At its height, "The Bleep" was in 200 cities and grossing between $500,000 and $600,000 a week. Much of the credit for that success can be taken by John Raatz, whose Los Angeles-based public relations company, the Visioneering Group, masterminded "The Bleep's" marketing. Raatz, whose Web site describes the company as "a public relations firm linking spirit, vision and values with communication to promote a positive future," set up more than 100 screenings of "The Bleep" for yoga teachers and practitioners, as well as spiritual groups. He put ads for the film in publications such as Yogi Times, Whole Life Times and the Light Connection. He also enlisted employees and scores of volunteers nationwide to distribute posters, fliers and postcards touting the movie.

JOHN RAATZ, Founder and CEO of The Visioneering Group, is a modern-day Renaissance man. A skilled and experienced communicator, strategist, administrator, musician, teacher and entrepreneur, the thread that runs through Raatz's professional life is an abiding commitment to others' excellence and success ... and to the unfolding process that's lifting all of humanity to a new level of ethical and spiritual expression.

Raatz has been a personal manager in the entertainment industry, representing both high-profile celebrity actors and musicians. He's been a successful stockbroker, a major executive at a public relations agency, a professional blues/rock guitarist, a publisher of a leading-edge newsletter and the administrator of one of Southern California's most forward-looking holistic health clinics.

Raatz holds a Bachelor of Science degree and professional certification in public relations, and is pursuing a BBA degree from the State University of New York Regents Program as well as certification in financial planning from the College for Financial Planning. He is a frequent lecturer on public relations for the UCLA Extension PR Certificate Program.

Embodying an eclectic spiritual path since 1967, Raatz is a certified meditation teacher and, since 1976, has instructed thousands in the practice. Since 1989, The Visioneering Group has represented many of the foremost authors, books, films and musical projects in the alternative/transformational movement, including What the Bleep Do We Know, 11th Hour, Baraka, Mindwalk, A Brief History of Time, Fritjof Capra, Peter Russell, Chellis Glendinning, Dead Can Dance, Eckhart Tolle, Deepak Chopra, Madonna and Donovan.


John Raatz joins the Visionary Series Workstation as guest via interview for our premiere launch, a program based on the Visionary Series Podcasts, but also including articles, excerpts, more interviews, and virtual panel discussion amongst guests featured per issue, covering cutting edge topics but with central themes for sharing experiences and exchanging concise ideas with greater depth and brevity.

Our Premiere-First Issue will be launched and released from this site by end of October 2008, bearing this theme: What the Bleep Revisited -- Embracing and Celebrating Practical Spiritual Technology, featuring Will Arntz including the following: Rupert Sheldrake, Lynne McTaggart, William Tiller, Bruce Lipton, John Hagelin, Candace Pert, Fred Alan Wolf, Tim Freke, Charles Tart, Paul Von Ward, Byron Katie, Joe Dispenza, C. Norm Shealy, Pavel Mikoloski, John Raatz, Gary Renard, Stanley Krippner, and special guest, Neale Donald Walsch of The Secret.

Be sure to drop by to see the Workstation Site in development. Until then enjoy our podcasts and stay tuned for our premiere-launch scheduled late October 2008.  

Byron Katie & The Work

---

About Byron Katie

Byron Katie, founder of The Work, has one job: to teach people how to end their own suffering. As she guides people through the powerful process of inquiry called The Work, they find that their stressful beliefs-about life, other people, or themselves- radically shift and their lives are changed forever.

Based on Byron Katie's direct experience of how suffering is created and ended, The Work is an astonishingly simple process, accessible to people of all ages and backgrounds, and requires nothing more than a pen and paper and an open mind.

Through this process, anyone can learn to trace unhappiness to its source and eliminate it there. Katie (as everyone calls her) not only shows us that all the problems in the world originate in our thinking: she gives us the tool to open our minds and set ourselves free.

Katie is the author of three bestselling books:

Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life (with Stephen Mitchell),
I Need Your Love-Is That True?: How to Stop Seeking Love, Approval, and Appreciation and Start Finding Them Instead (with Michael Katz),
and the recently published A Thousand Names for Joy: Living in Harmony with the Way Things Are (with Stephen Mitchell).

Her latest book is Question Your Thinking, Change The World: Quotations from Byron Katie.

How The Work Began

Byron Katie became severely depressed in her early thirties. For almost a decade she spiraled down into depression, rage, self-loathing, and constant thoughts of suicide; for the last two years she was often unable to leave her bedroom.

Then one morning in February 1986, she experienced a life-changing realization. There are various names for an experience like this. Katie calls it "waking up to reality."

