The Global Conversation

Tag: unconditional love

  • What Are They Trying to Do?

    If you call someone a “Judas”, most people in the western world will understand that you’re calling someone a traitor or a false friend or a turncoat. Someone who will “sell out” their friends. Someone who values money above human life and above truth and above Love.

    The reference, of course, is to Judas Iscariot, who, according to most interpretations of the four gospels of the Christian Bible, betrayed Jesus to the Romans for 30 silver pieces. Most people seem to despise Judas and blame him for the death of the Son of God. For his part, according to some accounts, Judas felt so guilty that he later hung himself and, if asked, most people would suggest that he now rots in hell in eternal torment.

    I have a very different view of Judas. Jesus states that one of his twelve chosen disciples will betray him. And he knows it’s Judas. So if Judas is not “in on” the plan for Jesus to be crucified, then God/Jesus is using Judas as a pawn, against his free will. And this is something that God will not do! Therefore, Judas is an integral part of Jesus’ soul’s plan: to be crucified and rise from the dead after three days to show all of humanity that death is not the end. That life and Love go one forever without end.

    And, in fact, if it were NOT for Judas’ “betrayal”, the Romans would have had no reason to crucify Jesus and his soul’s agenda would have been unfulfilled. The way Jesus led his life, the only way TO be crucified was to have Judas “betray him”. So if it was NOT Judas’ choice to help Jesus to fulfill his soul’s agenda, then he was “used” by God/Jesus and that is simply not possible.

    So I believe that Judas accepted the role of Jesus’ betrayer, knowing full well that his name would be vilified and demonized for thousands of years afterwards. That he would be hated and scorned and, if others had their way, would be severely punished for his “betrayal”. I view Judas as Jesus most trusted friend. As the one who Loved Jesus the most because he was willing to be forever hated to help Jesus fulfill is soul’s agenda.

    So when police in Missouri recently arrested Craig Michael Wood on suspicion of murdering 10-year-old Hailey Owens and later reportedly found child porn on Wood’s computer, my initial reaction was the same as everyone else. “What a monster! Lock him up and throw away the key!”

    Then I remembered Judas.

    Most Christians— both back then and nowadays— would, I think, have said the same thing about Judas. “Lock him up and throw away the key!” (As an aside, many of the comments I read on various news sites and social media sites proposed punishment for Wood (who is still innocent until proven guilty in our legal system!) and other pedophiles/child murderers that was much more cruel, violent and ruthless than simply removing him from society for the rest of his life!)

    Judas sacrificed his “good name” and his “reputation” for the greater good. Jesus chose to die the kind of death he did to help every soul who lived after him to remember that death is not the end. Judas accepted the scorn and contempt of generations that would follow him to help Jesus get this message out to the world.

    God tells us in CwG that there are no victims and there are no villains, even if it appears that way sometimes. So Craig Michael Wood is not a villain and Hailey Owens is not a victim, although most people will see it that way. On some level, their souls (apparently— remember innocent until proven guilty) chose to meet in this lifetime in this manner so that we, collectively as the human race, might learn from the experience. So that we might be able to more fully express our divinity after Hailey’s death.

    Please understand, I do not condone what Wood has been accused of doing. But I recognize that there are many, many souls alive today that sacrifice their physical, mental and even emotional well-being to provide us with opportunities to demonstrate Who We Really Are.  As history has demonstrated to us over and over, and as personal experience has shown us over and over,  it is the most trying times and the most heinous acts that give us the greatest opportunity to grow the most spiritually.

    I am relatively certain that many people reading this are going to be very angry at my words.  At the challenge they present us as Divine Children of God to Love everyone, even the “least of our brothers”, unconditionally. Maybe even at me. Some may even think I’m as “bad” as her alleged murderer for suggesting that Hailey “planned” this and that Wood was (allegedly) helping her fulfill her soul’s agenda.

    That’s okay, because sometimes I myself wonder if these kinds of thoughts are “valid”. And yet when I look back on my life,  I realize how many important relationships in my life were with survivors of childhood abuse. I volunteer to help in domestic violence shelters and on sexual assault hotlines.  I wonder if maybe the reason for so many relationships of all kinds with survivors of abuse is so that I could think these very thoughts.  That I could come to understand that even those who society despises the most are still Divine Children of God. Are still worthy of unconditional Love. Are still contributing members of the human race.

