"Gentrify your own hood before these people do it... Claim eminent domain and have your people move it... That's a small glimpse into what Nipsey was doing..."
~ Jay Z
"Eminent domain in the United States refers to the power of a state or the federal government to take private property for public use while requiring 'just' compensation to be given to the original owner."
~ Wikipedia
As the article writer took a contemplative walk to meditate as to what would be written about the enigmatic figure that is Ermias Joseph Asghedom, aka Nipsey Hussle. The physical rapper, songwriter, entrepreneur, and community activist is no more. However, at our core, we are 100% energy. Energy that was never created, can never be destroyed, moves into form, through form, and out of form, and the cycle is repeated.
On my walk earlier today, as I contemplated the title of this article, an individual crossed my path who totally resembled Nipsey; about the same height, full long beard and braided hair. He came practically out of nowhere, as he appeared from the side of a small building, made the right turn onto the walking trail, about 40 feet ahead of me. He was smoking a cigarette, made the first left from the trail and headed off in another direction.
I thought, how interesting, here's a figure that materializes right before my eyes, that favors Ermias Asghedom, in every way, shape, and form. The figure was a spirit visitation because the soul is ubiquitous. Considering the fact that I was, and have been since his timely demise, listening to his art, my energy attracted Nip's energy, to remind me how important this article would be, and not to procrastinate.
The "timely demise" comment is not a typo because there is no such thing as an "untimely demise." The soul exits the body at the appropriate and pre-ordained time. Please understand, unless you lived in Los Angeles, or you ardently followed Rap music, you probably were not familiar with Nipsey Hussle. Now the world knows who he was and what he represented consciously, and now sub-consciously.
The astute lyricist Jay Z put it this way, "Gentrify your own hood before these people do it... Claim eminent domain and have your people move it... That's a small glimpse into what Nipsey was doing..."
Allow the author to divagate a bit, to elucidate on "Eminent Domain", "Urban Renewal", and their deleterious effects.
Americans of all racial and ethnic backgrounds have suffered from government violations of constitutional property rights. But minority groups have often been disproportionately victimized, sometimes out of racial prejudice and other times because of their relative political weakness.
The Supreme Court has given condemning authorities a blank check to take property for whatever purposes they want. Private to private condemnations are often used for the benefit of the politically powerful at the expense of the politically weak. For most of American history, African Americans and other minority groups have fallen into the latter category. As a result, we have often been victimized by the use of eminent domain for “blight” and economic development takings.
Beginning in the 1930's, many states adopted laws and constitutional amendments allowing the condemnation of “blighted” property for transfer to private parties in order to alleviate “slum-like” conditions. Over the next fifty years, as many as several million Americans were expelled from their homes as a result of blight and urban renewal condemnations. Numerous businesses, churches, and other community institutions were also destroyed.
The vast majority of those uprooted from their homes have been poor minorities, primarily African Americans. The use of eminent domain to evict poor blacks during the post-World War II era became commonplace. "Slum clearance" was often referred to as, "Negro clearance."
Between 1949 and 1973, two-thirds of the over one million people displaced under takings sponsored by the Urban Renewal Act of 1949 were African American. This figure understates the total impact of blight takings on blacks, because many blight condemnations were also undertaken by state and local government without federal backing. Hispanic groups, such as Puerto Ricans, were also commonly targeted.
Factors to be considered in determining if an area is "blighted" and thus subject to urban renewal condemnation include such diverse matters as irregularity of the plots, inadequacy of the streets, diversity of land ownership making assemblage of property difficult, incompatibility of an existing mixture of residential and industrial property, overcrowding, incidence of crime, lack of sanitation, drain areas makes on municipal services, fire hazards, traffic congestion and pollution.
For an area to be termed "blighted" and thus subject to urban renewal condemnation, degree of deterioration or precise percentage of obsolescence or mathematical measurement of other factors do not have to be arrived at with precision, since combination and effects of such things are highly variable.
In many cases, the disproportionate impact on African Americans was not merely an accidental byproduct of efforts to "clean up" poor neighborhoods; it was deliberate gentrification.
Local governments sometimes sought to rid themselves of what they called “niggertowns.” In most cases, those displaced by blight condemnations ended up worse off than they were before, and were not fully compensated for their losses.
In 1954, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of blight condemnations in Berman v. Parker. Berman upheld a blight condemnation that was part of a project that forcibly displaced over 5,000 people in a poor Washington, DC neighborhood. Some 97.5 percent of them were African American. Only about 300 of the 5,900 housing units constructed on the site after blighting and gentrification, were affordable to the former residents of the area, most of whom ended up in worse conditions elsewhere. By the 1960's, the neighborhood in question was majority white.