On her site are lots of splendid audio-visual  material showing the work in action. Her frank mpact with people is immediate. I really look forward to having her on Making It All Click -- Visionary Series after her European Tour and before and during Oprah, which should be some time around August according to her very, very kind agent, and the interview has just been confirmed yesterday, August 6th, so stay tuned!

Byron Katie joins the Visionary Series Workstation via interview for our premiere launch, a program based on the Visionary Series Podcasts, but also including articles, excerpts, more interviews, and virtual panel discussion amongst guests featured per issue, covering cutting edge topics but with central themes for sharing experiences and exchanging concise ideas with greater depth and brevity.

Our Premiere-First Issue will be launched and released from this site by end of October 2008, bearing this theme: What the Bleep Revisited -- Embracing and Celebrating Practical Spiritual Technology, featuring Will Arntz including the following: Rupert Sheldrake, Lynne McTaggart, William Tiller, Bruce Lipton, John Hagelin, Candace Pert, Fred Alan Wolf, Tim Freke, Charles Tart, Paul Von Ward, Byron Katie, Joe Dispenza, C. Norm Shealy, Pavel Mikoloski, John Raatz, Gary Renard, Stanley Krippner, and special guest, Neale Donald Walsch of The Secret.

Be sure to drop by to see the Workstation Site in development. Until then enjoy our podcasts and stay tuned for our premiere-launch scheduled late October 2008.  


Use this link to stay up-to-date regarding all Making It All Click-Visionary Series Interviews!

Joan Borysenko, a distinguished pioneer in integrative medicine is also a world-renowned expert in the mind/body connection. Her work has been foundational in an international health-care revolution that recognizes the role of meaning, and the spiritual dimensions of life, as an integral part of health and healing. Eloquent and inspiring in settings that range from hospitals to hospices, from theaters to conference venues, and from boardrooms to houses of worship, she is a credible bridge between faith and reason. Her brilliance, humor, and authenticity-in combination with the latest research-make her a compelling and inspiring speaker and writer.

After graduating magna cum laude from Bryn Mawr College in 1967, Dr. Borysenko earned her doctorate in Medical Sciences from the Harvard Medical School, where she completed post-doctoral training in cancer cell biology. Her first faculty position was at the Tufts University College of Medicine in Boston. But after the death of her father from cancer, she became more interested in the person with the illness than in the disease itself, and returned to Harvard Medical School to complete a second postdoctoral fellowship, this time in the new field of behavioral medicine. Under the tutelage of Herbert Benson, M.D., who first identified the relaxation response and brought meditation into medicine, she was awarded a Medical Foundation Fellowship and completed her third post-doctoral fellowship in psychoneuroimmunology.

In the early 1980's Dr. Borysenko co-founded a Mind/Body clinic with Dr. Benson and Dr. Ilan Kutz, became licensed as a psychologist, and was appointed instructor in medicine at the Harvard Medical School. Her years of clinical experience and research culminated in the 1987 publication of the New York Times best seller, Minding the Body, Mending the Mind, which sold over 400,000 copies. The 20th anniversary edition, newly revised, was published in 2007. Author or co-author of 13 other books and numerous audio and video programs, including the Public Television special Inner Peace for Busy People, she is the Founding Partner of Mind/Body Health Sciences, LLC located in Boulder, Colorado and the Director of The Claritas Institute Interspiritual Mentor Training Program.

Dr. Borysenko's warmth and credibility-plus her lively sense of humor-create a compelling presence. You can access video clips of Joan's inspirational reflections in the Community Members section of this Web site.  She also hosts a weekly Internet radio show, Your Soul's Compass, for Hay House and Joan is one of the most popular and sought after speakers in the field of health, healing, and spirituality, her engaging and well researched presentations are perfect both for professionals and for the general public.

Stay tuned for a wonderfully informative conversation where science and spirituality meet in harmonious embrace blessed by saged wisdom!

Dr. Joan Borysenko joins the Visionary Series Workstation as guest author and interview for our premiere launch, a program based on the Visionary Series Podcasts, but also including articles, excerpts, more interviews, and virtual panel discussion amongst guests featured per issue, covering cutting edge topics but with central themes for sharing experiences and exchanging concise ideas with greater depth and brevity.

Our Premiere-First Issue will be launched and released from this site by end of October 2008, bearing this theme: What the Bleep Revisited -- Embracing and Celebrating Practical Spiritual Technology, featuring Will Arntz including the following: Rupert Sheldrake, Lynne McTaggart, William Tiller, Bruce Lipton, John Hagelin, Candace Pert, Fred Alan Wolf, Tim Freke, Charles Tart, Paul Von Ward, Byron Katie, Joe Dispenza, C. Norm Shealy, Pavel Mikoloski, John Raatz, Gary Renard, Stanley Krippner, and special guest, Neale Donald Walsch of The Secret.

