Expect Nothing, Ask for Everything

1. Expect nothing, but ask for everything.

2. Gently but gleefully smash an unnecessary personal taboo.

3. End your association with a situation or place that feels oppressive.

4. Buck tradition with wit and compassion rather than with wrath and cynicism.

5. Escape an old niche where you got trapped for the sake of peace and harmony.

6. Carry a gift with you at all times in case you run into a fresh beauty who makes you feel doubly alive.





MOST POWERFUL STARTING POINT

The most powerful starting point for any endeavor is not the question 'What do I want?', but "What does Life (God, Consciousness) want from me? How do I serve the whole?"

—Eckhart Tolle





I'M A STAR, YOU'RE A STAR

You're a star -- and so am I. I'm a genius -- and so are you. Your success encourages my brilliance, and my charisma enhances your power. Your victory doesn't require my defeat, and vice versa.

Those are the rules in the New World -- quite unlike the rules in the Old World, where zero-sum games are the norm, and only one of us can win each time we play.

In the New World, you don't have to tone down or apologize for your prowess, because you love it when other people shine. You exult in your own excellence without regarding it as a sign of inherent superiority. As you ripen more and more of your latent aptitude, you inspire the rest of us to claim our own idiosyncratic magnificence.

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Tibetan Buddhist teacher Geshe Chekawa (1220–1295) specialized in bodhicitta, seeking enlightenment not for personal gain but as a way to serve others. On his deathbed, he prayed to be sent to hell so that he might alleviate the suffering of the lost souls there.

As you explore pronoia, you will discover that like Chekawa, you have a huge capacity to help people. Unlike him, you'll find that expressing your benevolence doesn't require you to go to hell. It may even be unnecessary for you to sacrifice your own joy or to practice self-denial. Just the opposite: Being in service to humanity and celebrating your unique power will be synergistic. They will need each other to thrive.

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The Golden Rule is a decent ethical principle, but it could be even better. "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" presumes that others enjoy what you enjoy. But that's wrong. There are many things you'd like to have done unto you that others would either despise or be bored by. Here's a new, improved formulation, which we call the Platinum Rule: Do unto others as they would like to have you do unto them.

Using this improved formula is not just a virtuous way to live, but is also the best way to ensure the success of your selfish goals. The rituals and spells of various occult orders purport to be supercharged techniques for imposing your personal will on the chaotic flow of events, but I say that practicing the Platinum Rule outstrips all of them as an exercise to enhance your potency and happiness.

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TO READ THE REST OF "I'M A STAR, YOU'RE A STAR," go here.





WHAT YOU CHOOSE TO NOTICE

We create ourselves by what we choose to notice.

Once this work of self-authorship has begun, we inhabit the world we've created. We self-seal. We don't notice anything except those things that confirm what we already think about who we already are.

Meditative traditions refer to the observer self. When we succeed in moving outside our normal processes of self-reference and can look upon ourselves with self-awareness, then we have a chance at changing. We break the seal. We notice something new.

—Margaret Wheatley





CHANGE FROM THE INSIDE OR THE OUTSIDE?

Do you change people first or do you change society? I believe this is a false dichotomy. You have to change both simultaneously. If you're changing only yourself and have no concern for changing the society, something goes awry. If you're changing only society but not changing yourself, something goes awry.

Now, 'simultaneously' may be an overstatement, because I think there are periods when one has to concentrate on one or the other. And there are periods in a society, in a culture, when the emphasis is appropriate only on one or the other. What I'm trying to say is, never lose sight of either the internal world or the external world, the peace within and the peace based on justice outside.

—David Dellinger





WE DIE TO EACH OTHER DAILY

We die to each other daily. What we know of other people is only our memory of the moments during which we knew them. And they have changed since then. To pretend that they and we are the same is a useful and convenient social convention which must sometimes be broken. We must also remember that at every meeting we are meeting a stranger."

—T. S. Eliot, "The Cocktail Party"





BLISSFUL DISCERNMENT

Think globally,
but act locally.

Plan for the future,
but act in the present.

Dream of all the masterpieces
you'd be thrilled to create,
but work on just one at a time.

Lust for every enticing soul you see,
but only make love
to the imperfect beauty you're actually with.

Allow yourself to be flooded
with every last feeling
that bubbles up from your subconscious,
but understand that only a very few of these feelings
need to be forcefully expressed.

Be passionately attuned
to all the injustices and hypocrisies
you see around you,
but be selective
when choosing which of those
you will actually fight.

—Excerpted from my book The Televisionary Oracle





MY DAILY HOROSCOPES

Some people don't know that I write daily horoscopes, available as text messages sent to your cell or smart phone.

They're shorter than the weekly 'scopes, but on the other hand they're more frequent -- every day of the week.

My weekly horoscopes are free, but the dailies cost about 67 cents a day if you sign up for a subscription.

If you think you might enjoy getting regular bursts of inspiration from me to illuminate your adventures, check them out.

Go to RealAstrology.com. Register or log in. On the new page, click on "Subscribe / Renew" under "Daily Text Message Horoscopes" in the right-hand column.





Healing mantra for the day: May I feel all I need to feel in order to heal; may I heal all I need to heal in order to feel.

—Marguerite Rigoglioso





DISCERNING HOPE

It's a dark and chaotic moment in our culture, but my discerning hope for the future is abundant.

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"It is not in the least superstitious, it is even a counsel of realism, to look for the unforeseeable and unpredictable, to be prepared for and to expect 'miracles' in the political realm."

—Hannah Arendt

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See an image of hope





THE SPIRITUAL POWER OF NOT TAKING YOUR THOUGHTS TOO SERIOUSLY

Here is a new spiritual practice: Don't take your thoughts too seriously.

—Eckhart Tolle

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Being spiritual has nothing to do with what you believe and everything to do with your state of consciousness.

—Eckhart Tolle





YOU HAVE A PIECE TO SOMEONE ELSE'S PUZZLE

"Everyone carries with them at least one piece to someone else's puzzle." So wrote Lawrence Kushner in his book, Honey from the Rock.

In other words, you have in your possession certain clues to your loved ones' destinies -- secrets they haven't discovered themselves.

Wouldn't you love to hand over those clues -- to make a gift of the puzzle pieces that are most needed by the people you care about?

Search your depths for insights you've never communicated. Tell truths you haven't found a way to express before now. More than you know, you have the power to mobilize your companions' dreams.





GREAT SPIRITS IN DISGUISE

"In mythos and fairy tales, deities and other great spirits test the hearts of humans by showing up in various forms that disguise their divinity. They show up in robes, rags, silver sashes, or with muddy feet. They show up with skin like old wood, or in scales made of rose petal, as a frail child, as a lime-yellow old woman, as a man who cannot speak, or as an animal who can.

"The great powers are testing to see if humans have yet learned to recognize the greatness of soul in all its varying forms."

—Clarissa Pinkola Estés





FREEDOM IS IN THE UNKNOWN

Freedom is in the unknown. If you believe there is an unknown everywhere, in your own body, in your relationships with other people, in political institutions, in the universe, then you have maximum freedom.

—philosopher John C. Lilly