Source: The Civil Rights Implications of Eminent Domain Abuse
Wholesale clearance of slum areas and pillar-to-post relocation of families who live in lower-income, impoverished neighborhoods, have long created discontent. Members of racial and ethnic minorities who have seen the impecunious buildings they occupied replaced by luxury apartment homes have grown resentful of city planning that rarely seems to make adequate provision for their needs. The late, great author James Baldwin, stated, "Urban renewal means Negro removal."
Nipsey Hussle's blueprint is all about lifting ourselves up from whatever challenges we face as Africans in America. Asghedom's archetype is also about self-education and entrepreneurship; it's about contributing to your own community. Thereby alleviating the need for handouts, and avoiding government-sponsored gentrification.
The definition of gentrification is, "the buying and renovation of houses and stores in deteriorated urban neighborhoods by upper or middle-income families or individuals, raising property values but often displacing low-income families and small businesses."
Therefore, the solution to this historical quagmire is to clean, maintain, rebuild our own neighborhoods; to buy black as often as possible (and if you can't buy black, support black). In order to succeed, we must first - as part of Nipsey's model and sacrifice - we MUST stop KILLING one another. When you take the life of another black man or woman, you're essentially killing yourself and crippling the entire African-American race.
Whether you believe this to be true or just hyperbole, "We are our brother's keeper." Anything we do, going forward, contrary to the aforementioned statement, is a tragic indication that Ermias Joseph Asghedom lived his life in vain; that his efforts and ultimate sacrifice was meaningless and futile.
The Marathon Continues...
We know the truth when we meet it. It’s just that having taken the plunge into “life” ourselves in this early stage of our civilization’s spiritual development, we don’t usually grant ourselves permission to go to places in thought that we can’t touch, taste, see, hear, or feel.
Very caveman, yet very predictable for where we are in our evolutionary arc. These are primitive times, and given that times are defined by the people who occupy them, we are primitive people. Not by chance, though, but by design. We knew it would be like this. We chose to show up early in humanity’s development, perhaps as part of the price for getting to show up later as masters, or because the possibilities that exist today won’t exist in the same way later on.
Doesn’t really matter now; we’re here. Babes in the jungles of time and space, and therefore understandably scared by the world around us, feeling vulnerable, relying almost exclusively on our physical senses to label, define, and make progress.
It’s odd how people like to be told what they already know, as if being told makes it more real. This is why the number-one thing the dead want to tell you is that no one dies. Not ever. Not anyone. Including you. You’re going to live forever, gallivanting throughout realities and dimensions unimaginable, carried onward by love, all misdeeds forgiven, infinite possibilities on deck, surrounded by friends and laughter, celebrated as the god or goddess you are.
Yes, as much as it seriously risks all credibility, you deserve the full truth: if you want unicorns, you get unicorns. Forms change, shapes shift, energy exchanges, but even the humblest of today’s greeting cards has the depth and clarity to remind you of what you already know: those recently departed loved ones are in “a better place.” And while you can tease or torture yourself by wondering if this is really true, doesn’t every religion echo that life is eternal? Haven’t scientists proven that matter is not solid, but organized energy? “Organized” being the highly operative, fully loaded, bursting-with-implications descriptor in this case.
Don’t your nighttime dreams hint at the obvious separation between consciousness and your physical body? And aren’t there enough recorded incidences of the paranormal to give even the most die-hard skeptics pause?
Whatever else consciousness might be, it was first a timeless, formless essence. And this, pretty much without any effort, paints a fairly clear picture: You, the formless and eternal, now temporarily possess a physical body, chemically and organically borrowed from the substances of earth, to channel your nonphysical energy and personality as you negotiate space, travel through time, and experience what has become known as life.
You chose to be here. Interesting how many do grasp that they’ll exist beyond the illusions but have trouble grasping that they existed before them. But if time, like space and matter, is an illusion of your own creation, you must have! Tricky.
Obviously your poor grip on this heretofore is because you lack any memory of your past, prior to becoming who you now are in the illusions. But since when does not remembering something negate its existence? And with the littlest bit of further introspection, connecting dots, suddenly it becomes crystal clear why you don’t remember choosing to be here … you didn’t want to remember.
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU DIE
Well, first of all, you won’t. Which is all you really have to know about death and why it’s the first thing “dead” people want to tell you. Many of them found this hard to believe themselves at first, gazing upon their own funerals, lingering around their old stomping grounds, stunned and amazed as they gestured and shouted to the friends left behind. There’s an abrupt disconnect, of course, that comes from leaving behind all things time and space and learning to maneuver in the unseen. The nature of this transition depends entirely on the beliefs of the dearly departed at the time of transition, because their beliefs and thoughts carry over to their new environs. Even there, thoughts become things, only they become things bigger and faster, arranged to match the expectations of new arrivals, often in the twinkling of an eye.
