Happy New Year!!!

Thanks Billy Taylor for the music and vibrations. I last saw you at Keter Betts' homegoing now we honor you.

To teach is to learn twice - Joseph Joubert

Next to knowing when to seize an opportunity, the next important thing is to know when to forego an advantage - Benjamin Disraeli

Whatever you think the world is withholding from you, you are withholding from the world - Eckhart Tolle

Vision without action is daydream. Action without vision is nightmare - Japanese proverb

The universe does not hear your words, you are vibrating and by your vibration you are attracting and when you are feeling negative emotion you are negatively vibrating therefore you are negatively attracting - Abraham

He who is outside his door has the hardest part of his journey behind him - Flemish proverb

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function - F. Scott Fitzgerald

It is always true that what I think and what I feel and what I get are always a match - Abraham-Hicks

The ego could be defined simply in this way: a dysfunctional relationship with the present moment...do I want the present moment to be my friend or my enemy - Eckhart Tolle

When spiders unite, they can tie down a lion - Ethiopian proverb

Be humble you are made of earth. Be noble for you are made of stars - Serbian proverb

Laughter is the closest distance between two people - Victor Borge

The Universe is Vast

I remember when I was living in my apartment in VA I had a poster on the wall that I got from the Smithsonian store at National Airport. It was a poster entitled “The Known Universe.” This poster had an image of the solar system with the sun and the nine planets in orbit. This image had a box around it and then a line connected to the box that went to a dot in the Milky Way Galaxy. That dot was where our solar system was in relation to the rest of the star groups in the Milky Way Galaxy. In the vastness of the Milky Way our solar system is just a dot in the swirling mass of stars and gas. Then there was a box around the Milky Way and a line that brought this box into a dot inside an area known as a star system. This system had a box around it and a line that brought it into another dot in an area at the top of the poster that stretched the whole length of the poster underneath the title, “The Known Universe.” This was all that “we” know because these stars and galaxies are all that the Hubble Telescope can see and detect.

When I think about this poster I am supremely humbled. I remember thinking that how could we give so much importance to our problems and issues and even to ourselves when this universe is so vast. We are such a minute part of this gargantuan universe that whatever we do on this planet, in our country, in our community, in our home is in the grand scheme of things so insignificant. I am reminded of the Buddhist saying that 100 years from now everyone will be gone. Well it takes more than 70,000 years to get to the next star Proxima Centauri, let alone the next galaxy. How can we measure time when we are not even there to look at the watch?

When we realize our own minuteness we come to the understanding that it is our collective selves and our unity with the cosmos that gives us significance. Only when we align with The All, the source of all things, we can have an identity with the universe. It is our connection to the universal that gives us significance.
So let go, and let God, surrender your ego to the universal Spirit. Let the Cosmos think, feel, speak, act, love and breathe through you. Be at one with the divinity within you and you will have all the power of this vast universe behind everything you undertake.

Summer Courses 2010

I will be teaching several online courses this summer in music industry and ethnomusicology at NCCU. You can apply online at:
http://web.nccu.edu/divisionofExtendedStudies/de/registration.htm

If you’re interested or know someone who is, don’t hesitate to register because classes may fill up. There are two summer sessions and the first session starts May 19th and goes until June 25th. Session II starts June 30th and goes until August 5th.

First Session
Music Industry:
MUSL 3860 Introduction to Music Technology – Acoustics – William Smith
MUSL 3870 Production I – William Smith

Ethnomusicology:
MUSL 3900 Music of Africa
MUSL 1000 Survey of Music

Second Session
Music Industry:
MUSL 3000 Commercial Music – William Smith
MUSL 4860 Production II – William Smith

Ethnomusicology:
MUSL 4850 African Influence on Music of the Americas

Overcoming Troubles

When trouble assails you move beyond the present and consider the past and the future as teachers. They will guide your action. The past is proof that you have made it through difficult circumstances before and that you exist today because The Creator brought you through those circumstances as He will bring you through your current circumstances. Then consider the future. All of the current circumstances will be just memories in the future; recollections of trials overcome.

The Zen axiom that in a hundred years everyone on this planet will be gone is solace in times of trial. It underscores the truth that nothing that you go through is of any real importance save to teach you that YOU are more important than the circumstance. Your spirit will live on beyond your trials and tribulations. Nothing is greater than The Self for it is eternal.

Do not give in to petty circumstances. When you do you are like a lion cringing from the bark of a dog. The lion knows its strength and will strut magnificently through the plain fearing no animal because it knows that it has dominance over the animal world. Walk with that wisdom and awareness and be strong in the knowledge of your royalty. You are The Absolute, The Unflinching, The Omnipotent Self who can surmount any obstacle and any circumstance just by existing. Smile at misfortune, laugh at troubles, welcome adversity because it will shrink when it gazes upon your steadfast assurance of your superiority. You will conquer any trial and tribulation because those trials are temporary while you are permanent. You have dominion over them and they are your subjects. They are here to serve you, not you to serve them. Realize this truth and stand firm.