Anthony Goulet's Blog: Real Warriors Love - Posts Tagged "inspiration"

On the mountaintop, upon the altar of light he was born. Others recognized him as the love he is and the love he came from. In his innocence, others were able to see their own innocence again and recall what truly matters. He was a precious child. Wherever he was people wanted to hold him because he wasn’t heavy, he was light because he was love. When people held him, they held a holy reminder of the truth of what we are.

As time went by the boy grew into a young man. In his journey from infancy to being a young man he encountered those who recognized him as the love he is. He also encountered others who saw him completely different than the love he is. Those who couldn’t recognize him as the love he is gave him a bag to carry. He was instructed to use the bag in this manner: Place everything you say, do and think that is wrong in this bag and carry it. Those who recognized him as the love he is also handed him a bag to carry with this instruction: Place everything you say, do and think that is right in this bag and carry it.

Accepting the bags and the instructions, he went on his life journey. Every day, whether at work or play, either he or someone else placed something in each of his bags. Some days his bag of wrong was heavier than his bag of right; and other days his bag of right was much heavier than his bag of wrong. He was strong, so he easily compensated from one side to the other to walk balanced and straight in public. However, every evening in private he unpacked both bags before going to bed. As he looked through his bag of wrong, he cried and condemned himself; and as he looked through his bag of right, he smiled, boasted and congratulated himself. Placing all his rights and wrongs back in their appropriate bags, he would sleep. Some nights when he forgot to place his wrongs in their appropriate bag, sleeping proved to be difficult.

Days passed, merging with weeks, blending to years and accumulated to decades of the rights and wrongs he and others gave him to carry about himself. He began to lose his balance, even in public. Both bags were full and heavy, overflowing onto others in every interaction. Some moments his wrongs along with the inferiority and condemnation that comes with that bag spilled onto others. In other moments his rights along with a sense of superiority and self-righteousness that comes with that bag spilled onto others. Weary, frustrated and lost, he decided to return to the mountaintop where he was born in hopes of finding himself.

Hours after sunset he finally made the seventeen-inch journey from his head back to his heart and was once again upon the mountaintop where he was born. He didn’t have to light a fire, because the star that never moves from that special place illuminated the entire area with its light. His grip loosened from the heavy bags of right and wrong as the memory of who he is ran through his tears and spilled upon the altar of light where he was born. His tears reflected the light that always shines brightly upon the altar of his heart, cleansing it, and revealing an inscription:

Of Light and Love you were born

And Light and Love you will always be

Place your bags of rights and wrongs

On either side of me


Step back upon the altar

Where light never ceases

And allow the light of love

To dissolve the useless pieces


Pieces of rights or wrongs

Hold not one glimpse of you

Step back upon this altar

To remember all that’s true


You are not lost

You’ve just used your eyes to see

Only your bags of rights and wrongs

Exchanging holy memory for misery


You’re not in either bag

And cannot be found in one or both

No matter if you hate yourself

Or use each day to boast


Beyond failures or successes

Past confidence or guesses

Afar from gracefulness or messes

Is your true reflection – Love


Of Light and Love you were born

And Light and Love you’ll always be

Throughout your life you may come here heavy

Yet, in this holy instant you are free

Walk in love,
Anthony Goulet

Our hearts are powerful. And not just in a spiritual sense. The heart is the most powerful source of electromagnetic energy in the human body. The heart’s electrical field is 60 times greater in amplitude than the electrical activity generated by the brain.

In many indigenous languages there are words to express feelings which all have the word "heart" as the root word. That’s powerful. That’s part of what my third dad meant when he would tell me, “Son, don’t let anyone take your spirit.” We cannot allow anyone or anything to blind us or turn us away from our hearts – our vision, mission, dreams, purpose and beauty. But so many systems are designed to do just that.

