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DESMOND:      I'm Desmond Berghofer from the Visioneers International Network and with my partner Gerri Schwartz we're here to welcome you to Episode 9 called Do Not Go Quietly of our Journey of Extraordinary Wisdom.

Today we are pleased to introduce two Visioneers Visionary Leaders, George and Sedena Cappannelli from Santa Fe, New Mexico in the USA. They are the founders of an enterprise called Age Nation and the producers and authors of an award winning television series called Ageless Living.

George and Sedena are here to remind us that a huge demographic change is sweeping the world at this critical moment in history. We're approaching the moment when for the first time in history in the USA and other industrialized nations there will be more people over the age of 50 than in the rest of the population. This is the cohort of people in charge and responsible for what happens in the world. They therefore have the major responsibility for solving the existential problems now facing the world before we are overwhelmed by them.

George and Sedena make a powerful pitch that these people in the second half of life have the experience and expertise to turn the ship around, by embracing the global mind change and new planetary consciousness called for by our other wisdom keepers.

If as a viewer of this presentation, you are among the cohort of people over the age of 50, then listen carefully, and be uplifted by what you are about to hear. If you're younger than that, also be encouraged by knowing that a powerful demographic of people have your back, and are ready to help you fashion the future world you want to live in.

To get us started on this inspirational message, Gerri Schwartz will give you her powerful perspective. Here's Gerri

GERRI:             Hello everyone listening to us today, and especially those from around the world, so good morning, good afternoon, good evening, and welcome. Let's begin then.

All of us alive today have the most extraordinary good fortune to live in the most momentous time ever experienced by humanity, yes, ever. Now, we have many challenges, and we must not minimize these challenges, but at the same time, advances in science, medicine, technology, and even every aspect of health and wellness are extraordinary. As you listen to George and Sedena tell their story, you will hear that millions of us are living longer and longer than any other cohort of five generations ever. Technology has made worldwide communication commonplace, transportation improvements have made travel everywhere, yes everywhere,possible. This is the era of the greatest advances in human rights ever,with ever more acceptance of diversity of every kind, and the greatest comforts and the richest arts are experienced by all of us, and I could go on and on. However, in spite of these accomplishments, all this wonder is at risk, and we are living at the time of the greatest danger to humanity, also ever.

The question is, Who will do something to ensure our survival? How can thriving for future cohorts be achieved?

Well, the answer is inherent in the question. The solution must be bold, magnificent, creative, and worthy of what humanity can become.  No more tinkering, and especially no more passing the buck. When we push back the borders and barriers between nation, age, race, belief, and gender, who is left?  Well, all of us, all of us.  And we must become the best possible generations alive ever to face the challenges that have emerged during our watch.  Our leaders, heroes, heroines, mentors, and champions must now step forward. No generation, especially not the elders, can take excuse in weakness or helplessness, because the challenges created on our watch must be approached also by us, by whom Jean Houston calls "the people of the breakthrough" and it is our contention that the elders, the adults, and the grown ups are in the best position to lead.

We who have experienced the most must take the most responsibility and step forward.  We must step forward to invite, inspire, and even command because we need the very best we can do in order to survive, and, people of the breakthrough, that's us, and that's on the table right now.

DESMOND:      Wow, Gerri, you're really telling it the way it is. What more do you have to say?

GERRI:             Well, I want to share some poetry, because in moments of great need, poetry often captures the spirit.  So, here goes.

When i was a young girl, my father was a traveling salesman, so time with him was very precious, and we needed to take advantage of these moments.  Even after all these years, I can hear his voice, and remember him reciting this poem. The Internet tells me it was written by Robert H. Smith.

 

The Clock of Life

The clock of life goes round but once
And no man has the power
To tell just when the hands will stop
At late or early hour

To lose one’s wealth is sad indeed
To lose one’s health is more
To lose one’s soul is such a loss
That no man can restore

The present only is our own
So live, love and toil with a will
Put no faith in tomorrow
For the hands may then be still.

So, the path ahead is soul size, but for those of us on the journey of second adulthood, and the journeys of elderhood, it is our journey to take.  So, here is a poem that speaks to that from a book of poetry that I'm writing.

 

Yes (3)
The Journeys of Elderhood

Even in elder time
the heart fire burns
with all that is left
to do…
to be…
to become…

No time for stopping now,
when flagging energy
creates a shorter day.

Instead,
Stoke the inner fires
with seasoned wood,
with sharpest mind
and experienced heart.

