I just heard about Harrison Butker's speech and he made headlines for apparently making "controversial" statements that promote motherhood.
On one hand, I am not surprised by his statements. Butker is a traditional Catholic who attends the TLM so it makes sense why he sees gender roles that way. From that perspective, men have always had a leading role while women are the supporting character who must submit to the men in their lives.
On the other hand, I am a bit confused by how strict gender roles are to be enforced. For example, if a couple cannot make ends meet, should a woman be able to take a part-time job to help her man out or is the man expected to take as many jobs as possible until he is able to provide for the family?
In any event, his speech is hardly controversial and the media twisted it into something "anti-women". Butker didn't say the women in the audience should be homemakers. All he said was that women have been told lies that being a homemaker is something to be ashamed of.

(continuation of part 2)
III. e) The Mobius FF x FFVII collaboration
Alright, back to our suspension world-hopping! Let’s visit the realm of Mobius FF, —more specifically, the collaboration between Mobius FF and FFVII—, where I found the most substantial evidence for my theory.
In case you’re unfamiliar with the Mobius FF (MFF) world and games, let’s begin with a bit of a summary of the parts relevant to us. The story takes place in a world called Palamecia, to which people from other worlds are inexplicably summoned. The vast majority of those who are brought there don’t remember anything from their worlds of origin or their lives before Palamecia except their names: these amnesiac people are called Blanks. The main character is Wol, accompanied by a guiding fairy of Palamecia named Echo. Echo knows a lot about the mechanisms of Palamecia, as she’s tied to the realm. The leader of this world is Vox, a being who manifests only as a voice. The first thing all Blanks remember before they wake in Palamecia is Vox telling them the rules of the realm. Incidentally, the crystals of the MFF world are teleportation crystals.
III. e) i. Devs’ Statements
Let’s review some of the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration devs’ statements before diving into its story.
For both the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration and the Remake project, Kitase took on the role of producer while Nojima supervised the screenplay and wrote the scenario. The project leader was none other than the Remake trilogy’s Hamaguchi, who told a SE interviewer the following:

“We would love for you to play the [MFF x FFVII] collaboration event as you look forward to [Remake’s] release” (“Celebration of the Overseas Release of the Steam Version and FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE Collaboration Event”, Square Enix).

He later hints at the collaboration’s storyline:

“This collaboration is focused on Cloud, so the other characters will not make an appearance. Players will join Cloud, who has gone astray in Palamecia, on his adventures and see how the story unfolds based on his decisions. Content-wise, FINAL FANTASY VII fans will surely become fraught with emotion as events unfold in-game (laughs).”

Kitase concurs on the emotional aspect of the collaboration in the same interview:

“When it comes to the story, I seek two things– ‘mystery’ and ‘[…] emotional impact’.”

Clearly, fans of FFVII are supposed to react emotionally to the events of the collaboration. With these statements in mind to give us perspective, we can get into the plot points relevant to our analysis. MFF x FFVII Remake comes in two parts, the relevant plot points of which I will describe and analyze one at a time.
III. e) ii. Eclipse Contact
1) Fact-Finding
Part one of the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration event is called Eclipse Contact. It came out in 2017 on Aerith’s birthday, February 7th, and its release campaign ran until March. In Eclipse Contact, Palamecia welcomes someone new: Cloud Strife appears in the realm with very little recollection of his core world of FFVII.
Cloud isn’t a Blank, since he recalls the mako reactors in Midgar upon his arrival in Palamecia, and also remembers that he was hired by Avalanche to blow them up:

“Echo: How did you end up in Palamecia?

Cloud: I… That day... I remember now. A job. I had taken a job. I was hired muscle protecting clients. They wanted to stop the reactor... We used a train to get past security... Was it at night? Something happened... Next thing I knew, I was floating through darkness. Then [I woke up here]”.

This piece of dialogue reveals that Eclipse Contact Cloud’s memories end at the very moment when Avalanche arrives at reactor 1 in OG (disk 1, chapter 1): the very beginning of the game. Consequently, Cloud does not remember anything that happened from the beginning of the OG timeline onwards.
Wol and Echo are intrigued by Cloud’s strange case: non-Blanks rarely arrive in Palamecia. The following text appears on the screen shortly after they meet:

“Perhaps he is not truly who he thinks he is.
Perhaps everything is illusory, a dream.
Only one thing is certain, that he must press on, one step at a time, toward the light that shines from the promised land.”

Just like he did in FFT’s Ivalice, Cloud feels the need to find the Promised Land in MFF x FFVII, despite the fact that he lacks memories of the OG timeline. Though Cloud doesn’t remember anything beyond the train ride to reactor 1, he does remember the Promised Land (at least somewhat). This is odd, given that in OG, Cloud didn’t learn about the Promised Land until several chapters into the game.
Wol and Echo agree to help Cloud figure out why he’s here, since there’s clearly something strange going on with his presence in Palamecia. In fact, Cloud brought Midgar’s mako reactors with him somehow, transplanting them onto the landscape of Palamecia. The group decides to bomb these reactors, following Cloud’s instincts in the hopes that it will jog his memory.
Now for my favorite part. After blowing up another reactor, the group is surprised by the appearance of a crystal. A piano rendition of Aerith’s theme begins. When Wol tries to touch the crystal, something akin to a force field rejects him. When Cloud approaches it, however, the crystal responds to his hand by flashing with light. As it begins to glow, Wol concludes that the crystal is linked to Cloud and Cloud alone. Let’s examine the resulting dialogue:

“Echo: This is the light in your memories. The light of home.

Cloud: Home? But I don’t—

Echo: If you don't remember… then your home is lost to you.

Cloud: Then my memories are gone.

Wol: Do you want to reclaim your past?

Cloud: Not interested... I am what I am now. Not what I was.

Wol: Then tell me… This light. If you can’t remember it, what does it mean to you?

Cloud: It's a warm light... I feel at peace. If this place —home— is as warm and peaceful as this light, then I want to go there.

Echo: You can't go there... Not back to the past.

Cloud: I see.

Echo: But even if you can't go back to the past, you can go forward. If you wish for it strongly enough, the crystal will show you the way. The way to a new world. The way to your Promised Land. […]

Cloud: So... Should [I] take [my] chances and make a wish to this crystal?

Wol: Go ahead. It’s your crystal.

Echo: I should warn you that once you start on this journey, there's no coming back.

Cloud: The past is the past. I want to go to a place where everything is new. I’m ready.“

What follows is a moment I call the wishing scene (13:43-14:34). Cloud closes his eyes and wishes on the crystal. It flashes, and suddenly, rainbow-colored ripples of light appear around it. Aerith’s theme is replaced by a slightly modified version of “Midgar, City of Mako”, the track that plays during the opening cutscene of Remake. You can recreate the modification by listening to “Midgar, City of Mako” from 2:00 to 2:23, then skipping to 3:00 and listening until 3:18. You may recognize the musical motif that kicks off the wishing scene as the Lifestream motif, which has become symbolic of the mysteries of the Remake trilogy, as it often plays during scenes where unexplainable plot deviations from OG occur— more specifically, deviations involving multiverse shenanigans. For instance, it plays during MOTF 4. It also plays in Rebirth after Cloud blocks masamune as Aerith is shown dying anyway.
Cloud disappears with his crystal, after which Echo speaks to Wol about Cloud’s journey:

“Echo: Each person gets the Promised Land they justly deserve, not the one they really need. If you’re a bad person, you go to a bad place. If you expect nothing, you get nothing. Even the journey there makes you look deep within yourself to find out who you really are. Cloud should be facing his own past as we speak. It’s cruel, but necessary. That battle was a long time coming”.

Apparently, at least in the context of this collaboration event, the Promised Land can be a reward or a punishment, depending on which you deserve. Echo explains that Cloud will have to face himself and his past on his way to his Promised Land. This means that the Cloud that appears in Eclipse Contact must next embark on a journey that will confront him with his past, test his mettle, and ultimately lead him to the Promised Land he justly deserves.
III. e) ii. 2) Fact Analysis
There’s a lot of vital information to dig into here, mostly provided by Echo. She claims that the crystal’s light is linked to Cloud’s memories of home; Cloud has to have known this home in the past, as it could not otherwise exist in his memories. MFF Cloud must be a post-OG Cloud. Unfortunately, Echo indicates that whatever Cloud’s home is, he’s lost both it and his memories of it. Despite this, Cloud describes his home as warm and peaceful, concluding that he wishes to find it. Though Cloud can’t return to the past, Echo tells him that if he wishes it strongly enough, the crystal can guide him toward a new world, where his home and his Promised Land exist in the future. The fact that Aerith’s theme is playing all throughout these descriptions of Cloud’s lost home, his Promised Land and the past that he can’t return to makes it extremely obvious that these concepts all point to Aerith. Aerith is Cloud’s lost home. Wherever Aerith is, that’s his Promised Land. The time spent with Aerith before her loss is the past he tragically can’t return to. You might have clocked the similarities between Eclipse Contact’s mention of Cloud’s lost home and DFF’s mention of Cloud’s lost dream: in both these titles, Cloud’s home and dream are equivalent to his Promised Land. It’s confirmed yet again that Aerith is the one Cloud hopes to return to, just like every soul returns to the Lifestream. At this juncture of my research, I was curious as to why the last thing Cloud remembers before waking in Palamecia is the run-up to the Reactor 1 bombing mission in OG (disk 1, chapter 1). This mystery will have to persist for a while longer.
The alarm bells in your head might’ve been triggered by the mention of the wishing scene’s rainbow ripple effects— and rightfully so. This visual cue has sparked passionate debate in the fandom since its appearances in Rebirth, as seen in these pictures:
Zack Choosing To Get A Cure For Cloud, Rebirth Chapter 14; Creating a New World/Timeline
Aerith Pushing Cloud Out of that World/Timeline, Remake Chapter 14
Cloud Blocking Masamune, Rebirth Chapter 14; Creating New World/Timeline
You might have read or heard that this rainbow effect signifies that a character has entered another timeline, created a portal to another timeline, created a new timeline or is being shown different timelines. Indeed, whenever the OG timeline is deviated from in a significant way, this effect appears. The pictures above present multiple examples of these shifting realities.
One might propose that the rainbow ripples in Eclipse Contact and Rebirth are unrelated because of the long period between their respective release dates. This long in-between period indeed makes it likelier that the effect was used without forethought in Eclipse Contact, forgotten over the years, and incidentally reused in Rebirth as a plot-important visual cue with no connection to Eclipse Contact. I’m inclined to disagree since the crystal is specifically described as a vessel that can take Cloud “to a new world” by Echo, which is a bit on the nose. Regardless, it’s plausible that there’s no connection. That is, it would be, if the rainbow effect didn’t show up in Remake too.
When the Whispers are finally defeated in chapter 18 of Remake, a burst of the rainbow ripple effects indicate the emergence of multiple worlds, newly freed from the restrictive clutches of fate (1:16:36-1:16:47). Shortly thereafter, Sephiroth takes Cloud to the Edge of Creation and invites him to join forces with him. Cloud refuses, and Sephiroth says the following:

“Seven seconds till the end. Time enough for you. Perhaps. But what will you do with it? Let's see.”

The question “What will you do with it?” implies that the answer is unknown, meaning Cloud is no longer bound to the OG timeline by fate: many alternate futures lay ahead. Sephiroth is telling Cloud and the audience that now, the mystery of the Remake trilogy has become “Which future will Cloud bring into existence? Which among the infinite possible timelines will his choices result in?” After pondering this aloud, Sephiroth leaves Cloud alone to consider the rainbow effects in the sky (1:19:23-1:19:36). Because they generally represent alternate or changing timelines, it’s safe to assume that the rainbow ripples here represent the myriad of possible worlds that Cloud’s actions in those seven seconds could generate. After all, Sephiroth was just talking about them, and chapter 18’s description in Remake reads as follows:

“In a world beyond, Sephiroth shows Cloud a vision of the planet seven seconds before its demise. Having strayed from the course destiny set for them, they strike out on a path towards an unknown future."

This explains why the player is shown Cloud staring at those colors in the apocalyptic sky at world’s end, directly after hearing Sephiroth’s cryptic words: those are all the alternate “unknown future” timelines ahead of him, now unravelled from fate. Amongst those rainbow ripples lies the answer to the question “What will you do with [the seven seconds]?”
Given that Remake was released in 2020 and Eclipse Contact came out in 2017, the major story elements of the Remake trilogy —including the eventuality of alternate timelines— had to have been planned out at the time of Eclipse Contact’s release: while the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration was being made, Remake was also in production. Also recall that the collaboration event and the Remake trilogy share a codirector in Hamaguchi, a writer in Nojima and a producer in Kitase. Based on all this, it’s more than likely that the rainbow ripples in the Remake trilogy and inEclipse Contact represent the very same thing: alternate worlds and timelines. All this to say that when the rainbow effect appears around the crystal in the Eclipse Contact, it means the crystal is acting as a vessel to another world, just like Echo said.
But that’s not all Echo said: she also mentioned that this other world would take Cloud to his home, to his Promised Land. We’ve already established what that means for Cloud, what it’s meant since two whole decades at the time of Eclipse Contact’s release: this crystal will take Cloud to Aerith. So, where exactly did the crystal take Cloud? In what world can he meet Aerith again?
The music that plays during the wishing scene gives us a huge hint. As I noted before, the track playing in the background is a slightly modified version of Remake’s “Midgar, City of Mako”, which plays in the introduction cutscene of Remake. This is a musical cue that the ending of Cloud’s journey in Eclipse Contact and the very beginning of the Remake trilogy are closely related. Add the fact that the devs wanted players to experience this collaboration event before playing Remake, and it becomes undeniable: the crystal that appeared to Cloud in Palamecia —which offers to lead him to his home and Promised Land, meaning to Aerith—, took him to the world of the Remaketrilogy.
Eclipse Contact is huge. The whole crux of my theory lives and dies right here. However, we still have part two of the MFF x FFVII Remake collaboration event to analyze as well as its promotions to look into before I can drop the thesis on you, so bear with me in order to receive the most thorough analysis of all this possible! I want to give you every drop of proof I can!
III. e) ii. MFF x FFVII Remake Fatal Calling
1) Fact-Finding
Fatal Calling came out February 1 of 2018, and its release campaign ended in March. The game opens with a cutscene: Cloud is floating, seemingly unconscious, through a sparkling, green current of light. The current flows into a circle of bright, white light, surrounded by rainbow ripple effects as Cloud is driven toward and into it. An orb floats along with him. The Advent Children theme “The Promised Land” plays, a choir of mournful, aching, mutedly desperate souls engaged in a lamenting prayer. Sephiroth’s voice echoes:

“Sephiroth: It’s time. You may turn your back on the past, lock your memories away. Hide reality beneath a layer of illusion. But destiny will not die so easily. Yes. At memory’s end you may plead for it all to go away. But the past is a curse, binding your soul. It’s time. Wake to your fate. Rise to your destiny.

Cloud: (In a half-conscious grunt) Reunion…

Sephiroth: The light will lead you. Wake to your fate. Rise!”

Sephiroth’s mentions of Cloud hiding under an illusion and repressing his memories are no doubt allusions to Cloud’s past, which was complicated and darkened by Hojo’s experiments. It makes sense, then, that Cloud responds with “Reunion”. Fatal Calling indeed focuses on Cloud’s relationship to his past, his identity and Sephiroth. Everything involving Nibelheim —where everything started—, Sephiroth’s manipulation, and Hojo’s experiments are on the table. Also noteworthy if not out of place is Sephiroth’s evocation of fate.
Cloud enters a battle with Sephiroth with the help of Wol and Echo, who are surprised to see him back in Palamecia. Cloud tells them about the orb seen floating along with him in the opening cutscene: though he calls it a materia, he doesn’t know how or when he acquired it. Based on his behavior, it appears that Cloud remembers just as little about the events of OG as he did by the end of Eclipse Contact. Wol informs Cloud that whoever he heard speaking to him on his way here was probably Vox pretending to be Sephiroth.
As the group advances, Cloud recalls Midgar and decides they should go there next. At one of Midgar’s mako reactors, the group encounters Sephiroth, who speaks to himself:

“It's still not enough. This... this is but a pale imitation of the power I desire.”

Once Sephiroth has disappeared, Cloud explains what he remembers: Sephiroth was the greatest SOLDIER of all and a hero to Cloud, though Cloud can’t remember what exactly ended this admiration. As players of FFVII OG, we know the event in question is the Nibelheim incident, wherein Sephiroth slaughtered the town’s residents, including Cloud’s mother, after learning of his past. The former war hero also severely injured Tifa, whom Cloud presumed dead when he found her in the old mako reactor with a vicious slash on her chest. Cloud is agitated by the gaps in his memory, so the group resolves to follow Sephiroth for answers. When they find him again, Sephiroth causes Cloud to experience a piercing headache with the mere mention of the Reunion. They fight, but Sephiroth is too powerful— he skewers Cloud with the masamune and taunts his unconscious body:

“Sephiroth: A puppet. I won’t kill you. Not yet. Not until you know true despair.
Wol: If you want despair, we got plenty to go around. Palamecia’s full of it.
Sephiroth: Yes, this planet knows suffering. But it is not the world that was promised to me. I must go home. Tell Cloud, if he wants to see me again, he should face his memories. I will await him there, in the land of memory, where it all began. In Nibelheim.”

