Tag Archives: Spiritualist minister

Are We Still Playing The Game of Fragments?

Brace yourself:

I’m about to tell you a radical, probably shocking secret. (But I’m going to make you wait.)

In a world as topsy-turvy as ours, any claim of the ability to shock us might be considered presumptuous. Maybe even egomaniacal.

After all, we’re stuck in a “civilization” that wallows in the deepest slime of corruption. Groans under the weight of horrid slick tales of blood-splashed brutality and greed-splashed stupidity.

We’ve penned up the world’s healthy wildness, humanity’s ingenious native wisdom & bull-dozed them into cesspools.

Are we waiting for every last remote chance of their revival to dissolve?

Are we “the 99%” actually teamed up with “the 1%” to turn Earth into a shanty museum where the most beautiful and good lay frozen in panoramic exhibits of the past?

Are we waiting until that silent deadline when the simple clarity of enjoying living blue seas, of non-slime-slicked oceans, of non-cracked, non-fracked, non-heart-attacked lands with more beasts thriving than monster bugs & rats, has slipped horribly from the fringes of our reality?

Are we blindly waiting until livid red volcanoes of subconsciously suppressed hate, denied fear, unbridled toxic intent, so swamp our cities with psychic lava of hopelessness that humanity’s forced to cower in a prison corner of Creation?

Let’s be completely honest with ourselves here. Nobody’s watching or judging us in this moment–
except, of course, our most scrupulous exacting taskmasters–
our inner selves.

So we must ask ourselves, because to avoid these harsh questions is to embrace the most deadly mediocrity:

Will we continue to curdle our ethics so sourly that the most shallow behavior, most self-congratulatory criminality, most imbecilic violence are celebrated with no sadness?

Can’t our jaded eyes see how our personal integrity, holistic usefulness & sense of community suffer by being reduced to embarrassing court jesters performing in the royal courts of the rich?

Can’t we see how we–
from the most religious to the most atheistic–
from the most advanced intellectuals to the most incurable simpletons–

all of us seem stuck in a unexplainable waiting game?

For sure, our wait’s well-camouflaged. By sheer cleverness of denials and sheer urgency of private worries.

As a result, some of us, frozen, await Jesus Christ’s return.
Some of us expect the next Buddha, the next Iman Mahdi, the next great Caesar to relieve our responsibilities.

Some of us pretend to expect the next great President, the next great corporation, the next great Mayan 2012 calendar date to force our hands, to cleanse our festering wounds–
or the next great & horrible enemy to slap us awake.

Some of us await the landing of the UFOs or the all-saving kindness of our Space Neighbors to revive us, or the next stupendous drug to make us less stupid–
or so stupefied we won’t feel our pain.

Or, the next 1-chance-in-77-million of winning the lottery, the next fated sweet encounter with a soul mate, the next corporate bail-out, the next public hand-out, the next death of an unknown rich uncle…

But what are we waiting for?

Are we really happy with waiting for a dozen different quantum reality versions of a Jesus to wave his wand & decree with finality to each of us in turn,
“You, bad…
You, good…
You, losers…
You, the champs…
You, the chimps”?

Or to distract us with fears of suffering beneath the lash of the next “You’re fired”, “You’re too old”, or “Guess what–you’re doomed, you’re damned & you’re dead!”

Now we’ve force-fed ourselves these tough questions, here’s Part One of that radical shocking secret:

Our waiting time is over.
Our waiting game is already up.
Our ancient tired legends & prized excuses have already surrendered their vitality.
Collapsed like sacred but useless sands of time slip-sliding into the hourglass’ bottom.

The clock already strikes past midnight for the human race.

What does this mean?

It means our past is dead. Our denial is dying.
And here we are.
Naked.
Awakening.
Scared.
Crying out for our Mamas & Papas.

But here we are.
One human family, utterly bored at playing The Game of Fragments.

Can you sense the return of your trust?
Can you feel a strange new calm?
Can you feel your fears of abandonment dissolve?