To tackle
the illusive…
the impossible…
and even just
the hard to do.

Gather
All the deep
soul strength
for lift off.

Engage deeply.
Champion right causes.
Proceed with the
fearless courage that
elder age allows.

The stakes are higher now.
The time is shorter
Strive higher.

Greatness, even the heroic,
does not come
to those who take
excuse in aging.

Let the 3rd voyage,
The Journeys of Elderhood,
begin.

Yes…
to purpose and intention,
to passion and compassion,
to good memories,
to new planning,
to learning and reading,
to writing stories and poetry.

Yes…
to children and grandchildren,
to concerts and graduations
and celebrations.

Yes…
to loving deeply,
to friendships old and new,
to generosity,
to sharing well earned wisdom.

Yes…
to being,
to the truth
of the soul
and the spirit
and the sacred.

Yes
to life
le chaim!
to life.

— Geraldine Schwartz

The revered Canadian poet, Leonard Cohen, is one of my heroes. Now, he is probably best known for his song. Hallelujah.  But in his elder years, Leonard Cohen completely reconstructed a career that bad action by others he trusted had destroyed.  He became a raving success.

And a few months before he passed in 2016 he wrote a poem to the God of all of us called Hinini! Hinini! which means, Hey God, here I am, I'm ready.  This inspired me to write my own poem to the God of all of us. I called it Tain Li Zman, which means, Hey God, give me time.

 

Tain Li Zman
Hey, God. Give Me Time.

Time
to love,
and
be loved
in return

to see more graduations
and even babies
in the next generation

to write more poems,
to dance and
to ride merry-go-rounds
wherever I find them.

Tain Li Zman…
Give me time
to learn more
to create the big
piece to pass on
my hard-won wisdom.

Give me time
to witness
human nobility
and the evolution
of our species
toward goodness, and

a new genius
of the mind,
of the heart
and the soul
whose combined
power could find
the solutions

to transform
humanity,
and finally
grow up!

Then, like Leonard,
I might be ready
to say to the God
of all of us…

Hinini…Hinini…
Hey, God, I’m ready…

or

I may write
another poem

— Geraldine Schwartz, October 2018

 

DESMOND:      Knowing you, I'm sure you're going to write another poem.  But in the meantime, I would like to mention a book written by George and Sedena, also called "Do Not Go Quietly" that features a poem by George called "Not Quietly," which I would like to read.

Not Quietly

No, we will not go quietly,

Not meekly into this or any other night.

We who cheered when Martin marched

And who first heard Rachel Carson’s call;

We who lost our heroes to hate

And tried to find ourselves in love;

We who died at Kent State

And cheered when the wall came down;

We who contributed to the loss of America’s grace

And then celebrated the rebirth of hope

We will not go quietly

Not meekly

Into this or any other night.

— George Cappannelli —

The message of George and Sedena complements what our other wisdom keepers have said.  Like Willis Harman, they speak of global mind change.  Like Ervin Laszlo, they call for planetary consciousness.  Like Jane Goodall, they see care for the Earth and all its living systems as essential.  They are the embodiment of male and female equality and combined power described by Anne Baring.  And they are the possible humans envisioned by Jean Houston.  And like Robert Muller, they are global citizens encouraging the possible.  And finally, like Bill Halal, they say that the time to act is now.

So, let's bring on George and Sedena with their message to inspire you.

SEDENA:          Hi, I'm Sedena Cappannelli.

GEORGE:        And I'm George Cappannelli. We're co-founders of Age Nation in Santa Fey, New Mexico and co-producers of the award winning Ageless Living television series.

SEDENA:          And we are also proud members of the Visioneers. We're so pleased to be with you and to celebrate the launch of this exciting innovative and much needed initiative, designed to share with you wisdom, insights, and recommendations and live strategies presented by a truly remarkable group of authors, experts and leaders.

GEORGE:        The Visioneers have a goal, and that's to wage peace in a time of division, disruption, and confusion, to inspire, and inform, and create a vital living library that can give us hope, and also support the evolution of human consciousness, and not just in this time but for generations to come.

SEDENA:          So, this video you're about to see is part of our Ageless Living television series, and it will introduce you to some of our work that's designed to inform, inspire, and provide solutions for whom we call people who weren't born yesterday, and also younger people who are now inheriting our future.

In the short program we also share some valuable information about the demographic revolution that will eventually see 50 percent or more of the populations in the major industrialized countries in our world 50 and older at the same time, for the first time in history.

