FOUNDER'S ARCHIVE:

January 2, 2010

Setting Intention for 2010

Today I came to the realization that I want to be a philanthropist; that’s what I want to be. One who gives freely to those in need, with no regard to where his next meal is coming from, because he or she knows that the next meal is assured to those who love God.

In my heart of hearts I believe that everybody want to be able to share without fear of lack; that would turn everybody on. I’ve known “bad” people and this is a feeling that even they have deep within, but don’t get to feel or express very often.

The real secret in life is that it is a game, full of irony, full of potential, full of “winners and losers”; because that’s the way WE set up and play the game. One of the most compelling and underappreciated ironies of all is that while we allow fear of lack to dominate our intentions and actions, the payoff from the opposite of not lacking (that is possessing or having everything we think we need) is way over rated.

This is evidenced by the millions of people who have everything they could possibly need to address their physical comfort, and are still not happy. Because what their souls truly desire is not things, but LOVE. Along the way, conditioned by society, parents, peers, the media, etc; they have come to love things, thinking that somehow things will give them access to love. And things never do.

The joy of having comes not from the having, but in feeling secure enough in the having to be able to GIVE freely. And the Good News is that everybody and everything that is of and from God has MUCH to give. Look at Mother Teresa. Look at Gandhi. Look at Martin Luther, and Martin Luther King, Jr. They gave much because they served. And you don’t have to have much in terms of things in order to be able to serve, and give. We place so much stock in $ that we have come to equate giving with dińero. But history shows over and over and over again that the greatest and most Godlike impact on mankind comes not from those who give money, but from those who give of themselves, coming from a position of love. This is because God’s currency is not dollars or yen or pound sterling, but LOVE. Were it not so, I don’t believe the Christ would have placed so much emphasis on it.

So 2010 becomes the year of living into my intention of being a philanthropist and sharing the joy of being a philanthropist. Want to join me?

The Perfect Seed

June/July 2009

This piece started out as a prayer for Omar Eduardo Gonzalez Casamayor on the occasion of his christening on March 14, 2009. Because of the casual nature of the beach front event I wound up not sharing this for Omar that day. On reading it now, I think it’s worth sharing with you. What follows is pretty much what I had wanted Omar’s handlers to hear as they embarked upon the journey of shepherding him to manhood.

Teach Omar:

• That every one has the opportunity to be themselves, and to be OK with being themselves.
  
• That when God intended you Omar, he intended ONLY you. You are not a copy. It is your job/responsibility to be the YOU that God planted here. This of course is true for each and every one of us.
  
• To keep hope alive. Not as a slogan but as a way of being in the world; taking the WORD as true, as many of us have been taught to believe. If we believe the WORD is true, then we have an obligation to act like we believe it’s true.
  
• That the Word says the only thing we need to do to find fulfillment in life is to love, as in “love thy neighbor as thyself”.
  
• To have courage so strong that when others tear at you, you can still send them love, as the Master commanded.
  
• To have Faith to believe that when people say you’re anything but what you need to be or should be, have faith to believe that all you ever need to strive to be is the YOU that God intended.
  
• To know that your main job is to find the seed of perfection planted in you, pre-engineered to live life to its fullest, full of love and joy. And then to nurture that seed by living love in every waking moment of your life, regardless of what others say or do.
  
• Omar, remember that heroes of the game of life reside in your DNA; Christ, Martin, Gandhi, Chavez, Mohammed, the Buddha. Why should Omar’s name not be included in this list of overachievers?
• Whatever skin God put you in; the seed in that skin is God’s seed.

If it’s true that God made man in its image and after its likeness then how can Omar be anything less than the perfect seed? Let us love and nurture the perfect seed in ourselves and one another to the glory of our illustrious heritage as God-seeds and to the glory of the manifestation of God-seeds doing God’s work – creating the new heaven on earth.

April 2009 Message

Being Love

The essence of our being is love.

What, then, is love? Because it must be experienced in order to be meaningful, I can't define it for you except to say that it is the total absence of fear and the recognition of complete union with all life. We love another when we see that our interests are not separate. This is always a union of higher minds and not an alliance of egos.