Sephiroth darkens Cloud’s materia, turning it black. Later, Wol explains to Cloud that Sephiroth stole the light from his materia, taking Cloud’s strength along with it.
Once Cloud has woken up, the group travels to Nibelheim to uncover the truth about Cloud’s memories. Cloud slowly gathers pieces of his past, shown to the player as titled, diary-like text written from various perspectives. Cloud learns the truth about SOLDIER, Jenova cells, Sephiroth, and what happened in Nibelheim. Let’s examine a few of these diary entries:

“A Warrior’s Tale: There's a girl in Nibelheim I think about. Warm. Cheerful. More grown-up than a child. Haven't talked to her much, but she seems nice. She's going to be leading the SOLDIERs to the mountain reactor. Maybe if I get into the survey team I'll get a chance to talk to her? Nah. She's out of my league.”

Young Cloud’s crush on Tifa is on full display! This must be a memory from his time as an infantryman accompanying Zack and Sephiroth to Nibelheim.

“Tale of the Nameless: I drift along in the mako, asleep. Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Who am I? Give me a number. I… I… I am… The Reunion. The Reunion must happen.”

This entry could be taken from any one of the Nibelheim survivors’ perspectives, as they were all bathed in mako and turned into Sephiroth clones. I would venture to say this is Cloud’s perspective though, given the reference to this iconic line from OG:

“Cloud: Professor... please give me a number. Please, Professor...
Hojo: Shut up, miserable failure.” (disk 2, chapter 2).

The trio encounters Sephiroth near the old Mt. Nibel mako reactor. Because Sephiroth stole the light from his materia earlier, Cloud goes into the confrontation already drained of his strength. However, when Cloud lifts the materia in his hand, it lights up and creates rainbow ripples in the air around him, similar to those seen in Eclipse Contact and Rebirth. Cloud is healed of his injuries: he closes his eyes for a moment, wearing a peaceful expression. Sephiroth is displeased, but recovers quickly:

“Sephiroth: The guiding light… it healed you.

Wol: […] here, near the mako reactor, the materia regained its light. And your strength returned […]. [Sephiroth]’s here so he can steal the power you've stored inside that materia.

Sephiroth, with a short laugh: I have all the power I need. Cloud. What strength you’ve regained is yours. Use it to fight me. It’s time. Let’s decide this, in this land lost to despair. The prize is home. The Promised Land. There to answer the call of destiny.”

With this second evocation of fate, Sephiroth disappears.
Cloud, Wol and Echo find Sephiroth at the Northern Crater. He mocks Cloud for believing the orb in his possession is materia. Sephiroth waves a hand and his signature black and purple fog surrounds Cloud, immobilizing him. Sephiroth claims that the power Cloud regained at the Mt. Nibel reactor was Sephiroth’s all along. Now that it courses through Cloud’s veins, Sephiroth controls him. He calls Cloud his puppet and finishes with the following before the two vanish, leaving Wol and Echo alone:

“Now, let us return. Back to the Promised Land. The time of the Reunion has come.”

After Cloud finally breaks free and defeats Sephiroth with the help of Wol and Echo, the villain makes a final threat:

“Very good, Cloud. You’ve destroyed an illusion. But the time will come to abandon your illusions and face reality. Then, you will know true pain.”

Sephiroth disappears for the last time, his body surrounded by his signature dark fog and the rainbow ripples. A piano rendition of Tifa’s theme begins. Cloud’s orb rises into the air and becomes a crystal, with the same shape and glow as the one we see in Eclipse Contact. The following dialogue is illuminating:

“Cloud: I will fight. The light will lead me where I need to go.

Wol: You sure? Wasn’t that [crystal] Sephiroth’s?

Cloud: I heard Sephiroth's voice, at the end. Inside me. Whatever he put in me, it’s still in there. Someday I’ll settle that score. If I can't avoid destiny, I might as well face it head-on.

Wol: Yeah. That was quite a speech, Cloud. Surprised you made it through without laughing.

Cloud: Yeah, forget I said it. I will too.

Echo: Forgetting won’t make it go away. Even if the words fade from memory, your dream will never disappear. Not until it becomes real.“

The crystal shines as though in response.

“Echo: See? See, that's how the light of hope works. Hope can turn your dreams into reality.

Cloud: Yeah. I guess so. I might forget this world, but I won’t forget hope. And my reality, that’s for me to live.”

Tifa’s theme ends. Cloud approaches the crystal, and disappears in a beam of blinding light. Once Cloud has vanished with the crystal, Aerith’s theme begins playing. A few pale feathers with a slight orange tint (the color of MFF) float down onto the floor where he stood seconds before. The image fades to black. The credits roll, and Aerith’s theme continues all the way through.
Once both the final name in the credits and Aerith’s theme fade, we’re surprised by a sudden, troubling image: Sephiroth appears in a frightening flash, standing amidst the flames of Nibelheim. When his image fades to black, the collaboration title *“Final Fantasy VII x Mobius Final Fantasy”*appears on the screen. The FFVII title is surrounded by the 1997 meteor logo. Then, a flash of light: the titles reappear, except this time, they read “Final Fantasy VII REMAKE x Mobius Final Fantasy”. The new Remake Meteor logo replaces the 1997 version. As soon as these changes to the FFVIItitle and meteor logo occur, Aerith’s theme returns. It plays on until the game ends a few seconds later, the screen fading to black.
III. e) ii. 2) Fact Analysis
The introduction cutscene shows that MFF Cloud travelled from Eclipse Contact to Fatal Calling via Lifestream. It’s unclear how much time has passed in between, but the atemporal nature of the Lifestream makes the question irrelevant. My theory that MFF Cloud has died is corroborated by the way he’s depicted in the opening cutscene: his eyes are closed and his body is limp as the Lifestream carries him.
Eclipse Contact ended with Echo’s claim that Cloud will face his true self and confront his past while he journeys to his Promised Land. This description resembles what Cloud experienced in the OG Lifestream sequence (disk 2, chapter 8). Indeed, Fatal Calling revolves around the same topics the Lifestream sequence addresses: the truth about the Nibelheim incident, Hojo’s experiments, young Cloud’s crush on Tifa, etc. The opening cutscene shows Cloud being transported to his Promised Land and facing his past on the way there, just like Echo said he would.
Let’s now take a long detour to examine the song that plays during the opening cutscene of Fatal Calling: “The Promised Land” theme from Advent Children. The title and general subject of this song are obviously relevant to the cutscene, but there must be more to its inclusion than that. Perhaps the lyrics can help us understand its appearance in the opening cutscene of Fatal Calling. Here are the unofficial English lyrics (translated from the original Japanese lyrics by an anonymous fan and verified by me via DeepL):

“Why do we cling together?
Why do we give punishment to lesser hearts?
The planet did not forgive us
Did not forgive us
The planet did not forgive us
Did not forgive us
The pulse of veins flows through the earth
A faint, faint pulse
Of a heart drawn to death
A gentle life returns to the planet
Is it necessary to sacrifice souls?
Why do we cling together?
Why do we beg for forgiveness
In the Promised Land?” (“‘The Promised Land’ (theme)” by Final Fantasy Wiki).

The song appears to be a regretful lament of human behavior, expressed by the repetition of “Why do we […]?” questions. The behaviors listed are all typically human ones: the terms “[clinging] together” and “[giving] punishment to [the] lesser” express the uniquely human nature of tribalism and the consequences of the fear and hatred it can generate, and “[begging] for forgiveness in the Promised Land” is likely a reference to the human hypocrisy of only feeling sorry for one’s crimes when judgement day arrives. This last line describes a scenario where someone remains passive or ignorant in the face of something important, only to realize its essentiality once it’s too late. The repeated“The planet did not forgive us” lines reflect the fear of being condemned forever because of one’s mistakes, as though the planet is a deity one has sinned against. The lyric describing a pulse in the earth is obviously about the planet being alive— a reference to the Lifestream. But the pulse is faint and weak and the planet is dying, perishing because of mankind’s greed. This is an indictment of mako energy. The line “A gentle life returns to the planet” refers to an innocent’s soul returning to the Lifestream after death, while the next lyric “Is it necessary to sacrifice souls?” protests the “sacrifice” of the planet’s soul energy for mako production. In all this darkness, this song’s mention of “forgiveness in the Promised Land” leaves a modicum of hope for a better place, however meek, even though mankind might not deserve it. The song “The Promised Land” is both a lament of mankind’s ways and a plea for mercy, with religious and/or spiritual undertones. The song’s themes seem to be: the Promised Land itself, regret and shame, the sins and foolishness of mankind, the death of innocents, grief, Cetra spirituality, and a meek, quiet hope despite it all. The most interesting aspect of the song is its antithetical portrayal of death as a thing of both despair and hope, condemnation and salvation, cruelty and mercy, suffering and relief. Maybe we can glean more information about this theme’s significance in the world of FFVII if we examine the contexts in which it appears.
Importantly, the song plays in Marlene’s introductory narration of Advent Children, meaning its themes are related or similar to the film’s. I highly recommend listening and watching it again, even if you remember this iconic segment. Marlene references Aerith’s sacrifice as the image of Cloud lowering her into the water is shown. Note that Marlene says “Sadness was the price to see it end” (2:36) after we are shown Aerith’s death and her subsequent unleashing of the Lifestream (1:49-2:24): Aerith’s innocent life was sacrificed for the planet’s survival. The lyrics “A gentle life returns to the planet” and “Is it necessary to sacrifice souls?” suit Aerith’s situation quite well.
The theme also plays in Advent Children as Kadaj dies in Cloud’s arms (1:45:00-1:47:55), hearing Aerith’s gentle voice and reaching up to take her invisible hand. Here is what Aerith says to him in his dying moments as “The Promised Land” plays:

“Aerith’s voice: Kadaj?
Kadaj: Huh?
The dark sky has gone with Sephiroth. Healing rain starts falling from bright clouds. The rain no longer hurts Kadaj.
Aerith’s voice: You don’t have to hang on any longer.
Kadaj: Mother! Is that…?
Aerith’s voice: Everyone’s waiting, if you’re ready.
Kadaj nods his head slightly in acceptance. He holds out his hand, and slowly evaporates into the Lifestream. Cloud watches […]” (Advent Children).

Kadaj is brought into the Lifestream by Aerith as she provides rain from the Lifestream. All those with geostigma are healed by the rain, and Tifa feels Aerith’s presence as the party celebrates:

“Tifa, looking out at the falling rain […]: Somehow, I knew you were there. Thank you” (Advent Children).

Cloud stands in the rain with a smile —his first in the whole film—, closes his eyes and basks in Aerith’s healing with his face upturned. He is finally at peace:

“Cloud’s expression is one of peace as the [Lifestream] rain patters against him” (Final Fantasy VII Advent Children English script, “[83] Atop the Shinra Building”).

One thing is clear: the track “The Promised Land” accompanies Aerith. It only makes sense, since we’ve seen overwhelming evidence that she is Cloud’s Promised Land, and since she occupies the Lifestream —which some consider the Promised Land as it is where souls go after death— during the events of Advent Children. Note that when the piece plays, Cloud is shown either mourning Aerith and releasing her into the river at the Cetra capital, or basking in her presence, smiling with relief at the peaceful feeling that she’s somewhere near: these two opposing scenes reflect the song’s antithetical portrayal of death.
Additionally, the song’s themes of regret, shame concerning one’s sins and a small hope perfectly describe Cloud’s character arc and feelings in Advent Children. Cloud regrets his inability to save Aerith, which he considers a sin. Further, he only realized how important she is to him once it was too late to tell her. And of course, he harbors a fragile yet important hope that he’ll be reunited with her in the Promised Land:

“‘Can sins ever be forgiven?’ — Cloud asks this to Vincent, who mutters a brief answer. For both of them, ‘I couldn't protect my loved one’ is the sense of guilt that they carry, so their words resonate with weight” (FFVII 10th Anniversary Ultimania Revised Edition, “Chapter 2: Character in FFVIIWorld”, “Vincent Valentine”, “In Advent Children”, page 72).

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"’It is my sin that I couldn't protect my loved one’ — under this assumption, Cloud closes off his heart. What will the reunion with Aerith bring him? ‘I... think I want to be forgiven. Yeah, I just want to be forgiven’” (FFVII 10th Anniversary Ultimania Revised Edition, “Chapter 2: Character in FFVIIWorld”, “Cloud Strife”, “In Advent Children”, page 40).

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“Cloud, after seeing Aerith’s hand reach for him through the Lifestream: … I think I'm beginning to understand.
Tifa: What?

Cloud: An answer from the Planet… the Promised Land... I think I can meet her... there” (disk 3, chapter 3).

Just as the song and Marlene express in the introduction of the film, Aerith was innocent, and her sacrifice generated great grief. Cloud finally experiences peace when he feels her presence in the healing rain, and he smiles: he’s glad to be with her again, even if it’s only for a brief moment of tangential respite.
The scene depicts Aerith guiding Kadaj into the Lifestream as the song plays, tying her to the concept and theme song of the Promised Land once more. This connection is later solidified by Tifa’s thanks to the late flower girl. All of this evidence shows us that this musical theme is intimately linked to Aerith, as it never plays in her absence. After all, the song speaks of sins, the death of innocents, forgiveness, grief, a small sense of hope, regret and the afterlife: all themes relevant to Cloud’s feelings surrounding Aerith’s death in and outside of Advent Children.
The Remake OST also includes a version of this piece called “The Promised Land - Cycle of Life”. This iteration of the theme begins playing in the wake of the first bombing mission, right after Sephiroth taunts Cloud with his mother’s dying words in Sector 8 (chapter 2). Sephiroth appears to Cloud surrounded by flames, evoking the Nibelheim massacre, and the theme begins playing in the background once he disappears, continuing (13:17-15:30) as Cloud walks through the sector, encountering fires and destruction all around him. This version of the Promised Land theme is meant to emphasize the deaths of the innocent Nibelheim townsfolk and the innocents in Sector 8. This dreadful atmosphere is amplified by the cries of despair that ring all around as Cloud passes by NPC Sector 8 residents. Perhaps the themes of tribalism and mankind’s sin are relevant to this scene as well, since Shinra and Avalanche are two distinct and warring groups whose quarrels, regardless of their necessity, result in the deaths of innocents. The theme of guilt also emerges, reflecting the Avalanche members’ feelings upon seeing the unintended collateral damage of the explosion. “The Promised Land - Cycle of Life” plays until Cloud encounters Aerith on Loveless. So it seems in this scenario, the heavy weight of death and despair is lifted when Cloud meets the lively, cheery Aerith. Once more, Aerith is central to the musical theme of the Promised Land, as well as to the concept itself.
I also noticed that a version of the song plays as Cloud and the party ready to enter the Forgotten Capital to save Aerith in Rebirth’s chapter 14: it truly adds the weight of her upcoming death to the scene.
Back to Fatal Calling, the scene where Cloud regains his strength is quite mysterious. Wol says Cloud’s orb regained its “guiding light” light because of its proximity to the mako reactor. In the moment his strength is replenished, Cloud is shown tilting his head back and closing his eyes: this is reminiscent of the scene in Advent Children when he stands under Aerith’s healing Lifestream rain, feeling at peace. The rainbow ripples shining from the orb indicate that something is crossing the boundaries of worlds. Since the mako reactor pumps up the Lifestream, being near a reactor also means being physically near the Lifestream. This means Aerith’s spirit is within proximity. In my opinion, Aerith was able to heal Cloud from the Lifestream, just like in Advent Children. However, Aerith is not in Palamecia with him: her healing had to travel there through the Lifestream, transcending the boundaries of worlds, hence the rainbow ripples.
Let’s now address the appearance of Tifa’s character theme in Fatal Calling. Since Fatal Calling is all about discovering Cloud’s past in Nibelheim and then in Hojo’s lab, it makes lots of sense for Tifa’s theme to play as the crystal appears. In OG’s Lifestream sequence (disk 2 chapter 8), she’s the one there helping Cloud sort through his past instead of Wol and Echo. Cloud even picks up a piece of his childhood crush on Tifa in Fatal Calling as a shard of his memory. After all, this crush was the catalyst for him joining SOLDIER, and everything that transpired in consequence:

“Cloud: That was the first time I heard about Sephiroth. If I got strong like Sephiroth, then everyone might... If I could just get stronger... Then even Tifa would have to notice me” (FFVII OG, disk 2, chapter 8).

Additionally, it’s fitting that her theme should begin right after Sephiroth speaks of “[abandoning] your illusions and [facing] reality”, considering that Cloud’s false persona was concocted by Jenova using Tifa’s mistaken impressions of Cloud:

“While being tended to by a station worker in the Sector 7 Slum train station, [Cloud] was reunited with Tifa, and using the abilities of Jenova’s cells, formed a new personality” (FFVII 10th Anniversary Ultimania Revised Edition, “Chapter 2: Character in FFVII World, “Cloud Strife”, “Cloud Behavior Record, Compilation of FFVII”, page 40).

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“(Image caption:) A new personality takes shape the moment he sees Tifa” (FFVII Story Playback, “Story Check: Tifa’s Flashback”).

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“Tifa (to Cloud): Deep down, you're a pretty nice guy. Didn't see it when we were kids, but...” (Remake, chapter 14).