Can you feel your first deep stirrings of an ancient competence?
Can you admit you believe in your own soul’s wisdom?

Can you abandon your fears that our bridge to The New World is too shaky, too endless, too painful to cross?

Can you stop theorizing about what awaits you on the far side?
Stop squabbling about who deserves to cross & who deserves to stay behind in the Old Darkness?

Can you just be happy with putting one foot in front of the other?
With helping your neighbor who feels too lost or afraid, too ignorant or worthless, to take his or her next small step?

Can you taste your desire to emerge safely on the other side?
To reach new lands & dimensions of greater adventure?

Can you picture with your inner eye & your hidden hearing & your unused heart strength, what it might be like–
no, what it WILL be like–
for you to set foot on that promised shore?

Do you dare imagine the sweet new taste of your freedoms?
Your soul’s secret delight at everyone winning The Game of Fragments?
Can you imagine the awaiting Game of a higher, healthier, happier Reality?

If you can, are you willing to arrive safely–
are you willing for us ALL to arrive safely–
whatever the nature of this Promised Shore–

on that peaceful Island Earth whose pure freshness tugs at our attention–
whose lightening gravity demands we command & commit our energies–
to unchain our futures from self punishment and recrimination
over ancient memories of Paradises Lost–

No matter what the cost?

Are you ready?

I believe you are ready.

I believe I am, too.
Because Reality demands this.

I even believe some of us might already have arrived.
This very minute, crowded around by unseen angels they wave & yell for us.

To snap us from our self hypnosis.

To guide us by the crystalline ring of their voices until the low fog lifts
and reveals that far shore, now startlingly close.

Almost at our feet.

To quicken our steps on our way back Home.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Let me know any way I can help.
Peace & Happiness to you,
Rev. Scott Ufford,
The Psychic Philosopher
Copyright 2012

I Promise to Stop Procrastinating, Sooner or Later: New Year’s Resolution #1

A. The Historical Problem

Maybe you’re familiar with my “sad condition”. It’s called “procrastination” by some, and “a sure sign of genius at work” by more enlightened critics.



As a Master Procrastinator, or The Procrastinator King, any excuses I invent for my own slack behavior are far more clever and self deceptive than any my supporters might concoct for me.

“We know you have a lot of stress”–
“Everybody is too busy these days to finish everything”–
“It’s just because you’re artistic and you meditate a lot!”
etc. etc.

(Amateurs! Well meaning, but amateurs. They probably never goofed off a day in their virtuous lives, so they don’t realize they’re being played. Or, they’re compensating for me because they secretly wish they could be as slack–but that’s another story.)

Fact: I am far too diligent in my slothfulness for anyone else’ kind alibis to work.

Fact: Only the master of his own jail cell may convincingly portray himself as a prisoner…

Lounging comfortably on his tattered bunk, with unlaced scruffy boot he pushes his prison door key out of sight under threadbare rug when sympathetic visitors come to his cell.

B. Some Brutal Solutions

Probably the most compassionately brutal thing you can do for the self-educated & self-imprisoned man:

Use tough love.

Like a Sherlockian psychologist, deduce his weak point, find the key to his deception.

Threaten to uncover & steal that key.

Convince him of your sincerity, at least he’ll lose his crocodile-like torpor for a second. Leap up in half-hearted defense of his right to waste his life…on his own terms.

Why?

Without the comforting fact of his capacity for self-escape, his confinement would soon prove intolerable!

So if you want someone to get off his or her lazy butt, just find a way to threaten to make his self-confinement WORSE or IRREVERSIBLE.

Or, refuse to visit his jail cell.
Refuse to send monthly care packages reminding him how nice life would be if he were free.
Refuse to make sympathetic excuses for his procrastination.
Refuse to accept his apologies for not following up on his dreams.

Eventually, he might creep mouse-like out of his cell when he thinks no one’s looking…just to sneak a fresh breath of that strange new air called “life” coming in from beyond the jail.