It isn't possible to evaluate or prove love in the usual ways. The fact that we are not able to measure it does not make it less real. We have all had glimpses of pure, unconditional love, and there is unquestionably a part of us that knows it exists. We become aware of love whenever we choose to accept people without judging them and commence the gentle effort of giving without any thought of getting something in return. This means, for example, that true love is not giving in order to change another's attitude from a bad mood to one of lightheartedness or from ingratitude to one of thanks to us. True love is a completely pure and unencumbered form of giving. It is extended freely to the love in others and is its own reward.

The word love, as we generally use it, means something quite different from real love. It is conditional love -- giving in order to get. It is a bargain, a trade arrangement. This is often fairly obvious in romantic relationships in which each partner is giving with the expectation that it will be returned in the specific form that is desired. Conditional love is also what passes for kindness in most parent/child relationships. Here, the extension of love is contingent on approved behavior and attitudes. Parents frequently seek an affirmation of their own worth through the accomplishments of their child and through "payments" of respect. Children often love their parents only when they get what they think they want, whether this be a new possession or approval and praise. Such love is neither dependable nor permanent, and its temporary nature causes us to carry the underlying fear that we are about to be abandoned.

When we are giving true love, our concern is not with our own or anyone else's behavior. We feel natural because we recognize that love is our natural state. We are not aware of limitations. We don't question the possibility of devotion, and we are not preoccupied with time. We are only conscious of now and all it contains. When we are extending love, we are free and at peace. Attitudinal Healing shows us how to allow ourselves to experience this kind of love -- the only love that is eternal.

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February 2009 Contribution Deposit Summary

I thought you would all be happy to know that I just completed tallying up contributions from December of 2008 till now, February 13, 2009, close to a quarter. On the anniversary of Betty Curry’s birthday.

February 13, 2009

Contribution Deposit

Summary

I know that Kelli will breathe a bit easier knowing that the program/project budget is being replenished a bit.

Please join me in celebrating each and every one who contributed to this deposit, directly and indirectly. And let’s see if we can’t top this with Golf Outing proceeds and Gallery Sales activity over the next quarter.

Charles H. Curry

Founder and President

The Living Love Foundation, Inc.

P.S. from Kelly Curry – The children of Rancho Sespe raised another $42.00 to buy their own art supplies for class in December by knocking on doors …please add their donation thanks. This is great to be able to breathe easier -

When I Get to be a Girl – December 2, 2008

When I introduced my Founder’s Message two months ago I said that my intention was to update it monthly. That might actually become more frequent now that we have entered this very active and high energy period in mankind’s evolution toward Oneness that you have begun to notice all around you. Little did I know when I wrote the Sept/October message that I would be moved to change the identity of this column to The PoPcycle Chronicles, which we are introducing with this, our third entry.

Let me give you a little bit of background on the new brand. Over the past year I have fully stepped into the personae of PoP at The Living Love Foundation. Pops is a label that daughter Kelli laid on me back in the ‘90’s when she were publishing Freedom Rag magazine (http://www.freedomrag.org) and I was playing advertising entrepreneur at The Orpheus Connection. Pops was and is a term of endearment which I now know is bestowed based on way more than age.

Well, over the last year or two as Kelli and I have been engaged in the family’s latest and most daring intention to date, The Living Love Foundation, I’ve noticed the Pops label showing up more and more on a day to day basis and even being directed at me by others outside the immediate family who are also pursuing the cause of children with us. So I figured if I couldn’t stop ‘em, especially when they’re doing no harm, I’d get on trend with them and see how far we want to take this Pops thing.

But being ME, I had to add my special twist, turning Pop into PoP, making it an obvious palindrome, being absolutely the same forward or backward, coming or going. This is my way of reminding myself of my intention of being consistent in my practice of unconditional love come good, bad, success, failure, whatever – coming or going, always being the same.

So that’s the origin of the PoP. Then I thought why not share the cycle of evolution of Chuck into PoP as it unfolds. And what better vehicle than my monthly Founder’s Message at www.livinglovefoundation.org? Ergo, The PoPcycle Chronicles.

Enough history. What follows is my first published chronicle, which is actually shorter than this intro. I hope you can see the connection to Living Love and to the Oneness energy that’s coming upon us.

