Do You Like Watching Cooking Shows?

 I have one for you.

This is a YouTube video sent to me from a reader on my https://Travels with Jo.com

 Site/

It is Roasting a chicken in Borneo.

It starts slowly with a girl riding a moped through the Borneo jungle. Eventually, she comes to a hut where she proceeds to prepare a chicken for the family meal. As the family—a young couple, a boy, grandma—became involved in its preparation, I, from across the globe, became mesmerized. And I wanted to share their experience.  

Borneo roast chicken

https://www.youtube.com/embed/gEUqYxb-I7w

(Cut and paste.)

 

With a Smart Phone we are connected around the world. Not only do we have the ability to call almost anywhere, we have the Internet and a camera in a device small enough to place in our pocket. (And, I remember when calling abroad took about 8 hours from call to connect.)

In my little corner of the world, I sit at my computer and let fly whatever comes to me. You wonderful people are one precipitant of my barrage. I want to share, but not inundate you, for I get about two feet of emails daily. Not fun stuff, though. Basically deletable. But once in a while, something comes through, like a note from one of you guys or from that young girl who sent me a video of her roasting a chicken.

As you search through your emails, I'm hoping Tuesdays with Jo comes up as one of the fun ones.

Like spaghetti thrown at the ceiling, I've been throwing my work, that is, inclinations that come to me, to see if it sticks.

This is what I have been doing this past week:

 

INTRODUCTION

 

“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I’ll meet you there."--Rumi

 

https://herestothedream.blogspot.com

 

Are You Listening to The News?

 Tuesdays With Jo

 

Remember when the Newspaper was the News?

 

 

Your grandfather or some elder in the family read it daily cover to cover. They were informed and would sit around the table arguing politics long after you left the room.

 

Reporters worked diligently to find and be the first to publish a story. Foreign correspondents went into the battlefields to report the news. In our lifetime, reporters such as Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, with an informant named Deepthroat, broke the story of the Watergate break-in and brought down a President. 

 

Now we’re not sure what is true and what isn’t. If we watch the news (which I don’t, but I get some second-hand), we can tune in for 15 minutes any time of the day. If you miss it once, you can tune in later and catch it. Yet there are those, so I’ve heard, that have the TV turned on ALL DAY. Talk about programming the brain.

 

We begin to think what’s placed before us is the way the world is, and if you hear it over and over, whatever comes into our senses repeatedly, tends to stick. Yet we go to the grocery store, and people are doing their shopping, relatively happy. People are going for walks with their baby strollers and their dogs. Kids are on their bikes. We go to events, and people are laughing and talking about where they will go for lunch. Kids are practicing for the Olympics. Some have dreams of starting a Band. Others are hooked on the computer, and we know those brains will be the programmers of the future. People are writing, and researching and blogging, and singing-- practicing their craft. Many people are turning to spirituality and consciousness training. Many are hiring coaches to help them. 

 

There is a world of Well-being, 

 

Yet the news is a handful of information—primarily shocking, confusing, or dire. The news comes from a tiny pocket of people who control the media. The media owners tell what they want to tell us, and generally, it is to get attention.

 

Out there is a beautiful world. Do we believe it?

 

 

Keep watching the news, and you will get sucked into someone else’s mindset. It is not representative of humankind.

 

No matter where we are, what our beliefs or politics are, we know how watching the news makes us feel.

 

It makes us feel that it’s impossible to gain certainty and direction in our lives when the whole world is uncertain.

 

To believe that we  need the outside world to be okay for us to be okay is a myth.

 

We must get so solidly grounded that we will be secure in our souls, and we will become the change the world needs. 

 

That’s the TRUTH.

 

This morning a reader commented on an old blog post from https://travelswithjo.com titled “This is Only for Those Folks Who Want to Blog, or Write, or Be Heard.” I hit the link--it was written on Jan. 15, 2019. At the bottom of the post, I had included the link to the song, Starry Starry Night, and I listened to it again. 

 

Don McLean sings the song over the printed lyrics and pictures of paintings by Vincent Van Goth. It is awesome. Watch it. It will feed your soul. 

 

Music and art give us time to connect to something outside ourselves. It’s next to impossible to worry while listening to a beautiful song or viewing a gorgeous painting. Art allows us to enter into the sublime. 

 

Isn’t that what life is all about?

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxHnRfhDmrk

 

Let's Talk Turkey

 

I’m posting what I feel, not to get numbers, but I’m have enough ego to want someone to read what I am written.

I know with a blog, you need to produce something people want.

Sometimes a blog is for information, often it is to inspire, sometimes for entertainment. Some people blog for self-indulgence. However, I prefer to say it is for self-expression. I encourage people to do that, to find whatever floats their boat and do it. That gives life its juice.

I have read that your demographics are into what you are into, and I would like to supply what you are looking for, but I must admit it is a shot in the dark. Thus, I must provide what I’m into and take my chances.

I found out today that more people watch YouTube than they read blogs, and while I’ve have been reticent about going on YouTube, now I find I don’t have to put my big fat face on it. (My face isn’t fat.) I’m thinking of filming forest trails, for I love the forest, and I live in Oregon, where there are forests to share. While walking along the forest trail, filming, I could talk about how we attract what we want, how we can have a happy life, and get what we want out of life. We are here for a reason, and I see that frustrated and unhappy people abound. We all need a picker-upper once in a while. Hell– we need it daily.

Having someone admit it isn’t all a bed of roses is essential too. (I’ll try not to use too many clichés.) It’s okay to acknowledge where you are. If it’s in the dumps, admit it and move on from there. Rarely do we jump from absolute misery to absolute happiness in one quantum leap. We climb up incrementally. Like anger is better than depression. What comes after anger? Maybe some resolve, some insight. Calm even. Acknowledge where you are and move from there. The idea is to not allow the minutia of life to overshadow the grandeur of it. (You see, I talk to myself as much as to you, for I have noticed that once I express my feelings, I am uplifted.)

I want to celebrate life. Is that what you want?

Upward and onward,

Love from Jo

P.S. I placed wild turkeys for the picture above, for they have enough smarts to survive, among coyotes, dogs, raccoons, and whatever else likes turkey for dinner.

A few years ago, we rented a lovely home on three acres in California. After a time, the owner moved in chickens and turkeys. They were out of view from the house, and as I had some experience with chickens I offered–for a reduction in rent, to feed them for him. It was a great arrangement, and the turkeys were young and thus became attached to me. They would sing out a chorus of gobbling when I approached their pen–of course they knew food came with me, but even the owner said they liked me. The trouble was we also had coyotes that would break in during the night, I would see the evidence come morning. So, I kept calling the owner to shore up the fencing. Finally, he got it rather coyote proof.

And then, can you believe it? I guess turkeys are inquisitive creatures, and would go up to the fence to meet Mr. Coyote, and zap off with the head.

I tried to tell them, but would they listen?

I’ll try to steer you right.