Be sure to drop by to see the Workstation Site in development. Until then enjoy our podcasts and stay tuned for our premiere-launch scheduled late October 2008.  

Use this link to stay up-to-date regarding all Making It All Click-Visionary Series Interviews!

Unleash your Potential with the Corporate Sufi TM

Azim Jamal is a leading inspirational speaker, management consultant & executive coach. He was born in Tanzania and educated in Kenya, the U.K. and Canada. He made his life-changing career switch from "accounting for business" to "accounting for life" during a soul-stirring experience while volunteering in the developing world. Overcome by the plight of homeless refugees in war-torn areas of the world, he vowed to make a difference in people's lives. Since then, Azim has been spreading his unique, thought-provoking message in becoming a Corporate Sufi - one who can achieve material abundance through spiritual abundance. Azim is the author of several books including # 1 Amazon Bestselling Author of The Power of Giving. Over one million people worldwide have heard his inspiring words and his work has received accolades from leading thinkers including Dr. Deepak Chopra, Dr. Wayne Dyer, Jack Canfield, Brian Tracy, and Dr. Ken Blanchard.

Stay tuned for an intriguing conversation through which we discuss the power of giving, while addressing our greatest challenges:  the power to receive, be nurtured, and celebrate it all without condition or fear of being exploited.

Use this link to stay up-to-date regarding all Making It All Click-Visionary Series Interviews!
In the meantime here are some questions, I may ask our 'Sufi Corporate Expert' on giving:

1. Azim, before we go into discussing the book tell us a little about your co-author, how the two of you met, and why the of you decided upon this joint authorship for a book with this particular theme: THE POWER OF GIVING - HOW GIVING BACK ENRICHES US ALL - CREATING A BUNDANCE AT HOME, AT WORK, AND IN YOUR COMMUNITY?

 

2. I'd like to start by asking a fundamental question, Azim: the word abundance What does this word mean in your book in your own life a principle focus important for us all?

     

3. You know, Azim, now more than ever before there is a lot of fear in just holding on to what you've got with the American Government, for instance, announcing this recent economic crisis, there is a suggestion that the average individual can't trust in the goodwill of an institution which historically stands for having faith in even the god we all trust. Why are we investing our faith and trust of goodwill into everything and everyone else but in our own power to give?

 

4. You know your book sort of suggests that real abundance cannot happen if we compartmentalize too much, what I mean is: you go through the trouble of mentioning, work, home, and community. Isn't that not what most people are thinking when talking about increasing abundance?

 

5. I remember watching an episode of Oprah when she gives everyone a credit card with a balance $2000, and everyone cheered with gratitude. There was a catch. Oprah said everyone could have their card, if they spent the balance on someone else in need, but not themselves. What kind of experience do you think Oprah was getting at here and how may this tie in to your book's main message?

 

6. Now, I am assuming that Oprah also intends that each audience member go and start spending these card balances on people they know, not just total strangers, which brings up the sticky issue of family ties. Is it appropriate that people have faith that family ties are inherently closer with stronger bonds than that between close friends, and how does that set us up for disappointment? 

   

7. Nowadays the term value doesn't mean as much and we are being asked to assess what has intrinsic value for instance, having money to do things or having time to create great experiences. What do not understand we talk about that which has intrinsic value?

 

8. Lately, we are also talking about cause and effect or law of attraction. It seems your book takes a look at the same quantum mechanism but in reverse, building an expectation based on what happens when we give without fear and using that power and motive to do wonderful things. Why concentrate on effect and not the cause?

   

9. Your book talks about hope, gratitude, personal gratification outside of expecting something in return as being true riches and wealth. What can we do with these feelings as we observe the after math of giving and receiving, nurturing and being nurtured?

   

10. We are talking about mindfulness these days as the ability to pay attention to our own thoughts and stream of consciousness. So what are we to observe in order to give where there is an intrinsic need, I mean, how do know what a person really needs?

 

11. In your wonderful book you give advice on how to move past anger and move closer in a relationship by addressing what is most difficult to articulate. For instance, fear of being hurt again. What does this do, and how does this free up one's ability to fully express love and have abundance?

 

12. I usually do not ask questions about or discuss politics here in this forum, but one of America's candidates is talking about a new world order, if you will, invoking fear in some and a sense or courage in others when facing the great unknown. Is it true that we can build a stronger government and economy using the same actions and principles for building-up and healing relationships and strengthening family and community on a smaller scale, and if so how?

