Reverend Joan M. Kistler

Synopsis: Hope for Humanity News is a series of three to five-minute weekly podcasts designed to educate, inspire, and comfort listeners during these challenging, but hopeful times.  Hi everyone! Welcome to Hope for Humanity News! I’m Reverend Joan Kistler. Last week, we talked about how the ego uses painful emotions, like anger and fear, to pull us away from the present moment. But then we suggested that anger and fear are not the only weapons in its arsenal. Another weapon is guilt. How does the ego use guilt? The ego is like an angry, scared child who doesn’t understand the way life is. So, it’s constantly stomping its feet and demanding things because it’s scared that it’s not going to get what it needs and wants. Life always provides us with what we need, but not always what we want. That’s the way life is. The ego generates fear because of its lack of trust in life to provide what it needs, and it produces anger because it refuses to accept that life doesn’t always provide

Synopsis: Hope for Humanity News is a series of three to five-minute weekly podcasts designed to educate, inspire, and comfort listeners during these challenging, but hopeful times.  Hi everyone! Welcome to Hope for Humanity News! I’m Reverend Joan Kistler. Last week, we talked about how the ego uses one of its favorite tactics, judgement, to pull us away from the present moment. At the end of the broadcast, I mentioned that the ego also uses painful emotions, especially anger and fear. How does the ego use anger and fear? The egoic mind developed out of the primitive reptilian brain. This part of the brain contains the emotional center of the brain, which is responsible for our fight-or-flight response. When a threat is perceived, a signal is sent from one part of the brain to another part, which dumps adrenaline into the bloodstream, causing us to feel unpleasant “anger” or “fear” sensations, such as increased heartbeat and breathing, and tense muscles. The problem is th

Synopsis: Hope for Humanity News is a series of three to five-minute weekly podcasts designed to educate, inspire, and comfort listeners during these challenging, but hopeful times.  Hi everyone! Welcome to Hope for Humanity News! I’m Reverend Joan Kistler. Last week we ended our broadcast stating that one of the ego’s favorite tactics for leading us away from the present moment is judgment. How does the ego use judgment? The ego resists reality, and judgement is its primary resistance weapon. The ego is really into its beliefs and opinions and will defend them at all costs. That’s because beliefs and opinions are the house of cards upon which its illusory identity is built. The ego has beliefs and opinions about everything, and it has to be right, or its illusory house of cards collapses. Since reality is its enemy, the ego must always judge against it with reasons that are always right and “solutions” that are always right. When we identify with the ego’s beliefs and opinions, it

Synopsis: Hope for Humanity News is a series of three to five-minute weekly podcasts designed to educate, inspire, and comfort listeners during these challenging, but hopeful times. Hi everyone! Welcome to Hope for Humanity News! I’m Reverend Joan Kistler. Last week we ended our broadcast stating that a main difference between the ego and Essence is how each deals with the present moment. Since they are opposites, they deal with the present moment in opposite ways. The ego fully resists the present moment while Essence fully accepts it. Essence accepts the present moment because the present moment is what it is. It is reality. Essence can communicate with us only when our mind is quiet, when our awareness is in the present moment. It doesn’t invade our minds like the ego, and it doesn’t talk much: it communicates with us more through feelings. Its wisdom just drops into our minds, and we are suddenly at peace. The ego resists the present moment because the ego is an illusion. Theref