I often speak about the sacred walk from our heads back to our hearts. It’s a sacred journey because once we make it back to the beauty, peace and power the Creator has placed within our hearts, we are alive again. There are systems, if internalized, that can take away our vision, compassion and empathy, and replace it with a brain-oriented, mechanical (machine-like) way of interacting, which disconnects us from life. Life doesn’t happen in our brains. Life happens in our hearts! The moments when we have the greatest inspiration (In-Spirit) and clarity are when our minds are quiet enough to hear our hearts again. That is how we lived as children. That's where our genius resides, awaiting our return.

We need all that we are. The Creator has created us with magnificent minds, bodies, emotions and spirits. Don’t dismiss your heart. Don’t let anyone or anything dampen your spirit! Let the power within you extend outward to heal yourself and others. So many people have heard the phrase "follow your heart," but how do you follow something you refuse to listen to?

Listen to your heart to know and live the songs, beauty, stories, guidance and adventures the gentle voice of the Creator continually speaks within your heart. Return to the quiet so you can hear again!

A question I often ask my own children as well as the youth I serve in youth programs is, “How’s your heart?” That question helps them get out of their own way and reminds them to look, listen, and feel with their own, beautiful hearts. Conversations that stem from heart-speak can be much more stimulating, healing, and beneficial than brain-speak. That’s why it’s important to intentionally speak from our hearts to the hearts of others. If it’s not from the heart it holds no relationship to anything real.

The more you speak with your heart and the more you allow your heart to speak with you, the more your heart will reveal and heal.

So, how’s your heart?

~ Walk in Love,
Anthony Goulet

There is a voice we do not need to find, but long to remember. It’s a voice we know better than any other voice. We can fight it, but it never fights us because it loves us. We can attempt to drown it out with drugs, alcohol and distractions, but it can never die. We can try to forget it, yet it always remembers for us because it is never against us. It cannot leave us alone because it is as incapable of separation as water is of being dry. The voice is
you—the real you. You can lay your mask down now because you are welcome here.

Sometimes, when listened to and believed, the voices of strangers can make a stranger of our own voice. Listen only to the voices that echo your greatness. Stop making a stranger of yourself, the Creator, and others. As you remember your voice, you rejoin with the Great One, your true self, and all life in the great Universe (Uni-Verse)—the ancient song of truth, that in the holy instant of our creation we agreed to sing together.

Your voice gently knocks from the inside, within each heartbeat, longing for you to remember, remind, and shine forth Love's truth:

You are alive because you are Life.
You are beautiful because you are Beauty.
You are healed because you are Healing.
You are talented because you are Talent.
You are hopeful because you are Hope.
You are forgiven because you are Forgiveness.
You are faithful because you are Faith.
You are innocent because you are Innocence.
You are gifted because you are a Gift.
You are blessed because you are a Blessing.
You are true because you are Truth.
You are miraculous because you are a Miracle.
You are sacredness because you are Sacred.
You are holiness because you are Holy.
You are loved because you are Love.

~ Walk in Love,

Anthony Goulet

It was a time of great difficulty for the people. There were wars, rumors of wars, famine, unwholesome reasoning, unskillful desires, contrived malice, drugs, alcohol, and a thick fog of hopelessness that began to take over the land. It was a time when many no longer believed in their own voice, so they couldn't believe in the voices of others. The people wanted things to be different, yet they attacked all those who thought or acted differently. It was a dark time when rumors, gossip and other forms of violence held the people’s attention, while talk of peace, healing, and solutions were mocked. Warriors were perceived as cowards. Cowards were perceived as warriors. Drugs, alcohol, and jealousy were treated as friends, yet friends were treated as enemies.

In the midst of this great despair, many cried out to the Creator for help. Since no prayer ever goes unheard or unanswered, the Creator sent help immediately. The Creator sent a sacred woman to the people. The sacred woman carried a sacred bundle that was to be gifted to the world. The sacred bundle of light she carried contained the answers to the prayers of the people.

