I would like everyone to know the coffee shop is available for private groups to meet, create and plot. Responsible, genuinely decent people... keep the place in mind when you need a space for your socially conscious, spiritual and/or artistic, creative small groups. It would be good to bring in a little extra money and I will simply ask that you take up a love offering and pay for any drinks and food that you use.
In these troubling times those of us who are trying to bring a little good into the world need to get together and stick together and support the places which support us. I am not going to go into a long explanation about costs and the economy because we all are living through it. The coffee shop is here for you, day in and day out. All kinds of people come here and get support, love, connection. They find out about work, put up notices about everything imaginable happening around town, meet others of like mind, have a place to voice their feelings and concerns and be heard. If there is one thing I am, it is a good listener and listen I do. Remember, the real purpose of the coffee shop is hardly to sell coffee. The real purpose of the shop is to be a place where people get together and do some things which change the world...a big world, a small world, a minuscule world, the world of lakes, the world of nature, the world inside minds and hearts.
Almost everyone is concerned about the dreaded gas prices, the economy, the housing issue and the war. How will we survive this?
I know how.
I learned this stuff from people greater than myself, from reading and listening and studying. I never would have come up with these things, if not for Neal Donald Walsh, the Dalai Lama, Marianne Williamson, and alas, Bertie Greer, my grandmother. When I was a kid I would meet people who knew her, in one way or another and they always expressed great love and admiration for her. One time I met a man who sold vacuum cleaners ...a door to door salesman, trying to sell something nobody had the money to buy. He was dead broke, with three kids at home and he was desperate to the point of near suicide when he knocked on her door.
Well, Bertie didn't buy a vacuum cleaner from him but she did give him lunch and five dollars. When I was talking to him he wondered if he had ever paid her back and he gave me a five dollar bill to return to her.He told me how she listened, encouraged him and gave him the strength to carry on. He never forgot her. When I arrived with the money she just laughed and said that wasn't a loan. It was a gift, but she was glad he was doing well now.
My grandfather was one of the few men who had a job during the *Great Depression*. My grandparents did not hoard what they had in those troubling times, just taking care of themselves. They shared with their neighbors and friends. Neither one of them told me about this. I learned about this as I was growing up from people in their church and neighborhood, a story here, a tale there, about their generosity. And of course, I saw their example of giving over the years..My grandfather had his special boys who he took to the barber shop every Saturday. He believed a man needed a good haircut for self-esteem and he did this for boys whose families had a good haircut way down on the list of needs. My grandparents did things for others just because they were decent, sharing people, without the help of any non-profit government status or grants. They did what they could because it was simply the right thing to do. I asked Bertie about it one time and she simply answered, "Chicken and dumplings doesn't taste so good when you know your neighbors are chewing on shoe leather" Quite a role model.
My mother was similar in her consciousness. She graduated from college the same month I graduated from high school. We were just about *middle class* right around that time of my life. She got a job teaching third grade in a poor neighborhood. She was constantly on the look out for clothes and shoes, pencils, paper, things which her kids needed and their families were unable to provide.
I learned from these great people, that it is by connecting and being supportive and loving toward each other that will get us through these times. Oddly, it is the time to be generous, to give, to share. The metaphysical principle is give what you need most. If you need some love, then send out some love. If you need compassion and understanding, try listening and supporting someone who needs it, validating people's feelings. If you need money, give it. Stopping the flow, will indeed stop the flow...both out and in..