C. The Shocking Results

Who really knows? That’s why life is a freedom and freedom is life.

But one thing you know–
tough love works.

Just be careful how much you use it for others–
they might catch on & use it for YOU.
Because nobody’s perfect, you know!

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

My Post Script & Pre Script–
What YOU Get Out of This:

I promise to post more regularly in 2012.

Twice a week. Shorter posts.

With more of my philosophical & political views,
more of more quirky sense of humor,
& more of my wild-eyed creative knee-jerk responses to the events of the day that concern us.

I’ll invite you to get more out of this blog & its growing community–
including surveys & contests,
& share special inspirational secrets.

Why? Because I believe you have special qualities–
you have special potential you WANT to tap into THIS very exciting year of 2012.
God knows these gifts are waiting inside you.

When you tap into your uniqueness with daring & with hope–
miracles can happen.

And I want to help.

Promise!

Sincerely,
Rev. Scott Ufford
The Psychic Philosopher

Copyright 2012

Raw 9/11/2001 WTC Memorial Poem: YOU DIED

A raw memorial poem I wrote in NYC in 2001 immediately after destruction of the World Trade Center & the slaughter of 4,000:

YOU DIED.

My heart is ripped open.
Gouged open.
I am in shock.
I am grief.

* * * * * * * * * * *

My brain is pounding pounding
My pulse is crazed
Everything is askew
Empty
Whirling
Gasping breathless.
I’m spinning.
Who will catch me?
What can heal me?
What is real?
Where are you now?

* * * * * * * * * * *

No words to cry.
No one to hear me.
No way to cry.
My blood runs away.
Painfully sweet.
My pain flows like warm honey
Into your hive.
Into my full memories of you.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Incredible loss.
Horrific waste.
No comprehension.
I will never see you again?
Impossible.
My heart recoils at the thought
Like a gunshot aimed
In a terribly
Insanely
Wrong direction.
Look, I’ll prove it.
With my eyes closed tight right now,
I can still see you . . .

* * * * * * * * * * *

Life.
Slowly.
Flows.
Back.
Into my wretched heart.
Heals it like a
Long-vanished ocean tide
Returning to bathe crusted shores
To wash away my grief.
I am so grateful to you.

* * * * * * * * * * *

I can feel you grinning with relief.
At me.
You live in stunning new dimensions.
You see me finally
Waking up.
And.
Breathing.
Deeply.
On my side of the ripped veil.
We are both going to be
Okay.
In the morning, my tears taste
Good.

* * * * * * * * * * *


Bloody History of this Raw Memorial Poem

These few words about slaughtered friends,
about unexpected sacrifices, losses, grief and redemption
at NYC’s World Trade Center and across America
were written one gray morning after September 11, 2001.

Pinned to the sagging wire fence at Union Square Park–

surrounded by heaps of sad flowers taped to hopeful notes
pleading for any word of the whereabouts of loved ones lost in the confusion–

lit by nearby pools of candles burning in memoriam over smiling family photos of the doomed–

abandoned to the elements just a stone’s throw from the Dalai Lama’s
scale model of the Twin Towers wreathed in carnations and tears–

half hidden next to park visitors’ unforgettable words and pictures of anguish,
anger, prayer and pleading scrawled on a giant public paper canvas taped around all the paths–

two weeks later to be rolled up & shipped to the Smithsonian for what?
for safekeeping?–

my simple words lost in the miserable maze heaped
below the 145 year old gray equestrian statue of Washington
inscribed in bold chalk letters with the message PEACE NOT WAR–

this little memorial poem somehow got scooped up & quoted
on sites dotting the countryside, such as
Tulsa World.

Is it all just about luck?
About the Divine Hand?
About when it’s your time to go, you go?

By the grace of unseen guidance I and so many others survived.
Others did not.
We still remember them.

The blessings and lessons of our lives go on.

Scott Ufford
Spiritualist minister
Copyright 2001, 2011