмнш (License: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International)  There has been a lot of talk about the Coronavirus. When I connected with this novel life form and asked it to tell me about itself, what came through was a list of its top gifts, followed by a message for humanity. I was somewhat surprised, and also comforted, by the information. My hope is that these words will help people to relax and trust that life is acting with benevolent wisdom. The gifts of the virus:Slowing down humanity’s frenetic activitiesActivating networks of cooperationSpreading helpful DNAUpgrading humanity’s immune systemCreating the conditions for peace and well-beingSaving lives, especially over the long term, by strengthening the web of lifeHere is the message that the Coronavirus had to share: My friends, it is true that I am here to bring closure to the inharmonious ways of being that are causing harm to humans and the whole web of life. All the same, I am not a vengeful being or anything that is intended to be destructive. I am simply the rebalancing agent in the overall equation of life’s evolutionary process. By fighting me with fear in your hearts, you oppose the larger natural systems and cause me to take other forms. What I am, and my fundamental purpose, will not be deterred, for I am life itself acting through the available forms of distribution. The virus that you see me as is one of an endless series of permutations. This kind of process is one of the ways I innovate life forms and deliver new DNA sequences that will eventually be shown to be helpful. The back and forth between humanity’s collective immune system and the virus is raising consciousness as humans examine their interactions, and it is literally increasing the intelligence of the superorganism that is the species as a whole. These tests are normal. I repeat: These tests are normal. For those who can hear this message and embrace me easily, you already know that fear is a much more lethal poison. For those who will not be comforted by these words, one day you will know that I come as an act of love. When you can open to the love that is at the very heart of this situation, the crisis that your media and governments decry will transform into a flower of life, spreading new consciousness and multiplying circles of cooperation. Pay attention to your thoughts and see if you can identify the benefits of redirecting humanity’s attention from incessant wars and violence to the common “enemy” that I am willing to be perceived as. Love will go this far, and farther, to bring healing to the mind of a young species that is still in the process of remembering itself as a divine incarnation. Yes, you are a divine incarnation capable of fabricating realities based on goodness and beauty and compassionate understandings, actions, and beliefs. Believe me when I say that I, too, am here as an act of compassion. Accepting me in this way will lighten your heavy burden for the divine sends only love your way. Sometimes this love takes curious forms in order to circumvent your intricate defenses against waking up to your own glory. I can assure you that the most functional strategy will be to embrace me as a friend of the human family.From jeffvanderclute.comFrom James O’Dea Could this virus actually help restructure the world economy, help us build community, reinforce the role of good science and force us to stop flying around so much/ show us we can save the environment by e-commuting more and be less frenetically busy. Will we take the opportunity to step back and heed the message?Beating the Coronavirus: as Simple as A, B, CBy Lynne McTaggart Last weekend, we held our Get Well Health Expo at Olympia. Thousands came to meet the many dozens of pioneering doctors and therapists of all varieties that we had carefully selected to offer alternative solutions proven to work. Of nearly 50 brilliant talks and demonstrations, two delivered by Dr. Damien Downing, a pioneer in ecological medicine and president of the British Society of Allergy and Environmental Medicine, and Dr. Thomas Levy, a cardiologist and one of the world’s experts on vitamin C, offered the same message: there is a simple solution to the coronavirus, which has gripped the world in fear. Dr Downing was one of a team of orthomolecular doctors (who offer therapeutic nutrition based on biochemical individuality) to put together an effective plan of attack for the coronavirus. Read more: http://bit.ly/2TnYPMxSpiritual Leadership to Help Humanity Address the Coronavirus and Beyond…By David Gershon Humanity needs our spiritual leadership as it encounters this latest manifestation of our collective consciousness called the coronavirus. We need to directly help those in our spheres of influence and all of humanity raise their frequency from fear to love and compassion. This will not only protect them from contracting the virus by strengthening their immune system, but also help them them start a positive contagion to transmute the virus. A blessed opportunity for all of us to do good! Ultimately this virus is a fear epidemic not an actual health emergency, as 98% of the people who contract it experience flu type symptoms, get over it, and build up healthy antibodies. Those who suffer more or leave their body were already preparing to leave and are primarily the elderly. There will be more experiences coming over the next few years, like this one, that will test our fear transformation capacity and provide opportunities to awaken humanity from its slumber into spiritual growth and service. A key element of our reinventing the planet work is transmuting fear at the deepest level of our psyche about our viability as a species into hope about our future based on game changing personal action. This can and will transmute whatever fear comes our way. Pandemic Preparation and Positive Steps To TakeBy Stephen Dinan Excerpted from Stephen’s blog at  https://medium.com/@stephenOKdinan/pandemic-preparation-938361649386. I believe crises carry the seeds of opportunity if we approach them in the right way, which means clearly understanding the facts and strategizing a response that helps us emerge stronger and wiser on the other side. […] The best case scenario is ultimately for us to approach this global pandemic as something that calls us into a higher level of collaboration, creativity, and conscious living. We can emerge living more sustainably, peacefully, and enjoyably with our local communities. We can develop more skills for independent lifestyles. We can cultivate a higher-quality, less expensive lifestyle with less stuff. We can remember who we are and our true purpose, which is to ultimately to leave our planet better for the next generation. Sometimes is takes an apparent tragedy to wake us up. The coronavirus pandemic can be a wake up call if we face the facts soberly and move into immediate right action to mitigate the damage and optimize the upside. Let’s write the story of 2020 as a year not solely as a global tragedy but as a difficult birth of a new way of being. Just as the toughest life experiences can catalyze our greatest personal growth, so can this planetary emergency lead to a real evolution of our species. See Stephen’s blog for: PANDEMIC PREPARATION AND POSITIVE STEPS TO TAKE SPECIFIC STEPS ON WHAT TO DO!A Flow-Based Perspective on the Coronavirus: How to Thrive in the Midst of the Collective Chaos By Justin Faerman I’m re-sharing this Facebook video I made recently, given all the chaos going on in the world with the coronavirus and other similar situations these days. If you are looking for some sound advice on staying safe, sane, healthy and in a high level of flow in the midst of all the upheaval and fear, have a watch as I go over some incredible research that will help you thrive in the midst of these turbulent times. Watch video here. Phase Shift Has Arrived – Hold on to Your Hats!By Daniel Christian Wahl Let’s make this the catalyst for the re-design and regeneration of the human impact on Earth – we can heal the Earth and her people, regenerate ecosystems everywhere, regenerate our cooperative nature and build renewed social cohesion through community solidarity … This is the time to accept that change is no longer an option but now forced on us at a scale that the current economic system will AND SHOULD NOT recover from! … the time to (re)create vibrant bioregional economies that incentivise ecosystems regeneration and a reregionalisation of production and consumption is here. Time to switch to Gameb – a globally cooperative humanity worth its name … united in the commitment to create conditions conducive to life and redesign the human impact on the planet from exploitative and degenerative to healing and regenerative. Yes, this pandemic is upon us and the stock markets are collapsing, production, air travel, air pollution, … are dropping … recent predictions based on a model by researchers of the Universities of Based and Stockholm suggest that even with a summer dip in the rate of increase the COVID-19 virus could infect 100 million people (at a time) by Winter 2020/21. Let’s not plan for return to business as usual after this – the climate emergency and obscene levels of in equality within and between countries clearly indicate that BAU was not working and heading for imminent collapse and synchronous failure anyway. We are now pushed to a global mobilisation of resources and civic participation that the planet has not seen before. Let us not waste time by pretending that what we had before was working or is worth returning to.What are some of the measures that communities, cities and regions will have to have to begin to explore anyway? How do we feed our population at the bioregional scale from food grown mainly regionally? How to we provide energy from regional renewable resources as oil production and oil prices force us out of fossil fuels (for good)? How to we switch to regional transport systems that are not dependent on expensive imports of fuel? In short, we need to redesign for community and regional resilience to a turbulent economic future while increasing food, water energy sovereignty at those scales. This kind of resilience building was needed in any case as a global preparation for a worsening climate crisis and to avoid cataclysmic runaway climate change. The scale of collaboration needed for the response to climate change seemed impossible to catalyse in the time we had left. Now COVID 19 is forcing us to mobilise in unprecedented ways and we are doing so as one global species facing a calamity that we can only solve collaboratively and together – for all equally – or we will not solve it at all! … sounds familiar? COVID 19 might become the catalyst for the transformation of the human presence and impact on Earth that climate change should have been but was to diffuse of a thread for our species to come together around in an effective way. Now that we are and have to achieve this, let us make the most of the effort and resources spent! The world will never be the same. … and that can be a good thing too! Already the lives saved by dropping air pollution in China alone might soon begin to out-number the tragic and catastrophic loss of lives that the viral pandemic is and will continue to cause. With suffering and loss at that scale it