The sacred woman’s journey from the heavens was a much shorter trip than the journey she took after she arrived on Earth. Once on Earth, the sacred woman had to endure many things on her journey to deliver the sacred bundle to the people. Before the sacred woman was given the sacred bundle to carry and deliver to the people, she was first given the highest levels of fortitude and resiliency. She was met with the violence of those difficult times. She suffered through many disappointments, attacks, betrayals and condemnation. The bundle was given to her to deliver to the people because the Creator knew, although she may feel pain and she may stumble, she would not be detoured by violence that erupted upon the land during those days. She was charged with delivering the bundle of light, so the darkness of those times held not even the slightest chance of victory over her.

Just as the Creator had done for her, she did the same for the bundle. She placed all that she is within the sacred bundle before delivering it to the people. Through the sacred woman, life, fortitude, resiliency and answers to the prayers of the people were all lovingly wrapped inside the sacred bundle of light. Coming close to death, the sacred woman laid down her life to deliver the sacred bundle of light to the people. The sacred woman is your mother. The sacred bundle of light the Creator delivered through her is you.

Walk in love,
Anthony Goulet

The word Holy doesn’t just translate in religious terms to sacred, although due to religious indoctrination many immediately interpret it this way. Holy means whole, one, complete, without separation. And yes, for those who do believe in a Creator, this includes the Creator and all of creation with no separation, and that all life is connected by and through the great love of the Creator. Science agrees that all life is connected within our ecosystem, yet attributes this to an evolutionary process. So, both spirituality and science agree that all life is connected. Science and spirituality also agree on another matter: that there are many things we simply do not know. Science agrees and confirms that the infinite universe and universes are too vast to ever fully measure. Spirituality agrees and confirms that the Creator is beyond human measurement.

I am not writing this to debate, but to remind those who claim spirituality, in whatever form it may be, to fill the lack, not within debates, but within the needs of human beings. All life is interconnected and each of us as human beings, no matter how much knowledge we gain, will leave this physical existence not knowing way more than we will ever know. Yet, when we claim to believe in the Creator, people expect us to make what we claim to believe visible in our actions. We must make the Creator visible to others, not in what we say we believe, but in how we live.

Most people are not disenchanted with the possibility of a Higher Power Who loves all people unconditionally and is willing to send miracles to those in need. Most people are disenchanted with religion—religiosity that has been used to commit separation, hate, and thus violence in all its forms, including genocides throughout the world.

Spirituality isn’t about believing in God and then going around trying to prove the God of your understanding exists. It’s about believing God/Creator so the teachings of love, hope, faith and compassion, that thread through all spiritual practices, flow through you. Spiritual practice is not about converting others, it’s about converting your own mind and heart from fear to love. Instead of sending prayers, love, and light from a distance, why not close the distance and fill the lack by meeting the needs of others? Why not be the prayer, love and light, by delivering food, clothes, comfort, medicines and blankets to those in need? Why not allow the Creator of your understanding to answer the prayers of others through you? Fill whatever is lacking within the lives of those around you with love and prayer in action, so that even if those you serve never claim to believe in God/Creator, they will always know, even if for just a moment, the power of love.

I love Creator. Not because of religion, but because when I was hurting deeply and in great need, the love of the Creator poured through others to fill me with goodness. They didn’t try to convert me. They saw me as an inseparable part of Creator and themselves. They reached out to me, not with religion, but with love. No stipulations, just a humaneness that awoke me to my humanity. After that moment, all I wanted was for others to have that same experience. The same experience of being filled with goodness, eliminating what was once a lack, and returning to a wholeness I had forgotten about until the moment when love reached out to me through other people.

We as humanity do not need love. We need to remember we are love. In the holy memory of what we are, which can be reclaimed in this holy instant, we remember that love created us exactly like Itself, and in love there is no lack, thus no need.