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Through his research, teaching, and collaboration, Dr. Dimitrios Psaroudakis GMC demonstrates the integral role of mathematics in understanding and improving

(continuation of part 1)

III. Searching for Aerith Beyond FFVII

There were absolutely no answers in Remake or OG (at this point in my research, Rebirth wasn’t released yet), no matter how much I looked; nothing at all hinted at how Cloud could’ve obtained the memories of OG that emerge in Remake as MOTFs. I knew I had to look elsewhere to search for more clues, so I decided to check every piece of media ever released by SE with a mention of Cloud or Aerith in it, digging for hints in the compilation and beyond.
And boy, did I find them.
III. a) Core Worlds and Suspension Worlds
There are a couple of general FF rules that we need to establish before going forward.
It’s important to note that there are multiple realms in which the FF stories take place, each with a different name, history and society. This ensures that all FF stories occur separately, never intercepting or interacting— though they do have creatures like moogles and chocobos in common, as well as concepts like airships, gil, magic and some form of crystal. For simplicity, I will refer to these separate worlds in which the numbered FF games (FFI, FFII, FFIII, etc) occur as “core worlds”.
Characters from different core worlds may appear together in non-numbered FF games, the events of which have no impact on the core world at all: it seems that sometime after a FF character has reached the end of their core world’s plot-line, they may somehow be summoned to far-removed realms where they will face new adventures. I call these far-removed realms “suspension worlds”. One example of a FF game that takes place in a suspension world is Dissidia Final Fantasy, wherein characters from multiple core worlds unite to accomplish a mission as a team.
III. b) Final Fantasy Tactics
First on our list of non-compilation SE games to explore is 1997’s Final Fantasy Tactics (FFT), a game whose plot takes place in the suspension world of Ivalice. Let’s plot out the relevant events, and then analyze!
III. b) i. Fact-Finding
The main character of FFT, Ramza, encounters a brunette flower peddler with Aerith’s iconic, gravity-defying bangs:
\"Aeris\" in FFT's Ivalice
If you choose to buy a flower from her, she express her relief: apparently, business isn’t going well because no one is interested in flowers. The girl wistfully dreams aloud:

“When is my knight in shining armor going to take me away from here...?”

Later, Ramza and his companions encounter a mysterious machine that can summon people from across universes. The machine is activated, and a rather rude young man with spiky blonde hair appears. Cloud claims he used to be in SOLDIER, and says the last thing he remembers is “getting stuck in the current”. He looks to be disoriented and lost, and suffers from piercing headaches. Mere moments after being summoned to Ivalice, Cloud rambles:

“What’s this? My fingers are tingling… My eyes… they’re burning… Stop… stop it [Se]phiroth…”

He dashes out of the room, but not without announcing:

“I must go… must go to that place…”

Outside, Cloud encounters the brunette flower girl Ramza met earlier. She offers Cloud a flower, but he only stares at her wordlessly:

“Flower girl: Buy a flower? Only 1 gil.
Cloud: …
Flower girl: Something wrong? Do I resemble someone?”
Cloud: No… it’s nothing.”

As soon as Cloud leaves, a gang of ruffians surround the flower girl and start harassing her, demanding payment that’s apparently overdue. One of them finally calls her by her name: “Aeris”. He grabs her, insinuating that he might sexually assault her in lieu of payment. Aeris is not strong enough to push him away. That’s when Cloud returns:

“Cloud: Get your hand off her!
Thug: What did you say!?
Cloud: Didn't you hear me? Get your dirty hand off her!
[…]
Cloud, to Aeris: Go… now.”

Aeris heeds Cloud’s advice, fleeing the scene before a fight between Cloud and the thug can break out. After Cloud scares the ruffians off with the help of Ramza and his companions, he speaks once more:

“I lost… something very important… Ever since, I’ve been lost […]. What should I do? What about this pain [?] Must go… to the Promised Land.”

III. b) ii. Fact Analysis
There’s a lot to unpack here, all of which you probably clocked in your head upon reading, but let’s put it down in writing.
While FFT Cloud’s memory is far from perfect, the Aeris he encounters in Ivalice doesn’t recognize him at all. FFVII Ultimania Omega addresses this question without answering it:

“[The flower seller’s] name is Aeris, and she has the same appearance and tone of voice as the Aeris of FFVII. However, when she comes across Cloud, she does not recognize him. Could she really be the same Aerith who appears in FFVII but with memory loss, or is she a completely different character?” (“#4 Proof of Omega”, “FFVII in Other Games”, “Final Fantasy Tactics”, page 560).

Regardless of her unknown identity and inability to recognize Cloud, FFT Aeris’ fantasy of a “knight in shining armor” is quite reminiscent of the flower girl/bodyguard dynamic we’ve come to know and love. Cloud’s armor doesn’t shine, but in my opinion, if you’re looking for the dystopian, corporatocratic equivalent of a knight, you can’t get much closer than a supposed-former-SOLDIER-turned-bodyguard. Additionally, despite his rude and cold attitude toward Ramza’s gang, the urgency with which Cloud swoops in to save the flower girl from the ruffians betrays a softer, warmer side to him: the flower girl/bodyguard dynamic strikes again!
FFT Cloud’s dialogue borrows two lines from the speech OG Cloud makes as Aerith lies dead in his arms (disk 1, chapter 28): “My fingers are tingling. My mouth is dry. My eyes are burning!” and “What are we supposed to do? What about my pain?” You might’ve noticed that this glimpse of grief Cloud experiences in FFT bears a resemblance to the fourth MOTF 4 experienced by Remake Cloud (see section “II. a)”). Could it be that FFT Cloud and Remake Cloud have something in common?
Shortly after being summoned to Ivalice, FFT Cloud declares that he must go to “that place”, a mysterious line that is later elucidated when he tells Ramza that he must go to the Promised Land and find the “very important” thing he’s lost. The Promised Land is the Cetra culture’s afterlife, meaning FFT Cloud is looking for someone who’s died, someone “very important” to him. OG suggests this is none other than Aerith:

“Cait Sith, reading Cloud’s fortune: You will find [what] you pursue. However, you will lose the most precious thing” (disk 1, chapter 16, English translation by Kotaku’s “Let’s Mosey: A Slow Translation of Final Fantasy Seven: Part Eight” by Tim Rogers, 9:42-9:52).

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“Cloud, after seeing Aerith’s hand reach for him through the Lifestream: … I think I'm beginning to understand.
Tifa: What?
Cloud: An answer from the Planet… the Promised Land... I think I can meet her... there” (disk 3, chapter 3).

Finally, let’s try to understand where on the OG timeline Cloud was summoned to this suspension world from and what he remembers. His comment about getting stuck in a current has to be about the Lifestream; apparently, on top of its atemporal nature, it can act as a conduit to other worlds. One only enters the Lifestream if they’ve somehow fallen into the core of the planet or once they’ve passed away and returned to the planet. Both scenarios merit consideration.
On the one hand, it’s possible that Cloud was summoned to Ivalice after he and Tifa fall into the core of the planet: this point in the FFVII OG timeline occurs after Aerith’s death and shortly before Cloud finds out he was never SOLDIER, which matches the gaps in FFT Cloud’s memory quite well. However, this scenario does not account for the vagueness with which FFT Cloud remembers Aerith and her death. Most importantly, Cloud’s realization that he can find Aerith in the Promised Land occurs much later in the game (FFVII OG, disk 3, chapter 3) than when he falls into the Lifestream with Tifa (FFVII OG, disk 2, chapter 8).
On the other hand, FFT Cloud’s vague yet persistent memories of Aerith suggest that he’s been summoned to Ivalice after his eventual death post-OG, but also that he’s lost quite a large portion of his memories. His incomplete memory loss is likely the result of Cloud’s individuality’s erosion by the Lifestream after death, which we discussed in section “II. a) ii.”. We can therefore surmise that by the time he is summoned to Ivalice from the Lifestream, Cloud has been dead for long enough that the Lifestream eroded a large portion of the memories of his lifetime. This post-death scenario is likelier than the first. The memory of Cloud’s realization that he was never SOLDIER must be gone, which explains why he claims otherwise upon being summoned to Ivalice. Contrastingly, vestiges of Cloud’s OG memories of Aerith cling to his soul, even after others have been wiped clean. Could this be a consequence of their soulmate bond? Could the strength of Cloud’s love and grief for Aerith have made his memories of her stronger and more difficult for the Lifestream to erode? Could it be both?
One thing is clear: Aerith is of fundamental importance to Cloud, even when he can’t quite remember her. In fact, the only other character he remembers and/or mentions in FFT is Sephiroth. It does make sense that the memories of those who have marked one’s soul forevermore would be the most difficult for the Lifestream to erode.
III. c) Dissidia Final Fantasy
The next stop on our travels through suspension worlds is 2008’s Dissidia Final Fantasy! Now strap in, because here’s where things get really serious.
III. c) i. Fact Finding
In the suspension world of Dissidia Final Fantasy (DFF), the goddess of harmony Cosmos and the god of discord Chaos are engaged in a never-ending cycle of conflict. Both deities need warriors to fight on their behalf, so they recruit core world characters into their respective teams by summoning them to DFF. Some of these summoned characters are FFIV’s Cecil, FFVI’s Terra, FFVII’s Sephiroth, FFX’s Tidus, and of course, FFVII’s Cloud. The warriors find themselves in the suspension world of DFF with no memories of their core worlds’ plotlines. However, as the DFF adventure progresses, they are able to recover pieces of their memories here and there. It isn’t clear how much they come to remember. Ultimately, the warriors hope to return home to their core worlds by fighting in this war and seeing to its end.
Cloud is summoned to DFF as a warrior on the side of Chaos, who seeks to destroy all existence. Sephiroth is also on Chaos’ side, meaning the two are teammates despite being enemies in their core world of FFVII. It just so happens that Tifa is a summoned warrior in DFF too, though she’s fighting on Cosmos’ side. Intrigued by her vague familiarity, Sephiroth hypothesizes that killing Tifa will bring back his memories of OG’s plot line: before long, the masamune wielder finds Tifa alone and corners her into a one-on-one fight. Thankfully, Cloud swoops in and saves her before Sephiroth can do any harm. Tifa is thankful for Cloud’s help, though confused that Cloud would elect to assist her and turn against a fellow warrior of Chaos; she doesn’t remember what Sephiroth and Cloud mean to each other in OG. In fact, Tifa doesn’t even remember Cloud’s name or that they share a core world, though Cloud feels somewhat familiar to her. For his part, Cloud at least remembers that Tifa is someone he cares about from his core world. As Tifa thanks Cloud for saving her from Sephiroth, something she says elicits an odd reaction from the warrior of Chaos:

“Tifa: The way you showed up and fought that guy off. It was a pretty cool thing to watch. You were like a hero, charging in to save the girl.
Cloud gasps at her words. She doesn’t notice” (Dissidia 012: Treachery of the Gods, report 5: “Unexpected Fulfillment 2”).

On another note, Cloud knows he will have to fight Tifa once the Cosmos-Chaos conflict comes to a head, as they are on opposing teams. He thinks to himself:

“Once [her] memories return, [she]’ll lose the will to fight just like I have. So... Before that can happen, I have to act...” (Dissidia 012: Treachery of the Gods, report 5: “Unexpected Fulfillment 2”).

In order to end the cycle of the conflict and to avoid fighting Tifa, Cloud decides to try and defeat Chaos himself. Predictably, Cloud is no match for the deity. As he dies, Cloud pleads the following to the goddess Cosmos:

“Cosmos, goddess of harmony. If you can hear me, listen to my plea. I beg you. Save her. Save my friend… Tifa.”

Cosmos hears him and responds immediately:

“Cosmos: An end to this conflict, and a life spared? This is your heart's desire? If your will remains unchanged, I shall bring you here when the battle draws to a close. Cloud. My chosen" (Dissidia 0.13: Treachery of the Gods, report 7: “Unexpected Fulfillment 3”).

Cloud’s wish is granted by Cosmos: the first phase of the conflict ends without Tifa getting hurt, and she is sent away from the suspension world of DFF before the second phase begins. Cloud is saved from death, and Cosmos enlists him into her team of warriors for phase two: this time, Cloud is fighting on the good side.
Now we enter phase two of the war. Cosmos tells her team of ten core world warriors that in order to save the world from Chaos’ destruction, they must collect what she describes as crystals containing the power to persist through darkness. I call these the “DFF crystals”. There are ten DFF crystals in total: one for every warrior in Cosmos’ group to find. To obtain their crystal, each hero must overcome a trial that will confront them with whatever personal struggle they faced in their core world; if they prove themselves worthy, their DFF crystal will appear to them. On one hand, some warriors’ DFF crystals simply take the form of the crystals found in their core world. For example, Onion Knight’s DFF crystal looks to be nothing more than one of FFIII’s elemental crystals, which hold little to no personal significance to him. On the other hand, some warriors’ DFF crystals symbolize something more personal to their respective warriors. For instance, Cecil’s DFF crystal looks to be one of FFIV’s dark crystals, which specifically represent the dichotomy of light and darkness he struggles with in his core world’s plot line. Cosmos describes the quest for the DFF crystals as follows:

“Cosmos: The crystals embody the strength to face despair. With ten gathered, there is hope yet to save the world. The path to your crystal will be perilous... and different for each and every one of you. But you must believe in and follow your own path. Even if you know not where that path leads" (Dissidia 013: Light to All, prologue: “A Final Hope”).

From this exposition, simply keep in mind that: Cloud must find his crystal by overcoming a personal trial, and his crystal may have the appearance of an object in OG that’s important to him.
Once the team is debriefed on their mission, Cloud remains reticent to fight; he doesn’t much like the mysterious nature of this conflict. Not knowing exactly what they’re all fighting for is clearly bothersome to the swordsman, and the idea of thoughtlessly engaging in battles leaves a bad taste in his mouth. Fellow warrior Firion understands that without a reason to fight, Cloud’s heart just isn’t in it. He imparts upon Cloud that he must have a dream he’s fighting to protect, something he wants to see come true, to motivate him to stop Chaos from destroying all existence. Unfortunately, Cloud doesn’t have a dream to preserve, or can’t find one for himself:

“Cloud: I've looked, but I'm still empty-handed. And without a dream, what do you suppose I should do? […] Maybe what I'm looking for... isn't here” (Dissidia 0.13: Light to All, chapter 1: “Beyond Doubt”, “Gateway of Good and Evil”).

Another fellow warrior, Cecil, expresses worry for Cloud, whose response evokes the main theme of FFVII OG:

“Cecil: Everyone's worried, Cloud. But... Do you shoulder a larger concern?
Cloud: Concern... Maybe a sense of loss" (Dissidia 0.13: Light to All, chapter 1: “Beyond Doubt”, “Beyond the Continent”).

Whatever Cloud is looking for “isn’t [there]”, and he feels “a sense of loss”: Cloud’s motivating dream has been lost to him. This is later reasserted in a conversation with Terra, another warrior of Cosmos:

“Terra: And you, Cloud... What's your dream?
Cloud: I've lost mine" (Dissidia 0.13: Light to All, chapter 3: “The Chosen Battle”, “Gateway of True Intent”).

Later, Cloud encounters and fights Sephiroth, who is still a part of Chaos’ team. Sephiroth is defeated, but not before he’s taunted Cloud with his habitual puppet talk. However, Cloud remains strong and refutes Sephiroth’s manipulation, asserting that only he can determine his own path. This must’ve been Cloud’s personal trial, because his crystal appears at that very moment: it is a small, light green orb that looks like materia from his core world. Having pocketed his crystal, Cloud decides he must find his own reason to fight. Interestingly, his search is depicted as intertwined with Fate:

“Cloud: Even if I have my doubts... I have to find my own answer […] Until then, I'll keep fighting.
Narration: The warrior has vowed to keep fighting— and keep fighting he will […]. Etched in destiny, his quest for answers continues on” (Dissidia 0.13: Light to All, chapter 1: “Beyond Doubt”, “Gulg Gateway”).

Later, the nemeses meet again in a segment called “Recurring Tragedy”. Their interactions here are particularly interesting. Sephiroth speaks of making Cloud suffer through despair and pain as though referencing their history together:

"Sephiroth: This disease called hope is eating you alive. The world of suffering was born out of such half-baked ideals.
Cloud: If that's the case, I have to endure the suffering. There's no moving on if I run from it.
Sephiroth: If that is what you wish for, you shall drown in the pain. I'll lead you to true despair. [My] shadow is burned into your heart. We'll meet again, Cloud. I'll keep coming back— as long as you are who you are."
Sephiroth disappears. Cloud looks out into the distance before the scene ends.
“Cloud: No thanks. The one I really want to meet is…” (Dissidia 013: Light to All, epilogue: “Conclusion of a Cycle”, “Recurring Tragedy”).