is inappropriate to draw comparisons and comparing numbers does not reduce the suffering for those affected. Even if the viral death tall ends up being much larger than currently estimated it will remain a fraction of the death toll caused by the systemic dysfunctionalities of our current system and expected to be caused by the kind of climate change and ecosystems collapse scenarios we were heading for in the short to mid-term in any case. Phase shift is here! We will surprise ourselves with our capacity to collaborate across boards as one global species! Let’s make our efforts count and design for human and planetary health as we build a new future together based on diverse regenerative cultures everywhere. Diverse bioregional economies supporting cultures that heal their local rivers, regenerate forests, grasslands, soils, wetlands and oceans. Cultures that are elegantly adapted to the bicultural uniqueness of the bioregions we now have the opportunity to re-inhabit has healers and in a globally collaborative way! reGeneration Rising! Trim-Tabs Unite! … or as my friend Joe Brewer likes to say: “Onwards fellow humans!”The Chinese Medicine/Macrobiotic Approach to Protecting Yourself From the CoronavirusBy Dr. Michael Wayne, Ph.D., L.Ac. As a long time practitioner of Chinese medicine and long time proponent of eating a macrobiotic diet, I often think of the opening passage of the seminal book of Chinese Medicine, “The Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine,” also know as the Nei Jing. In the beginning of this 2,200 year old book, the Yellow Emperor asks his personal physician, Qibo, why people aren’t as healthy or live as long as people once did, to which Qibo replies that people have gotten out of balance with the natural order of things and have lost the Way (the Way meaning the Tao), and that because of this, their poor dietary and lifestyle choices were leading them to serious health issues. That’s an interesting observation from Qibo, especially since his observation came 2,200 years ago, in an epoch that was much simpler than our current times. If Qibo and the Yellow Emperor thought people had lost the Way back then, imagine what they would think now. In our era, people have surely lost the Way, what with the level of serious health issues that abound. And as we currently see with the threat of the coronavirus, nature is on a trajectory of self-regulation to help reestablish the natural order of things – as nature will do – since people have lost the Way. Yet, as the virus, or the threat of the virus, wreaks havoc on routines and lives, this can be seen as a learning opportunity – just as the Chinese word for crisis, 危机, is composed of the words danger and opportunity. The opportunity is there, if we so choose to see it. A virus, including the coronavirus, is a biological agent that reproduces inside the cells of a living host; once the host cell is infected by the virus, it’s forced to produce thousands of identical copies of the original virus at an extraordinary rate. Viruses are not malicious; instead they are intelligent, full of information, and always on the lookout for a susceptible host. And when humans lose the Way, that’s when they become a susceptible host. To date, 5,000 species of viruses have been discovered; each time a new virus is mapped out, it’s considered a novel strain – that’s why the coronavirus is considered novel, because it’s a new strain. And because it’s a novel strain and there’s no known way to stop its trajectory right now – outside of the public health measures that are being advocated in order to “flatten the curve” – it’s creating a certain level of heightened anxiety and panic. But if we come back to the Way, to the Tao, we can help arrest the growth of the virus and at the same time, not be susceptible hosts. According to the Tao Te Ching, we should never destroy that which may appear to be our enemy; instead, we must seek to achieve the harmony of opposites. This is the teaching of the Way. Within our body are trillions of microbes; when we are in proper balance, these microbes are beneficial and help maintain good health. Viruses are also microbes, but they only proliferate in the body when we are not in proper balance. As I said above, viruses are intelligent and full of information; there is much complexity within the makeup of a virus. The best way to overcome a virus and achieve the harmony of opposites is to introduce complexity into the body, which then overwhelms the virus. That is why the treatment of human immunodeficiency virus – HIV – turned the tide when drug cocktails were introduced: instead of just one drug used to stop HIV, a multitude of drugs were used, and in the process, created much complexity within the body, thus overwhelming and neutralizing the virus. Chinese medicine has intuitively understood this need for complexity in its long and storied history. Over hundreds and thousands of years, China has had to withstand epidemic diseases, and over time, the wisdom of the ancient Chinese doctors realized that the best approach to dealing with viral epidemics was complexity, in the form not of drug cocktails but of herbal formulas, which is a cocktail of usually four to 20 different herbs. Famous herbs used in these formulas, and still used today, include Qing Hao, or Wormwood; Huang Lian, or Coptis; Chuan Xin Lian, or Andrographis; Yin Chen Hao, or Artemisia capillaris; and Sheng di Huang, or Rehmannia root. All of these herbs are readily available today and can be used as part of a formula to help overcome any virus situation. Most importantly, you can restore balance, create complexity in your body, and bring yourself back into alignment with the Way/Tao through diet. This is where the wisdom of macrobiotics comes into play, as the macrobiotic approach to eating has always understood the healing power and Way of food. Before a whole foods, plant-based diet was a popular conception, there was macrobiotics, pointing to the wisdom of eating a grain based, primarily plant based diet. Macrobiotics is based on the traditional Japanese approach to eating, with an emphasis on whole grains, various vegetables, and legumes, including tofu and tempeh; included in this are certain high quality, medicinal foods that nowadays some would call superfoods: foods such as miso; tamari; seaweeds; umeboshi plums and paste; mochi; tekka; root vegetables such as daikon, burdock, lotus root, jinenjo, and taro potato; seitan; pickled foods; kuzu; kanten; natto; shitake mushrooms; and others. All these macrobiotic foods are capable of creating complexity in the body by mobilizing the trillions of microbes in your body to be activated, energized, and invigorated, which then catalyzes the microbes to immobilize microbial life that is seen as detrimental to the body, such as viruses; in addition, it makes sure the body is not capable of being a susceptible host to any sort of virus that is looking to invade the cells of your body and infect it. While using Chinese Medicine and eating a macrobiotic diet doesn’t supplant or negate the commonsense public health advice being advocated right now to stop the spread of the coronavirus, at the same time, the Chinese Medicine/ macrobiotic approach can help protect you from the coronavirus by guiding you back to the Way, allowing you to live a more balanced life, and eliminate the opportunity for you to be a susceptible host. As this is just a short overview of the Chinese Medicine and macrobiotic approach, I’d be happy to answer any questions. You can email me at drmichaelwayne@me.com. My website is www.drmichaelwayne.com.We Need to Seek a Higher Faith Rather Than a Worldwide FearBy Drs. J.J. and Desiree Hurtak Much of the world media is pushing humanity into a psychology of fear rather than an understanding how we are to use our greater powers of higher consciousness to overcome negative realities. This is what a Living Faith is all about! The bottom line: Be practical and cautious, but most importantly, be daily renewed through the indwelling power of your Higher Self. In daily practice, we are to be both cautious and co-creative in the way we can share the daily bread, without caving in to a life style of fear that would diminish the opportunity to fully use our gifts of positive psychology and sociology, even in the face of danger! HOWEVER DARK THE HORIZONS, THIS IS THE GREATEST TIME FOR US TO USE THE OUTPOURING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. Those of you who have traveled to India, Africa or even parts of South America, know that 1/4 of the population in those areas live with some type of illness and are on the front lines of near-starvation, intensified by environmental changes and lack of non-renewable resources, including fresh water. Also be aware that this is only the first of the new challenges we will be facing in the coming years. By understanding and using the limitless energies from a higher spectrum of Life, connected directly with the Shekinah Glory, the Language of Light and the Sacred Scriptures, we can be as Mother Teresa, who had no fear of going into the places of India that had leprosy, cholera and other deadly diseases. Of course, we need to be vigilant, but instead of focusing on just the virus, see the “Corona discharge” – the paraphysical term for the ‘bio-photonic discharge of light’ energy that naturally comes off your body (according to Dr. Marcel Vogel and Dr. Richard Gerber, who had both studied The Keys of Enoch®). We are really light beings and when you let the Divine Energy flow into your body and mind, you are fused with the Holy Spirit in bringing forth a renewing power of the Divine. You are also protected. If you feel the need, call upon Michael, the Christ or any power of the Divine your directly wish to connect to — stay centered in the Light. Let us make a commitment to be fused with ‘the Light’ that comes by the use of Prayer and the Divine Names of the Christ and the Holy Spirit (Heb.: Ruach Ha Kodesh). Indeed, let us bring comfort, hope, understanding and protection into our communities with the power of Prayer, to transform those who are living in fear and darkness. Let us say together: Ruach Ha Kodesh Christou.   At this moment let us be one with the Holy Spirit, who is totally aware of all that is unfolding within and around us. Only Higher Divine Guidance can truly help each of us with the problems we have, and will be, facing with planetary changes. This is the opportunity to awaken our inner Faith and Strength. Planetary changes include viruses and other plagues, as mentioned in the Bible, which will continue to be felt, but remember, the people of Faith lived through them all. Now is the time to activate your Living Faith that provides you insights and, ultimately, provides you with Eternal Life and the joy of using the “Gifts” from on High, rather than a life of fear of the shadows of Death. Let us be the Light, the Love and share the Power of our Faith, understanding the Power of the Divine. Psalm 51 reminds us to ask for Divine help as it says: “… Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me….” Be as Mother Teresa and do not deny the OUTPOURING of the Power and Gifts of the Holy Spirit in your life! Be Blessed and be Strong in the power of God’s Word speaking within you,   Pax Vobiscum: Peace be with you!