Harps, angels, Jesus, Muhammad, Buddha, Krishna, and lots more deities, saints, and whatnot all have energy fragments (not as crude as it sounds) on standby for the constant flow of new arrivals who will be welcomed, scolded, praised, or celebrated in any number of ways based upon the deceased’s anticipated and believed-in scenarios.
Elaborate “sets” can be seen floating in cloud settings, golden gates are “assembled,” gardens of Eden are manifested, fiery dens are ignited—whatever. Remember: in illusionary dimensions such as time and space and the afterlife, these “saviors” can be in an unlimited number of “places” at the same “time.” Welcoming committees also include, when appropriate, a cadre of deceased loved ones and those whose lives were affected by the deceased’s life and choices. They all take on the physical form and age that pleased them the most as they gather to welcome and assure newcomers that they have indeed survived and arrived somewhere wonderful.
Time is not an issue; the party can last “weeks.” Space is not an issue; everything seems to exist just for you. Kind of like on earth, if you’ve noticed. Communication is done mostly through a suddenly remembered form of telepathy, which will feel as natural to you as shaking hands once did. Travel is accomplished by willing yourself to wherever you want to go. Friends are found the same way. Thought connects all, is all. You’ll also be thrilled to see that you, too, have taken on the physical form from your life that pleased you the most and that all aches and pains have vanished—and you’ll quickly learn how to change even further.
“Limitless” has a new meaning for the deceased. Loving guides soon appear, glowing, radiant, and joyful. They orient you and answer your questions. They teach you. Remind you. Love you. Show you. Everything becomes clearer. You remember the hopes and intentions of your recent life and why you chose it. You review play by play all that happened. You see how things lined up or didn’t, and why. You’re awed by your power, wisdom, and kindness, saddened by what you missed, mistook, and misunderstood, yet inspired to know you can try again, make amends, and move forward with and into even greater love. Past lives come into view, along with the friends, loves, and lessons they contained. Everything starts making sense. It comes together like the most amazing artistic creation, a masterpiece that boggles your mind with its perfection, and you are humbled to find the paintbrush still in your hand.
The Satan Lie
There has perhaps been no lie greater than the one told of a devil awaiting sinners in hell. Any good it may have done in preventing people from sinning has surely been offset by the mass manipulation it makes possible, extracting subservience from what become confused, unhappy lives filled with regret, guilt, and fear. Of course, for sinners discovering the lie while crossing the threshold between worlds, instead of having to meet their maker—or worse, a big red devil—it makes possible a delirium of joy that is quite unrivaled. They are elated to find that not only are they immortal, but they’re approved of, appreciated, forgiven, and adored, just exactly as they are. If only, they solemnly think to themselves, I’d known this while living … how different things might have been.
Fortunately, they see clearly that eternity still beckons and happy opportunities abound and maybe, just maybe, they can take what they’ve discovered and share it with those who are still living.
First of all, it’s the dichotomy of the illusions, again, that seems to make everyone wrong. To you, if there’s an up, there must be a down; if there’s black, there’s white; if “before,” then “after.” And from where you are, within the illusions, you’re right: there are! It’s just that the illusions of time, space, and matter are illusions. You unknowingly live your life inside a “house of smoke and mirrors” while attempting to explain the world outside.
Naturally, given such a handicap—exacerbated mightily by not knowing you’re handicapped—there’s a general belief that if there’s a God, there must be the opposite: a devil. Yet things are so not as they seem. What most can’t see is that without the illusions, there’s no time, no space, and no matter, and therefore no dichotomies. Which means no here or there. No before or after. No wanting what you have not or having what you don’t want. Essentially nowhere to go, no one to go with, nothing to do, and besides, you’ve nothing to wear. No adventure. No fun. That’s what the illusions are for! The price of fun and adventure, as made possible by the illusions, is believing in the li’l ol’ “lies” of here versus there, and so on. But once the game is on, it’s hard to know where to draw the line, and people take this whole concept to “places” it need not go.
For example, it’s why some folks needlessly, even when it hurts and terrifies, believe in the devil and hell.