    What message was Hailey Owens trying to get out to the world? Did Craig Michael Wood give up his “good name” just as Judas did by committing an act that most of us find vile and inexcusable? What message was he trying to teach the world? And, just as importantly, are we willing to learn those lessons?

     

  • Remembrance

    Having been there myself and having met so many others who are there as well, the one message that really needs to be sent out to those who are battling with addictions is: You are not bad; you are a spiritual being choosing a human experience called addiction.  And guess what?  You can choose again, right here, right now. You can decide to be a person who in the past struggled with addiction.

    There is a viral letter going around Facebook right now that is finding its way into many people’s lives, and I would like to share that message with you here in this column today because I find it to be a very important piece of knowledge for people suffering through the hardship of addiction.

    The following  was written by a woman named Courtney A. Walsh.

    “Dear Human:  You’ve got it all wrong.  You didn’t come here to master unconditional love.  That is where you came from and where you’ll return. You came here to learn personal love.  Universal love.  Messy love.  Sweaty love.  Crazy love. Broken love.  Whole love.  Infused with divinity. Lived through the grace of stumbling. Demonstrated through the beauty of… messing up —- often.  You didn’t come here to be perfect.  You already are.  You came here to be gorgeously human. Flawed and fabulous.  And then to rise again into remembering. But unconditional love? Stop telling that story.  Love, in truth, doesn’t need ANY other adjectives.  It doesn’t require modifiers.  It doesn’t require the condition of perfection.  It only asks that you show up. And do your best. That you stay present and feel fully. That you shine and fly and laugh and cry and hurt and heal and fall and get back up and play and work and live and die as YOU.  It’s enough.  It’s plenty.”

    There are two specific parts to this letter that I find to be powerful and healing.  The first is that our love can be demonstrated through “messing up.”   In the writing of CWG, God makes it clear in his message:

    “Taken to ultimate logic, you cannot experience yourself as what you are until you’ve encountered what you are not. This is the purpose of the theory of relativity, and all physical life. It is by that which you are not that you yourself are defined.”

    It is pretty clear that active addiction is not ultimately who we really are.  For most of us, our behavior impacted others negatively, criminally, selfishly, and even ruthlessly.  All of these things we have done out of the distorted view of love we have.  Some feel the bar of morality is set to high for them to achieve, others do not feel worthy of love.  The one thing I am more sure of now than ever is that we are all worthy of love, regardless of our past.

    When in the depths of addictive behavior, we are always one decision away from freedom.  We can “rise again into remembering,” as Courtney points out in her letter, “You didn’t come here to be perfect, you already are.”  You did come here to experience life and realize your wholeness. We tend to forget this or simply haven’t awakened to this yet.  Maybe the message hasn’t been delivered in just the right way for you to hear it. It is my hope that this column can send that message.

    The second part of this “Dear Human” letter that strikes a chord within me is this: “It (love) doesn’t require the condition of perfection.  It only asks that you show up.”  In fact you are showing up.  You can’t not show up for life. You can, however, check out of life.  And active addiction is just that, checking out. Making a decision to give life a chance without your addiction gives you the opportunity to “show up” as a more complete version of who you really are.

    In CWG Book 1, God calls what we are doing here Re-membering.  And it is we who choose this remembering.  And choosing to remember who we really are is a pure act of creation.  So why not put to rest the current story you are telling about who you are and awaken to the next grandest version of you?  Have you not experienced the darkness of addiction enough?  Are you aware that enough is enough when you say it is?  You are not powerless, you are not a victim, you are God living a human experience.

    Your awakening will not be without reward. Life after addiction is filled with many gratifying experiences.  The beauty of the light after living in the darkness has been experienced by millions of people who are living long-term recovery.  The journey of many recovering people has included joining together to support one another and ultimately share their gifts with other like-minded people.

    “Your job on Earth, therefore, is not to learn (because you already know), but to remember Who You Are. And to re-member who everyone else is. That is why a big part of your job is to remind others (that is, to re-mind them), so that they can remember also. All the wonderful spiritual teachers have been doing just that. It is your sole purpose. That is to say, your soul purpose.” CWG Book 1.