Natural Remedies for Covid 19 & Rational, Solution-Based Thinking & ResultsBy Mitchell J. Rabin, M.A., L.AC. We’re all in ‘the grip” (no pun intended) of the media hysteria, it’s become embedded in the field. Unhealthy.  Some good facts come through. More fear but some facts. Beyond both:   What to do about the Coronavirus? THINK!!! And take a look at how the mind influences our immune system and same with Vitamin C. Let’s focus not on fear and emptying stadiums but on rational thinking, science and solutions…. Below is an excerpt from Mitchell’s page. See all of his suggestions here:  http://abetterworld.tv/natural-remedies-for-coronavirus-rational-solution-based-thinking/  * * *At the end of the day, a lot of our health is in our own hands. That largely means that we keep our immune system well fortified. Through lifestyle choices we make regarding attitude, emotional wellness, stress management, centering, diet, exercise, sleep, steering clear of toxic foods, water, air and environments, enjoy plenty of laughing and loving, cultural/artistic self-expression and enjoyment of others, healthy relationships, healthy sexual expression, a daily diet of love, appreciation and gratitude, dwelling on healthy thoughts, listening to beautiful music, Chi-Kung, meditation, essential oils, living with purpose and serving what is higher and larger than ourselves like all sentient life, all aggregate to strengthen our immune system and resolve, to inform our commitment to health and well-being. Laugh all you want and like the famous Norman Cousens, you may just laugh yourself to health.    Do you think that these assertions in the face of this serious pandemic are silly? You may, but the science supports these assertions. We know factually what the experience and perception of stress does to the immune system. It is measurable and has been measured for decades. We know about adrenaline and cortisol release into the blood. We know what happens then when we are in cerebral and heart incoherence or its opposite, coherence and the effects these have on our physiology.  We also know the effect of the perception of, experience of love, gratitude and laughter are on the immune system, cell production, I do not think that we should be relying on these alone to neutralize the effects of any illness when we also know that additionally, there are potent immune-builders as Vit. C, D and a host of many vitamins and herbs (list below in detail in an article by Richard Gale and Gary Null). Combined, we have a scientifically-based, rational solution which will also lift our spirit as well as strengthen our body. It’s time that we truly honor the entirety of science, not just those areas we may prefer. Psychoneuroimmunology is the medical specialty that has re-integrated the mind and body systems into a coherent whole. The research done here, in neuroscience and endocrinology is extraordinary and at times considered to be particularly stressful, trotted out for all to see.  It is good to remember at times like we’re currently facing that what kept many Jews and others alive in the Concentration Camps when daily life was as horrific and bleak as it gets, was there ability to self-express at night through music, comedy, song, story and theater and connect with others. No drug or vaccine can accomplish these. The closest would be shamanically – and recently-scientifically – sanctioned plant medicines. Regarding strengthening the immune system and mind, below are two articles which educate us about very useful choices. Good to remember that fear shuts down the immune system as well as puts it on alert through adrenaline and cortisol release. While necessary for survival in some instances while that saber-toothed tiger is tearing after you down Madison Avenue, they are also strong toxins to our system. Hope, faith, love, compassion and gratitude, the positive emotions, have been proven to build the immune system. So while not everything is up to us, it is wise and prudent to engage and use what is.  Below is an article from GreenMedInfo describing hospital discharges in Shanghai of patients with coronavirus who healed through mega-doses of Vitamin C. Linus Pauling, who performed the ground-breaking research showing the extraordinary effects of Vit. C was the only person in history to be awarded two Nobel Prizes for his work on Vitamin C. The power of his and subsequent research has not gotten the recognition it deserves. One can speculate about why but for those of us who have been looking at this and related subjects for decades have a pretty good idea: There isn’t much money in it and widespread public knowledge of its efficacy (and Vitamin D, etc.) would greatly dent the medical industry’s control and market share. Whatever empowers people to take care of their own health means less or no dependence on the medical industry and is downplayed, sad as this may be. Read all the information on Mitchell’s blog at  http://abetterworld.tv/natural-remedies-for-coronavirus-rational-solution-based-thinking/ .COLLAPSE AND REGENERATION: Walking the Line Between Denial and DespairBy Lynnaea Lumbard for NewStories, March 14, 2020 A couple of months ago, I received an email from Jenn Meilleur, our soon to be new Executive Director at NewStories. She was curious about an article she had received on Deep Adaptation or “adapting to likely collapse.” Her question galvanized an outpouring of my thoughts that have been percolating for months on Collapse and Regeneration, which has become the emergent theme of NewStories work. For years now, NewStories has utilized the Two Loops map of a world in transition. The first loop represents the rise and fall trajectory of our current civilization, based on a set of worldviews and values which emerged in the Scientific Revolution of the late 1700’s. We talk about this loop as having peaked and being in decline. The second loop shows the birth cycle of a new emerging civilization based on a different set of beliefs and values which offer a more integral model for our relationships to Earth and to other humans. Initially it too seems to decline before the new ideas and values systems begin to gain strength and become a new blueprint, a new possibility, a new kind of civilization for Humanity. This pattern parallels the metaphor of imaginal cells emerging in a cocoon initially being killed by the old cells before they get strong enough to coalesce into a butterfly.  The Berkana Institute, NewStories and others started developing this map almost 20 years ago. Quickly, a new element was added to the map beyond the two loops – a bridge where it might be possible for people to cross over to the regenerative curve of the second loop without needing to fall all the way into collapse or to have been part of the early experimenter work.  For most of its lifetime, NewStories has worked to strengthen the upward curve of the second loop and to build the bridge from one paradigm to another through story and on-the-ground community building. Our work has both emphasized support for those working in existing institutions on the first loop who are developing new approaches and those starting or continuing on the second loop. Both pieces are essential – keeping things working even as they fall apart and building the new. Now we are rapidly becoming aware that none of us are going to be left out of the collapse of of multiple systems in which we live. Wars may be happening elsewhere, but fires, floods, hurricanes, bomb cyclones, tsunamis, crop failures, earthquakes and now pandemics are all around us. There is no way out of the experience of the collapse. We are already in it. Even those who may have bought their million-dollar apartments in underground bunkers in the desert are not going to be able to avoid the impact. No matter what your privilege, we are still all interconnected and when the food supply runs out, the grid goes down, communications stop, water runs out, and millions have a virus, we will all feel it. It’s essential that we learn how to hospice the passing of the old so it spews as little destruction and death as possible while we also midwife newly emerging patterns of compassionate caring and interconnectedness. Nowhere is this more evident than in our current crisis of COVID-19. The collapse is screaming from the headlines. And simultaneously the regeneration is flooding my email box. Everywhere people are coming up with new ways to connect and communicate, creatively adapting to being together in new ways. Our work over the next few months and years is to walk the line between denial and despair in ourselves and in our communities. Neither are an option. We must face the truth of the collapse that is unfolding and do our best to meet the challenges of rapid change without falling into despair. We need to feel our grief and also find our joy in celebration. I believe that holding the tensions between these opposites will eventually engender the transcendent function that will take us to a new, never before experienced consciousness. We must be brave and steadfast and take care of