This final line suggests Cloud has finally found a reason to fight: he wants to meet someone unspecified.
Finally, after the war has ended, we arrive at the final cutscene of DFF. I will let you read the full script, with notes added by me in bold behind the spoiler censors. Please do not read my notes if you do not wish to encounter spoilers for FFI, FFII, FFIII, FFIV, FFV, FFVI, FFVIII, FFIX or FFX:

“[The] heroes are all standing together in a grassy field with a forest behind them. Birds are chirping, the sun is shining brightly, and the wind is blowing gently. The heroes look around them in awe. They're all holding their crystals.
WoL: The battle has come to an end...
Tidus notices that his crystal has begun to emanate a blue glow.>! His crystal is a movie sphere from his core world of FFX: a capsule containing sounds and images that people record for later viewing. Tidus’ crystal likely represents the specific movie sphere recorded by his love interest Yuna, which revealed that she’d loved him from the beginning.!<
Tidus: Gotta go, huh...
The blue glow transfers to him as well. He turns to look at the others
[…] Tidus grins at the others, then turns and runs toward a nearby lake. He leaps into it in a manner reminiscent of [the events] of FFX. He vanishes as he descends toward the lake.
Zidane: We're not vanishing. We're returning—
Zidane is sitting on a tree limb as he says this. His crystal begins to glow gold, as does he. His crystal is shaped like a highly important ‘progenitor of all life’ crystal from his core world of FFIX.
Zidane: — to where we're supposed to be.
Zidane spins around the tree limb with the use of his tail and launches toward the sun. He's lost to view.
A white feather then drifts down from that direction and Squall catches it. The feather is reminiscent of his love Rinoa Heartilly, whose character symbol is a white feather. In fact, Squall’s crystal looks like a mix of his revolver gunblade from FFVIII and Rinoa’s feather motif. [Squall glows blue.]
Squall: Perhaps we can go on a mission together again.
Squall vanishes.
Cloud is then visible, standing in [a] flower field. The flowers are white and yellow. Cloud has his crystal, a light green materia from his core world of FFVII, in hand.
Cloud: [(Chuckles shortly, like a scoff)] Not interested.
Cloud walks off into the flower field, gaining a green glow. He vanishes.
A snowflake then falls into Terra's right hand as her crystal begins to glow pink. The flames drawn on her crystal represent her power, which is connected to the element of fire: her character arc in FFVI.
Terra: I think I've learned how to keep going. Thank you— and take care.
Terra glows pink and then vanishes. Bartz throws a stick. He's glowing pink as well.
Bartz: When you're having the most fun, that's when time always flies. His crystal is the Adamantite from his core world of FFV.
Bartz vanishes.
Cecil: It's mine to pass on—
A moon appears behind Cecil and goes through its phases as he begins to glow blue. His crystal has shadowed and illuminated parts, representing the duality of his character, which is central to his personal arc in his core world of FFIV. It also represents his brother Golbez, who has chosen the darkness. Cecil considers his familial bond with Golbez his guiding light and hopes to be with him someday.
Cecil: — this strength I've gained from everyone.
Cecil vanishes.
Onion Knight hugs his crystal and looks up toward the sky. His crystal is shaped like those found in his core world of FFIII**.**
Onion Knight: Everyone... thank you!
OK briefly glows blue and then vanishes.
There are wild roses at Firion's feet. He and WoL are looking toward the sky. WoL suddenly begins walking away while Firion looks down and sees the roses.
Firion: This isn't the end. Another dream is waiting to begin.
His crystal is the color of the wild roses that were at the center of his dream and of his motivation to fight Chaos. The roses are also the emblem of the Rebel Army he was a part of in his core world of FFII. His crystal is shaped like Pandaemonium, the final dungeon of his core world story. Firion gains a violet glow and then vanishes.
WoL is walking through the field and then comes to a stop. He's looking at something.
WoL: May the light forever shine upon us.”

As you can see, everyone’s crystal is very important to the story of their core world, and in the cases of at least Tidus, Squall, Terra and Cecil, the crystals represent something very personal. What about Cloud and his crystal, then? What about the dream he lost and the person he wants to meet? Let’s begin analyzing to answer these questions.
III. c) ii. Fact Analysis
Firstly, it’s clear to me that the Cloud that appears in DFF is a post-OG Cloud, given how many plot points from OG he interacts with. I’m reticent to say whether or not this post-OG Cloud is dead like in FFT, as he recovers many of his memories of OG during DFF and there is no evidence of him having passed away and joined the Lifestream.
The second thing I’d like to point out is Cloud’s strange reaction when Tifa compares him to a hero who swoops in and saves the girl from the bad guy. Cloud gasps, indicating that her words mean something to him; the trope Tifa references must therefore be included somewhere in the FFVII OG plot-line. Some of you are surely ahead of me by now, having realized that only the tragic antithesis of this trope appears in OG: Cloud is unable to save Aerith from Sephiroth (disk 1, chapter 28). Whether or not DFF Cloud remembers Aerith herself at this point, it’s clear he recalls the pain and guilt of losing Aerith to Sephiroth.
Next, let’s address Cloud’s lost dream: to meet an unspecified person. It seems Cloud is aware at this point that in OG, he was eternally separated from the person he dreams of meeting. So, who was he separated from in his core world? Who can he never meet again, even if his team of warriors defeats Chaos and Cloud returns to the realm of FFVII? There are a few options —his mother, his father, Zack, Jessie, Biggs, Wedge, and any other person he knew who died—, but the sheer narrative weight that Aerith’s untimely death carries makes it clear who he truly wants to meet. This is corroborated by Cloud’s “I think I can meet her… there” line in OG (disk 3 chapter 3), by FFT Cloud’s search for Aerith during his appearance in Ivalice, and by Cloud’s strange reaction to Tifa’s comparing him to a hero who swoops in and saves the girl from the bad guy. All the available evidence suggests that Cloud’s dream is indeed to reunite with Aerith, and that this dream is “lost” to him because she was killed by Sephiroth (disk 1, chapter 28). This would also explain the title of the DFF segment “Recurring Tragedy”, since as we all know, the ultimate tragedy of FFVII OG is Aerith’s death. Considering Sephiroth was the one to take Aerith away from Cloud, Sephiroth’s threats of drowning him in despair in “Recurring Tragedy” only solidify this interpretation of Cloud’s lost dream.
Finally, we arrive at the ending cutscene. Cosmos’ warriors return to where they belong to try and accomplish whatever dream they held as motivation during the Cosmos-Chaos conflict, each carrying their DFF crystal. Cloud is shown standing in a field of white and yellow flowers and walking deeper into it with a light green materia in hand. Why was a white and yellow flower field chosen to represent DFF Cloud’s dream? The answer is obvious. White and yellow flowers symbolize Aerith: she sold Cloud a yellow blossom upon first meeting him in OG (disk 1, chapter 1), and her yellow and white flowerbed cushioned Cloud’s fall when the two reunited in the Sector 5 church (disk 1, chapter 4). What’s more, we have the iconic credits video of the original cut of Advent Children to refer to, wherein Cloud is seen driving near flower fields. Aerith stands there (3:20), seemingly waiting for him. Here’s what Nomura had to say about this credits scene:

"[...] we filmed the video for the ending credits in Hawaii. There are fields of flowers on both sides of the road, and the colors —yellow and white— are the same as the flowers in Aerith's church […]. With Aerith, 'flowers' have been her image throughout the series” (FFVII Reunion Files, “Countdown to Reunion”, “Stories from CG Production”, page 87).

Even in the Advent Children Complete cut of the film, where Aerith is not shown standing in the field, the flowers and their symbolism of Aerith remain. That being so, it’s more than fair to say that the white and yellow flowers in DFF’s ending cutscene serve as yet another confirmation that Cloud’s dream is to be with Aerith.
With all of this established, we can address the nature of Cloud’s DFF crystal. As we established, every core world has its own version of a crystal, each possessing a distinct appearance, function and meaning. Materia are the crystals of FFVII, so one could be satisfied by the proposition that Cloud’s DFF crystal is simply meant to represent a random materia. However, I think Cloud’s crystal is specifically the White Materia, as it represents Aerith’s sacrifice, her importance to the plot and what she died fighting for. If any one object symbolizes her death, it’s the White Materia; it’s even given closeups during the event (2:33-3:02). Besides, unlike any other materia in FFVII, the White Materia is known to glow a light green when Holy has been activated:

“Bugenhagen: If [the prayer] reaches the planet, the White Materia will begin to glow a pale green” (FFVII OG, disk 2, chapter 15).

Here are pictures of the White Materia in OG and Advent Children, and two pictures of Cloud's DFF crystal (in order) so you can compare for yourself:
https://preview.redd.it/0qtumfeyfq0d1.jpg?width=386&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3995f010738c83fca0c5842a0564d0a9ad206dfd
https://preview.redd.it/0kj525tzfq0d1.jpg?width=1144&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=575573ef1d2c937635cf569d4a376886a24b384c
Cloud's DFF Crystal
Cloud’s DFF crystal
So far, in both suspension world games we’ve examined (FFT and DFF), Cloud is searching for Aerith. As a final note on DFF, it may interest you to know that codirector of the Remake trilogy Toriyama was actually a writer for DFF: he may have carried some themes from DFF to Remake…
III. d) Detour: The Final Fantasy 30th Anniversary Farewell Exposition
Before we hop onto the next suspension world, let’s return to ours for a quick detour: the 2018 Final Fantasy 30th Anniversary Expo. Themed with farewells and tragedy, this expo showcased the heartbreaking goodbyes featured in different FF games. Artwork, clips, quotes and images aplenty here! As the highly anticipated Remake was going to be coming out approximately a year and a half later, the FFVII section of the expo featured a few sneak peek Remake designs. This means the expo was at least partly curated with the Remake trilogy in mind; there could be interesting material in the FFVII section of the expo related to Remake. Let’s dive in!
Unsurprisingly, the focus of the FFVII section is Cloud and Aerith, since she is the loved one he lost in OG. Zack is also given a mention, however Aerith was the glaringly central star of the show. To showcase how important Aerith’s farewell in particular was to the expo, the FFVII portion was introduced by a photo of Cloud lowering Aerith into her watery grave and a video of her tragic death:
Final Fantasy 30th Anniversary Farewell Exposition, FFVII Introduction
The description under the video screen reads:

“She was gone in the blink of an eye. But the pain never went away.
Aerith awoke the ultimate magic to protect the planet and the people she loved. Yet her life came to a sudden end at the hands of Sephiroth, a man bent on seeing the world destroyed. Even the usually stoic Cloud couldn’t hide his grief at the unexpected death of an irreplaceable companion. ‘My fingers are tingling. My mouth is dry. My eyes are burning.’ True words, revealing Cloud’s deep sorrow” (Final Fantasy 30th Anniversary Exposition).

Conveniently enough for us, the expo’s tagline is “Who is the person you want to meet again?” Given that Aerith holds the spotlight in the FFVII section of the expo, it’s clear who SE is telling us Cloud wants to reunite with. Recall Cloud’s unfinished line in DFF: “The one I really want to meet is..." (Dissidia 013: Light to All, epilogue: “Conclusion of a Cycle”, “Recurring Tragedy”). We theorized that he must be referring to Aerith, and now, we are certain.
The expo also had pamphlet descriptions of the farewells depicted. Here is the general summary of FFVII‘s farewell story according to that pamphlet:

“The story follows the lead character Cloud, but it is the heroine, Aerith, who opens Cloud’s eyes and helps bring him closer to understanding the mystery that is his past. Through her, we draw closer to the truth of the story.
This scene, in which the heroine Aerith is lost, is easily the most shocking and tragic in the story. No one expected to say goodbye to such a major character in the middle of the story. Rumors of a secret way to revive Aerith spread, and it was clear players were having a hard time saying goodbye to her too. Even now, twenty years later, it still feels like a shocking turn of events” (Final Fantasy 30th Anniversary Exposition Pamphlet, page 36).

It’s interesting that SE would mention the rumors of Aerith’s revival circulated by players back in 1997, especially as fans were awaiting Remake’s release…
In light of everything we’ve analyzed so far, it can be said that between FFT (1997) and this farewell expo (2018), SE has consistently demonstrated that reuniting with Aerith is post-OG Cloud’s goal. That’s a period of over two decades— two decades of wishing, seeking, longing in real-world time for this character. This is a huge long-term commitment for SE to make, and you can bet the devs don’t take it lightly. Again and again, once the events of the OG game have ended, Cloud is shown to desire a reunion with Aerith. This ever-present and ever-insistent theme will become very important to us later in this analysis.
(continued in part 3)

Written 5/8/2024- updates attached below

I tried posting this on kendrick almost a week ago and it got no response, I messaged the mods to ask about Karma restrictions or account age requirements and they never replied. I made a new account and it was the same issue, but I found out last night I wasn’t fully banned, so I figured I’d throw it up and see if anyone finds it valuable. It’s written for people who have no prior knowledge of the rap game/music business. I don’t have to go as hard on obscuring names this time. One of the influencers I mentioned in my last post is known for doxxing and threatening violence against people who mention the many contradictions in their stories. (Sorry for any typos/mistakes I want to go to bed.)
Origins
I believe the current Drake and Kendrick Lamar beef is either completely or partially fabricated by certain industry leaders or the parties involved in an effort to distract from something bigger going down behind the scenes. If you were an influential label owner facing major accusations, and you needed to deflect media attention from yourself, recreating one of the most defining moments in rap history during the social media era would be a way to do it. It also wouldn’t hurt that two of the biggest rappers in the world were already sending shots at each other in their music for years prior. The public consensus is they are simply two famous rappers who hate each other and fighting over the spot for the top like in the 90’s. Only people who were directly involved could paint a more cohesive picture of the whole story. Even when all the cards drop, there is a good chance the average person won’t be able to find direct sources on their own and will continue to support their favorite artists and dismiss any evidence of their crimes like the drizzy subreddit or Ak fans.

As I said the beef between Kendrick and Drake has been brewing in the background for years, with both rappers sending shots and sneak dissing each other over the course of at least 8 years. The most agreed upon origin story is the first diss was the 2016 Big Sean and Kendrick collaboration, “Control,” and Drake responded with, “The Language”. Things stayed relatively lighthearted for a while and both were intentionally vague for many years. Before I go deep into the Kendrick and Drake stuff, it’s really important to examine some of Drake’s prior beefs because they add a ton of context to my theory. In my opinion Kendrick and Co. started scheming all of this some time around Mid 2020-Mid 2022, well after the whole Pusha T beef had transitioned into the Kanye beef.

What exactly started the beef is debatable, but at the time many attributed it to rumors of Drake pursuing Ye’s ex Amber Rose. Unfortunately the timeline isn’t 100 percent clear, and if I included every detail this would be at least 200+ pages so I’ll stick with the important stuff. The ultimate outcome of the Pusha T battle in 2018 was the revelation of Drake’s son Adidon that he had previously been hiding from the world along with getting Ye directly involved in the beef.

Here are some more examples of Drake antagonizing Ye and of him trying to use women as pawns to get material for his diss tracks. The Drake line, “Yeah, I probably go link to Yeezy, I need me some Jesus, but as soon as I start confessin' my sins, he wouldn't believe us," could be a reference to sleeping with Kim Kardashian, trying to double down on his threats to harm him or his family, or it could be a double entendre. Another example is using the name Kiki in another song, which was apparently one of Kim’s nicknames. Some other possible examples include the theories he may have tried the same thing with Kendrick’s wife Whitney around 2020-2021 in an attempt to use as ammo against Kendrick, which I’ll go into later. I don’t listen to much of either artist's music, but there are probably many of other examples in Drake’s catalogue that I’m leaving out. There is also his song Omerta released in 2019, which I'll go into below.

“Your baby mother call me when she lonely My tailor see me twice a week, he like my homie Forever grateful, forever thankful Diamond necklace, but she wears it on her ankle”

(Probably referring to Kim Kardashian since she had a few pictures with her wearing diamond ankle bracelets and was trying to make it into a trend.

“I plan to buy your most personal belongings when they up for auction”

(There were various rumors floating around for a while that Drake was blackmailing Ye with something and he was fighting to keep it from the public. I thought about it and this line might be referencing a sex tape with Kim or her little sister who me was very touch before she turned 18. In 2022 there was a whole storyline on Kim’s show where Ye flies to LA to prevent her second sex tape from being released.)

West Hollywood, know my presence is menacing
Cosa Nostra, shady dealings
Racketeering, the syndicate got they hand in plenty things The things that we've done to protect the name are unsettling But no regrets, though, the name'll echo Years later, none greater
Death to a coward and a traitor, that's just in my nature, yeah
(Drake and Ye both frequented the Delilah Nightclub located in West Hollywood and lived closeby on the same street for a while.)
"I don't carry cash 'cause the money is digital
It's the American Expresser, the debt collector"

(Sounds a lot more like it could be crypto to launder or send large amounts of ill gotten gains. It started becoming mainstream around them)

"Last year, niggas really feel like they rode on me
Last year, niggas got hot 'cause they told on me
I'm 'bout to call the bluff of anybody the fold on me"

These lines stood out because they could be referring to Ye telling the public about Drake's alleged threats a couple months before the songs release. This happened not long after the release of Sicko mode which was towards the end of 2018 as well. Ye was discussing the incident on Twitter and reached out to Drake and Travis to talk to him in private. In the next set of tweets Kanye publicly accused Drake of threatening him and his family in a major way. Surprisingly Ye seemed genuinely scared and amongst his, “crazy rants,” some of the stuff he said makes a ton of sense in hindsight. This also the beginning of his second serious public struggles with Bipolar disorder after being committed in 2016 shortly after an on stage rant where he calls out Jay Z for selling out and says he's afraid he might kill him.. As someone who shares the same diagnosis, I have a pretty good understanding of mania and psychosis and firmly believe that it's important not to write people off right away due to their mental illness. Some of my most thoughtful, creative, and productive periods were inspired by mania. Industry bigwigs have also been using mental illness to discredit influential black celebrities and visionaries going back decades, but it really picked up in the 80’s.

Dave Chappelle has gone into this a lot in the past and claims he experienced something similar before he quit show business and dipped to Africa. Their stories have a lot of interesting parallels if you’re familiar or curious. I remember he actually visited Ye at his house in Wyoming after he was reported to have had a, "mental breakdown," during his presidential run in 2020 thus marking his third breakown in six years.. The reason I put it in quotes is because it happened right after he publicly accused Kim of cheating and delivered his legendary speech on abortion. Dave went as far as going on live tv and telling the public he wasn’t crazy, he was just really struggling because he was the only one at the time fighting against the narrative, which can often be a suicide mission or a ticket to obscurity. These are three examples of someone speaking up and being deemed crazy, two years later came the nazi stuff and I'm sure we'll have plenty in store for 2024.

This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the very common pattern of artists dying or having their careers destroyed either after they try to leave their label or threaten to reveal industry secrets. A few more interesting industry connections I made in my research include the connections between:

T.U.G. records and J Cole's independent label Dreamville are both managed by Interscope Records, whose parent company is Universal Music Group.

