Hello Dear Ones!

I was recently honored to be one of the presenters for a Pecha Kucha event. For those of you who aren’t familiar with these “mini-TED talks” check out their website. Begun over a decade ago in Tokyo, the Japanese name (pronouced Pech-CHA-kahcha) at an international meeting of architects, it originated as a way of sharing, in an easy fashion, fascinating (and often complex) new ideas. (Pecha Kucha literally means “little talk” or “chitchat”).

The formula for Pecha Kucha is: the speakers talk for twenty seconds about each of their twenty images. The images can be related or timed, to the speaker’s mode of presentation, or not. In a short time I will post a link here on LordFlea to my PK talk that will be posted up on their main website, along with the 20 images projected as my voice is heard speaking. Until then, here are my notes I used to practice my talk, but it’s not verbatim the actual presentation I gave.

My (no notes used!) spoken presentation was on December 10, 2018 in St. Augustine, FL on a very cold night, with a PACKED HOUSE of enthusiastic supporters of ideas, bless ’em, bundled outside, that’s what we do in north Florida!

Greetings, you amazing beings of warm Light … only some of us, like me, needed some help to find this fact out! When I was young, I had a lot of fears and confusion about the world around me. But I can’t be the only person who has had to deal with negative emotions, right? My first memories are about flying away, escaping danger in my dreams. I started running away, for real, as soon as I could. Such delicious agony, so scary, so … crippling! I was always wondering what the secret to happiness could be?

I soon found out that Love made me feel the best! So I decided to go for the ultimate in its possibilities. Wherever I found Love, that’s where I wanted to be. Love gives the most bang for the buck. It never runs out. The more I gave, the more I got. I began to think of Love as my life’s currency, and wanted to spend it lavishly.

After art school, I began to focus on both mythology and love, the two subjects that turned me on the most. But I was still gloomy, and confused a lot. My art as well as my life was filled with angst, because childhood fears still ruled me. The times of my culture were mirroring this angst, people were angry all around me: It was the Vietnam War era. The acts of my government increased my fears a thousand-folk.

So I left America. For a whole decade. I wanted nothing to do with the war, or American capitalism and materialism. I was filled with fear and frustration about the future of the world, the state of our sick environment. I had been a early environmentalist; I was so mad about our toxic atmosphere and poisoned waters  and modern-day excesses … I was ready to get violent. So I had to say goodbye to my family, my friends, my country. I wanted to live in more loving surroundings. I had recently learned how to sail so I went to the islands of the West Indies where I immersed myself in Nature: the sea, the land, and hung with the simplest of jungle people. That’s me at the foot of 100-foot-tall bamboos. I explored Nature intimately, and was a botanical illustrator plus an inter-island trader of tropical fruits and veggies.

I became like a shape-shifter, becoming One with Nature that all around me, merging with all forms of Nature. My art now interpreted my everyday experiences: living intimately with plants in jungle settings, with people in the most primitive spots I could find, sailing whenever I could, exploring the gifts of the deep blue sea. Nature became my Teacher. Through It, I learned the Power of Unity, another way of saying knowing more intimately, Love’s great Power. Because that’s what I experienced. I became One with Nature all around me. I saw that Life is a web; what we do to one, we do to all. This was my new reality.

I began to meditate daily. This is when I discovered that I didn’t have to go anywhere, or do anything to be immersed in Love. All I had to do was go inside and feel the Love within me. I began to do healing work about the deep fears and confusion I’d had all my life. Slowly, I got better. I realized that another expression of Love is called Sacred Consciousness, the Oneness we all are, which is called by many names by different cultures. Some people call the Divine power within, or God, the name of Love. To me, Love is the Light of Consciousness, the universal consciousness which all of humankind innately has. Gradually, I healed my Self, so I could begin to help heal others.

My art was now about honoring this Power Within that I had discovered within my Self! No longer was my art about angsty, fear-filled topics like it had been, earlier. Now I made only homages to Nature’s Great Power, within ALL! As I grew more still, and listened to my own heart, I realized the world’s environment and human society desperately called out for the same healing as I had experienced. I made a conscious choice to focus only on positives, not on fears, or evil in the world. I gleefully threw out a lot of my bad old, angsty art.

I began exploring all forms of creative energy, another expression of Love’s great Power. Feminine, masculine energies, separately or both, simultaneously, sometimes. Looking for symbols that are universal, that anyone could understand, I painted, drew, made sculptures, wrote about my new passion: to express Oneness: that We Are All One. The Energy of Love became my favorite motif. I found unique ways of expressing it. Because Love within (Self Love) helped heal me, I wanted to help others discover this self-healing they have, too. We can heal the world, one person at a time! I knew Love could change our toxic environment, just as people get healed. To everyone, and in every way I could, I shouted my main subject: Love heals; Fear causes dis-ease.