    *Courtney A. Walsh can be found easily through Google by searching for “Dear Human.” The original intent from Courtney was for this to be “the seed of an empowerment movement for suicide prevention and bullying awareness.”

    (Kevin McCormack, C.A.d ,is a certified addictions professional and auriculotherapist.  He is a recovering addict with 26 years of sobriety. Kevin is a practicing auriculotherapist, recovery coach, and interventionist specializing in individual and family recovery.  Kevin has a passion for holistic living, personal awareness training, and physical meditation. You can visit his website Life After Addicton for more information. To connect with Kevin, please email him at Kevin@TheGlobalConversation.com)

  • Unwritten Messages

    Social media is the rage the world over. Everyone of us has that friend on social media who does almost nothing but post graphics with “inspirational” sayings. But it would behoove us to really LOOK at those inspirational messages before we share them with our friends and family because many times, there is a subtle, unwritten message that is also being shared. I’ve collected just a few examples over the last two weeks.

    Never push a loyal person to the point
    where they no longer give a damn.

    The intent of the message, I believe, is to warn people not to push someone too far or too often because even the most loyal person will say “If that’s what you want…” and stop coming around. The unwritten message here is that others have control of your thoughts, emotions and actions. Someone can “push” you and make you not care anymore is what this message is saying. It reinforces the idea that others can “make us” feel things or not feel things.

    Treat people the way you want to be treated.
    Talk to people the way you want to be talked to.
    Respect is earned, not given.

    I can wholeheartedly support the first two lines of this one, but once you get to the third line, you’re essentially unsaying everything you just said! How can I “earn” your respect if I have never met you? This meme seems to suggests that you should only treat people the way you want to be treated if you respect them, which means that you have to get to know them first so they have a chance to “earn” your respect. Which is the complete utter opposite of what the actual Golden Rule implies!

     Don’t waste words on people who deserve your silence.  Sometimes the most powerful think you can say is nothing at all.
    (Mandy Hole)

    Now we have the reverse situation. I can agree with the last line, but not the first line. Why? Because NO ONE deserves your silence.  We are all one. Not talking to someone because they “deserve” your silence is like saying “I’m not going to feed my right foot tonight.” Maybe your words, spoken in and motivated by Love, to someone who is “deserving” of silence is what it will take to heal the situation.

    Sometimes you give up on people not because you don’t care but because they don’t.

    I may have actually shared this one before I really thought about it. But giving up on someone is NOT a loving thing to do. How do you know that they don’t care? Even if they have said so, that may just be them trying to “look strong” or hide their real feelings out of fear of being hurt again. And if they really don’t care, then they really don’t care about themselves and they need unconditional Love even more! Love will always support everyone!

    Spend your time to [sic] those who love you unconditionally…not with those who love you only when the condition is right for them.

    This meme is advising you to only love those who love you unconditionally and avoid those who love conditionally. In other words, become someone you wouldn’t spend time with because you’re loving someone conditionally! (ie, on the condition they love you unconditionally!)

     Throughout life people will make you mad, disrespect you and treat you bad. Let God deal with the things they do ‘cause hate in your heart will consume you.

    The intent of this one, I believe, is to not let yourself be consumed with hate! I can agree with the part about hate in your heart, but no one can make you mad or make you feel disrespected unless you allow them to. And the implication is that God will punish them later for it so you don’t have to worry about it, which reinforces the idea of a vengeful, angry God who must be appeased.

    I believe we are who we choose to be.
    Nobody is going to come and save you.
    You’ve got to save yourself.
    Nobody is gonna give you anything.
    You’ve got to go out and fight for it.
    Nobody knows what you want except you and
    Nobody will be as sorry as you if you don’t get it.
    So don’t give up on your dreams.

    This one sandwiches good advice around a foul meaty middle. The bit about saving yourself is a bit sketchy because there’s really nothing to save yourself from other than the illusions you may be buying into. And in that sense, you DO have to save yourself because you are the only thinker in your mind. It’s your beliefs that need to change and you’re the only one who can change them. But you don’t have to “fight” for anything. There is no lack in the world. That is one of the five fallacies about life.

    When you have a good heart
    You help too much
    You trust too much
    You give too much
    You love too much
    And it always seems you hurt the most.