our ourselves and others. We each have choices to make, and the choices we make today determine tomorrow. May we continue to co-create the future we want to live in together.Coronavirus Crisis: Touching, Not Touching, Not SeparateTerry Patten Interviews Thomas Hübl, March 14, 2020I’m honored to release our new podcast conversation with the remarkable Austrian mystic, Thomas Hübl, speaking, healthy, but in mandatory quarantine in his home in Tel Aviv. We are calling the episode “Touching, Not Touching, Not Separate.” We presenced what is in the field — a lot of confusion, and the very human fears so many people are feeling about physical disease (to themselves and to loved ones) as well as fears about financial setbacks and sustaining their lifestyles. Among many tender observations and striking insights that emerged in this wide-ranging conversation, I want to call your attention to our conversation about “the system.” In a previous conversation, Thomas and I discussed I observed the paradox, that even though our system is completely unsustainable, we depend on it for our well-being. So we need to help it become healthier and more coherent, even as we work to help it become more sustainable. Thomas pointed out something crucial then about the ways people commonly relate to “the system.” Many of us commonly speak negatively or at least critically, about “the system” of human society, economy and civilization. (For good reasons. There is much that is unhealthy and needs to change.) However, Thomas observes that we are not truly separate from the system. What do we even mean when we say “the system”? And he suggests that even though we rightly intend for it to improve and transform unsustainable habits — we first may need to learn to love the system. I think this insight can help us practice in a more integrated way. And I find myself contemplating the organic transformation of our stance, our worldview, and our very ways of being — and how that can evolve how we relate to the fear in ourselves and in others — as well as the larger systemic turbulence, and even sometimes scary breakdowns. Listen to the episode “Thomas Hübl on Coronavirus Crisis: Touching, Not Touching, Not Separate” now on State of Emergence on any podcast player (Apple, Google, Stitcher, Spotify, TuneIn) or at stateofemergence.org.Prophecied Impact of Incurable Diseases on Global Economy and Beyond, March 1995, UN Headquarters, New YorkBy Chief Phil Lane, Jr. Beloved Friends and Relatives, It is my prayer that each of you and all of our Beloved Relatives of our Human Family are moving forward in the most graceful, healthy, compassionate and unified manner, possible. In March 1995, I was invited to make a presentation to UN Secretary-General, Javier Pérez de Cuellar and the World Commission on Culture and Development at UN Headquarters, New York, NY. My presentation, PROPHECIES, REALITIES AND GUIDING PRINCIPLES FOR THE FUTURE, included a Seven Point Summary of the Prophecied Global Challenges facing our Human Family, that I had experienced and that had been shared with me, by Indigenous elders, spiritual mentors, and teachings, over the years. As well, I shared the Sixteen Guiding Principles for Building a Sustainable and Harmonious World, publically, for the first time. These Sixteen Guiding Principles emerged from a 12-year process of reflection, consultation and action within Indigenous communities across Turtle Island. Since elder guided consultation began on these Guiding Principles in 1982, these Guiding Principles have been shared widely across the Americas and beyond. They are rooted in the concerns and wisdom of 1000’s of Indigenous elders, leaders, and community members, as well as, in the best thinking of many non-Indigenous scholars, researchers and human and community development practitioners.After sharing the Summary of the Prophesied Global Challenges, I shared that: “Not only is each one of these seven challenges monumental in themselves, but it is obvious to see that we are approaching a global catastrophe, as the crossroads at which they all meet is coming rapidly into view. It will take bold, courageous, unified and selfless action to avert such destruction; the choice to do so is ours, and that decision is ultimately a spiritual one.” Twenty-five years have now passed and we are now clearly seeing the beginning of the global impact of these seven monumental challenges intersecting, with growing global impact. The potential global catastrophe we are now facing, as prophecied, has the potential to be immense. At the same time, I understand that all that has, is and will happen, is far, far beyond my understanding and perspective. From my experience, only through consultation, compassion, unity, and, principle-centered, unprecedented, unified action, between all concerned, will we have the capacity to manifest Peace on Earth, as prophecied, sooner than later. After 75 winters, I am beginning to more deeply understand my father’s counsel since I was young, “Son, there is a sacred rhythm of life, an ebb, and flow, expansion, and contraction, and times to expand and times to consolidate.” More than ever before we, as a Human Family, need to forge together, a respectful, principle-centered Way Forward to a just and prosperous future for us. It appears we have been given a very important time of consolidation, integration, unification, and reflection, on the concrete, principle-centered actions needed to co-create the clear beginnings of Peace on Earth by 2030. Toward the Way Forward, sister Sommer Joy Ramer, brother Jon Ramer, myself and SINE (Synergized Impact Network), would like to warmly invite you to join us on a series of ZOOM Calls and SINE Waves on Facebook, during this time of consolidation and reflection, on the concrete, principle-centered actions needed to co-create the clear beginnings of Peace on Earth by 2030. These calls will begin with large and small groups, integrated into a consultation process on the Seven Challenges and the Way Forward. Thank you for taking the time to read and reflect. It is deeply appreciated!For Once I Have to Write About the NewsBy Sarah McCrum There’s been a change in the way the news media is working. I’ve noticed it especially in the last 12 months.  It started to grow last year with the focus on climate change at every opportunity. It became much stronger with the bushfires in Australia and it’s become even more obvious with the coronavirus. During 2019 we reached a point where I sensed that the reporting of climate change was beginning to make the challenges worse than they actually were. I don’t mean that the reporting was making it sound worse than the reality. That’s normal and to be expected. I mean that the level of focus and fear-mongering was manifesting and speeding up the disruption to our climate.On the principles of manifestation that I’ve studied for years, this makes sense. What we pay attention to grows. What we’re afraid of expands. And with the focus of the world’s media on the same topic every day, that’s a lot of people’s attention and a lot of fear. When they first started reporting the bushfires it seemed to me like regular reporting at a quiet time over the holiday and new year period. But at a certain point the energy changed. We were told that “Australia is on fire”.  However disturbing and distressing the situation for the affected communities, Australia, which is a vast country, was not on fire. But at that point, it seemed that the intensity of the reporting started to fan the flames of the fires and was literally making them worse.  And now we have corona. I’m not an avid news follower and I try to avoid mainstream media because it’s clear to me that the choice of what constitutes news has little to do with what’s significant or meaningful. But I am absolutely shocked at what’s going on.  As I flew to Singapore two weeks ago in a plane that was three-quarters empty, I felt that I could pick up a fever psychosomatically. The fear was tangible and I’m wondering at what point we’ll discover you can catch a virus by watching too much news. It might sound disrespectful. I understand that a new virus spreading across the world is a scary prospect, but the energy of this situation is bizarre. The fear that has been manufactured, and the extraordinary images of people in full protective gear, gas masks etc, are creating an energy that is more potent than the virus itself.  It would make sense to me that in a wise, mature society, the media would play a role in helping people to keep calm, focus on being healthy and protecting the vulnerable.  There’s an interesting side to this that I keep thinking about. It started with the bushfires. There was a global response and the consciousness community got busy organising a global online meditation to bring rain. I even know an 11-year-old girl who organised a rain dance with her friends. I’m sure there were many others.   