Love is the glue that holds creation together—not love and hate in equal measure. That life is good, not equal measures of good and bad. It neglects that you are of the Divine, by the Divine, and inclined to succeed, not inclined to succeed and fail equally. Feeling cold does not mean that later you have to feel hot in equal measure. Nor does living in the northern hemisphere mean that you must one day, inevitably, live in the southern hemisphere. Nor does living a life of joyful service to others mean that the pendulum must swing, turning such good Samaritans into axe murderers. One need not suffer to know joy, nor be afraid that happiness will later require sadness. And neither does a belief in God mean there must be a devil, any more than a belief in heaven means there must be a hell.
The Old Argument
“But what if God loved so dearly and was so wise, big, and courageous that He gave to His children the greatest gift conceivable: the freedom to make their own choices to learn right from wrong?” Yes! Nice! And with such a gift, all could then live forever and ever and ever, growing and learning and becoming and improving … Right? No. Unfortunately, that’s not how the story goes.
Instead, after some unimaginably brief period, assumed by most to be a single human lifetime, no matter who your parents were or were not, no matter where you were born, when you were born, and no matter how short your life was, upon its termination you could expect that the whole freedom thing was just a test and then would follow judgment and sentencing. Wait, if God truly loved “so dearly” and was truly that magnanimous in handing out the greatest gift, freedom, wouldn’t the testing-judging thing mean that somewhere along the way the offer had terminated?
How great is your freedom if, hypothetically, during a brutal life on earth—born during a famine, abandoned, sexually abused—you understandably spent the remainder of your life simmering in hatred and doing wicked things yourself, before your murder at age 32? You’d then be locked in hell for eternity? Or what if, after a delightful life on earth with loving parents in a modern society, you once cheated on your income taxes and lied to get your child into Harvard, costing an honest child with honest parents that spot? Red-hot pokers forever? Or what if you were the first person in the history of people to never make a mistake or do an unkind thing toward others, yet you accepted no prophet as your savior and rejected all religions? Ashes for lunch, again?
It’s a bit counterproductive, contradictory, and arbitrary to give folks freedom to learn and then not only suddenly deny it, but exact a stern punishment without end. What if, hypothetically, it took most people a few times “at bat,” needing several decades or lifetimes, before they acquired a sense of fairness and justice? Too bad?
What if Soul #19,428,939,045 had failed the first 19 lifetimes and had it not been for the big renege and eternal damnation, on the 20th his goodness would have smacked the ball so far out of the park, with such profound benevolence and kindness for all, it would have permanently altered the course of human evolution, ushering in a golden age of caring and kindness so grand it’s not even conceivable on the present plane? Or let’s say it might have taken him 19 million times at bat before making such a mark in history.
If eternal bliss lay beyond (mind you, that’s a very long time and a whole lot of bliss) for everyone, evermore? Suddenly 19 million times at bat becomes a pittance to pay for such stellar returns. As does 19 billion, or trillion, or zillion, given the inconceivable scope of eternity.
The beautiful idea of God “loving humanity” so deeply that He gave us freedom is blown to smithereens on the day such freedom is taken back, considering that on that one day there could have been a breakthrough that now can never be. And we haven’t even posed the greatest of all questions that in a split second, if we even attempt to answer, obliterates the entire notion of hell and the devil: “Why?!” Why would such amazing intelligence fumble around with such a pointless drill as having “children” in order to test, judge, and sentence them?
The whole notion reeks of the immaturity, boredom, impatience, anger, contempt, sadism, and failure of the age it was crafted in, thousands of years ago at a very dark time in human history.
One reason divine intelligence would move in such a direction instead of the direction we’ve deduced where everyone is of God, doing their best, learning and growing and improving, forever and ever, in a dream world from which all return, unscathed but more for the adventure, adding to all that God is?
As if God, the brilliance that started it all, that knew how to hang each star in the night’s sky and organize energy into matter, wasn’t also wise enough to rehabilitate everyone so in need. Big enough to forgive, unasked. Loving enough to refrain from tests, judgments, and sentences. Courageous enough to accept full responsibility for all creation. And great enough to be assured of unblemished success.
In fact, the system now in place achieves all this and undoubtedly more, rehabilitating, forgiving, and loving automatically, perfectly dispensing the exact right doses of whatever is called for at the exact right time. It’s just that inquiring minds have not inquired enough, or rather, that they’ve left it for other folks to do—folks with agendas.
I find the concept of blasphemy deeply disturbing. Religions have created a protection scheme to keep their ideas from being questioned. Written into the so-called holy texts is a death sentence for even speaking irreverently about the god the author(s) created.
These death sentences were carried out for centuries by the church and in many parts of the world today, 350 years after "The Enlightenment," death is still handed out for speaking out. I am not referring to the lunatic fringe of one religion or another that would seek to commit violence against blasphemers, but actual governments of nations that convict and punish the act of questioning.