Universal Music Group also hac Drake's label OvO label as well as Ye and Kendrick's old labels on their roster before they left to form their own independent labels in 2022 (around the same time the disses between Kendrick and Drake started escalating). Finally Bad Boy Records, which is owned by Diddy, and Motown Records who own Diddy's other R&B label Love Records, are also both owned by Universal. This means every label I mention is currently or was previously owned by Universal Music Group.

Ye tried for years to get out of his contract with Defjam, which happens to be ran by Jay Z who is known to be a close associate of Diddy. Jay would always used his money and power to fight against it. Ye even spoke out publicly on a few occasions, including when he said Jay Z was trying to kill him during one of his concerts. My theory is after years of getting nowhere and having his reputation skewered, in 2022 Ye finally said, "Fuck it," and dropped all the anti- Semetic stuff intentionally in a successful attempt to force his label to into using their morality clause, which requires labels to drop an artist if they're accused of any major controversy that could hurt the label’s profits. For the fourth time in four years the media reported he was having a breakdown. Even though they tried to punish him by cutting off all of his sources of income and freezing his accounts he still managed to bounce back pretty quickly. It was often reported how much he was losing, but it rarely discussed how he still was filthy rich in spite of the retrictions. His label wanted to discourage other artists from trying the same thing. My theory is he might have bought Kim or Kylie's alleged sex tape and used it for his own leverage. For Kendrick, his transition to his independent label ApLang went a lot smoother, but he had to split ownership of his new label with the previous manager owner Dave Free. Sadly it's still difficult for new or more niche artists to establish themselves without the some help.

He may be a lot of things but Ye isn’t dumb just because he has a mood disorder and the guys at the top know this, which is why I think he has really played up his diagnosis when it benefitted him. He’s still one of the most talented musicians in the game and I really think he sees his bipolar like a superpower as he says. It’s like his own invisibility cloak. He can go off his meds for a little, make an album after staying up for 72 hours, go on a “psychotic” twitter rant dropping facts throughout, then start up again once he makes enough news headlines. I think it’s worth noting the first divorce rumors in 2020 coincided with Ye’s abortion speech during his presidential run and the cheating accusations. that led to him dropping out and moving to Wyoming, and a couple months ago in February 2024 he was committed again.

The point I’m making is bipolar is complex, but pretty manageable especially if you have a ton of money to find meds that work for you and a good doctor and can keep substance abuse and stress at a manageable level. I think Ye is smart enough to know this, but it’s just safer for him to really play up the mental issues in the media. He’s proven he can literally say whatever he wants after getting cancelled and the average person is just going to write it off as psycho babble. While bias in health care is a sad fact of society, if you can use it to your advantage I say go for it. It might’ve just kept the microscope off of him long enough to plan his attack.

Ye v. Drake: Quotes of 2018
(Start of the beef, drake threats, and suspicion towards Kardashian family. )

“ It’s not about rap. It’s about family. We have to be close as a family and never let these people infiltrate just for radio spins”

“We need to show the world that people can talk without people ending up dead or in jail.”

”This is a man speaking to a man that has been placed in the program to fuck with Kanye West head and set me up“

”See when you care about your family you don’t let no man push you to do nothing that could risk your freedom“

These first four tweets by Ye were all in reference to perceived threats made by Drake after their beef escalated circa 2018. He began speaking on the industry and talking more about his psych hospital commitment two years prior and how he thought they were going to kill him. It's pretty obvious how the whole thing was planned by the sketchy doctor who called it in and his physical trainer who has a ton of connections to weird shit involving his celebrity clients.

I found interesting that Ye might not have been the first major league rapper whose life Drake threatened. During a similar period of mental illness the up and coming rapper XXXtentacion accused Drake of stealing his flow and dissed him a few times. Not long after he made a post online saying if he dies, it was Drake who did it. There are tons of conspiracies online, but none of the evidence is strong enough to draw a definitive connection. Also while it maybe be coincidental, Kendrick’s latest album Mr Morale also painted the picture that Kendrick was dealing with some serious personal issues. Some lines throughout the album may have been used to bait Drake into escalating, but it wasn’t until The Weekend, Future, and Metro Booming dropped, “We Don’t Trust You,” then Drake and J. Cole dropped, “First Person Shooter,” which was followed a couple days later with, “Like That,” where Kendrick started the chain of events that has led us to today.

Kanye vs. Drake: Quotes of 2020

Summary: Ye runs for president and gets suppressed for saying what very well could be the truth and was immediately deemed insane by the media. Kim did a couple interviews and everything he said was immediatly false. There is almost guarenteed to be some sketchy shit going down revolving her and her family. Ye was absolutely terrified of her keeping the kids away from him and it seems like there are still efforts being made to this day to paint a certain image of him for ulterior motives.

Below are six more quotes from a fan taking a deep dive into his 2020 tweets courtesy of u/ thehatstore42069 on Yeezy
”NORTHY I AM GOING TO WAR AND PUTTING MY LIFE ON THE LINE AND IF I AM MURDERED DON’T EVER LET WHITE MEDIA TELL YOU I WASNT A GOOD MAN,” West, 43, wrote in the tweet, adding, “WHEN PEOPLE THREATEN TO TAKE YOU OUT OF MY LIFE JUST KNOW I LOVE YOU”

"I need a public apology from J Cole and Drake to start with immediately... I'm Nat Turner... I'm fighting for us."

"the utmost respect for all brothers" and said "we need to link and respect each other... no more dissing each other on labels we don't own"

"Ye is constantly trying to tell people that his family does not have his or his kids best interests at heart. He goes on to list others, linking them together with the thinking emoji. These people include rap artist Drake and Larsa Pippen, wife of Scottie Pippe. Kim K is goddaughter to Pippen's daughter, showing how close the families actually are. All of these families that associate with Ye through Kardashian connections, as well as Drake, have been accused of the same thing Kris has. EVERY SINGLE ONE of these people have mixed race children that are groomed from a young age to fuck around with celebrities so the parents can remain famous. Drake on numerous occasions has been accused of grooming girls and then getting handsy on their 18th birthday.”

“These labels want their artists to make them money and they dont care about anything else. When Kanye says things like this in an attempt to expose him, the first thing they wanna do is drug him up and put him back in the studio.”
“Righteous indignation is typically a reactive emotion of anger over mistreatment, insult, or malice of another. It is akin to what is called the sense of injustice. This is how they keep the black man down. Keep people outraged about trivial things and distract them from the real issues in the world. The real problems in the industry. If you tell people enough times that they are unequal or discriminated against they start to believe it. Drug them when they step out of line and toss them aside when the checks run out. Ye is realizing he is pawn in a bigger game, and now that he has all these roots in the game such as Yeezy or the Gap or his music, too many people cant risk (Afford) a Ye who speaks his mind.”
(End of quotes)

Amongst the twitter rant, Ye warned about the predatory nature of record deals and discussed trying to get out of his own deal, and said again how his life may be in danger if it wasn’t already and was doing anything he could to protect his kids. The most fascinating part to me though is the public call to arms he made to Drake, J Cole, and Kendrick on twitter. After inviting them to all link up, he said, “It’s time to get free, we will not argue amongst each other while some guy we don’t know in Europe is getting paid and putting that money in a hedge fund.” I believe if Ye was able to pull off this meeting, there is an ever so slight chance that all four artists might be working together to take down a greater enemy. Weirdly there have been times throughout the last couple years where these supposed enemies were photographed together being friendly or praise each other in interviews, then out of no where the disses would start flying again.

To wrap things up I want to share my a few of my theories about the Drake/Kanye beef

A. Everything is exactly as it seems and the beef is over. Ye let his mental illness ruin his life and career so Drake simply picked another target after Ye stopped putting out disses. All of these connections are just a coincidence and all of this was choreographed to boost Drake and Kendrick’s music sales and possibly distract people from the Diddy trial and possibly the complicated geopolitical issues currently facing the U.S.

C. There is also the possibility that all four rappers are in cahoots and Drake’s dirt isn’t as extreme as people are theorizing, at least in comparison to the rest of the business. This could explain why everything has played out like a movie and how they were able to predict each other’s moves so well. This could either mean they’re all just trying to boost their sales or they’re all trying to take down the “slave masters,” as Ye calls them, and change the dynamic of the music industry in favor of the artist.

D. They may be trying to help their friends in the industry who are being abused or in shitty contracts. I know a lot of famous rappers have done a lot of collaborations with Jhene Aiko and Anderson Paak, who were both signed to T.U.G. records which I mentioned above in the connections to Universal Music Group. Considering they are both frequent collaborators with all of the artists involved on both sides, it’s not unlikely they may have played some part in influencing the takedown.

T.U.G was started by Chris Stokes with his partner Ketrina Askew. Back in the early to mid 90’s were gaining popularity attracting lots of young up and coming talent. They often collaborated with Diddy and his associates. In the 2000’s Raz B from the boy band B2K claimed he was molested by Stokes and his friend Marques Houston, then quickly retracted his claims. Years later he came forward again and said we was bribed into silence and that the rest of the victims were bribed with hush money and had another singer corroborate his story and they came forward together to level the accusations. After some of his former B2K members made fun of him for his claims and accused it of being a shakedown, Raz B revealed Stokes and Houston had preyed a lot of the children associated with the label including at least one of the former bandmates and paid them off.

I thought it was worth noting that the second whistleblower named Quindon Tarver died young in a car crash after mentioning his abuse again a few years prior. He seems to have left the industry not long after the incidents occurred and has few credits to his name. To this day Raz B is still trying to get his justice, while Stokes and his partner Askew, who was also involved in the abuse are still running the label to this day. Askew also has a ton of lawsuits, accusing her of using shady tactics to try to foreclose on houses. (Don’t quote me if a lawyer wants to take a look just google her full name), and has been tied to a ton of LLCs, similar to Drake. This is a good example of a shitty record deal, but I'm sure they have countless other friends in the industry who have even worse. While they were never convicted even Chris Stokes' wife confirmed it to be true.

E. The theory I personally think fits the narrative best and is the most realistic conspiracy is that Kendrick and possibly J. Cole went to the meeting, but not Drake due to his close relationship with Lucian Grange, the president of Drake’s label. Silence often speaks louder than words and this could explain why Kendrick was so ruthless and put so much effort into finding dirt on Drake. Ye, Cole, and Kendrick co-writing would be like the rap allstar team and if J. Cole wasn’t involved, it would also answer the question of whether or not he baited Drake into the battle by asking him to feature. I don’t think Drake is really their primary target though, which would explain letting him off easy. Compared to his bosses and their bosses he’s a small fish. If you take the big guys down you stand a better chance of landing a bigger blow on their operation.

Another really interesting connection is Kendrick and Ye were both signed under Universal Music Group and they both got out of their deals around couple months apart in 2022. As we speak U.M.G’s CEO Lucian Grange, who is often acccused of giving Drake special treatment, is facing charges related to sex trafficking by no other than P Diddy. This could very well explain the timing of it all. The craziest timeline would be Diddy masterminding all of this and using his connections to get it done and all the allegations are bullshit. The guy does seem pretty confident all things considered and constantly posts himself in his Batman costume which could mean he’s a vigilante.

It seems like there's a slight religious angle as well. (Ye and Diddy are both very vocal advocates of Christianity and Drake and Lucian Grange are both Jewish.) Obviously this is a reach, but they’ve been saying rap music was specifically promoted by mostly white label owners in the 80’s to help in the ongoing effort to expedite the systematic oppression of those living in black neighborhoods and the destruction of their family systems. Apparently it was an intentional decision to heavily promote rappers that promoted the very things that were destroying their neighborhoods. (So people know I'm and atheist and have zero agenda, I just thought it was interesting, please stay away from anything antisemitic. War is wrong on both sides.)

*** If my favorite theory is true, there is a possibility the Kendrick and Ye are going after Drake due to their mutual disdain for him and because he’s got a ton of power to dominate the charts and hog the radio airtime like Meek Mill and OG Maco claimed years ago. Even him dropping a record the same day as you could really fuck your album sales up. I’m also sure some of the many rumors throughout the years have had a least some truth and he will most likely snitch to avoid cell block one. I think that Drake could have been instructed to instigate this whole mess in order to draw attention away from the UMG charges brought about by Diddy. Or on the other hand it could be that Kendrick, Ye, and possibly Cole, may have had intel that Drake was going to be involved in the Diddy trial and are just gonna let the receipts show themselves. It might not have been the original plan, but they’ve already accomplished their mission of humiliating him, assuring he couldn’t use his influence to slide through the cracks, and taking over the throne.

Please take everything I say with a grain of salt I have no connection to this world or lifestyle. Regardless I believe all of the knowledge above does a pretty solid job at painting a picture of what may have let up to this and what may have been the source.
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More details found the last couple days…

Drake and Diddy Connections+Coincidences

Drake- In the P Diddy wig video from 2016 he talks about going to party with Drake, Cash, and The Weeknd in Toronto. Drake is also one of Birdman’s protégées who is known for being a predator and is rumored to have used label artists to lure young women.

Travis Scott- Interview where he comes out and says Diddy tried to lure him. Still has a long history of associating with him, video of him running from Diddy, his connection to Ruby Rose while underage.

Tim Westwood- Diddy had connections with sex offender Tim Westwood who also inspired the Drake song, “Westwood”. They also both were victims of drive by shootings along with The Weekend and they were all facing some type of allegations.

T.I.- Also has been associate with Diddy through the years, in 2021 his kid died and 11 women can forward at the same time to accuse him and his wife of drugging and assaulting them. Clearly someone wanted to fuck his life up. Possibly due to him getting arrested so many times for wild shit and people wondering how he continued to get away with it shining a light on how powerful industry lawyers are. He also had recently talked about having a gynecologist check to see if his daughter is still a Virgin, which sounds like it could have been an industrty secret. Could have been because he worried about someone trying to take advantage of her to get to him? Regardless that shit is fucking insane.

50 Cent- Has been saying pretty much the same thing as Travis Scott and has trolled Diddy for most of his career. It came out that his wife was a sex worker who was possibly recruited Diddy to help ruin his career. It sort of worked, which raises the question if 50 Cent is the only victim.

Ray J- Him and his sister worked with T.U.G. records when they were very young. Chris Stokes in the nineties who had connections with Diddy. He has been involved in a lot of sex scandals and allegedly may have played a part in Whitney Houston's death. (Which is also allegedly connected to Michael Jackson's death and both were deemed suspicious and happened during their final tours when their masters (song rights), became more valuable than their lives. Sony Records and Tommy Motolla, who also abused Mariah Carey when she was trying to start her career. These are just a few of the alleged examples of labels taking out musicians when they were worth more dead, another is the signing of high risk artists and requiring them to get life insurance so they can profit beyond releasing all their posthumous records. Also the ever so common story of the rising star artist that die at 21 after their first album or two.

He also partied with Diddy in Vegas with along Floyd Mayweather and a bunch of other famous industry people and athletes.

Tory Lanez- Tons of blackmail, also was signed by Interscope under UMG. got sent to prison for ten years after trying to leave his label. Also history of SA and and other allegations of violence towards women.

French Montana- On Diddy's label, close with Rick and Khaled, tons of drug and sexual assault allegations, also dated a Kardashian. Generally grimy.

DJ Khaled- Diddy said he could get anything in Miami, either referring to drugs or women, could explain his connections and lack of any notable talent. (New update, he was one of the first to promote Chris Alvarez’s instagram not long after he turned 18).

Rick Ross- Diddy said some weird shit about him and licked his lips and kissed him at a show. Ross is also signed to Bad Boy under Diddy. He ended up getting involved in the current feud and spamming social media nonstop dissing and threatening Drake.

A lot of the back and forth was both of them threatening to release dirt on each other. One strange coincidence I found was Drake recently trolled Ross about the 20 million dollar renovation to his home on Star island, where Diddy is currently residing. It’s rumored back in the day that P Diddy was caught in a room full of rich guys on ecstasy possibly at the beginning stages of a gay orgy. Drake also mentioned in the same tweets about Rick Ross that Birdman owned a house on the island and asked Rick Ross why he didn’t help him out.

Considering Ross is so sketchy and Drake claims the house isn’t that big, that’s a ridiculous amount of money. He may be covering up evidence, or creating tunnels in his house to escape if shit pops off and Drake might know what’s good. Interestingly enough Ross is very close with French Montana and also signed to Bad. He said his beef was related to something involving French, and Drake’s tweet popped up the same day the info came out concerning the Chris Alvarez stuff.

The famous line from U.O.E.N.O.

Meek Mill- “OG Maco called himself defending his friend Quentin Miller by substantiating the ghostwriting claims and agreeing with Meek. He hit up Twitter saying, "Some of us been knew. Meek just put it in the air. Sucks to have to compete with 6 n****s and get compared to”

Meek mill also had a short beef with Drake, some disses included lines referring to TI’s homie pissing on Drake at the movie theater, which is also interesting considering the current case against him. He also dropped a line saying Diddy almost got a domestic charge when he smacked Drake, which could either be saying that Drake is like a woman, or saying he was Drake’s boyfriend/sugar daddy.
( If you made it to the end comment with the number 8)
I thought it was interesting how the beef just kind of disappeared and even Meek said it didn’t seem genuine. Considering the allegations against Meek in the Diddy trial, and his rumored affair with Kim contributing to ending Kanye’s marriage, Meek Mill definitely did some dirt on him.

