Seimei Abe and Japanese Paranormal Activities

In order to describe him, I need to first explain about what he was. He was "Onmyoji" in the Heian Era (794 - 1192 AD) of Japan. I had unexpected problems selecting the best English description for onmyoji. The best definition I can give after my study is a shaman coupled together with functions of an astrologist, an exorcist, a medium, a prophet, a seer, and a sorcerer. In the Heian era of Japan, onmyoji was a formal position in the imperial government. In addition, they were doctors, healers, and spiritual advisors and consultants for emperors. I believe that Egypt and China had the same or similar positions in their government in ancient times. Seimei Abe was the first one of his kind and founder of his position in Japan.

Seimei Abe was born in 921 AD. It is said that he died in 1005 AD, at the age of 86. 86 seems like extraordinarily long life as in his days the normal life-span was 40 - 50 years old. It may not be abnormal to have a long life if he had lived for 86 years. His life is known from an official document of that age. However, his name appears in many Japanese folklore stories. If a historian carefully kept a record of folklore, it seemed to be that his life was more than 300 years serving almost every emperor in the Heian Era.

We can find many of his legends in folklore. When he was 15 years old and just a trainee, he accompanied his master to see the emperor. When he was walking along his master's cart, he recognized ghosts marching on the street going in the opposite direction. His master was sleeping in his cart. Seimei woke him up and told his teacher the ghosts were marching. His teacher spelled the words and avoided the marching ghost.

Later, when a mistress who could not be an empress consort cursed an emperor, Seimei used a reverse curse and saved the emperor. This incident gave Seimei fame and an unchallengeable position. As it is said, when a curse is reversed, the cursing person would be brutally harmed and usually killed, but Seimei managed to save the cursing mistress. However, the mistress killed herself later because she was ashamed by her own selfish conduct.

Seimei's residence was positioned in the protective direction of the imperial palace. Folklore says that his house lit up at night and opened it's gate in the morning, despite that, as his position, a person would never do these actions by himself and his house did not have any sign of a servant. He could kill frogs and turtles without touching them. He could bring them back to life later. Some myths even say that his mother was a white fox whom his father saved in a mountain.
Seimei has been gone in the history a long time ago. However, there may be still someone, today, who could do what he could do. He or she just would not show it to the public. Such a person may be your next-door neighbor.




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Do Not Abandon Topic Ideas

Writing articles is lots of fun. People enjoy posting their opinions on article submission sites. Many have blogs they update daily. Though writing is enjoyable, it can be difficult. Time-management is important for article writers, who need to continue learning effective ways to write. We must remain open to the things we see, listen to, and touch so that we can obtain article ideas from our surroundings. We must improve our creativity to form interesting article ideas. Anyone who writes articles or blogs is likely to experience problems on topics. Many of us sometimes cannot think up a topic no matter how hard we try. It is not easy to find and keep a topic that enables you to write a lengthy quality article. There are some web-based services that give bloggers and writers topic ideas. Many blog hosts provide bloggers with ideas. This shows that there are many who have problems coming up with topics.

Since finding a topic is an important process in article writing, I have my own method to finding and keeping topics. The followings are the list of my action items to find, keep, and maintain my ideas:

- Pay attention to a shift in emotion

- Write a topic idea with questions

- Take note or make a list of ideas

- Regularly or irregularly revisit listed ideas

- Do not abandon topic ideas because of difficulty developing a story

- Review used topics regularly. They are seeds of new writings.

No matter what I am doing, whenever I feel a shift in my emotion, that is the key to my topic. This may happen when I am reading a book, watching a TV program, watching a DVD, or walking my dog. Whenever this happens, I write about it, which shows how and why I felt that way. I also write down any questions I have. If my PC is available, I open my word processing software, name a document with the topic idea, and save it to my PC desktop. When I am out and away from my PC, I write my topic ideas down in the notebook I carry everywhere. I also use voice recording on my smart phone or call my home phone and leave a message with my topic idea. I then save my ideas to my PC desktop when I am home.

In this way, I constantly keep five to ten topic ideas. When I feel like writing based on the topic idea that has just come to mind, I start writing. When I find it is not so easy to write a quality article about my most recent topic, it is saved on my desktop to wait. Some topics stay there for a long time. However, in most cases, I use these ideas saved on my PC desktop within a few days. I do not abandon any topics.

I review unused topics regularly and irregularly. I revisit my list of topic ideas at least once in 2-3 weeks. It is somehow funny, but a topic once was difficult to develop a story become a good topic to write over a time. Used topics are still useful, too. Many of them give me a new idea of writing. I revisit used topics at least once in a month.

Using this method, I keep track of all my topic ideas. The topics will not abandon you, as long as you do not abandon the topics.