GEORGE:        We also hope this video will help you remember that no one is ever too young or too old to live their dreams, never too old or too young to sing the unique note that only we can sing in the song of life. So, welcome to Ageless Living.  Welcome to this international launch of this global initiative. We hope you'll join us and all the Visioneers in making the future more sane, constructive, compassionate, and more committed to peace and to the greatest good for the greatest number.

SEDENA:          So, we want to leave you with this ancient African proverb:

GEORGE:        "If you want to go fast, go alone.  If you want to go far, go together." So, what do you say?

SEDENA:          I say we go together. Why don't you join us.

ANNOUNCER:  Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome George and Sedena Cappannelli, award winning authors and co-producers of the Ageless Living series for their talk, Do not go quietly.

SEDENA:          Ageless Living is a series, thank you for being here and being a part of it.  It's a choice and it's a way of life.

GEORGE:        Before we talk more about Ageless Living and share a little more about what we can do to practice ageless living, we want to tell you a little piece of a personal story that might help you to better understand why Sedena and I are so committed to this work.

About fifteen years ago, we were invited to an international conference on aging in Australia, and it came, the invitation, not very long after we had made late in life passages with both sets of our parents, and had just begun this second half of life work, so we assumed that it would be good, we'd learn some

things. What we didn't realize is that it would change our lives.

As we sat in room after room listening to experts from around the world talk about many of the things they were doing in their countries to prepare for this thing called the demographic revolution, we were thrilled at what they were saying, and at the same time deeply embarrassed that these conversations were not happening in America.

We weren't talking about building new forms of multigenerational communities.  We weren't talking about changing assisted living models. We weren't talking about implementing a full single payer healthcare system. We weren't talking about courses to re-educate and re-induct older people into society. And we weren't talking about building age-friendly retail models and anything else. No, we were talking about a lot of things, but we weren't talking about the fact that 50 percent of our population here and in every industrialized country in the world would in the second half of the 21st century be 50 and older, for the first time in history at the same time. Pretty startling!

SEDENA:          Imagine this information was troubling, and the more I listened to these experts talk about all the good work they were doing in their countries, the more obvious it was that we and many of us in our country were in deep denial and asleep at the wheel. Youth obsessed, age adverse, and walking backward into a pretty challenging future that we didn't even know at the time was coming. At one point, I found myself in the ladies room very upset looking at those little white and black tiles on the floor, crying, and I was just trying to make sense of it all, and I kept wondering why are we in the United States so far behind?

GEORGE:        I was feeling some other things, sadness, some of the same sense of helplessness I felt when I made that late in life and end of life passage with my parents. They weren't prepared. They were prepared financially, a little bit, but they weren't prepared intellectually, spiritually and emotionally for the journey, and I wasn't really prepared to become one of their caregivers, or one of their decision makers.

Not surprising, there wasn't a blueprint that those of us in that position could follow, and something else was true. No matter how much of their money or our money we spend I could not provide for them the same level of care of attention of guidance and of daily love they had provided to me when I was a young boy, and that was devastating to me.  Maybe some of you have had that experience, or maybe some of you are having that experience now.

SEDENA:        So, on the plane ride home, George and I talked about not wanting to live any longer   in denial over the fact that our country was not taking true responsibility for them, and we also talked about how we both wished that we had known some of these things that we had just learned at the conference when our parents were alive. And we agreed that the majority of the people that we knew were like us, unaware of the scope of the demographic revolution, the impact that it was going to have on the millions of lives, millions of Americans who, as we had just learned, were entering the second half of life at one person every seven seconds.

So, in addition to being irresponsible, this would be self-defeating. It would be like walking out into a torrential rainstorm without an umbrella and expecting not to get drenched.  This demographic revolution is a reality, it's not going anywhere, and so that's when and why we made the decision to do this work, and here we are.

GEORGE:        So, let's talk about some other things we learned at that conference, and some things that have convinced us that if we as a nation wake up in time, we can still regain some of our compassion and our consciousness. You see, if we stop measuring our wealth just based on our GDP or on the daily Nasdaq Index and we remember that our strength does not lie in the number of trillions we throw against the defense department on an annual basis, but instead, remember that our true wealth lies in the core principles that are part of our founding documents, and that our tradition over the years of taking care of and sharing our compassion and our hope with others, that's our real wealth.

The demographic revolution is bringing these things, increasing longevity, decreasing birth rates, and as a result a shrinking tax base.  There are ten thousand people in the US every day who retire, and the majority of those people are going to live longer than the number of years that they have been gainfully employed.