“Niggas frauds I told the truth, don't ask me shit
All this industry fake enemy and rap shit”

“Money make a sucker that told look trill again”

One of the many chapters in Drake's history in which he is seen paying his way out of trouble and starting beefs randomly.
“Now when that shit went down with Chris, you wrote a check”
This line is referring to Chris brown beef, another beef that was lost to time. All I can remember off the top was someone throwing a champagne bottle at the other’s entourage.

Ty Dolla $ign- Huge feature artist, close with Ye. Grew up in the industry and talks about growing up on the road and being in the studio with his dad and Rick James who was should have already been in prison for life for dragging, torturing, and S assaulting multiple women and children throughout his career and was himself a victim of the industry. May be part of Ye's motivation, considering their recent close working relationship.
The end.
Courtesy of,
The Randomest Moniker

Shortly after Final Fantasy VII hit the gaming world in 1997, Cloud Strife’s howls of grief at the loss of his beloved companion Aerith Gainsborough were echoed by droves and droves of fans. These echoes gathered in swarms, reaching the developers in the form of petition signatures, each begging the makers of the game to allow Aerith’s resurrection. Though these prayers remained unanswered —until now—, there soon came more protests: this time, fans pleaded with the developers to consider making a remake of the original game. Both of these wishes were met with considerable derision, with large chunks of the fandom calling the requests delusional— which is why the Final Fantasy world had to prepare for another meteoric hit when the Remake project was finally announced in 2015. With Kitase, Nomura, Toriyama, Nojima, Uematsu and more of the original developers at the helm, along with longtime FFVII fan-turned-developer Hamaguchi, the Remake trilogy was met with great expectations. These were nevertheless surpassed, though one aspect of the trilogy’s first entry seemed to thoroughly puzzle some and enrage others. Far and wide, the resounding questions were “What are these Whisper things?”, “Why is Cloud having visions unrelated to Nibelheim and Zack?” and “Why and how in the hell did Zack survive?”
Friends, I believe the answer lies within this post. Welcome to my literary-analysis-based theory on the Remake trilogy’s most important and most secret plot point: Cloud’s hidden mission. I want to make this fun and suspenseful to read, so I will write my analyses in the same order and manner in which I encountered them while putting my theory together. You will be reading what initially sparked my curiosity, the path I took while researching for answers, the conclusions I made every step of the way, and only then will you read my theory, after which we’ll try and apply it to the Remake trilogy so far and see if it fits! I want you to experience the rollercoaster that I did when digging through SE content to bring you this post. Thank you so much for waiting for and anticipating this analysis, and I do hope you read every word to soak in every last bit of Clerith you can get. I also hope it’s really fun and touching for you (I cried at least once making this)! Let’s embark on our adventure through the compilation, other FF games and real-life events to find out what the Remake project is truly all about and anticipate the events of part 3.
N.B.: Please be aware that I have never seen this theory navigate online, so I have no idea if anyone has ever come up with a similar hypothesis. The big reveal I’m building toward might be something you’re already aware of or suspected. In that case, I hope this post doesn’t disappoint you if you’re one of the lovely people who requested it! At the very least, it will provide you with valuable literary and musical analysis, a ton of evidence you haven’t considered yet, and hopefully, entertainment too!
WARNING: Please be careful with the censored spoiler text, because I'll be referencing other FF games in this analysis and I don't want to ruin anything for you! Obviously, this analysis contains spoilers for the entirety of the FFVII compilation. Additionally, if you're not a fan of Clerith and you've stumbled upon this post, please stop here. I would hate it if something I worked on and posted made you angry, so please don't read this analysis. I have only good intentions and I just want everyone to enjoy the FFVII world as much as they can.

I. Groundwork: The Remake Timelines Theory

Before I take you on this ride, we must lay down the framework of the Remake Timelines Theory. In this section, we’ll be reviewing the general consensus of theorizers within the fandom on timeline/multiverse shenanigans, with some added specifications on my part. Please keep in mind that because the timeline mechanics are kept quite vague by the devs, there might be certain inaccuracies in my iteration of the timelines theory. Thankfully, these potential variances won’t have any effect on the legitimacy of the theory I’ll be presenting to you in this analysis.
I. a) Sephiroth’s Plan
The premise of the Remake trilogy is widely thought to be the result of post-OG Sephiroth attempting to succeed where he failed in OG. There are six key points we need to keep in mind to understand how this was possible.
I. a) i. Sephiroth in the Lifestream
Firstly, it’s important to remember that Sephiroth is dead and located in the Lifestream before OG even begins, and remains that way for almost all of OG's duration. He is only able to operate in the world of the living via his/Jenova's control over the living Sephiroth clones. In the OG timeline then, Sephiroth is sent to the Lifestream by Cloud twice: once before the game takes place on the night of the Nibelheim incident (pre-OG), and a second time during the final battle against Sephiroth (disk 3, chapter 3). During the long period between the Nibelheim incident and Sephiroth’s rebirth at the Northern Crater (disk 2, chapter 2), he exists in the Lifestream. After his ultimate defeat (post-OG), he returns there for good.
II. a) ii. Sephiroth Unintegrated
Secondly, because he is full of hatred and unyielding determination, Sephiroth’s spirit cannot become one with the planet. After both occasions where Cloud kills him in OG, Sephiroth retains his individual will and the memories of his lifetime, remaining a separate entity in the Lifestream. He says so himself in Nojima’s Advent Children prequel novel On a Way to a Smile:

“[Sephiroth] could sense the Lifestream trying to erode his spirit— the memories of his former experiences, thoughts and emotions. If he allowed himself to be taken into the current, the being he once was would soon disseminate and disappear amongst the spirit energy cycling around the planet. [He] thought this unacceptable. The planet was to be his to rule, and to become a part of that system would be nothing short of defeat” ("Lifestream Black 1").

Combined with Bugenhagen’s basic lesson on planetology (FFVII OG, disk 1, chapter 19), this excerpt provides interesting information on how the Lifestream normally works. Usually, when a life returns to the planet, its individuality (personality, will, consciousness, memories, etc.) is stripped away. The trappings of a soul’s former lifetime are progressively dissolved so that all that is left is the spirit itself, ready to integrate into the Lifestream. This way, soul energy can be “recycled” by the planet to animate new lifeforms in a sort of reincarnation process. The erasure of one’s memories in the Lifestream is necessary for the creation of a brand new life, poised to make its own memories: the slate must be wiped clean, so to speak. Sephiroth’s sheer hatred for and desire to dominate the planet is enough to keep him from undergoing this process.
It is also thought that Sephiroth cannot be integrated into the Lifestream because he was conceived with the use of Jenova cells in vitro. Given that so much of his consciousness and genetic makeup originate from an alien life force, it is impossible for him to become one with the planet.
Regardless of the reason, it is precisely this persisting individuality in death that allows Sephiroth to meddle in the world of the living during the post-OG events of Advent Children, as explained to us by post-OG Aerith in On a Way to a Smile:

“[Aerith] had sensed a different presence within the Lifestream cycling around the planet. It was the vehemence of a strong will, one that would never join with the planet. She knew this consciousness. It was [Sephiroth]. A merciless spirit hidden behind a beauteous wall. That spirit was now operating from within the Lifestream. [She] sensed that he was planning to exert his influence to the surface of the planet“ ("Lifestream White 1").

I. a) iii. The Lifestream Beyond Time
Our third point is that the Lifestream has existed for as long as the planet, and has therefore touched every part of its history— including, of course, the events of OG. On that account, one could think of the Lifestream as atemporal. Considering this, it is possible for a spirit in the Lifestream to communicate with or even travel to the past, provided the necessary circumstances and/or abilities. For instance, the Aerith that appears in Cloud’s resolution scene in Remake (chapter 14) is commonly considered to be a post-OG Aerith, appearing to him from the future to try and dissuade him from falling for her. This time-defying event is made possible by the fact that post-OG Aerith’s spirit has access to the atemporal Lifestream because she's deceased. In my view, this explains why she dissolves into green light (Lifestream visual cue) at the end of the resolution scene (5:19-5:45). This is not time travel per se, but it is a manner of communication unobstructed by the one-directionality of a linear timeline that only spirits can perform.
I. a) iv. Sephiroth Beyond Time
What we’ve covered so far amounts to our fourth point. Please familiarize yourself with the graph below before you continue reading. Refer back to the graph when you encounter text in bold.
The Remake Timelines Theory: FFVII OG Timeline
As we discussed in section “I. a) i.”, Sephiroth is dead and located in the Lifestream for the duration of the green arrow and beyond point D: in the context of the OG timeline, he can only ever be considered “alive” during the period highlighted in purple. In section “I. a) ii.”, we asserted that Sephiroth retained his individual will in the Lifestream, enabling him to exert his influence on the world of the living by manipulating his clones on the surface. In section “I. a) iii.”, we covered the atemporal nature of the Lifestream, which allows post-OG Aerith’s spirit to communicate with her past, living self thanks to her Cetra abilities. Now, I will explain to you how Sephiroth was able to do virtually the same thing, albeit his lack of Cetra blood.
To the characters of the story and a fully immersed first-time player of OG, the timeline above was not always an established series of events: when they first started playing FFVII OG, the player began at point B, with nothing existing beyond it. It is only as the player moved Cloud forward that the black, arrowed timeline was drawn, accumulating lived events (or points) in Cloud’s wake. The picture you see above is only available to Cloud and to the player with hindsight. All this to state the obvious: at point B, Cloud could not know what would occur, say, at point C.
During the period highlighted in purple, Sephiroth was “alive” again, accumulating new memories on the surface of the planet and adding them to his consciousness. When he entered the Lifestream for the second time at point D, he brought these memories with him. Simply put, after returning to the Lifestream at point D, Sephiroth remembers what happened during the period highlighted in purple. However, given that the Lifestream exists beyond time, upon Sephiroth’s consciousness’ return to the Lifestream at point D, his newly acquired memories were also made available to him at all points on the green, double-arrowed line— including point A, before the OG timeline even begins at point B. So while it is true that Cloud cannot know what will occur at point C if he is only at point B, Sephiroth indeed knows what will occur during the period highlighted in purple when he is only at point A. While a living, pre-OG Aerith would be able to receive post-OG Aerith’s spirit’s knowledge through the Lifestream thanks to her Cetra powers, Sephiroth has no need for this ability. The fact that he resides in the Lifestream for practically the entire FFVII OG timeline renders the limitations of time irrelevant: as far as the FFVII OG timeline is concerned, Sephiroth exists beyond time itself.
In summary, after point D was first encountered in OG, pre-OG Sephiroth (in the Lifestream) is made aware of his eventual defeat, and begins plotting an alternate path to victory. This time, with the benefit of hindsight, he will do things differently: we experience his "second” attempt at FFVII as the Remake trilogy.
I. a) v. Sephiroth Against Fate
Of course, the Whispers stand squarely in Sephiroth’s way. This leads us to our fifth point, which Remake Ultimania describes better than I ever could:

“According to Red XIII, who gained knowledge through his contact with Aerith, ‘The Whispers are drawn to those who attempt to alter destiny’s course and ensure they do not’ […]. It would appear that what the Whispers deem to be ‘fate’ is the original story of Final Fantasy VII” (section 08 “Secrets”, “Newly Arisen Mysteries”, “What Is the Goal of the Elusive Whispers?”, page 733).

OG’s plot line is the fated timeline, and the Whispers are tasked with its preservation. They prevent alternative paths from even beginning to branch out from the OG timeline, which poses a problem for Sephiroth: he cannot win FFVII if his destiny is to lose it.
I. a) vi. Sephiroth and the Multiverse
Consequently, our sixth point is that Sephiroth must dismantle the mechanisms of fate before he can even try to accomplish his dreams of godhood.
As Sephiroth explains in chapter 14 of Rebirth, “the planet encompasses [an ever unfolding] multitude of worlds”, and these “[new worlds are born] when the boundaries of fate are breached.” Since the Whispers uphold the “boundaries of fate”, a world in which Sephiroth’s evil plans succeed can only emerge after the Whispers have been defeated. Otherwise, destiny will continue to protect the OG plot line by preventing any significant deviations. Consequently, before the party vanquishes fate, the Remake timeline and the OG timeline are one and the same: before chapter 18, Remake Barret is OG Barret, Remake Tifa is OG Tifa, Remake Hojo is OG Hojo, etc. After the defeat of Destiny, the OG timeline is no longer protected by fate: there are now an infinite number of timelines or worlds, including those we see glimpses of in Rebirth: Remake Barret is no longer necessarily OG Barret, Remake Tifa is no longer necessarily OG Tifa, Remake Hojo is no longer necessarily OG Hojo, etc. Perhaps this is why Aerith gives the party the following warning at destiny’s crossroads in Remake:

“[This] is the wall of destiny. If we go through it… if we go beyond it… then all of us will change, too” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA script notes, “Destiny’s Crossroads”).

I. a) vii. Sephiroth’s Plan
Now that these six points have been elucidated, we can compose a solid hypothesis on how Sephiroth plots to win FFVII.
After gaining knowledge of his eventual demise (disk 3, chapter 3), pre-OG Sephiroth began thinking of what he must do in Remake from the Lifestream. First, Sephiroth must antagonize the Whispers in the initial stages of the OG timeline. He accomplishes this by commanding his clones to commit acts that drastically violate the fated timeline, engendering plot-line deviations that the Whispers must course-correct. The most extreme example transpires in Remake’s chapter 17 when the Sephiroth clone in President Shinra’s office kills Barret, forcing the Whispers to restore the fated plot line by coming forth and reviving him. The Whispers react to Sephiroth’s prodding by rushing in to protect fate, their efforts culminating in the protective wall of destiny that surrounds Midgar in chapter 18.
Secondly, after he’s created an opportunity for a battle against the Whispers, Sephiroth must convince the party to seize it and beat fate for him. After all, a mere Sephiroth clone is probably no match for Destiny. This second step is accomplished in Remake’s chapter 18 when Sephiroth successfully tempts Cloud to breach the boundaries of fate. Now that destiny is no longer a limitation, worlds deviating from the OG timeline can finally emerge; Sephiroth has a chance at victory.
The steps Sephiroth plans to take going forward are unknowable at this stage, but we do get more hints in Rebirth’s chapter 13. At the Temple of the Ancients, Sephiroth reveals a part of his plot:

“Sephiroth: My fragmented mother, these errant worlds... All shall be one again.
Aerith: The ‘Reunion’…!”

It seems Sephiroth eventually plans to merge the worlds created by destiny’s defeat in Remake’s chapter 18. My guess is he hopes to achieve godhood in part 3 and consolidate all diverting worlds into a single timeline protected by destiny once more— only this time, his victory will replace the ending of OG as the destined outcome. If he succeeds, Sephiroth’s Black Whispers will likely replace the planet’s Whispers as the arbiters of his desired fate.
I. b) Aerith’s Intervention
But Aerith can’t let this slide unchallenged!
We know that before chapter 18 of Remake, while the OG plot-line is still protected by fate, Aerith has knowledge of its future. This is insinuated by certain slips of the tongue: for instance, when Aerith reveals she knows Cloud is a mercenary upon meeting him for the second time in chapter 8, just like she knows Tifa will ask her to retrieve Marlene at Seventh Heaven in chapter 12. In the run-up to Remake, post-OG Aerith's spirit likely sensed Sephiroth planning his second try at FFVII in the Lifestream. She’s been able to anticipate Sephiroth’s plotting in the Lifestream before, namely in the context of Advent Children:

“[Aerith] had sensed a different presence within the Lifestream cycling around the planet […]. It was [Sephiroth] […]. That spirit was now operating from within the Lifestream. [She] sensed that he was planning to exert his influence [on] the surface of the planet” (On a Way to a Smile, "Lifestream White 1").

If you’re wondering how Aerith was able to maintain her individuality in the Lifestream like Sephiroth, On a Way to a Smile provides the following explanation:

“[Aerith] was an Ancient, which explained how she was able to maintain her individuality even within the Lifestream. If she so wished she could become part of the planet at any time, but [she] thought it too early for that just yet” ("Lifestream White 1").

It is thought that, as a countermeasure to Sephiroth's scheming, post-OG Aerith’s spirit used the atemporal nature of the Lifestream to inform her past, living self (pre-OG Aerith) of this new threat to the planet. Because the Cetra can commune with spirits, pre-OG Aerith would have been able to receive post-OG Aerith’s message from the Lifestream without a problem. Essentially, pre-OG Aerith received post-OG Aerith’s memories of the fated OG timeline. As a consequence, pre-OG Aerith embarks on the OG timeline with knowledge of the fated future that demands she give her life: the player experiences this version of her in Remake.
Be that as it may, it’s unclear how much Remake Aerith is aware of. You would think she’d be completely opposed to defeating, destiny since it protects the planet, but Aerith shows ambivalence toward the idea instead. Had she gotten a clear message from her future self that she must keep fate intact, she would not have allowed the party to enter the battle against fate in chapter 18. She doesn’t seem to know what the Whispers are the first time she encounters them either. Regardless, what’s important is that the Aerith seen in Remake is the result of pre-OG Aerith receiving knowledge from post-OG Aerith via the Lifestream.
I. c) Ambiguity: Memory Transfer or Time-Travel?
There remains an ambiguity pertaining to the Aerith we see in Remake and the question of time travel. What I’ve described to you in section “I. b)” is post-OG Aerith's spirit transferring her memories to her past self through the Lifestream. However, it’s possible that post-OG Aerith’s consciousness used the atemporal nature of the Lifestream to inhabit her living OG body instead, effectively time-traveling. There is no evidence to outright refute either explanation, since the gaps in Aerith’s memories of the OG plot-line in Remake can be explained in both cases. For instance, in a memory transfer scenario, it’s possible that post-OG Aerith only communicated the most essential information to pre-OG Aerith. On the other hand, in a time-travel scenario, one could interpret the following quotes as proof that the Whispers are progressively erasing Aerith’s memories of OG as Remake advances:

“Aerith: Every time the Whispers touch me, a piece of me falls away” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA script notes, “Aerith Speaks”)

&

“At any rate, Aerith is perplexed at how, like a flower being scattered, something inside is being taken away by the Whispers and lost to her” (Toriyama in FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA script notes, “Aerith Speaks”, “Scenario Staff Q&A - Answered by Motomu Toriyama”).