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5 Stages of Decision-Making Process

When one study on successful people in human history, he may find that these people listened to others. In addition, they had selected persons to whom they could listen. It is, however, not all they do for decision-making and implementation of their plans. First they think. Then, they listen. They use opinions of others to think again. It looks as they had certain cycle of decision-making and implementation process. They are as listed below.

1. They think by themselves.

2. They listen to others, whom they selected as opinion makers.

3. They think again with others opinions.

4. Finally they make a decision.

5. They implement the decision.

It is essential to point out that they had their own opinion before they listened to others. They develop their opinion first and then listen to others. Therefore, they can judge others' opinions in view of own opinions. It is useful to evaluate and judge others' opinions. If they did not have their own opinions, they would not be able to assess if others' were right or wrong. They always have their trusted people who give valuable opinions. Those are people who can give opinions, which are neutral, unprejudiced, facts-based, valuable, or unselfish.

The crucial here is above No. 3. They use opinions of others, but they do not blindly obey or follow the others. There is a lot of leaders, who at a glance, look like respectable leaders because they accept their subordinates opinions and follow them. Many of them failed due to lack of their own views over the opinions of others, even from own people. Real, capable leaders do listen to others and use their opinions. Final decisions are, however, not by their subordinates, but by themselves in case of capable leaders. Sometimes, exemplary leaders looked inflexible because they did not change their own opinions. In this sense, they can adopt or reject others' opinions based on their judgments.

They listen to their people, but the decisions are theirs. They make decisions based on theirs and others, but they take full responsibility of decisions. They never blame others for inappropriate decisions or mistakes. They must be this confident. Otherwise, they would not be successful on what they planned to do.

The decision-making process lacking any one of the above 5 process is not complete. If it were lacking any one of these, it would incline to lead to wrong decisions or mistakes. They are as parts of the automobile engine, power distribution mechanism. If one were missing, a car would not move an inch. Others' opinions and leaders' opinions are like both sides of car wheels. If missing either side, the car would circle around and go nowhere.



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Balance Sense

There is an old song in Japan, which sings about Judo. The song goes; "Do not think you are winning. You will lose." It meant that if you hope to win too much, you will be over pressured and lose. This is true. If a fighter thought too much about the result of the coming fight, he would lose flexibility. His body would not function like normal. As a result, he would lose the fight. The question is if the fighter should not think about win or lose at all. The dilemma is that he would not be able to win if he did not hope to win.

Everybody hopes to win in fighting. The point is if one had too much hope, it changes shape to be a desire. The desire takes the form of greed. When one became greedy, the state of mind desiring endlessly, he could no longer control his mind. As a result, he will lose his freedom of thinking and moving. If one does not have freedom of thinking and moving, the one would never be able to win a fight. A fight requires a lot of flexibility and free mind to win.

At the same time, however, if one did not have any hope to win, he would not train him, he would not think on his strategy how to fight, and he would not take pains and effort to prepare for his fight. Under this condition, a fighter will lose. It is as if too much is as harmful as too little.

As observed, too much is not good. Too little is bad, as well. There is a delicate balance point where one can walk on a tight rope stretched in the air. If weighed too much to right, the one would fall to his right. If weighed too much to left, he would fall to his left.

Let us consider an example of Japanese Sword Art, Kendo. When the opponent swings down his sword to cut you, if your head is half an inch far from the tip of his sword, you will not be cut. You are safe. In addition, if you keep your body as close as half an inch to your enemy's weapon, you are close enough to effectively counter-attack. If you are three feet away from your opponent, you are safe, but you are not close enough to strike-back your opponent. This space of half an inch between the tip of sword and your head is the balance point. If you keep the space, you will win.

As this physical example, there is a delicate balance point of mind, too. It is essential to keep the balance point. Hope to win so much that brain and body maintain energy to be ready for a fight. Be careful not to hope too much to become greedy or disparate to win. This theory appears to be useful not just for a martial arts, but also for success in business, academic achievement, and happiness in lives.


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Chain Reaction

In Japan, there is a short saying about chain reactions: "After the wind blows, coopers make money." This comic saying is about an unlikely chain reaction that could occur. There are several pseudo logical explanations to how this could happen.

First, when the wind is blowing, the air gets dusty. Dust will get into people's eyes, and will cause problems. Those who lose their sight will become shamisen players. Japanese shamisens use cat skin. It is a Japanese tradition that sightless musicians play this instrument. The more cats that are killed, the more mice there are. Mice bite barrels, damaging them. Barrel owners need to repair or replace barrels, which is why coopers make money.

Obviously, this is a kind of joke. Most people would never believe it to be logical. However, in the real world, things more peculiar than this happen.

Hisashi had never thought about moving from his apartment in San Francisco. It was one bedroom, and good enough for him and his wife. Later, his wife's mother moved in, and one bedroom became too small. They looked for a two-bedroom apartment, and found a house to rent in San Mateo, south of San Francisco near the airport. They decided to rent it, and then Hisashi's wife wanted to get a dog.