    The unwritten message here is that having a good heart means you’re going to have a life full of pain. Yes, you can help too much. It’s called enabling. Yes, you can give too much. It too is called enabling. But you cannot trust or Love too much. And nothing can hurt you unless you allow it to! Your soul is indestructible. Your soul is immune to harm of any sort. In fact, you can really do nothing BUT Love because Love is all there is.

    When people walk away, let them.
    Your future is not about people who walk away.
    It’s about people who stay in it for the ride.

    Yes, you let people walk away if they choose to. That’s respecting their free will. But someone who is an abuser will not walk away and will stay “for the ride”. Someone who enjoys taking advantage of others or feels entitled to take what they want from others will “stay for the ride”. You must Love yourself AND them enough to say “This is enough!” [Note: I fully understand there are no victims and there are no villains. The use of the term “abuser” is for the sake of ease in understanding.]

    And finally, la pièce de resistance:

    Share this within 2 minutes if you believe in God
    and he’ll do you a huge favor!

    This has got to be one of my all-time favorites for memes with unwritten messages. I had no idea that God was out there with a stop-watch checking to see if you’ve shared a graphic before he’d do anything for you! How many of the fallacies about God does this embrace? I’m thinking at least the first three! God needs you to share this message so he can help you! And you MIGHT not do it so he may fail to be able to help you. And if you don’t give him what he needs, he’s not going to help you (separate himself from you)!

    Words are an enigma in many ways. The power of words to hurt you is inversely proportional to your understanding that the only power words have is the power you give them. If you believe that being called fat and lazy is hurtful, then you will be hurt when you are called fat and lazy. If you believe that being called fat and lazy are simply words that another person is using to express their anger and frustration because they don’t understand why their life is the way it is, then being called fat and lazy won’t bother you. It may, in fact (hopefully), cause you to feel empathy and compassion for the person who is calling you fat and lazy because they don’t understand something that would allow their life to be so easy for them.

    I have often been told that I am too wordy. And I cannot disagree. I often say the same thing in an article half a dozen times in half a dozen ways so that I do everything in my power to make sure that what I am saying is clear. That there is minimal room for misunderstanding. Unfortunately, the craze of graphic memes that fills the pages of social media has exactly the opposite goal: use as few words as possible to get their message across. And that means the message is often self-contradictory and open to misunderstanding and misinterpretation.

    It’s so very easy to simply click the “share” link and spread the messages of these memes to all your Facebook friends. But before you do, take a few minutes to make sure that the message you are sending is one of Love.

    (Shelly Strauss is a civil rights activist and speaker.  In addition to becoming an ordained minister, she has written 20-plus novels and is the “resident visionary” at One Spirit Project.  Shelly is also a spiritual helper on the ChangingChange website, offering support and guidance to people faced with unexpected and unwelcome change .)

  • If I say “I love you,” will you say it back?

    Isn’t it heartwarming and wonderful to watch very young children, two-, three-, four-year-olds, who express and demonstrate their love so spontaneously and unreservedly?  It’s not unusual to hear the collective sound of a harmonious “awww” from observers on a playground witnessing two new young friends sharing in an impromptu hug or unforeseen kiss on the cheek. These children live in pure awareness.  Their love is unfiltered, not yet programmed, authentic, allowing them to exemplify the level and kind of love we all yearn for but have somehow forgotten how to experience.

    But why have we forgotten?

    At some point in our childhood, we are exposed to and told to believe in a different kind of love.  This different kind of love works swiftly to reprogram what we come here already knowing:  that we already ARE love.  This different kind of love then works tirelessly to convince us that if we “do this” or “be that” or “do things in a particular way,” we will finally earn and be rewarded the love of another.  Haven’t we all, at some point or another in our lives, yearned to hear the words “I love you”?

    But what do we really mean when we utter these three words to another with an underlying hope that we will, in turn, hear “I love you” back?   To say nothing of the paralyzing fear that the possibility exists that we may not be the recipient of another’s confirmation of love.  Would it be possible to be in a relationship where the knowing of one’s love was so palpable that the desire and need to hear this verbal affirmation would no longer present itself?