SEDENA:          We are experiencing the largest transfer of wealth in the history of the world, from the many to the few.  And a number of the many will not have the resources to support lives of even modest dignity after retirement. Our aging population is not even on the list of under-served and at-risk populations, and therefore receives only a small percentage of all the funds donated by grants and gifts.

GEORGE:        Doesn't even begin to talk about the fact that in the developed world, we're the only country that doesn't have a single payer healthcare system for everyone.  That healthcare system does not do a very good job of informing us really about aging and dying.  As a result, Americans spend, count them, five hundred billion dollars a year on late-in- life and end-of-life medical procedures that do not necessarily improve the quality of life at all.

In addition, because time is money in this medical system, the number of gerontologists and longevity specialists are declining as the number of those of us who are aging are increasing.  Hell of a condition, huh?

SEDENA:          So, these are some of the reasons we decided to do the work that we do, and why we think it's important to remember Nelson Mandela 's sage advice that "the impossible is only impossible until it is done."

GEORGE:        So, let's fast forward from 2015.  Sedena and I have been blessed to have been able to start Age Nation and empower New Mexico. We've written some new books, "Do Not Go Quietly," "The Best is Yet to Be," “Getting Unstuck.”  We’ve hosted radio programs and conferences and global digital summits, would even help create a new aging age-friendly model for cities around the country. 

And in Washington in 2015 there was a White House conference on aging that announced some remarkable advances over that time on that plane when Sedena and I were coming back from Sydney and decided to do this work. 

SEDENA:          So, on the government side, there were new rules requiring investment advisors to put client interest before their profits, significant advances in improving retirement security for federal workers and military service members, and there was a victims of crime act to support older Americans.

GEORGE:   Technology companies were finally beginning to wake up and realizing that they could challenge innovators to create tools for older Americans, not just younger Americans, better support programs were being developed in companies for employees who are also caregivers and Fortune 500 companies were really going to work to try to develop much better retirement programs for their employees.

These are just a few of hundreds of advances that were announced, but then two things happened. The first was we began to realize that this demographic revolution was unfolding at a pretty astounding rate and that although we were proud of some of our accomplishments it was clear that we needed to do something more to pick up our game and contribute in a different way.  

And then, of course, something else happened. A new administration stumbled into Washington unprepared to govern, and they were far more interested in giving more to those who already had a lot than to those who needed a lot more.

So, what we began to see was that a lot of the gains of the previous decade reported at that 2015 conference on aging were either being diminished or being eliminated.  So, we realized that we had another choice to make. We're we going to contribute to a breakdown or to a breakthrough?  And if we didn't want to see all of that great work eliminated, then it was clear that there were some things that had to happen. A new national rallying cry had to be given to young and old alike.  We had to seriously begin to look at could we create a new definition of what it meant to live and age consciously in the 21st century, could we build new bridges of understanding and collaboration across generations, and most important, could we ourselves retake our rightful position in the decision-making process of our time?

"We are called to be the architects of the future and not its victims."  These words by Buckminster Fuller, American architect, author, and futurist remind us of the part that we can and we believe we must play in ushering in a time of new hope and promise, a future more inspired, sustainable, and conscious than much that we see being demonstrated around us in the world today.

These words also speak to our past victories lessons learned, and they remind us of the high price that we pay for our inattention and our stumbles, our unhealed wounds in our unfinished work work that we believe is ours to do and that in good conscience we cannot and should not leave to other generations to do for us.  This we believe is the sacred contract we have with ourselves and with the future.  It's especially true for those of us who several decades ago made a lot of promises about changing the world and are still well short of that goal, and so in our time together let's talk about some of what's unhealed unhandled unanswered and unfinished, but most important, let's talk about the things that we can do individually and collectively to fulfill our promise.

SEDENA:          We believe the world today calls us in support of a new story. It invites us to acknowledge at least in part our role in creating the challenges that we now face and to sing the unique note that each of us has to sing in this orchestra of life, and to remember the advice of leadership expert Michael Altschuler, who said "The bad news is time flies, the good news is you're the pilot." I love that.

This is why it is time to explore this thing called Ageless Living, this way of living and thriving without regard to time, without being encumbered by limited beliefs about what is possible for each stage of our lives.

