Updates

If you've ready any of my previous Updates (and apparently people do read them, because occasionally I'll get an inquiry about one point or another), you may know that I closed my video production business, Gold Thread Video Productions--under which name I produced the documentary this website supports, "In Another Life"--and moved from Atlanta, Georgia to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. I am here specifically because, as a follower of Meher Baba since 1974, I am involved in audio/video archiving of material connected with his legacy. I now have ready access to the Meher Spiritual Center, a magical place that Meher Baba called his "home in the West". Formerly I was only able to get here once every year or two. Now I have a veritable "feast" of access.

Many times I have felt the urge to emblazon something about Meher Baba on this page--occasionally I have wanted to do something even more drastic, like put a quote by him on the home page of this site with nothing else, to simply replace the entire "reincarnation education project" as I've come to call it, with one quote and Meher Baba's name. But I've always changed my mind, because I know how it will be received. This website is intended to give people good information about reincarnation; if they choose to pursue the clear path I've made to the deeper teachings and the Masters who gave those teachings, including my Master, then they have that opportunity. But it must remain an opportunity. So I always talk myself out of it.

This evening, however, searching for a quote to share in a meeting, I ran across one which directly addresses my erstwhile company's name. I'm quite sure that 99.9% of the potential clients who ran across my company name had no idea what it meant. I'm sure, in fact, that they thought it sounded quite mamby-pamby. I was amused when people would interpret it as "Gold Threat Video Productions", and they seemed disappointed when I corrected them. At least, they thought to themselves, "Gold Threat" had some teeth in it...

But the poet who wrote the lines I'm going to quote below was hardly a "wus". He was a tough Australian, tough in a breed of tough men, but his heart was alive to what he perceived in Meher Baba. He was a direct disciple and lived as one of Meher Baba's close men "mandali" for many years--no easy task. These two stanzas are from a book entitled "Stay With God". And if you ever want to read a blazing sun of a book which pulls no punches; exalts that which should be exalted and puts everything else in its correct relation (which is to say, God first and everything else behind Him); then I highly recommend it.

So, there. I've done it. This is what my company name meant; and if you ever purchase a copy of "In Another Life" and see the opening logo for "Gold Thread Video Productions", this is what I was trying to convey...

Without a word of the Word in one's heart,
without a reflection of His light, Whose seventh shadow
is the physical sun, in one's eyes--that is, without
the sacrifice having been made which is savour to God--
no food nourishes, but is poison which paralyses
and finally kills us to our essential Self. With bricks
of dead tissue do we build our vast hospitals,
with the steel of maimed minds do we forge the knife
which performs the operation. The world of nature,
helpless from our helplessness, weeps.
And from her overmuch tears roll the floods
and from her shame and burning shines the sun of drought,
Weeping and burning is nature, because of our heedlessness,
and the Winds, finding no home, return to God.

So the artist, if he is to sing or write or paint
or play in truth, in praise of love, may not of himself, but first
find the golden Thread by which he moves, the lovely Note
from which he has continuous becoming. Then find the Holder of the thread,
the lovely Singer, and offer Him his body, speech and mind
in service, nor asking in return the gift of art or anything,
for even this finding and surrenderance is by Grace--Grace
which puts us under eternal obligation of repayment.
Heaven and earth move by the Word alone;
and It moves out from Silence. The Mover
is the Perfect Master, Who holds the thread which binds
each one together in one gathered piece of movement;
Who sings the Song which is our sighs and tears,
our well directed thought and sudden laughter.
--Francis Brabazon

Music opening this page: "High Landrons," Eric Johnson (Ah Via Musicom album)
All I can say is, if you have a chance to see Eric in concert, don't pass it up...
sell the car and hitch to the concert if you have to.