At first it seemed as if nothing happened. A few drops of rain and the fires continued to rage. But a couple of weeks later it started to rain. And it rained and rained and rained. Here in Queensland, we’ve had the wettest summer imaginable. In February only a handful of days were sunny and the all day downpours have continued into March. There’s been major flooding and we’re no longer hearing the story of the bushfires because they’ve stopped.  Now, this might be a sign of the new normal – just another extreme weather event, but there are two points that stick in my mind. The first that I remember vividly is an Australian bushfire expert on television predicting that those fires were just the beginning. The long-range forecast back then was for a long, hot, dry summer. What happened? The other thing I remember was that when the fires were at their peak I received many emails asking if my husband and I were ok. One woman said she was praying for rain to fall all the way across Australia.  At the time it seemed odd. Most of this country is desert. It was very unlikely that it would rain everywhere. But every day now when I get up to another day of pouring rain, grey clouds and intense humidity I think of all those people who prayed for rain and wonder if there’s a connection. As these scenarios play out, I get the feeling that we’re witnessing a wonderful phenomenon – the rising of global consciousness and the ability of an aligned crowd using subtle technologies (such as meditation and prayer) to influence world events.  Lynne McTaggart has shown time and time again how this works, through her books, “The Field,” “ The Intention Experiment,” and “The Power of Eight” and her massive group intention experiments. For a group to come together through the power of social media, and have this effect, is very encouraging for the future. It’s important to point out that we can never be sure of these outcomes. I am not claiming that the global meditation caused the rain. Lynne McTaggart doesn’t claim that the global experiments cause the outcomes. However, I’ve seen these apparently coincidental occurrences so often and in so many ways that I have no doubt there is something significant enough going on to merit a lot of attention.  When I see the irrationality and craziness of the world’s media, as it increasingly focuses on a single topic and whips us into a fervour of fear, I feel that I’m witnessing the dying screams of an old way of doing things as a new way emerges into the light of day. Can you imagine the power of well-designed group meditations and prayers for climate stability? Or powerful group meditations for cleaning pollution? Or global healing for the corona virus itself, so the drama simply quietens down and the disease is allowed to disappear as quickly as it emerged?  Anyone who’s bored with the news would do well to spend their time learning how to meditate effectively, how to pray in a way that works and how to manifest more of what you want to experience in the world and less of what you don’t want. You may or may not be successful in your desired outcome, but you will learn so much along the way that you will be very grateful for having put time into it.  It seems to me that our challenge now is to learn how to put out fires without causing floods, how to influence the climate without adding to instability; how to clean pollution without inciting more damage; how to heal viruses and other common diseases so we can all enjoy a better quality of life.  Now that’s worthy of our attention and it will help to keep us healthier at the same time.  If you want to participate in being part of the solution, please join me in a live online collective healing event on March 16/17. I will share with you a powerful way to face fear and we’ll relax together as a group to activate collective healing of the corona virus. Join the Activation for Collective Healing.2020, Vision, and “Head and Heart” Energies By Jarrad Hewett 2020 is an extraordinary year, in so many ways. We started off with a rocket-ship of energy, and the planet has been increasing in speed and frequency, ever since.     This year is very much focused on vision: who are we, we have we been, and who do we wish to become.     In so many ways, everything coming to a head, right now, in the world, is representative of this immense energy and the structural changes we are all collectively and individually experiencing.     So, I wanted to simply share a bit about my perspective – an energetic perspective – on what the coronavirus represents.    I was asked a question last Sunday, and I wanted to share the answer, and add a bit to it, as well as include a very strong energetic claim at the end, to help you center, whole, heal, and ground. The topic was specifically coronavirus, and how to create in a way that wasn’t re-active or driven by panic. Here is my answer:   A lot of what’s been happening in the world, is all about the head and the heart coming together – and how that looks in this space of vision… who we have been, who we are, and who we are becoming, in this moment of now, which is all there ever is.   There’s a larger psychological lesson to this which reflects the energetic, and it’s about choice and balance, about bringing the head and heart together, and from that space, utilizing facts and science and information – which requires us to trust what we’ve created at larger levels – And if we don’t trust those, than we need to change them, or create spaces wherein we do.   There’s a space where people would like to return to simplicity and trust (which is heart), and where we want facts to BE facts (head). We want and desire honesty, and at a wider level, there’s such a fear and a “me-me, mine-mine” energy, that these manifestations are inevitable until we, as a whole, can begin to fully love everyone – and what I mean by that is not just a lip service kind of love – which we sometimes give ourselves, as well – but an actually showing and being of love.   Right now, we have an unprecedented opportunity to balance the head and heart.      We’ve had Atlantis where it was all head, and we’ve had Lemuria, where it was all heart… and, right now, on earth, we are very much working our way through the screaming inner child who wants that toy NOW and DOES NOT want to share!     This is a major balancing – or opportunity and calling forth – for that masculine, feminine, and child and for an emergence and merging or marriage of heart and head, working as one (mirrored in our pituitary and pineal glands, as well, which create how we see ourself and create our world), wherein we know, as the child, as well, we are safe and taken care of, and can therefore “see with our eyes,” “hear with our ears” and accept, love, and create what we desire, based on a new dynamic of balance, inside and out.   In these moments, our job, is to unite as THE I AM THAT I AM, bringing all of us on board: head, heart, and our playful, joyful selves, and find the knowing, love, and leadership inside of us – which is how the return to centered, balanced, emotion, feeling, and facts all come into play… head and heart… head and heart…     So, with that in mind,  here is our Intention and Claim: I choose and know that I am One with the True Light of Creation, the Love of All, the Light of All, and I allow all wounds to be healed, all loops to be closed and transmuted, and I direct, choose, and allow that the Light of Truth be shone upon All, knowing the Truth to be Love and Joy, Ease, Empowerment, and Peace.   I take full responsibility for the creation of all that I AM, and I release and direct into the light of Source for healing any and all fear and limitation, as well as Genetic Templates and patterns, cords, obligations, contracts or agreements known or unknown, in all time and space, known or unknown.     I DIRECT THAT I AM COMPLETE AND WHOLE IN EVERY MOMENT.   I CHOOSE THAT I AM COMPLETE AND WHOLE IN EVERY MOMENT.   I ALLOW THAT I AM COMPLETE AND WHOLE IN EVERY MOMENT.    And I am enough!   I AM WORTHY!   I LOVE AND RESPECT MYSELF.   I recognize, claim, and affirm that I AM the creation of me. I acknowledge, affirm, claim, direct, and choose to know that I am the creation of me, and I choose to create myself with the Authority of the Divine, with Love, and Joy and Power in Divine Love, Peace, simplicity, and Pure Divine Inspiration and flow.   I choose to stand firm in the knowing that I AM THAT I AM and that any energy I may have been carrying, creating, or giving my power away to – including but not limited to the energies of sabotage or anger or rage or destruction or any lower vibration or energy in any shape or form is released and transmuted, and I choose a new.     I choose LOVE and GNOST. I CHOOSE KNOWING.     I direct the dissolution of all bonds between any and all frequencies which may be holding me in duality, polarity, or from committing 100 percent to the creation of that which I truly desire. I know that I desire total freedom, and I direct the dissolution of all bonds between any frequencies holding limitations around freedom, love, and my ascension and creation, as well as truly knowing myself as creation and I AM THAT I AM through love and pure joy made manifest.   AND SO IT IS.