 

13. There is another suggestion I like here, and that is giving someone what you need most, and there are plenty of ancient and contemporary ideologies and philosophies, including spiritual principles that back this initiative up. How do we do this without projecting our fears onto others?

 

14. How have you been using this book in your daily life and how are the principles in the book suppose to play as your own experience and opportunity to grow and evolve, do you believe?

 

15. You are engaging in a rather rigorous promotional tour telling the world about this wonderful book. What is that going to be like for you and what do you plan to achieve?

 

16. Are there any other initiatives associated with the book wherein people can participate and be enriched, like talks, workshops, social and community project building?

 

17. We are nearing the end of our conversation, Azim, when I traditionally ask a question on higher purpose, and in considering what that may mean to you, are you fulfilling yours, do you believe?

 

18. Please share with our audience some word or advice as you generously give in your book, many times over, about finding everyone finding their own personal power to give where they live and build relationships.

Journey Through the Light and Back

After suffering from a terminal illness, in 1982 Mellen-Thomas Benedict ‘died' and for an hour and a half he was monitored showing no vital signs. Miraculously he returned to his body with a complete remission of the disease - and what may be the most inspirational near-death experience story known to date.

While on the "other side" Mellen journeyed through several realms of consciousness and beyond the "light at the end of the tunnel". He was shown during his NDE, in holographic detail, Earth's past and a beautiful vision of mankind's future for the next 400 years. He experienced the cosmology of our soul's connection to mother earth (Gaia), our role in the Universe, and was gifted with access to Universal Intelligence.

Since his near-death experience, Mellen-Thomas has maintained his direct access to Universal Intelligence, and returns to the light at will, enabling him to be a bridge between science and spirit. He has been involved in research programs on life after death experiences and has developed new technologies for health and wellness. With humility, insight, and depth of feeling he shares his experience and insights.

He brings back a message of hope and inspiration for humanity about Life After Death and Reincarnation delivered with a joy and clarity that is refreshing. His depth of feeling and passion for life is a gift to be shared.

I am sure we will all enjoy innovative perspectives in experiencing on earth creating in continuance in context to our complete soul's journey of unfolding and returning to the divine beings we already all.

Use this link to stay up-to-date regarding all Making It All Click-Visionary Series Interviews!
Here are some questions I may ask Mellen-Thomas:

1. Mellen-Thomas, how long have you been communicating with the spirit part of our whole reality?

2. If there was as an opinion or attitude about psychic development, mediumship, and general intuition during your childhood, what was it, and how did it effect your choice as an adult facilitating those kinds of connections you are known for.

3. What was life like for you before deciding to devote a huge part of your purpose to spirit communication?

4. In your site you shared a life-changing experience from earlier on regarding your physical health and worldview. Please share this inspiring, eye-awakening story.

5. You have a very distinctive name. If this applies, who named you and how does the name tie in to your identity for this lifetime?

6. I learn throughout my experience as medium, that there is a learning curve, especially regarding the mindset or perspective of spirit energy. Is there a universal truth you intend to convey to almost every client with whom you interact? Are there any spiritual concepts that your clients find particularly difficult to grasp? What are they, if this applies?

7. There is this word or concept I have read about called serial time where in metaphysical terms this means continuous and spontaneous time. You have a very expansive viewpoint on time when it comes to living moment by moment and toyour method in service for others. Can you explain that please?

8. Why do make such a strong correlation between our physical bodies and the universe, and what part of this idea do most humans miss out on? Are there any advantages to this point of view and our every day health and vitality?

10. What daily practice do you advise to those who wish to open more to the spirit realm? Is it necessary for you to prepare ahead of time and then afterwards or can you get engaged whenever you want or whenever you are needed?

11. Is there some physical quality you possess, which makes you more sensitive than others to spirit; or this not the case at all? Have you acquired this trait over many life times? Can others achieve the same, particularly during this period of accelerated transition?

12. What kinds of events are you participating in these days? Generally what can those who attend come to expect from this experience with you? Do you provide workshops, and if so what is the format like?

13. Are you still taking on new private clients? Is it typical that your readings involve a deceased relative or spirit guide for information's sake, even when a client has no real interest in the spirit realm? Do you convey your intuitive response in context to the spirit source you encounter during a standard reading, or must you be discreet as to not offend or frighten a client who is not prepared?

14. What is the best way for a client to learn about you and then prepare ahead a time for a reading with you? How can one stay up-to-date regarding your personal appearances and what are your talks like?

15. Will you please leave the audience a word of inspiration encouraging that we all find our path, become our path, and fulfill our planetary roles outside of fear?