I became a family person! Then I realized, in my blended family setting (marrying a man whose very young children I helped raise) that “bad things” do happen, but never causes the love to stop, ever! I was Angel Mom to my husband’s two kids. In my blended family I realized challenges are opportunities to transform negatives into positive experiences. Finally, I realized all of humankind is one big blended family.

I realized I had completely changed my thinking! Instead of holding onto fears, my work and my life were now about spreading positive solutions to others! Using Love’s great Power is the only way to heal our toxic, challenged world. I knew this because it worked to change my own bad thinking. As we think, we become, I now knew was true. I had discovered the secret of happiness that I’d been searching for all my life. What we hold in our consciousness, our thinking, is what we become, and, in turn, when enough of us think this way, what our world becomes. I said NO to fear, worry, gloom. I said YES to Love in all its many scrumptious flavors. This is the secret of happiness!

I nurtured my blended family, and with my art I nurtured the world. I began to write books. I created Lord Flea, this spiritual blog. I wanted to share how great a creative Force that Joy is, a cousin of Love. I documented the resilience, hope, gratitude we can choose instead of hanging onto negativities like hopelessness, fear, anger.

Experiencing Oneness became my everyday occurrence, everywhere I went! Interpreting it in my art and my writing became my passion. The stories we tell each other, the dreams we have, the songs we sing, are the healing balm of our very needy world. Instead of conflict, we can look for similarities in others. We can choose to BE happy even though bad things swirl around us, like storms do in Nature. I started calling myself a spiritual activist, because spreading Love however I could, was now my art form.

Then, in 2012, the Higgs Bosun was discovered by quantum physicists, who were awarded the Nobel Prize for their long awaited proving of this connective energy force. Nicknamed the God Particle — at last there was tangible proof about what every meditator since time immemorial knows if True (and Albert Einstein predicted in his Theory of Relativity) … that … we are all One. Our connection is now a measurable form of invisible, sub-atomic energy, this energy that is discernible in every single substance available for testing, from Earth and beyond. Love, or consciousness, or “invisible energy” is called many names. I just happen to choose to call that interconnecting energy, simply delicious Love in all its many flavors.

Creativity is generated on the right side of our brains. The left side of our brain focuses on the logical use of thought. In order for us to be balanced, energetic beings, we must strive to use both our rational and our creative energies. Love is also a freely operating use of a person’s creative power. The collective unconscious connects us, fills us with inspiration. Solutions for ALL our challenges await us, just waiting to be discovered, if we cultivate creative energy. We are all connected through this positive creative Energy of Love. I am taking recruits for the Army of Love!

At this time in our society, we are experienced a great division. But we have a choice. Because our minds are the builders of our lives, we can choose to find similarities between ourselves, instead of focusing on how different we are. Listen to people who are different than us. Reach out to them. The only solution for our numerous world challenges is to USE the tremendous energy of healing, of acceptance, of creative ideas that pour forth from the unlimited Source: the Power of Love we all have, within our own selves.

It’s true: How we Think, we become. Recognize the choice all of us have! Let’s create a wave of healing, nurturing Love that can overcome any difficulty, any hurt, any evil, any challenge. The Army of Love has the power to end wars, even. There are millions of us enlisted in this Army already, more and more everyday. How we think, we become.

Iesha Evans is one of us, here when she stood against the armed Riot Squad of Baton Rouge, Louisiana in 2016, showing the force of her steady, serene love in this spectacularly inspiring picture. Anger begets anger. Love breeds more love. Show the Force of your loving acceptance. Be part of the solution, not the problem.

So we must be careful about, and watch! the way we think. Our brains don’t know the difference between reality or fantasy. This has been proven scientifically. What our mind focuses on becomes our life’s reality. If you want to help yourself, and the world around you, change your thinking from fear to some form of Love. You create your own reality. What you think, you become. Change your thinking, change your life, and help change the world to a better, safer place to live.

Always look for, and you’ll find, chances to celebrate Love. Choose to be filled with Love, the magical elixir of life. Reach out, talk to people who don’t think like you do. Find common ground. Share the JOY.

When life doesn’t make sense, or things anger or disappoint us — go within. Follow your breath, focus on Love that burns brightly within, as our connected human consciousness. Solutions are waiting to be discovered for all our challenges. We have a choice, no matter how dire we feel about things going on, outside our own control. In difficult times, go within. Choose to focus on the Light of Love within everything in existence. We are amazing beings of warm, creative Light! What a simply scrumptious idea this is!