This ambiguity is completely irrelevant to Sephiroth’s situation in Remake, as we established in section “I. a) iv.”.
The specifics don’t matter nearly as much as I’m impressing upon you by explaining all these little alternatives. Simply keep in mind that: regardless of why, the Sephiroth and Aerith we see in Remake know the events of the OG game because they have acquired this knowledge from the future, and the events of Remake occur squarely within the OG timeline until the Whispers are defeated in chapter 18.
So there! That’s my iteration of the Remake Timelines Theory! I hope I’ve made it clear in your mind, or at least clearer. Now that we’ve established the widely theorized premise of the Remake trilogy, we can get into our theory on its hidden premise.
II. My Initial Curiosity
My theory first burgeoned upon going through Remake for the second time. I noticed something strange going on with Cloud, something that could not be explained by the Remake Timelines Theory. Key moments in Remake Cloud’s experience of the OG timeline (aka, everything before chapter 18) stuck out to me as strange and mysterious, and certain inexplicable audiovisual cues struck me as hugely significant. It was upon watching the tear fall from Cloud’s eye during my second go at chapter 8 that I knew I had to look into this.
At the very end of Remake’s chapter 8, Cloud watches Aerith walk away from him, humming happily into the night air as she sets off to lead the way to Sector 7. According to the VA script notes, “his heart skips a beat” and watching her walk away provokes a sudden “anxiety” within him. Triggered by the familiarity of the sight, a strange sensation overcomes Cloud:

“[There’s a] close-up shot of Cloud’s fingertips (they’re tingling). He presses them to his temples (his eyes are burning). A trickle of tears quickly rolls down from the eye hidden behind his hand” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA script notes, “A Midnight Ambush”).

If you’re clever, you’ll recognize these lines as a reference to the speech Cloud makes in OG following Aerith’s death at the City of the Ancients (“My fingers are tingling. My mouth is dry. My eyes are burning!”) (disk 1, chapter 28). In this small moment in chapter 8 of Remake, Cloud experiences a flash of the profound grief he is destined to feel upon Aerith’s fated death.
Many players immediately recognized the composition of this scene: the blue-greenish air, the straight path Aerith heads down, the sight of her walking away itself… this moment closely resembles Cloud’s Sleeping Forest dream of Aerith in OG, wherein Cloud and Aerith’s very last words are exchanged (disk 1, chapter 25). Toriyama, codirector of the Remake project, comments on this scene thusly:

“It’s possible these similarities […] cause a memory of the future to be called forth in Cloud” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA script notes, “A Midnight Ambush”).

The language used by Toriyama here is strange in both the English translation and the Japanese original: the term “memory of the future” makes no sense. One cannot remember things they haven’t already experienced, so why did Toriyama use the word “memory” to describe a "future" event? Couldn’t he have simply said that Remake Cloud experiences “visions of the future” rather than “[memories]”?
Cloud experiences a few moments like these throughout the game. These pseudo-premonitions are just as markedly exclusive to Remake as the Whispers are. I did not want to dismiss them as a foreshadowing device the devs included just to elicit emotional reactions from OG players; I felt they were more important. And thus began my digging! My mission was initially to figure out what these “[memories of the future]” (MOTFs) could signify… I had no clue it would turn into what I’m writing right now.
II. a) Each MOTF and Its Context
I began by finding every one of Cloud’s MOTFs so I could better understand them.
MOTF 1 occurs in chapter 2 on Sector 8’s Loveless Street, when Cloud sees Aerith struggling against the Whispers. The VA script notes reveal that even though this is only his first time seeing her, Cloud recognizes Aerith’s face:

“Recognizing Aerith’s face causes Cloud to experience [a hallucination]. Sephiroth is suddenly standing between him and Aerith” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA script notes, “Encountering Aerith”).

Sephiroth then taunts Cloud with words that, according to the script notes, “[live] inside of Cloud's heart”: “You can’t protect anyone. Not even yourself”. Cloud should not recognize Aerith’s face at this point in the OG timeline, nor should he associate it with not being able to protect people.
MOTF 2 occurs in chapter 3, at the plaza in front of the Sector 7 slums support pillar. Cloud experiences a MOTF of the plate falling, which is fated to occur at a much later point in chapter 12. The Whispers float near him, “watching Cloud alertly as he sees a vision of the future” (FFVII Remake Ultimania, section 08 “Secrets”, “Newly Arisen Mysteries”, “What Is the Goal of the Elusive Whispers?”, page 733).
MOTF 3 occurs in Aerith’s church at the start of chapter 8, when Aerith mentions that her mother’s materia is “not good for anything at all”. Triggered by the mention and sight of the White Materia, Cloud’s fourth MOTF takes the form of a vision: he sees quick flashes of the materia falling into the lake of the Forgotten Capital and Aerith holding her hands together in prayer. These are evidently visions of her death in OG (disk 1, chapter 28).
MOTF 4 is the one we first discussed, occurring at the very end of chapter 8 as Cloud watches Aerith walk away from him to lead the way toward Sector 7.
MOTF 5 occurs in chapter 13 shortly after the Sector 7 plate has fallen on the slums. Cloud tells Barret that Marlene is safe at Aerith’s house, and they begin heading there. As Cloud thinks about Aerith, the VA script notes describe the very next moment as follows:

“Cloud: Tifa, you know anything about the Ancients?
Tifa: I’ve heard of them before, but…
Barret walks on ahead, showing little interest in the topic.
Barret: Read a book on planetology and they’re sure to come up. They’re a tribe that cultivated the planet a real long time ago. Used to talk to it. That sort of stuff.
Cloud: That must be why the Turks were after her.
[Psychic] interference starts up.
[Cloud has a] flashback of Sephiroth from five years ago, after learning of his ancestry at Shinra Manor […].
Sephiroth [(in flashback, voice tinged with madness)]: Within my veins flows the blood of the Ancients. I am the rightful heir to this planet!
The flashback ends and Cloud looks lost in thought. The interference starts up once more. Cloud makes agonized sounds. When he opens his eyes, Sephiroth is actually standing before him.
Sephiroth: You failed again— failed to protect [her]*.
Cloud is startled. He shrinks back. Tifa watches what’s happening. The other two can’t see Sephiroth. All they see is Cloud acting frightened.
Sephiroth: But loss will make you strong. […] Isn’t that what you want?
With that, Sephiroth departs.”

*Sephiroth does not use a gendered pronoun here, because the grammatical structure of the original Japanese sentence doesn’t necessitate it. I've seen some debate as to whether the proper translation is “her” (Aerith, who’s just been kidnapped), or “them” (Jessie, Biggs or Wedge, who have seemingly just died). I believe Sephiroth was referring to Aerith for a few reasons. First, Cloud’s hallucinations of Sephiroth always appear as a response to whatever he is perceiving or thinking about at the moment. At this point in the scene, Cloud has been thinking and talking about Aerith for some time, and not about Jessie, Biggs or Wedge. The Sephiroth hallucination must therefore be referring to “her” rather than to “them”. Secondly, Cloud was never tasked with “[protecting]” Avalanche, but he was in fact tasked with “[protecting]” Aerith as her bodyguard back in chapter 8: it makes far more sense for Sephiroth to be referring to Aerith when he speaks about someone Cloud “failed to protect”. Finally, FFVII Remake Ultimania describes this piece of dialogue as “[Sephiroth aiming] these profound words at Cloud, who not only failed to prevent the tragedy in the Sector 7 slums but allowed Aerith to be abducted” (Sephiroth’s profile in section 01 “Character & World”, “Impressive Words”, page 29): the specific mention of Aerith here seals my decision to translate the line with the pronoun “her”.
Contrary to Sephiroth’s words, this is the first time in Remake that Cloud “[fails] to protect [Aerith]”, and he hasn’t “[lost]” her either— not yet, at least. So why use the words "again" and "loss"? This fifth MOTF must be similar to MOTF 1, in that Sephiroth is referring to Cloud’s guilt surrounding Aerith’s death in OG.
MOTF 6 occurs in chapter 17, in Aerith and Ifalna’s old room at Shinra HQ. The Whispers swarm Aerith as she tells the party earnestly that she wants to do everything in her power to help her friends and the planet: according to the script notes, it is at this very moment that, “for some reason, Cloud feels his chest constrict tightly” (FFVII Remake Material Ultimania Plus, VA script notes, “Aerith Speaks”). In the corresponding cutscene, this unpleasant physiological reaction to Aerith’s words makes Cloud glance down at his chest with a confounded frown. This physical response to her speech about wanting to fulfill her duty to the planet implies that Cloud somehow knows deep down that saving the world will cost Aerith her life.
At this point, I noticed that five out of the six MOTFs Cloud experiences in Remake are triggered by and/or revolve around Aerith specifically, the one exception being a MOTF of the Sector 7 plate fall. One could actually argue that this MOTF revolves around Aerith too, considering the plate fall marks the first time Aerith is taken away from Cloud since reuniting with her in the Sector 5 slums church. This is more than plausible, as MOTF 5 proves that in the wake of the Sector 7 plate fall, Cloud’s main concern is Aerith (see section “II. a)”). How fitting is it, then, that the merc of few words’ longest uninterrupted piece of dialogue in all of Remake is:

“We found an underground Shinra lab where they've done human testing. This wasn't the first time and it won't be the last. I know these people, and I know they're never gonna let Aerith go. She's the last living Ancient on the planet. Think about what that means to Shinra's scientists. Especially to that son of a bitch Hojo. We're all just numbers and meat to him—“ (Remake, chapter 13).

Cloud would’ve gone on too, had Elmyra and Tifa not stopped him.
At this juncture in my research, my questions were only stacking up. What are these MOTFs? Why is Cloud the only one experiencing them? Why do all of them implicate Aerith? What did the devs hope to accomplish with their inclusion in the game? What do they mean for Remake’s story? But most importantly:
II. b) What Does Cloud Know?
The first assertion we have to make is simple, yet essential: the only reason Cloud would experience MOTFs is that whatever’s triggered them is significant to him in one way or another. Some part of him must recognize his triggers for them to be triggers at all. It’s clear he doesn’t consciously understand the meaning of his MOTF triggers, just like his Jenova triggers: for example, Cloud doesn’t know why Zack’s name causes him to experience psychic interference, but it sure does. We as players know Cloud’s MOTFs are hinting at Aerith’s fated death because of our awareness of OG, but as a character navigating the OG timeline, Remake Cloud shouldn't even be unconsciously aware of Aerith’s eventual death in the slightest! Whatever the nature of the MOTFs, it’s essential to understand that if Cloud “[recognizes]” Aerith’s face the first time he sees her, it must mean some part of him knows Aerith’s face in the first place. If this recognition triggers a hallucination of Sephiroth telling Cloud he “can’t protect anyone”, it must mean some part of him knows he was once unable to protect Aerith. The same goes for every other MOTF: subconsciously, Remake Cloud somehow has memories of the OG timeline. Most interestingly, it looks like he either only has OG memories related to Aerith, or like his OG memories of Aerith are simply the only ones prominent enough to trigger his MOTFs. Why and how does Remake Cloud have memories of OG, and why are they so focused on Aerith in particular? What does he know?
When examining a situation with no explanation, it’s wise to examine similar situations that have already been explained. Maybe the mystery of Remake Cloud’s MOTFs will become more approachable if we consider the cases of the only other Remake characters who seem to know the future: Aerith and Sephiroth. Remake Sephiroth knows the future of the OG timeline because his consciousness exists beyond time in the Lifestream, while Remake Aerith likely obtained her knowledge of the future from post-OG Aerith’s spirit via the Lifestream. But what about Cloud? Where does his weaker, fragmented knowledge come from?
(continued in part 2)

I seem to be at an impasse and I just can't seem to figure out this game. I just came from finishing Fallout3 to which I had a great time. I hopped into FNV after recommendations from the Fallout community, but so far it's gone.. not well and I'm really close to just giving up.
1) The food doesn't heal and wears off in seconds. The books of various topics also expires in seconds. Sleep and stimpacks can't be the only way to heal up in the midst of a gunfight, not to mention that Stimpacks are rare! I've been looking in all the usual places, med kit boxes, random containers, dead people, etc...
2) The guns suck! All of them. Even if fixed to 100%! I have a variety of weapons and have even modded a few, but I can't seem to kill anyone or anything with any semblance of regularity even with using VATS. If I don't get that first headshot off on a crit (with or without VATS), I'm going to die. If there's more than one person I'm battling, I'm going to die. I even have the DLCs and supposedly start off with good guns but not that I can tell thanks to the amount of times I've had to reload.
3) The Karma system seems to be completely screwed up. Why am I getting bad karma for stealing from .... the powder gangers? The same a**holes that just tried to blow me up with dynamite. I don't give two sticks about how the powder gangers think of me, I thought I was supposed to destroy them after what they tried in Goodsprings?
4) I can't go ANYWHERE outside of Goodsprings without getting owned by the wildlife! Radscorpions, bloatflies, more scorpions, a couple of centaurs, cazadores, raiders, viper clan thugs, powder gangers, etc. just seem to walk all over me.
5) Everything wants level 50! I can't pick this lock without 50 lockpick. Can't hack that terminal without level 50, can't fart without being level 50, oh but I can die a lot at level 1.
6) The bad-guy-detector in the HUD (the lines that show the cardinal direction and whether or not a particular entity is hostile) is laughably narrow in some cases and extends to ridiculous lengths in others. Using the dry lakebed as an example, I saw three scorpions that didn't even register in the HUD, meanwhile the HUD will show me a neutral party that's two miles away that I don't even have line of sight to. At least with FO3, the red dots were bad guys, the green dots were good guys, and it was fairly consistent 1/4 mi radius from the player's position.
I really need some guidance. I want to get to the story but I can't even exist without something taking a chunk out of me. I've already rebuilt my character twice, do I need to do it again? Are there any guides available that are trusted that can at least get me buffed up enough to even consider going to NV?
Steam says I've played for 12 hours, there's at least two character recreations, and countless reload-from-saves due to random encounters going generally poorly. 12hrs into Fallout3 and I already had a pretty effective arsenal up and was up to at least level 8 or 9.
Preferred playstyle: Sniper, not that I can find a sniper rifle to save my life. Close quarters combat even with the caravan shotgun seems to be more miss than hit even at point blank range and CQC with the grenade launcher (see the Powdergangers jail shootouts) really just seems to be adept at killing me and me only.
My current stats: Level 6
Skills: Barter 15 Energy Weapons 22 Explosives 22 Guns 47 Lockpick 37 Medicine 25 Melee Weapons 21 Repair 45 Science 30 Sneak 40 Speech 35 Survival 15 Unarmed 15
SPECIAL: Strength 5 Perception 6 Endurance 4 Charisma 1 Intelligence 9 Agility 8 Luck 9
Perks: Built To Destroy Educated Run 'n Gun Small Frame Swift Learner
Suggestions, tips, guidance is appreciated! Thank you.

Term: Simile

Definition:
A simile is a figure of speech that compares two different things using "like" or "as" to make the comparison more vivid or explicit.
Example: "Her smile was as bright as the sun."
Freewrite Prompt:
As the clock struck midnight, the old house creaked and moaned, its sounds like a choir of ghosts singing tales of forgotten secrets.

First off, Nazi Germany was definitely a totalitarian state and Hitler was clearly THE leader who would not tolerate any dissent against him. Also I'm not saying Hitler wasn't responsible, he definitely was. But I find it curious that a lot infamous things that Nazi Germany did was much less Hitler micro-managing things and much more his subordinates than I previously thought.
Compared to fellow dictator Stalin who's infamous for personal orders such as "No Step Back", a lot of memorable actions of Nazi Germany were not done by Hitler himself. For example.
-Goebbels was the one making the infamous "Total War" speech, I mean he was the propagandist, but that's surprising such a famous speech wasn't done by Hitler himself -The Final Solution & its specific details was mostly planned by Himmler and the SS (Not that that Wehrmacht was clean, but that should be common sense)
While Hitler definitely played a huge part in running Nazi Germany & was the man topping it all, could he had really done a great purge Soviet-Style and center it around himself rather than his subordinates? Apart from Operation Valkyrie which was done by the Wehrmacht, was Hitler really secure in his position of power within the NSDAP itself? Yes Night of the Long Knifes was a purge of political opponents, but that's typical of every totalitarian state.

First off, Nazi Germany was definitely a totalitarian state and Hitler was clearly the leader who would not tolerate any dissent against him. Also I'm not saying Hitler wasn't responsible for whatever happened whether he or a subordinate, he definitely was for all of it. But I find it very interesting that a lot of things that Nazi Germany did was much less Hitler micro-managing things and much more his subordinates than I previously thought.
Compared to fellow dictator Stalin who's infamous for personal orders such as "No Step Back", a lot of memorable actions of Nazi Germany were not done by Hitler himself. For example.