GEORGE:        So, no matter how old you are, no matter what your gender is, no matter what your race or ethnicity or economic status or political persuasion, we believe it's still time to heed the call and to help give birth to this new story called Ageless Living.  It's a story that can support each of us and contributing our courage our skills and our passion creating a world no longer constricted by prejudice. This is especially the prejudice of ageism. Are we suggesting that we're going to be able to do all of this in one program or that Ageless Living is the only path? No, we're not doing that, but we can make you a couple of promises.  One of them is that Ageless Living is a good path and it's one that we're entitled to walk on simply by virtue of our birth, no student loans, or visas, or permissions required.  You know, Ageless Living can contribute at each stage of our lives to creating a more conscious and noble world in which all of us are encouraged to live the dreams we were born to live.  A second promise that we can make is that in addition to sharing some good information with you, we'll also share some very specific solutions, not just now but in the months ahead, in the form of books and podcasts and online webinars and a whole series of things. To begin, let's look at a couple of Ageless Living guidelines. The first is from Wayne Dyer who said "change the way you look at things and the things that you look at change."

SEDENA:          We have so much power to affect our world by our thoughts and our perspectives, and we talk a lot about this in our book, "The Best is Yet to Be."  You may have heard of the observer phenomenon, this is where scientists have discovered that the one observing an experiment has the power to affect and even alter the outcome of the experiment, and here's the key, based on their expectations.  So, we are as unlimited as we say we are and the best is yet to be based on our expectations.

GEORGE:        A second guideline is from Seneca the Younger, who said, "If you don't know the harbour you're heading for, no wind is the right wind."  And whether you've been in a dingy or schooner, you know how valuable this advice is.  It's also true for those of us who spend the majority of our time on land and know that without a vision or a goal it's damn hard to get to a destination.

SEDENA:          So, let's take Seneca's good advice and do a short process.  This one can help us identify at least one harbor that we're heading for.  So, we can start by shifting the focus from our heads to our hearts, and just take a few slow deep breaths, and for a moment just relax in your seat and ask yourself this question:  If i could wave a magic wand and make the limited beliefs that I hold now about aging disappear, what would my life be like?  Please give yourself this opportunity for just a moment to feel into or visualize just one thing in your life that might change without some of the limiting beliefs that you now hold about aging and what a difference it would make to you and your family and your friends and the planet as a whole, and if by chance any doubts or concerns come up, you know those stuffs and concerns that kill so many dreams, just push past them for a moment and stay with what you know.

GEORGE:        The dreams we're talking about, the ones that well-meaning friends and relatives and sometimes even strangers try to talk us out of, they use words like foolish, or romantic, or God forbid, economically risky.  They put us in a prison of the predictable and the usual, of the half truths and the doubts, rather than in the open space of creativity and spontaneity where the impossible becomes possible. There are a lot of reasons that we struggle with all of this and perhaps the image that Sedena called up or asked you to call up before will call your heart awake when some of these doubts come up, but if not, there are some words from Lewis Carroll that he had the Queen share with the young girl Alice when the girl said there's no use crying, one can't believe impossible things.

SEDENA:          And what did the queen say, "Why sometimes, I believe as many as six impossible things before breakfast."  So, let's not be afraid of the impossible.  Let's use the miraculous tool of imagination that Einstein said is more powerful than knowledge. Let's practice believing that we really can live the lives we were born to live, manifest our dreams, express our creativity and our compassion and love for others and for ourselves, which is sometimes the hardest thing to do, isn't it. Let's take the poet Rumi's good advice: "Let the beauty of what you love be what you do."

GEORGE:        It was clear to us that the old story, scarcity-based, competition-driven consumption, focused, and patriarchal-centered was really a dying story, and what was needed was a new story, collaborative, sustainable, egalitarian, empowering, a story that aligns us with the dreams that we were born to live and the dreams that we are here to express. Don't you think that's a good idea?

SEDENA:          Absolutely.  So, with this background in mind, let's look a little closer at the new story and the upside. Each stage of our lives is the new beginning and the second half, which in traditional Chinese medicine is known as the second spring, is a particularly unique stage.  We are older, and it feels like it all happened so fast, doesn't it.  We now have more wisdom, certainly more experience, and some days we even have more mastery over life than we ever had when we were younger. We can begin to experience greater creativity, a newfound sense of meaning, and acknowledge that time is precious, and use it more wisely, maybe take ourselves less seriously and enjoy the gift of being alive.

As Pablo Picasso said, "It takes a long time to become young." Yeah, and Picasso was talking about being ageless, timeless, eternal, enduring. Isn't that great? Ageless Living is a moment by moment choice, to grow and thrive without regard to time, so that we can live the lives we're born to live and make the contributions we were born to make, that's what it is.