    Somewhere along the way, in an attempt to capture the essence of love in a way that makes sense, we boxed it into our language, as we do many of life’s esoteric ideas and concepts, and formulated our own version of love.  We have minimized, twisted, stretched, warped, contorted, and manipulated this small but powerful phrase — “I love you” — to the point that its meaning is almost spiritually unrecognizable.  We hinge or hasten our expression of love upon some need-driven expectation of what we may or may not receive in return.

    Imagine a world where we did not condition our love, or the expression of it, upon an assurance and acknowledgment that we will be loved back, a world where everyone demonstrates their love freely, openly, and unconditionally, where love was not bartered over or bargained for.  I have, on more than one occasion, found myself asking the question:  Are we even capable of experiencing unconditional love for a period of time beyond an occasional moment or two?

    And the answer I receive is that if we fully awakened to who we really are – all of us – we would never place another condition upon our love.  We would not need to prove love’s reciprocity because we would already know and feel its omnipresence.  Fear and doubt would never cause us to hesitate in expressing our deepest gratitude and affection to anyone, as we would no longer buy into a perceived need to self-protect; but rather we would each place into the world our highest intentions and actions, giving freely from the source of our own abundance, understanding that the entire purpose of our being here in the first place has very little, if anything, to do with ourselves…and everything to do with all those with whom we share our path.

    I once saw an interview with Tony Robbins, the well-known motivational speaker, where he was asked if he gets nervous before he walks out on a stage in front of thousands of people.  His answer was (paraphrasing):  “If I thought that going out on that stage had anything to do with me, I would be nervous, tongue-tied, struggling to find my words.  But going out there has nothing to do with me.  It is about those people in the audience.  I am here for them.”

    That, to me, is unconditional love, giving your gifts absent the necessity to receive anything particular in return, a choice and demonstration of your Highest Self which arises out of a deeper understanding of why you are here.   Unconditional love asks, “Who am I in the room to heal?  And how will I let them know I am here?”

    Perhaps as our world continues to shed its Old Cultural Story, the one which carries with it a “different kind of love,” we will collectively begin to once again behold the world as our playground, just as we did when we were children, spontaneously and unreservedly declaring and expressing, returning to Love and a remembrance of Who We Really Are.

    (Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation.  She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com)

     

     

  • What role are you playing?

    “All the world’s a stage,

    And all the men and women merely players:

    They have their exits and their entrances;

    And one man in his time plays many parts,

    His acts being seven ages.”

    ~ William Shakespeare’s “As You Like it”

    During my years as an elementary teacher, I would encourage the children to role-play. It was an enjoyable alternative to teacher-led learning, both for the younger children who engrossed themselves in mimicking their favorite animal or activity, and for the older children, it provided an opportunity to acquire a deeper understanding of a character or scene they were studying.

    One day, a group of younger children were role-playing the person they wanted to be when they grew up.  A boy held an imaginary hose as he put out a ‘fire,’ whilst a girl, playing the role of doctor, questioned a ‘patient’ about his health.  As each child took turns to explain to the class who they were pretending to be, a small voice was heard from the back of the group, “Who are you pretending to be, teacher?”

    Although a seemingly innocuous question, only in later life, when addressing the choices I had made for myself, did I wonder whether they had been made for my own good or merely for the good of the role I had chosen to play.   The language of role-play peppers our conversation.  We hear about ‘the role of the parent,’ ‘our role in society’ or ‘defining our role.’  It is as though, upon entering adulthood, role-play is a given.  Having pretended to be someone else as children, it is now assumed that we have sufficiently perfected our role so as to avoid the reveal of our true nature. Sadly, though, unlike the child who reverts back to themselves once the game is over, many adults have so refined their role that they have come to define themselves by it.

    It could be said, however, that it is in infancy where we learn the fundamentals of role-play, when we tune into the primary caregivers’ needs that are inextricably linked to our own. Derived from survival instinct, the infant intuitively feels what they need to do in order to ensure that their own physical and emotional needs are met. So from the earliest stage, we behave in a way that pleases our caregivers, because the more pleased they are with us, the more loved we feel by them, in which case it appears that the greatest role we play in our lives is motivated by the primal need to be unconditionally loved and accepted.