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“When I get to be a girl…”

Several years ago when I was a young man a young boy of about 7 or 8 made the above statement in my presence. Unaware of the false illusion of time, space and reality that I am aware of today, I interrupted him before he could say what his desire or intention would be when he became a girl. Looking back on this now I am very, very sorry that I passed up this opportunity to perhaps get a look at reality through the veil of fog that I had developed around me in the process of “growing up”.

The bible says that “a child shall lead them” and Jesus the Christ himself said, “Suffer (allow) little children to come unto me and forbid them not, for such is the kingdom of heaven”. Had I more fully understood at the time that children have natural born insights that have not yet been sucked out of them by “socialization” and “maturation”, rather than tell that boy that he would never be a girl, I would have let him finish explaining what was on his mind and in his heart before “correcting” him.

Today I know that even though the authentic self that I am is housed in a male body, not only does that self have feminine as well as masculine sides, it is quite possible that I have been in the past or will be in the future housed in a female body on earth. I also know now that although I have seen myself as separated and distinct from all others as a unique entity on earth, truly I am but one cell of the Universal All There Is, the Father/Mother God that is All There Is. I also know now that God wants to manifest on earth through each of us, especially the children who have not yet been fully blinded by the veil of humanity that fogs us in from our memory and recollections of home.

The lesson for me and my message to you is that when it comes to dealing with children let us listen to them without judgment, and let’s gently encourage them to stay tuned to the inner voice that has them asking questions that do not necessarily fit our jaded perspectives of what life is and should be. They may have just the word we need to remove some of the fog from our eyes and the dross from our ears, so we can see and hear reminders from God back home.

Quiet is kept, but it could be that children don’t listen to us when they “grow up” because we didn’t listen to them when they were young; when they really did have something worth listening to. Let’s not make that same mistake again with current and future opportunities.

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November 4, 2008

Today I celebrate what I believe universes in the future will acknowledge as an historic moment in the annals of man on earth.

What an opportunity we now have at this watershed moment to celebrate what it means to be an American and a citizen of the world!

Barack Obama, a black man, today became President-elect of the United States of America.

Some will have you believe that this election is all about what it means to African-Americans. And it is true that African-Americans have every reason to celebrate this historic victory. Imagine going from being chained as a slave to master of the White House in less than 200 years. That is indeed significant in the annals of time. Let that be an inspiration to all who feel on the outs. But personally, that’s not the only thing I’m celebrating tonight.

I’m celebrating that today, for the first time ever in my life, I have unlimited reason to believe and feel in my heart that the “unreasonable” promise of America, called a grand experiment by Alexis DeTocqueville, can come true, for all Americans. Dreams are coming true even as I record this.

No doubt we as a nation have made terrible mistakes along the way. The very constitution that is the foundation of our republic was admittedly flawed from its inception. But we have struggled as a nation to grapple with the conflicts that the founding fathers were able to acknowledge but not resolve. By excluding some from the promise, our founding fathers created a living lie that created a gulf between the fulfillment of the promise and the reality that we saw around us. All men are created equal (except the ones we define as less than equal). Freedom and justice for all (except those whose freedom is practiced differently from mine).

From the beginning we have been a conflicted nation, but we have made much progress toward resolving our conflict. Today’s events are a major step in moving into a new era of togetherness for our nation. And if we as a nation are willing to continue to pursue the God given dreams of our founding fathers to make this unbelievable dream a reality, who or what can stop us?

But we will need to understand and love our dream enough to get busy making it come true. For those of us who take sustenance from the word of the Bible, there is motivation in knowing that In God, there is no thing that is not possible. I believe that all we really need to do is to agree on what we agree on and then to reason together as we take it from there.

I am also celebrating the healing comments from John McCain in conceding that he had lost to a more formidable opponent. John McCain loves America and although I was disappointed in some of the negative, fear based appeals made on his behalf, I was glad to hear him concede that that he believes Obama also loves America. Perhaps most importantly, I was pleased that he pledged his allegiance to the president elect.

This makes it much easier to me to quote:

I pledge allegiance to the flag
Of the United States of America
And to the republic for which it stands,
One nation
Under God
Indivisible
With liberty and justice for all

Wow! Can you feel it? What if all of us who voted for anybody started from a position of agreements and moved out from there in our quest to deliver the dream this nation is grounded upon? What a dream it will be.