Definition of law of contradiction

a principle in logic: a thing cannot at the same time both be and not be of a specified kind (as a table and not a table) or in a specified manner (as red or not red)

(Merriam-Webster.com)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Virus
Rotavirus
Virus classification
(unranked):	Virus
Various
See text

A virus is a small infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses can infect all types of life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea.^[1]

Since Dmitri Ivanovsky‘s 1892 article describing a non-bacterial pathogen infecting tobacco plants, and the discovery of the tobacco mosaic virus by Martinus Beijerinck in 1898,^[2] about 5,000 virus species have been described in detail,^[3] of the millions of types of viruses in the environment.^[4] Viruses are found in almost every ecosystem on Earth and are the most numerous type of biological entity.^[5][6] The study of viruses is known as virology, a sub-speciality of microbiology.

While not inside an infected cell or in the process of infecting a cell, viruses exist in the form of independent particles, or virions, consisting of: (i) the genetic material, i.e. long molecules of DNA or RNA that encode the structure of the proteins by which the virus acts; (ii) a protein coat, the capsid, which surrounds and protects the genetic material; and in some cases (iii) an outside envelope of lipids. The shapes of these virus particles range from simple helical and icosahedral forms to more complex structures. Most virus species have virions too small to be seen with an optical microscope, about one hundredth the size of most bacteria.

The origins of viruses in the evolutionary history of life are unclear: some may have evolved from plasmids—pieces of DNA that can move between cells—while others may have evolved from bacteria. In evolution, viruses are an important means of horizontal gene transfer, which increases genetic diversity in a way analogous to sexual reproduction.^[7] Viruses are considered by some to be a life form, because they carry genetic material, reproduce, and evolve through natural selection, although they lack key characteristics (such as cell structure) that are generally considered necessary to count as life. Because they possess some but not all such qualities, viruses have been described as “organisms at the edge of life”,^[8] and as replicators.^[9]

Viruses spread in many ways. One transmission pathway is through disease-bearing organisms known as vectors: for example, viruses are often transmitted from plant to plant by insects that feed on plant sap, such as aphids; and viruses in animals can be carried by blood-sucking insects. Influenza viruses are spread by coughing and sneezing. Norovirus and rotavirus, common causes of viral gastroenteritis, are transmitted by the faecal–oral route, passed by contact and entering the body in food or water. HIV is one of several viruses transmitted through sexual contact and by exposure to infected blood. The variety of host cells that a virus can infect is called its “host range“. This can be narrow, meaning a virus is capable of infecting few species, or broad, meaning it is capable of infecting many.^[10]

Viral infections in animals provoke an immune response that usually eliminates the infecting virus. Immune responses can also be produced by vaccines, which confer an artificially acquired immunity to the specific viral infection. Some viruses, including those that cause AIDS, HPV, and viral hepatitis, evade these immune responses and result in chronic infections. Several antiviral drugs have been developed.

Etymology

The word is from the Latin neuter vīrus referring to poison and other noxious liquids, from the same Indo-European base as Sanskrit viṣa, Avestan vīša, and ancient Greek ἰός (all meaning “poison”), first attested in English in 1398 in John Trevisa’s translation of Bartholomeus Anglicus’s De Proprietatibus Rerum.^[11][12] Virulent, from Latin virulentus (poisonous), dates to c. 1400.^[13][14] A meaning of “agent that causes infectious disease” is first recorded in 1728,^[12] long before the discovery of viruses by Dmitri Ivanovsky in 1892. The English plural is viruses (sometimes also viri^[15] or vira^[16]), whereas the Latin word is a mass noun, which has no classically attested plural (vīra is used in Neo-Latin^[17]). The adjective viral dates to 1948.^[18] The term virion (plural virions), which dates from 1959,^[19] is also used to refer to a single viral particle that is released from the cell and is capable of infecting other cells of the same type.^[20]

History

Martinus Beijerinck in his laboratory in 1921

Main articles: History of virology and Social history of viruses

Louis Pasteur was unable to find a causative agent for rabies and speculated about a pathogen too small to be detected by microscopes.^[21] In 1884, the French microbiologist Charles Chamberland invented the Chamberland filter (or Pasteur-Chamberland filter) with pores small enough to remove all bacteria from a solution passed through it.^[22] In 1892, the Russian biologist Dmitri Ivanovsky used this filter to study what is now known as the tobacco mosaic virus: crushed leaf extracts from infected tobacco plants remained infectious even after filtration to remove bacteria. Ivanovsky suggested the infection might be caused by a toxin produced by bacteria, but did not pursue the idea.^[23] At the time it was thought that all infectious agents could be retained by filters and grown on a nutrient medium—this was part of the germ theory of disease.^[2] In 1898, the Dutch microbiologist Martinus Beijerinck repeated the experiments and became convinced that the filtered solution contained a new form of infectious agent.^[24] He observed that the agent multiplied only in cells that were dividing, but as his experiments did not show that it was made of particles, he called it a contagium vivum fluidum (soluble living germ) and re-introduced the word virus. Beijerinck maintained that viruses were liquid in nature, a theory later discredited by Wendell Stanley, who proved they were particulate.^[23] In the same year Friedrich Loeffler and Paul Frosch passed the first animal virus through a similar filter: aphthovirus, the agent of foot-and-mouth disease.^[25]

In the early 20th century, the English bacteriologist Frederick Twort discovered a group of viruses that infect bacteria, now called bacteriophages^[26] (or commonly ‘phages’), and the French-Canadian microbiologist Félix d’Herelle described viruses that, when added to bacteria on an agar plate, would produce areas of dead bacteria. He accurately diluted a suspension of these viruses and discovered that the highest dilutions (lowest virus concentrations), rather than killing all the bacteria, formed discrete areas of dead organisms. Counting these areas and multiplying by the dilution factor allowed him to calculate the number of viruses in the original suspension.^[27] Phages were heralded as a potential treatment for diseases such as typhoid and cholera, but their promise was forgotten with the development of penicillin. The development of bacterial resistance to antibiotics has renewed interest in the therapeutic use of bacteriophages.^[28]