I cannot define love or God/Creator, but I know when something I am writing, speaking or doing is with love and God/Creator, because it fills me as I give it away. As love and God/Creator move through us to meet the needs of others, we are filled, because we will always receive what we give. God’s math is Love. And in God’s math there exists no division.

God's Math

I’m not a theologian, nor a mathematician
We know God through love, not religion
Love given is only addition
In God’s math there exists no division

While serving full time as a Street Outreach Worker for many years, I had the great honor of serving our most marginalized, traumatized and endangered youth and young adults on a daily and nightly basis. Young people who’ve been abandoned and shuffled through every system of placement imaginable. They’ve witnessed and experienced things no human being should have to endure. They have been rejected by those who were supposed to accept them, left by those who were supposed to walk with them, and violated by those who were supposed to protect them. The verdict many of our youth and young adults surviving on the streets come up with about themselves is that they are guilty. Guilty of things that are not their fault.

Through the lies of the unholy trinity of guilt, shame and blame, which enters people’s lives through the doors of abuse, pain, loss and trauma, people mistakenly come to the conclusion they are deserving of the harsh realities of the streets, or isolation in the woods and under the bridges. Within the illusion of the unholy trinity, people decide they are unworthy of help, comfort and support. When Street Outreach Workers meet the youth and young adults where they are, it is not only food, clothing, survival bags and safe transportation that’s delivered to them. Street Outreach Workers deliver a verdict of innocence to those we serve.

As Street Outreach Workers meet the basic needs of the young people, we remind them of their greatness. For many, it is the first time they have heard someone tell them, I believe in you and every dream you didn’t get the chance to live because you’ve been surviving a nightmare. Yet, you survived. You are stronger than everything and everyone that hurt you. Despite it all, here you stand. You are my hero and I believe in you. When you’re ready, let’s start working on using all the skills you’ve had to use to survive and see how those same skills can be used to help you live the dreams you were born to manifest.

With love guiding the process, someone’s vision will return to them in a holy instant! When someone’s vision returns, it is revealed they’ve been sitting in an empty courtroom demanding a retrial when they have already been declared innocent. Looking around the empty courtroom, they notice the open windows and doors leading to fresh air, sunshine and freedom. With each step upon the walk towards freedom, they begin to reexamine their self-imposed guilty verdict, as those who love them point out their strengths, intelligence, fortitude and innocence. After they take the sacred walk from their head back to their heart, their own internal jury hands them the only verdict that matters - their own. Finally, they declare themselves innocent!

It is not just youth experiencing homelessness who need to hear holy reminders about their sacredness. I’ve met people living in hell surrounded by what many would consider to be luxuries. I have met people living in heaven surrounded by what many consider to be poverty. I’ve witnessed people decimated from designer drugs and expensive liquor in a mansion. And as what happened with one of my biological brothers, I have witnessed addiction destroy people on the streets, as they spent their last minutes on earth sitting in an alley with a needle in their arm.

Just as the youth I've been blessed to serve on the streets won’t awaken from the nightmares of the unholy trinity and see their own beauty until they’re reminded they are sacred blessings, miracles and gifts, I am reminding you of the same! I’m not just sharing words with you. And I am not sharing opinions. I am sharing my experience. I was once in an empty courtroom demanding a retrial after I had already been declared innocent. My empty courtrooms looked like being homeless, hungry and sleeping in cars and in parks. My empty courtrooms looked like using drugs and alcohol every day to feel normal. My empty courtrooms looked like suicide attempts. Yet when love entered the room and led me to freedom, one of my missions became delivering the verdict of innocence to everyone God allows me to serve. With the Creator, I enter empty courtrooms wherever they may be, and deliver my brothers and sisters their verdict of innocence, just as others had done for me. If you are sitting in an empty courtroom demanding a retrial, receive this verdict: You are innocent. You are a sacred blessing, miracle and gift!