As President-elect Obama said tonight, there is much work to be done to give all Americans equal opportunity to live their lives freely under the law and in our hearts. So I say we get busy to deliver the most exhilarating outcome we can imagine from this opportunity, defined as the opportunity to approach the oneness of national intent that will sustain us. OK?

Charles Curry

November 4, 2009

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Sept/October Message:

Welcome to the inaugural message in this slot. My intention is to update this section monthly. I’ve chosen to kick off the series with a message around the origin of The Living Love Foundation, Inc.

“Unless ye become as one of these, ye shall not enter the kingdom of heaven”

I founded The Living Love Foundation because I had finally been given an opportunity and a motive for throwing caution to the wind and living for God the way I have long believed I should. So in the face of cynicism and idle curiosity in a society blinded by fear and distrust, I declared the existence of a new organization dedicated to giving the young masters and the young goddesses of today and tomorrow access to some of the same understanding that has compelled me to whatever level of success I’ve enjoyed in my life.

The opportunity was time on my hands following my retirement from corporate America and the transition of my wife and best friend of 38 years, all within a nine month period. The motive was a compulsion to evidence for myself that I fully got the lesson of the previous 59 years and to make sure I wasn’t the last one to have the chance to get it.

Social scientists will tell you that the end of a job (or in my case a career) and the death of a loved one are two of the three most disruptive and potentially traumatic things that can happen in a person’s life. Moving to a different city is the third. They will also tell you that the way in which one manages these transitions determines the quality of the life that remains. This was a crucial time for me. I chose to meet these two disasters head on and try to “turn lemons into lemonade” so to speak; to use what I still had to get what I still wanted out of life.

What I wanted more than anything else was some peace of mind. I wanted to feel good about myself and I wanted to make sure that when it came my turn to transition that I could look back on my life without regret and with the knowledge that I had brought joy to more than just myself, the way that Betty had. So I opened my heart to try to know what it was/is that I could do to capture and possibly share that joy that I had seen with Betty.

So I started a journey, an inquiry in search of some answers. To my great surprise, I came to realize that most of the really important lessons I learned in life were learned before I was even a teenager. Oh I had many opportunities to relearn them over the years through experience, but the seeds were planted way before I learned to ride a bike or to sing a lick.

One of the lessons I learned from the loving family that shepherded me through childhood is that the choices we make in life greatly influence the quality of life we get to live. “You reap what you sow” was not difficult for me to comprehend because I spent the first seven years of my life on a farm in Alabama. There my grandfather grew cotton, corn, peanuts, sugar cane, pigs and other things.

My grandmother also had a garden that provided the family with fresh greens, beans, sweet potatoes, squash and other items that she turned into delicacies on a wood burning stove in our kitchen. The idea that if you sowed peanuts you would get watermelons never occurred to me. So it was no stretch at all to understand that if you wanted love and respect from those around you, you would not get it by sowing hate and deceit, but only by sowing love and respect.

This is but one of the universal laws or truths that appear to be at work, (whether we personally accept them as truths or not) and that help explain a lot of what we see going on around us. And according to the master thinker and teacher, children and childlikeness are a key component of how they work.

Our mission with Living Love is to share with the children what we’ve learned about what works in this game called life, while they are young enough to still have the joy of childhood in them. We hope that in the process we can encourage them to stay close to the child in them, to never lose the fresh eyes they use to see how to move the energy around them in loving, positive and carefree ways, the way Betty Curry did.

I think Betty’s greatest legacy is not her love of the arts and children (which were legendary), but her ability to see life as a child, with a child’s carefree enthusiasm. I think this is some of what Christ was getting at when he said “Unless you become as one of these, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven”. We’ll share more on this subject in the upcoming months.

The Foundation is a work in progress, and I plan to use this space to keep all interested parties up to date on how we’re progressing and where our thinking is with regard to future progress.

In the meantime, smile often and heartily, treat people with dignity and respect, be yourself no matter what, know that people just want to have fun, and be the child that Christ is looking for to help usher into heaven.

Charles Henry Curry
Founder and President
September 15, 2008