GEORGE:        Ageless Living also tells us that aging is not a tragedy, nor is it a disease that needs to be cured.  Aging is actually a natural part of life. As you've noticed in the physical realm, every entrance has an exit, every beginning has an ending.  So, if we're really wise, we'll recognize that while it might be true at some particular time in history that ageless living will become some kind of a wrinkle-free, pharmacological illusion of life in which our bodies never age and in which we're eternally buff, painless and sagless, right?  Maybe for some future version of homo sapiens that comes off of a 3D printer or something.you know.  It's not true for us yet, so the fact of the matter is, if we really want to do ourselves justice, we shouldn't walk backwards into the future, clinging tenaciously to some sort of a myth of youth, you know.  We ought to look aging and dying in the eye and be grateful for the opportunity to explore these stages of life.  We ought to be proud that we've gotten this far, and that we're able to do what we're able to do.

You know, life is like a good book, or a musical composition and if you only read the first few chapters, or you only hum the first few choruses, then the truth of the matter is you're going to miss the really juicy stuff, the conflicts, the breakdowns, the breakthroughs, and the finale, and that's where the real emotional, intellectual, and spiritual wisdom of life comes from. This incredible gift and opportunity that we have.

SEDENA:          So you can see we're excited about it.

GERRI:             Wow!  Let's take George's advice to focus on the juicy stuff.  To do that, I'd like to share some lines from my poem, "Now."

"Now that the power of my mind and heart burst with Amazon spirit to do, to be, to create, to invent new solutions for a troubled spirit,

Let us seize the moment to embark with adventurous heart on a journey so new, so wisdom-based, so focused that even the angels and gods would approve."

You will hear the same spirit expressed in Episodes 17 and 18 of the Visioneers Audio Theatre podcast, also released today. Put them on and hear the story coming to the climax as the world prepares for a global celebration of new possibilities in the Congress of the Global Mind.

And now, to conclude this episode with the big vision, having listened deeply with open heart and mind to the profound underlying ideas and themes so eloquently expressed by George and Sedena, let us listen to Shakespearean actor Christopher Gaze as he recites my poem that describes this big vision called "Sapiens Two."  Here's Chris.

CHRIS:            

Sapiens Part Two

Suddenly, a sacred quiet descends, and I enter deep deep into heart space, where visions of a new time, of sapiens emerging, vibrate with such clear energy I can smell and taste and even hear their voices speaking.

First, I see them in the pastel colours of dreams, but as I stand transfixed, the gaudy colours of a vivid intense reality comes into view, the new race, strong in body, beautiful in form and feature, in every kind and colour, spirits glowing, the electric connections between them visible crackling, vibrant, full of grace.

Sapiens Part Two.

And the vision splits into thousands of images of actions, in forest wilderness, vast oceans, farmers fields, villages and towns, and teeming modern cities. Acting with intention, they are rebuilding, recovering, reimagining, creating, inventing a new connected living world, to enhance a divine future, where peace and justice, respect and prosperity joyfully coexist,

Where the dark evil of centuries past is controlled and contained, its actions no longer tolerated, its perpetrators exiled to far off margins, and starved of the nutrients enjoyed up to recent times, they become extinct.

The images become grand swirling tapestries that now begin to fade into the pastel colours of dreams.

And I awake to consider the meaning of what was so strangely and clearly witnessed, and to ask, How, oh how, can we begin this sacred holy mission built on the noble, the wise, and the seeming miracles of our moment in the human journey, to create a wondrous future full of the grace we can now actually imagine?

TATIANA SONG:         

Garden of Love

Meet me in the garden of love dear

and lets leave behind these difficult years

I’ve lost you again and again and again

I’ve made you an enemy when you are my best friend

and I want to find you again

so meet me in the garden of love 

 

God knows we’ve tried and failed each other, hundreds of millions of times 

God knows you’ve disappointed me, but I’ve been out of line 

and I want to find you again 

so meet me in the garden of love 

 

Its so quiet here, the world cannot intrude on this refuge, this safe place

and now that i’ve found you again 

lets never lose our way 

We must not forget this moment 

where the world finally stood still 

and I could tell you that I love you

and I always will 

 

Its so soft lying next to you

without all our struggles and fears

We’ve let go of all our mistakes

forgave all our lost years

Now I’ve found you again 

Here in the garden of love

— Tatiana Speed