Allow love to take you on the sacred, seventeen-inch journey from your head back to your heart so you make an exodus from empty courtrooms. May we meet upon the field of freedom where we are reminded that we need each other to free each other. Living from our beautiful, open hearts, love freely flows, offering only freedom with her creative beauty, weaving together an all-inclusive masterpiece, reminding us that we are each a sacred piece that pieces peace together.

Walk in love,
Anthony Goulet

Attempting to prove our manhood is like trying to punch a hole in water. Many men are out in the world doing their best to prove their manhood to those whose insatiable appetite for more proof will never be quenched. Like truth, manhood has no universally agreed upon operational definition, and still there continues to be conflicting burdens of proof required of men.

How can something be proven when there is no universally agreed upon standard? How does a boy know he has become a man in a society where being a man means different things to different people? How do males in our society actualize manhood with standards that vary from person to person, home to home, community to community? I’ve known very gentle men who were told they were not real men because of their gentleness. I’ve known the “strong and silent” type of men who were told they’re not real men because they don’t express their emotions in a manner acceptable to some.

From a young age, men are bombarded with conflicting messages of manhood and even emasculated for adhering to a version of manhood that is right with their own heart, but contrary to someone else’s version of manhood. Since manhood naturally evolves to fatherhood for many, let’s take the unconscious, outdated and dangerous burden of proof off our men and future generations by understanding that manhood can only be proven within the consciousness of each individual man.

Within my work as a gang interventionist, prisoner reentry counselor, and fatherhood coach I have asked countless younger and older men two questions that incite so much introspection we’ve had group and individual conversations about it for months. But asking questions isn’t enough. The environment must be ripe with honor, love and compassion for there to be true dialogue. And there are three rules that must be broken for an environment to be healing. The three rules that must be broken to achieve healing exist in all unhealthy relationships. The three rules are:

1. Don’t talk.
2. Don’t tell.
3. Don’t feel.

When men are in spaces where those rules are broken, we freely talk, tell, feel, and heal.

Now that we are ready to break those three rules, I ask the questions. When I ask the questions, I ask in this manner: Since we are willing to die or kill or lose our freedom defending our manhood, it is a good idea to at least know where this thing called manhood is.
Where is our manhood?
Is our manhood in our pants, pockets, bank accounts, fists, titles, sexual exploits, or material possessions?

In the process of answering these questions, we unfold and unravel the societal burdens of proof that have been heaped upon men since we were children. And to the great credit of our men, they always lead us to the answer—our hearts. The answer is not a burden, it’s light because it’s love. The answer is just a short distance away from the heavy, unfair and inconsistent burden of proof our men have carried far too long upon their shoulders and within their minds. And when men take the walk from their heads back to their hearts, we remember that we never had to become someone or something because we are already everything—we are sacred blessings, miracles and gifts. Within this realization there is nothing to prove, only a truth to live.

When the burden of proof is revealed as the problem, not the solution, men feel a relief, and the walk from our heads to our hearts is once again seen as meaningful not meaningless. In taking the journey from the head back to the heart, men realize their manhood can never be taken or threatened so there is nothing to attack or defend. In this journey our men remember their true callings. In this journey our society gains more peacemakers, present husbands and present fathers. In this journey society has men who no longer carry a burden to prove anything, only a willingness to share the goodness that has been within them all along, but for a moment was hidden underneath a burden of proof that was never theirs to carry.

Walk in love,
Anthony Goulet

A psychopath and a saint both agreed to take part in an experiment a mystic was conducting. Near the fireplace, they both sat on the floor in the mystic’s home, as the mystic conducted the ritual.

If done correctly, the ritual would give the psychopath and the saint the ability to instantly experience each other’s entire lives—every memory, thought and emotion. Neither the psychopath nor the saint thought the ritual would work. They both agreed to attend because of the meal the mystic would serve afterwards. But alas! The ritual worked!