    In the event that our needs are being met, the question arises as to why we would not continue role-playing as adults.  If we are already receiving unconditional love and acceptance, then there is no reason to change, except that we are not receiving unconditional love and acceptance from others, otherwise we would not continue playing a game that denies us the opportunity to unconditionally love and accept ourselves.  In other words, when we are shown how to love and accept ourselves by others, we become our own primary caregiver.

    Part of the maturation process, this stage of our emotional development allows us to confidently detach from the care-giver and establish ourselves in our own power. At this point we see that role-playing is not only superfluous but a hindrance to our emotional growth and well-being.

    In hindsight then, it appears that the only reason we should ever role-play is to imagine ourselves as another person, but not necessarily to be that person, otherwise we are in danger of becoming habitual repeaters of a pattern that stunts our emotional development.  We would spend our lives believing that the satisfaction of our needs depends on someone else’s fulfillment of them.  Like the son who excels in the profession of his Father’s choice, or the daughter’s husband who was more her Mother’s choice, we are all in danger of losing ourselves in a role….. unless we acknowledge that it is each individual alone who is the source of their own fulfillment, at which point our relationships become truly authentic as we come to recognize the authenticity within ourselves.

    (Gemma Phelan is from Ireland where she works as an editor. In her spare time, she enjoys giving musical recitals and teaching various complementary healing modalities.)

    (If you would like to contribute an article you have authored to the Guest Column, please submit it to our Managing Editor, Lisa McCormack, for possible publication in this space.  Not all submissions can be published, due to the number of submissions and sometimes because of other content considerations, but all are encouraged. Send submissions to Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.  Please label the topic: “Guest Column.”)

     

  • What would love do now?
    Wear a pink tutu in Times Square, of course!

    51-year-old Bob Carey, standing 5-foot-10-inches tall, and weighing more than 200 pounds, is appearing around the country in only a pink tutu and creating a 61-page book of his self-portraits in an effort to support his Beloved Other, Linda, who has advanced breast cancer.

    His extraordinary journey has taken him to the Grand Canyon, Coney Island, Times Square, The Washington Monument, a cow pasture in the midwest, and Giants Stadium, just to highlight a few.  You can view some of the images from his self-published book here:  Tutu Breast Cancer Project.

    Linda Lancaster-Carey, 51, who was diagnosed with cancer in 2003, says, “He’s not afraid to put himself out there. It’s his own body, with all its imperfections.”  The Careys say laughter has always been at the heart of their relationship and that the photography allowed Bob Carey to focus on something other than his own fear and anger surrounding his wife’s illness and the loss of his father to lung cancer and his mother to breast cancer.

    The Careys’ story demonstrates the level of unconditional love that so many people desperately yearn for but fall short of time and time again in their relationships, a level of love and commitment that perhaps may have not have been as fully experienced but for Linda’s illness.

    I imagine there was an earlier time in Bob Carey’s life where he would not have even considered donning only a pink tutu in the middle of Times Square, much less actually do it.  Even now, some members of the media have been less than kind, colorfully pointing out the flaws in Carey’s physique, to which he replies, “The photos are about transforming into somebody I’m not. It’s about being vulnerable.” Carey is also feeling pushback from critics who question his actions, women who are put off by the pink tutu and those who have grown tired of the “pinkification” of October, which has been designated as Breast Cancer Awareness month.

    In the midst of darkness and pain and uncertainty, Bob Carey answered the question, “What would love do now?”   He pushed past the illusions of fear, embraced his vulnerability, and stepped into his next grandest version of himself, gifting to his wife and all those whose lives he touches the remembrance of his own sufficiency and divinity.  His act of self-definition now spans the country, if not the world, so others, too, can remember more fully who they are:  as sufficient and divine.

    Conversations with God, Book 1, reminds us:

    “What you do for your Self, you do for another.

    What you do for another, you do for the Self.

    And this is because you and the other are one.

    And this is because…

    There is naught but You.”

    Perhaps the Careys’ story will serve to inspire us all today to do something extraordinary, something silly and unexpected, an expression of pure givingness to our partner, and thus to ourselves — or to ourselves, and thus to all of humanity — as a demonstration of our Highest Self and our deepest affection and in remembrance of who we really are.

    Yes?

    (Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation.  She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support .   To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)