By the end of the 19th century, viruses were defined in terms of their infectivity, their ability to pass filters, and their requirement for living hosts. Viruses had been grown only in plants and animals. In 1906, Ross Granville Harrison invented a method for growing tissue in lymph, and, in 1913, E. Steinhardt, C. Israeli, and R. A. Lambert used this method to grow vaccinia virus in fragments of guinea pig corneal tissue.^[29] In 1928, H. B. Maitland and M. C. Maitland grew vaccinia virus in suspensions of minced hens’ kidneys. Their method was not widely adopted until the 1950s when poliovirus was grown on a large scale for vaccine production.^[30]

Another breakthrough came in 1931, when the American pathologist Ernest William Goodpasture and Alice Miles Woodruff grew influenza and several other viruses in fertilised chicken eggs.^[31] In 1949, John Franklin Enders, Thomas Weller, and Frederick Robbins grew polio virus in cultured human embryo cells, the first virus to be grown without using solid animal tissue or eggs. This work enabled Jonas Salk to make an effective polio vaccine.^[32]

The first images of viruses were obtained upon the invention of electron microscopy in 1931 by the German engineers Ernst Ruska and Max Knoll.^[33] In 1935, American biochemist and virologist Wendell Meredith Stanley examined the tobacco mosaic virus and found it was mostly made of protein.^[34] A short time later, this virus was separated into protein and RNA parts.^[35] The tobacco mosaic virus was the first to be crystallised and its structure could, therefore, be elucidated in detail. The first X-ray diffraction pictures of the crystallised virus were obtained by Bernal and Fankuchen in 1941. On the basis of her pictures, Rosalind Franklin discovered the full structure of the virus in 1955.^[36] In the same year, Heinz Fraenkel-Conrat and Robley Williams showed that purified tobacco mosaic virus RNA and its protein coat can assemble by themselves to form functional viruses, suggesting that this simple mechanism was probably the means through which viruses were created within their host cells.^[37]

The second half of the 20th century was the golden age of virus discovery and most of the over 2,000 recognised species of animal, plant, and bacterial viruses were discovered during these years.^[38] In 1957, equine arterivirus and the cause of Bovine virus diarrhoea (a pestivirus) were discovered. In 1963, the hepatitis B virus was discovered by Baruch Blumberg,^[39] and in 1965, Howard Temin described the first retrovirus. Reverse transcriptase, the enzyme that retroviruses use to make DNA copies of their RNA, was first described in 1970, independently by Howard Martin Temin and David Baltimore.^[40] In 1983 Luc Montagnier‘s team at the Pasteur Institute in France, first isolated the retrovirus now called HIV.^[41] In 1989 Michael Houghton‘s team at Chiron Corporation discovered Hepatitis C.^[42][43]

More at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virus

Translators:  Mike Zonta, Melissa Goodnight, Richard Branam, Hanz Bolen

SENSE TESTIMONY:  We may be vulnerable to contagion from dangerous memes or dangerous viruses.


5th Step Conclusions:

1)  Truth is consciousness, first person singular, the one and only original, with sole standing in law and the sole agent of justice.

2) Truth is the Ultimate Power of purpose, resulting in the Flawless (Psycho – Logical): E=mc2, this tasteful Consistency of Integrated renewal Being the High Spirit of Lively Cheerfulness, in the Sophisticated display of Elegance; the Natural Androgynous system of behavior.

3)  
All is One Infinite Consciousness — totally communicable intelligent wholeness, that is always assured of absolute purity and safety, as it is forevermore inviolate and incorruptible.

4) I We Thou is Universal Integrity the All One Mind Truth is the Enzyme and catalyst encouraging able sound strong well change, directing expressing All I Am, All We Are, All Thou Is without being consumed. — Truth I Am is Well, directing all ably, without being consumed.

All Translators are welcome to join this group.  See Weekly Groups page/tab.

Randy Rainbow SUBSCRIBE FOR THE LATEST RANDY RAINBOW VIDS!** RANDY RAINBOW LIVE 2020 TOUR!: FIND TICKETS HERE: https://www.randyrainbow.com/tour/

Being bad-tempered and pessimistic helps you to earn more, live longer and enjoy a healthier marriage. It’s almost enough to put a smile on the dourest of faces.

BBC Future|getpocket.com

• Zaria Gorvett

On stage he’s a loveable, floppy-haired prince charming. Off camera – well let’s just say he needs a lot of personal space. He hates being a celebrity. He resents being an actor. To his ex-girlfriend Elizabeth Hurley’s friends he was apparently known as ‘Grumpelstiltskin.’

Hugh Grant may be famed for being moody and a little challenging to work with. But could a grumpy attitude be the secret to his success?

The pressure to be positive has never been greater. Cultural forces have whipped up a frenzied pursuit of happiness, spawning billion-dollar book sales, a cottage industry in self-help and plastering inspirational quotes all over the internet.

Now you can hire a happiness expert, undertake training in ‘mindfulness’, or seek inner satisfaction via an app. The US army currently trains its soldiers – over a million people – in positive psychology and optimism is taught in UK schools. Meanwhile the ‘happiness index’ has become an indicator of national wellbeing to rival GDP.

The truth is, pondering the worst has some clear advantages. Cranks may be superior negotiators, more discerning decision-makers and cut their risk of having a heart attack. Cynics can expect more stable marriages, higher earnings and longer lives – though, of course, they’ll anticipate the opposite.

Good moods on the other hand come with substantial risks – sapping your drive, dimming attention to detail and making you simultaneously gullible and selfish. Positivity is also known to encourage binge drinking, overeating and unsafe sex.

Hugh Grant apparently hates every film he’s been in, even though they’ve made him $80m. Credit: Rex Features.

At the centre of it all is the notion our feelings are adaptive: anger, sadness and pessimism aren’t divine cruelty or sheer random bad luck – they evolved to serve useful functions and help us thrive.

Take anger. From Newton’s obsessive grudges to Beethoven’s tantrums – which sometimes came to blows – it seems as though visionary geniuses often come with extremely short tempers. There are plenty of examples to be found in Silicon Valley. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is famed for his angry outbursts and insults (such as “I’m sorry, did I take my stupid pills today?”) yet they haven’t stopped him building a $300 billion company.

For years, the link remained a mystery. Then in 2009 Matthijs Baas from the University of Amsterdam decided to investigate. He recruited a group of willing students and set to work making them angry in the name of science. Half the students were asked to recall something which had irritated them and write a short essay about it. “This made them a bit angrier, though they weren’t quite driven to full-blown fits of rage,” he says. The other half of the group were made to feel sad.

Next the two teams were pitched against each other in a game designed to test their creativity. They had 16 minutes to think of as many ways as possible to improve education at the psychology department. As Baas expected, the angry team produced more ideas – at least to begin with. Their contributions were also more original, repeated by less than 1 percent of the study’s participants.

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has a large repertoire of signature insults, such as “if I hear that idea again, I’m gonna have to kill myself.” Credit: Getty Images.

Crucially, angry volunteers were better at moments of haphazard innovation, or so-called “unstructured” thinking. Let’s say you’re challenged to think about possible uses for a brick. While a systematic thinker might suggest ten different kinds of building, it takes a less structured approach to invent a new use altogether, such as turning it into a weapon.

In essence, creativity is down to how easily your mind is diverted from one thought path and onto another. In a situation requiring fight or flight, it’s easy to see how turning into a literal “mad genius” could be life-saving.

“Anger really prepares the body to mobilise resources – it tells you that the situation you’re in is bad and gives you an energetic boost to get you out of it,” says Baas.

To understand how this works, first we need to get to grips with what’s going on in the brain. Like most emotions, anger begins in the amygdala, an almond-shaped structure responsible for detecting threats to our well-being. It’s extremely efficient – raising the alarm long before the peril enters your conscious awareness.