The psychopath and saint both began praying, laughing and crying uncontrollably until they embraced one another. They held each other as if they were long-lost lovers. Peering deeply into each other’s eyes, in unison, from the depths of their souls, they whispered, “I am so sorry. I didn’t know. I couldn’t see. I forgive you. Will you forgive me?”

Through their unified laughter, they exclaimed, “Yes! How could I not?! I love you!” The psychopath and the saint left the mystic’s home, no longer a psychopath or a saint, but as human beings, arm in arm, with plenty of food to share with others.

After they left, the mystic sat alone, gazing into the fire as it illuminated yellow, red and green glows throughout the room. Within the song of the crackling fire, the mystic listened to the Voice of God sing:

Return to the holy,

return to the holy,

return to the holy,

for holiness is within you

Smiling, the mystic looked up, “God, thank You. I love You. I promise I’ll cook more dinners like this and send out Your invitations more often.”

A boy went to a community meeting with his grandfather. The boy loved spending all the time he could with his grandfather because their time together was filled with great stories, laughter, play and wisdom. Before sitting down at the meeting, the boy and his grandfather helped themselves to some hot chocolate and doughnuts.

During the meeting, a man began to talk badly about the grandfather. The grandfather was simply looking at the man who was speaking ill of him and smiling, until he noticed his grandson had tears streaming down his face.

“Why are you crying, Grandson?”
“Because he’s talking bad about you.”

“Are the things he is saying about me true?”

“No, that’s why I’m crying.”

“So, because he is saying these things about me, does that make them true?”

“No, of course not. But all you do is help people and some people still talk like that about you.”

“Grandson, don’t cry for me, cry for him.”

“I don’t understand, Grandpa.”

“I’m helping him right now. He obviously has a lot of anger he needs to get out, and I am happy to help him this way, too. He is speaking volumes about himself and nothing about me or you.”

“So what do we do, Grandpa?”

“Enjoy our hot chocolate, doughnuts, this beautiful day, and let them talk.”

(Rain of Thoughts, Anthony Goulet, 2015)

There was an eleven-year-old girl playing on the porch in her backyard, attempting to drown out the sounds of her parents screaming, yelling, and fighting with one another inside the house. Unfortunately, the girl was used to this and knew the police and protective services would arrive at any moment.

Seeking her own safety, the girl was playing outside with a beautiful porcelain doll her grandfather had given her. Her grandfather had passed on and was the only person who made her feel safe, seen and secure. For the girl, the beautiful porcelain doll she held and played with is an extension of her grandfather—an extension of his love and safety wrapped around her. As she was playing with her doll, she dropped it and the doll broke into several pieces.

She fell to her knees, picked up the broken pieces, and in despair, she wept uncontrollably. She looked up at the sky and cried out, “Why, Creator? Why did you let this happen? Fix this. Please, Creator, fix this.”

From behind the clouds, the girl heard the Creator’s voice. “I know you are hurting, my darling daughter.”

“Creator, of course I am hurting. You know how much this doll means to me.”

“Of course, I know. I am the Creator.”

“You know it is the only thing in my life that makes sense. My grandfather, who was my whole world and my safety, gave me this doll. He passed away last year, and this is all I have left.”

“Of course, I know, my darling daughter. I am the Creator.”

“You know how much I need you to fix this because it hurts so bad. It hurts so bad, Creator. Please fix this.”

“My daughter, I know you are hurting. Yes, I can fix this. I know all and can do all things. I am the Creator.”

The girl became furious. In her anger she clenched the broken pieces of her doll, and as blood began to drip from her hands, she screamed, “You just keep telling me that you are here! You just keep telling me that you know how I feel, and that you can do all things, but you are not fixing anything!”

“My darling daughter, I am the Creator. I love you more than you can possibly imagine. I can do all things. I am here with you. And I can fix this, but you are holding on to the brokenness tightly and it is hurting you. If you want me to fix this then please give me the pieces.”

Walk in love,
Anthony Goulet