Hisashi wondered if the rent agreement allowed them to keep a pet, but his wife bought a puppy anyway.

When their landlady found out they had a dog, she told them that renters were not allowed to keep dogs. Therefore, Hisashi's family was forced to move out in 30 days. They looked for a new place that would accept the new family member, a puppy. They found a house for sale in East Bay. Although they thought it might cost too much, they believed they could afford it and decided to buy the house. It appeared that the puppy gave them an opportunity to buy their first house.

This narrative is based on a true story. People might think they are lucky, and everything that happens is accidental. What if they had decided not to keep the puppy? What if they had decided to sell the puppy and keep their residence? There seemed to be a reason why it happened the way it did. However, some people might think that the events were coincidences. Others might believe that the puppy was a godsend, and the result was a blessing.



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Self-Employed and Being Employed

When one stayed in the same environment, he got so much used to it that he took it granted. It would be okay if one kept staying in the environment. If, for any reason, one needed to get out of his long-stayed environment, he would get lost for various things. It is true in a working environment. If one were working in an office of relatively large organization, he would take it granted for some certain things, which his organization provided. He would lose supporting function. If he was in sales department, he had marketing, accounting, finance, delivery, and, in many cases, technical support from his company.

If he decided to go for his own business and resigned his organization, he is not quitting his company. He is quitting these supports, too. One gone independent sometimes found him to get lost, losing all supports he used to get. In his office, someone else planned, drew, and printed, and brought his own company brochures so that he could give them to his clients. Being independent, he needs to prepare a media, even not a brochure, which explains who he is and what he does. Somebody else used to take copies for him when he needed them. He needs to take his own copies after his independence. Papers! Who prepare papers for his copies? He needs to do it.

Facing a difficult client, he had office fiends, who he could discuss the situation. He now needs to consider and decide his action by himself. One needs to be careful on his mental situation in dealing with this change of environment. There are people who are depressed with these changes. Some may become even sick.

There was a real estate agent who went independent quite recently. He used to work in a good and wide office. He did not have to worry about who run his financial. He had support to do basics for him. His assistant took copies and stapled documents so that documents were ready for submitting to his clients.

He needed to take his own copies and stapled his documents for his clients. He could not invite his clients to her office, because his office was simply his garage room. He did not get depressed. He thought he should play smart. He tried to use resources of others as much as he could. There were several related people with his deals, such as banks, title companies, financial institutions, and agents from his counterpart, sometimes buyers' or sometimes sellers'. Oh, yes, he should not forget about his clients. His clients are prestigious people, since they are the ones who buy and sell properties. They had resources this independent real estate could use. He started to use PC in his client's home. He took his copies, using printers they had. He emailed documents and asked recipients to print. Gradually, this agent started to lose trust from his clients. These seem trivial things. However, human relationship could be harmed from small things. These are the ones, which people gone independent, should pay attention.


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A Medicine for Chapped Hands

It was family medicine in ancient China. The family was engaged in dyeing fabrics in cold water in the winter. The family was suffering from chapped hands that were caused by cold water and wind from working in the winter. They developed a special medicine to treat chapped hands. A traveler heard rumors that this family had medicine to treat chapped hands, so he visited the family and offered to buy the medicine, its prescriptions, and instructions. He wanted to prescribe the medicine, so the traveler offered the family 10,000 yen to buy the medicine, its prescriptions, and instructions.

The family discussed the proposal. Their dyeing business had brought them less than 1,000 yen. The offer was more than 10 times their normal business. So they decided to sell the instructions, prescription, and medicine to this traveler. The traveler took the medicine to the northern part of China and told a local king that he had a special method to treat chapped hands for soldiers who fight in the winter. Recognizing that this would give their soldiers an advantage against their enemies, the local king hired him as an army surgeon. He soon became an army general surgeon, thanks to the effectiveness of this medicine. His kingdom continued to win wars against their enemy, thanks to this medicine. Finally, the traveler became a premier of this kingdom.

In contrast to this traveler, the family spent all the money from the sale of this medicine and returned to their old dyeing business. They remained in a dyeing business and never became rich or held high position.

This is a story appears in ancient Chinese philosophy book of Taoism, Zhuangzi. The medicine, powerful enough to raise the traveler to the number two position in a kingdom, was, when treated as just a medicine for a dyeing business, not an effective tool in making the original family successful.

The story is somewhat scary to consider. We may be in the possession of something as powerful as this medicine, but, unlike the traveler, we are not using its effectiveness to the full. Many of us are more like the original family in this story. We do not realize the powerful nature of the thing in our possession and waste its value. I believe that the story teaches us the importance of paying attention to the real nature of things and analyzing how to use them. In addition the story tells us the importance of thinking outside of the box. It is amazing to think that this story was written more than 2000 years ago.





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