Then it’s up to chemical signals in the brain to get you riled up. As the brain is flooded with adrenaline it initiates a burst of impassioned, energetic fury which lasts for several minutes. Breathing and heart rate accelerate and blood pressure skyrockets. Blood rushes into the extremities, leading to the distinctive red face and throbbing forehead veins people get when they’re annoyed.

Though it’s thought to have evolved primarily to prepare the body for physical aggression, this physiological response is known to have other benefits, boosting motivation and giving people the gall to take mental risks.

Beethoven was easily frustrated and would throw objects at his servants. Credit: Shizhao/Wikimedia Commons.

All these physiological changes are extremely helpful – as long as you get a chance to vent your anger by wrestling a lion or screaming at co-workers. Sure, you might alienate a few people, but afterwards your blood pressure should go back to normal. Avoiding grumpiness has more serious consequences.

The notion that repressed feelings can be bad for your health is ancient. The Greek philosopher Aristotle was a firm believer in catharsis (he invented the modern meaning of the word); viewing tragic plays, he conjectured, allowed punters to experience anger, sadness and guilt in a controlled environment. By getting it all out in the open, they could purge themselves of these feelings all in one go.

His philosophy was later adopted by Sigmund Freud, who instead championed the cathartic benefits of the therapist’s couch.

Then in 2010 a team of scientists decided to take a look. They surveyed a group of 644 patients with coronary artery disease to determine their levels of anger, suppressed anger and tendency to experience distress, and followed them for between five and ten years to see what happened next.

Over the course of the study, 20 percent experienced a major cardiac event and 9 percent percent died. Initially it looked like both anger and suppressed anger increased the likelihood of having a heart attack. But after controlling for other factors, the researchers realised anger had no impact – while suppressing it increased the chances of having a heart attack by nearly three-fold.

It’s still not known exactly why this occurs, but other studies have shown that suppressing anger can lead to chronic high blood pressure.

And not all benefits are physical: anger can help with negotiating, too. A major flashpoint for aggression is the discovery that someone does not value your interests highly enough. It involves inflicting costs – the threat of physical violence – and withdrawing benefits – loyalty, friendship, or money – to help them see their mistake.

Support for this theory comes from the faces we pull when angry. Research suggests they aren’t arbitrary movements at all, but specifically aimed at increasing our physical strength in the eyes of our opponent. Get it right and aggression can help you advance your interests and increase your status – it’s just an ancient way of bargaining.

In fact, scientists are increasingly recognising that grumpiness may be beneficial to the full range of social skills – improving language skills, memory and making us more persuasive.

Now known for donating over $28bn to charity, Bill Gates was once famously easy to anger. In fact, anger and altruism may be closely linked. Credit: Getty Images.

“Negative moods indicate we’re in a new and challenging situation and call for a more attentive, detailed and observant thinking style,” says Joseph Forgas, who has been studying how emotions affect our behaviour for nearly four decades. In line with this, research has also found that feeling slightly down enhances our awareness of social cues. Intriguingly, it also encourages people to act in a more – not less – fair way towards others.

Harsh, but Fair

Though happiness is often thought of as intrinsically virtuous, the emotion brings no such benefits. In one study, a group of volunteers was made to feel disgusted, sad, angry, fearful, happy, surprised or neutral and invited to play the “ultimatum game.”

In the game, the first player is given some money and asked how they’d like to divide it between themselves and another player. Then the second player gets to decide whether or not to accept. If they agree, the money is split how the first player proposed. If not, neither player gets any money.

The ultimatum game is often used as a test of our sense of fairness by showing whether you expect to get a 50-50 share or whether you are happy for each person to be in it for themselves. Interestingly, all negative emotions led to more rejections by the second player, which might suggest that these feelings enhance our sense of fairness and the need for everyone to be treated equally.

Reversing the set-up reveals this is not just a case of sour grapes, either. The “dictator game” has exactly the same rules except this time the second player has no say whatsoever – they simply receive whatever the first player decides not to keep. It turns out that happier participants keep more of the prize for themselves, while those in a sad mood are significantly less selfish.

“People who are feeling slightly down pay better attention to external social norms and expectations, and so they act in a fairer and just way towards others,” says Forgas.

Optimistic newspaper articles have been linked to poor economic performance in subsequent weeks. Credit: Getty Images.

In some situations, happiness carries far more serious risks. It’s associated with the cuddle hormone, oxytocin, which a handful of studies have shown reduces our ability to identify threats. In prehistoric times, happiness would have left our ancestors vulnerable to predators. In modern life, it prevents us paying due attention to dangers such as binge drinking, overeating and unsafe sex.

“Happiness functions like a shorthand signal that we’re safe and it’s not necessary to pay too much attention to the environment,” he says. Those in a continuous happy haze may miss important cues. Instead, they may be over-reliant on existing knowledge – leaving them prone to serious errors of judgement.

In one study, Forgas and colleagues from the University of New South Wales, Australia, put volunteers in either a happy or sad mood by screening films in the laboratory. Then he asked them to judge the truth of urban myths, such as that power lines cause leukaemia or the CIA murdered President Kennedy. Those in a good mood were less able to think sceptically and were significantly more gullible.

Next Forgas used a first-person shooter game to test if good moods might also lead people to rely on stereotyping. As he predicted, those in a good mood were more likely to aim at targets wearing turbans.

Of all the positive emotions, optimism about the future may have the most ironic effects. Like happiness, positive fantasies about the future can be profoundly de-motivating. “People feel accomplished, they relax, and they do not invest the necessary effort to actually realise these positive fantasies and daydreams,” says Gabriele Oettingen from New York University.

Graduates who fantasize about success at work end up earning less, for instance. Patients who daydream about getting better make a slower recovery. In numerous studies, Oettingen has shown that the more wishful your thinking, the less likely any of it is to come true. “People say ‘dream it and you will get it’ – but that’s problematic,” she says. Optimistic thoughts may also put the obese off losing weight and make smokers less likely to plan to quit.

Defensive Pessimism

Perhaps most worryingly, Oettingen believes the risks may operate on a societal level, too. When she compared articles in the newspaper USA Today with economic performance a week or a month later, she found that the more optimistic the content, the more performance declined. Next she looked at presidential inaugural addresses – and found that more positive speeches predicted a lower employment rate and GDP in during their time in office.

Combine these unnerving findings with optimism bias – the tendency to believe you’re less at risk of things going wrong than other people – and you’re asking for trouble. Instead, you might want to consider throwing away your rose-tinted spectacles and adopting a glass half-empty outlook. “Defensive pessimism” involves employing Murphy’s Law, the cosmic inevitability that whatever can go wrong, will go wrong. By anticipating the worst, you can be prepared when it actually happens.

It works like this. Let’s say you’re giving a talk at work. All you have to do is think of the worst possible outcomes – tripping up on your way to the stage, losing the memory stick which contains your slides, computer difficulties, awkward questions (truly accomplished pessimists will be able to think of many, many more) – and hold them in your mind. Next you need to think of some solutions.

Psychologist Julie Norem from Wellesley College, Massachusetts, is an expert pessimist. “I’m a little clumsy, especially when I’m anxious, so I make sure to wear low-heeled shoes. I get there early to scope out the stage and make sure that there aren’t cords or other things to trip over. I typically have several backups for my slides: I can give the talk without them if necessary, I email a copy to the organizers, carry a copy on a flash drive, and bring my own laptop to use…” she says. Only the paranoid survive, as they say.

So the next time someone tells you to “cheer up” – why not tell them how you’re improving your sense of fairness, reducing unemployment and saving the world economy? You’ll be having the last laugh – even if it is a world-weary, cynical snort.

This article was originally published on August 10, 2016, by BBC Future, and is republished here with permission.