• Goebbels was the one making the infamous "Total War" speech, I mean he was the propagandist, but that's surprising such a famous speech wasn't done by Hitler himself
• The Final Solution & its specific details was mostly planned by Himmler and the SS (Not that that Wehrmacht was clean, but that should be common sense)

While Hitler definitely played a huge part in running Nazi Germany & was the man topping it all, could he had really done a great purge Soviet-Style and center it around himself rather than his subordinates? Apart from Operation Valkyrie (which was done by the Wehrmacht), was Hitler really almighty in his position of power within the NSDAP itself? Not necessarily the security of his position, but his ability to tune Nazi Germany to his liking. Yes Night of the Long Knifes was a purge of political opponents, but that's typical of every totalitarian state.

There is great benefit, these days, in having a name unlike any other: you float to the top of Google searches. Bolerium Books, in San Francisco, knows this well, although it wasn’t a consideration when it first opened, in 1981. Bolerium’s co-owner, John Durham, runs through any number of explanations for the name, depending on whose leg he wants to pull and how hard. “It was an ancient road in Roman times,” he intoned recently, “large, funny, and sluggish,” while another co-owner, Alexander Akin, roundly mouthed, “Not true.” (The word is a Roman one for Land’s End, in Cornwall, England. The bookstore was once a bit closer to the ocean.) Fittingly, there is no other place like Bolerium, not on the Internet nor in the province of the real. Similes come steadily, none of which really seem to fit. Perhaps Durham’s is best. “We’re like a platypus,” he told me recently, “ugly as fuck and all sorts of parts.”.
This moment of serious American protest against Trump has led to one of Bolerium Books’ best sales years ever.Photograph by Thor Swift / NYT / Redux.
At last count, the store contained 67,385 single titles in stock. Estimates of the time that has elapsed since the last deep cleaning ranged from a jokey “twenty years ago” to a hemming “define ‘clean.’ ” “Nature abhors a vacuum,” Durham quickly noted. A store map gestures at the sheer amount of stuff, with sections labelled as “Reef of Flotsam” or “Onset of Confusion” (right by the entrance), or, in one cramped corner, “Hell.”
The semi-barbed humor protects something serious and deeply essential. Few people walk in (“the door is locked to keep out the unworthy,” Durham wrote in response to a negative Yelp review, though he made sure to mention the password, “swordfish”). Those who do manage to enter find, three floors above one of the Mission District’s busiest intersections, a vast and quiet space populated by seven staff members, thousands of books about and from social movements, densely packed rows of pamphlets and ephemera, and, in the adjacent storage room, great snowbanks of paper. These snowbanks, or “midden heaps,” as Durham calls them, are from attics, basements, personal archives, and libraries across the country. They have all been sold or donated to Bolerium. In them, evidence of the past is to be found, possibly reckoned with, and then, hopefully, sold.
From Bolerium’s snowbanks have come copies of On Our Backs (a lesbian erotic magazine put out in response to the anti-pornography publication Off Our Backs), century-old postcards of pacifist Doukhobors protesting in the nude, intricate Black Panther posters and handbills, an issue of Lumberjack (“with appendix on musical saw”), and the famous inter-commune Kaliflower newsletters from early-nineteen-seventies San Francisco. But with a staff so expert that they can translate a Mongolian treatise on traditional Oirat law using a handmade cheat sheet, classifications like “famous” and “obscure” begin to blur. So do “past” and “present.” Rather than a platypus, maybe the store is more like an estuary: the disparate holdings mingle, rolling in and out according to murky tides. (If you visit the Web site and browse the digital catalog by date, the tides begin to feel more explicable; one week, for example, carries a huge wave of Alan Watts-related material. The next week brings a crush of gay romance novels.) At Bolerium, for better and worse, you can wade around in what Durham calls “the primary source material for history.”
Here is an 1838 publication by the American Anti-Slavery Society and a brochure arguing for the Equal Rights Amendment. A pamphlet from a 1928 speech by Marcus Garvey sits not far from a publication on “incidents in the Life of Eugene V. Debs” written by his brother, Theodore (once, before an important speech, a piece of barbed wire tore “a great rent in [Debs’s] trousers . . . the flap of which hung down like the ear of a Missouri houn’ pup”). Among many other small, sheeny pins is a button from the 1990 AIDS Walk in San Francisco. Here are fliers that passed from hand to hand at protests, meant to convince, assuage, and inflame, and here’s a lump of coal from a miners’ strike in Alabama with tiny chicken-scratch wording: “never forget.” Notably, this year of serious American protest has been the store’s best sales year ever.
Not marked on the map is that other part of American history that has, this year and every other, raged—a section that Durham loosely calls “the White Problem” and keeps behind the locked door of a different room altogether. Accessible to scholars and those who know to ask, the spindly bookcases contain titles like “Gun Control Means People Control” and “Fluoridation & Truth Decay,” as well as several publications by the John Birch Society. “You can’t understand American history without understanding the far right,” Durham told me. “What it’s done, its justifications, its tropes and idiocies.”
It was to the deepest corner of the storeroom that the archivist Lisbet Tellefsen was drawn one afternoon. (Tellefsen visits Bolerium as a “treasure hunter,” and has amassed the largest collection of Angela Davis-related material in the world.) One time, she idly tugged out an issue of The Bayviewer, a magazine that once served the historic black neighborhood that James Baldwin characterized as “the San Francisco America pretends does not exist.”
.
The magazine fell open to a page bearing the face of Tellefsen’s father, whom she had not seen since she was two, in an advertisement for his Oldsmobile dealership. That led to an ongoing saga of tracking down half-siblings and cousins found on Ancestry.com. “There is so much history there,” Tellefsen told me. She visits Bolerium once a month, wary of buying back her own consigned material. “It’s so rich with connections. We have an understanding of history, but places like that hold so much.” Bolerium’s official motto, “Fighting Commodity Fetishism with Commodity Fetishism since 1981,” does not quite distill the feeling of holding some of these discoveries between your fingers, or explain the way that ephemera can work to vivify history, very often through its ordinariness. A bit of light browsing recently unearthed a flier from a class reunion of Florida’s first accredited African-American high school, as well as an Electrolux manual from 1933 listing Pope Pius XI as a famous customer.
But history is ongoing, and the present moment needs its collectors. During the Occupy Movement, the store paid a dollar for each flyer or poster that people brought in, then put together a sweeping collection for the British Library. Holdings from contemporary social movements are fairly small, since so much planning, discussing, and arguing takes place on Facebook and Twitter. “Occupy was the last one to have lots of leaflets,” Akin told me, somewhat sadly. Currently, he is collecting material from what he calls the “shock-and-disbelief period” following the 2016 Presidential election. Only from “marinating in the sauce of time” do these things begin to accrue both value and interest.
.
Recently, in one snowbank, Akin found a sketch done in creamy pastel of a basalt mountain and drifting clouds. Tiny guard towers dotted the background. It was a drawing of the view from Tule Lake Segregation Center, the largest of the incarceration camps that held Japanese-Americans during the Second World War, and the one which held those people deemed by the government to be “disloyal.” The artist was a man named Tomokazu, surname unknown, who resided for over thirty-five years in Plumas County, California, before being imprisoned at Tule Lake. The piece of paper sat among countless others all bearing dispatches of one kind or another from the past, which is not a foreign country, really, but a place hovering just under our present, and made of paper and ink, buttons, and voices.
https://xenagoguevicene.wordpress.com/2020/08/12/bolerium-books-the-san-francisco-bookstore-where-the-revolution-ends-up-by-lucy-schiller-the-new-yorker-20-sept-2018/

In the Era of Fear I Comfort them with Great Love
Anita Moorjani was cured from cancer not because of a certain medicine, vaccine or chemotherapy. She was cured because of this Great Love. Anita Moorjani is a forty years old woman who is simple and honest. She was born in India, grew up in Singapore and was English educated. Later she went to Hong Kong. She knows Tamil, English and Cantonese. In 2002 the doctor said that she was down with cancer lymphoma or the blood cell tumor. After four years, in 2006 seventy percent of her body is covered with the cancerous cells. She stayed in the hospital, suffering terribly because of this illness. Later the doctor pronounced her death. After three days she woke up and was cured miraculously. This is truly inconceivable when she woke up from her death. In her mind she was very sure she was cured already. No treatment was needed. But she was very weak. She could not even talk. The doctor was surprised of her condition and again they carried out a checking on her body and found that she was free from all symptoms of cancer. In her mind she knew she was already cured. In her mind there was a great transformation that she personally experienced. And all the cells on her body were transformed into healthy cells. Later she wrote a book entitles: After dying once I finally learn to love’ By looking at this title, it coincides with Master Shan Dao’s teaching on the one with deep faith in the dharma. He said, ‘Standing here is waiting to die. Going forward is also death. Turning back, I too cannot escape from death.’ This can be found in the ‘Analogy of two rivers and one white lane’ the three sure deaths. If we have died once, we will truly give ourselves up. This is the same as the Pure Land teaching that we have to admit we are the sinful mundane man. We lose all hope as we have no ways to leave the triple realm. In cultivation we need to really undergo a total death in order to really practise the path. The zen cultivator says this is known as undergoing great death and great living. Otherwise, no real cultivation can be expected because most of us are very arrogant, very self-centred, without much changes in our stubborn mindset. That is why she said after dying once only she managed to learn how to love. In the Pure Land door this is known as having deep faith. Such a man will surely have faith in Amitabha’s 48 vows to gather in living beings without any doubts and suspicion. By relying on the strength of the Buddha’s Vows we will surely attain a rebirth. This is living in the great love of Namo Amitabha Buddha. We receive the love of Amitabha Buddha. Only then we can have the genuine love and we are able to learn to love. If we do not feel the love of Amitabha Buddha, we will not know how to love. Our love will be frightening as it is an attachment, a desire to control, to possess others. Such a love is impure, it is a threat to us. If we are not careful it might turn into hatred. Such is a frightful kind of love. If we learn from Amitabha Buddha, the love is pure, without condition and transparent. This is truly loving a person. It is not easy to learn this. We look at the couples around us. So many got married and end up in divorce. How about those who do not get a divorce? Yes, they spend the whole life fighting！The truly loving couples are as few as the stars in the broad day light. So, learning to love is our homework for the whole life. It is not easy. Today I would like to discuss this passage with you. After reading her writing I feel most shameful as what the author has said is very true in accord with her experience. Even though I have left home for more than twenty years, receiving the teaching of the Buddha, the guidance of the patriarch, the exhortation of my Master, the help of my lotus friends and all, I still feel I am lacking in genuine practice and virtues. On the contrary this lady has not met with the Buddha Dharma. She has such an awakening after dying once, it is truly a gain for her. She said, ‘After my body stopped functioning, I entered into another world.’ She was so seriously ill that her heart, her liver and everything stopped functioning. This is to show there is a world after death. She said, ‘I saw myself as a very wonderful person. This is because I was not terrorised until I had a change in shape.’ ‘I felt there was this vibrant energy around me and I was able to enter it. I realise if a man can see his wonderful existence, he must be the happiest man.’ Most of us like to complain about our imperfect existence. We often think thus, ‘I do not have enough money. I am not healthy. I am not pretty. I do not have enough clothing ….’ Here we must learn to see the good points in us, to appreciate the value of our existence. A woman who can say like this is truly very calm in mind. A man who always complains about himself will not be able to live happily each day. So, without knowing the love of Amitabha for us, we will be a great complainer. We complain about no money, we complain about our look, our wrinkles and so on and so forth. What kind of life will this be with so many complaints? She said, ‘I found that there was this power surrounding me.’ When we pass away, we will no longer be using our eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body and mind to observe. Instead, we will be awakened to our innate Buddha. She felt she is surrounded by this vibrant field of energy and she is also this energy. What kind of power is this? It is a kind of energy. It is always in the universe or the dharma realm in the Buddhist terms. In fact, this is Amitabha Buddha. This is the strength of the Buddha Nature. She uses her Buddha Nature to experience the Buddha Nature. It exists forever. It is neither born nor become extinct. If the Buddha enters the world or does not enter the world, it is always there without changing. Of course, she does not use these Buddhist terms. She said, ‘When I give up the attachment to the mundane world, I enter another world effortlessly. It is unnecessary to pray, to recite a sutra or to give a dharma talk. It is unnecessary to seek forgiveness, repentance or other methods.’ ‘Death gives me the feeling that I do not need to do anything. It is just as though I am telling someone I am coming to the end. I cannot do anything anymore. I give up. Whatever you want to do I will just accept.’ I feel that this passage is very near in meaning to the Pure Land’s view. It means when we die, we have just to let go as nothing can be done anymore. Most people die in torment as there are many attachments in this world. They are worried about their children, money and work. Some people find it difficult to die. So, from here we must learn to let go when it is our turn to leave the world. Moreover, we have the promise from Amitabha Buddha who will come to receive us in accord with the strength of his vows. It is much easier for us. This lady just let go and she entered another world. Her state should be quite high too. I will explain below. I feel that she had arrived at the border of the Pure Land. Her state of an awakened mind showed that she was not in the heaven. She seemed to be enlightened to the Buddha nature and non -existence of a self. She experienced the light of enlightenment and returned to life, to lead a life of love. So, in our practice we are told to let go of all attachment and to wish for a rebirth in the Pure Land relying on Amitabha’s strength of vows. So from here we can see it is very easy to be born in the World of Ultimate Bliss. She said it is unnecessary to recite a sutra, a dharma or seeking for forgiveness. She enters the other world naturally when she simply gives up herself. I remember once I went with my Master to console a dying man. I was very touched by my Master’s words. He said kindly to the man who is on the verge of death, ‘So and so, now we will recite Namo Amitabha Buddha. If you can recite, then recite together. If you can’t, just lay down and relax. It is ok if you just listen to our recitation.’ Are not these words very comforting? The dying man will feel very safe and relax. But if you were to say, ‘So and so, this is the last chance. Bring out all your strength to face death. If you can recite then recite together. If you cannot recite, you must try also!’ On listening to this threat, the sick man is stressed out. He will die instantly as he has no strength to join in recitation. The Master who with his great love understands the rescue of Amitabha Buddha is a natural process that he is able to say in such a comforting way. No condition is needed. There is no threat nor fright in his words. A man who threatens people is not calm as he must be frightened too in his mind. That is why what he says will frighten people, giving stress to others. If we are loving in our mind, our words will only bring love, peace and calm to others. People will feel our love for them. So, this lady says it is unnecessary to read or recite any prayer or seeking forgiveness. This is because the wavelength of her mind is on a par with the great love of the universe. She naturally enters it. Namo Amitabha Buddha is a dharma that requires no seeking or pleading. It is a dharma of rescue without condition. When we recite Namo Amitabha Buddha, the wavelength of our mind is the same as Amitabha Buddha. So, we will attain a rebirth naturally. Many of us who do not understand the kindness of Amitabha Buddha will seek a rebirth by pleading to the Buddha every day. His mind is unsettled and frightened that he might be left out. This is because he does not understand when he recites the Buddha’s name, the wavelength of his mind is in the same frequency with Amitabha Buddha’s mind and vows. Then people will ask, ‘Do we still go to recite the Buddha’s Name for the dying man?’ ‘Yes, of course.’ This is because the dying man has yet to understand this point. When we recite for him, he will be safe in the shine of Namo Amitabha Buddha. This is a method which is bestowed upon us to save us with this Name in accord with the strength of the Buddha’s vows. When she says to somebody, this refers to Amitabha Buddha. She says she cannot do anything anymore and she gives up. She gives herself up to the Buddha. So, when we die do not try to fight with death and refuse to die. We must just admit we are the offender and we need the help of Amitabha Buddha to take us, to rescue us. Namo is to admit we take refuge in the Buddha, we surrender ourselves. When we cultivate this door, we must not add in our ideas. We must just let Amitabha Buddha to decide for us. This is because Amitabha has the power of great vow, the extensive great strength of the Buddha Nature, the strength of immeasurable light, the strength of immeasurable lifespan. We just have to give up all planning. He will plan for us. So, when we recite the Name of the Buddha, just recite without thinking of doing this or that trying so hard to reach a certain acceptable standard. These are all unnecessary. This type of thinking is the habit of the sagely path cultivators. When we sit on the plane, just sit there. The plane will bring you to your destiny. It is unnecessary for you to help the plane to fly. Amitabha Buddha the pilot does not need you to fly the plane. If he needs your help then he is not known as Amitabha Buddha. Anita said, ‘In the other world, I found that my mind is very clear and bright. I realise by myself that I will only die out of the fear and terror in my mind.’ These words are very true. Clarity of mind means her mind is pure. In this world our mind is turbid, dark and deluded. That is why are enveloped in all kinds of worries and terror. But once we arrive at the Pure Land, we will naturally be pure and bright. This is because the land is pure and is enveloped in bright illumination. She said she naturally know she will be cured. This knowing ability is possessed by us originally. No learning is needed because our Buddha nature is originally pure and bright. In the Saha world our ability is being covered up by afflictions. But when we arrive at the World of Ultimate Bliss, we will naturally possess this ability. This ability reappears relying on the strength of Vows of Amitabha Buddha. When we arrive at the Pure Land, we will naturally possess the ability to make offerings to the Buddha. On hearing one sentence we are enlightened to the millions. Our mind is opened up to the thousands of million Dharanis. Everyone of us have this innate ability. And Amitabha Buddha’s strength of Vows enhances its opening. In this Saha World our innate nature is all covered up and cannot function. In the world of ultimate bliss, by relying on Amitabha Buddha’s strength of great vows, our innate ability is open up. So they are not contradicting. ‘I naturally know the source of the thought that I will die. The source is I was frightened. If there is no fear, there is no death.’ In actuality there is no death. It is only our fear of death that this illusion comes froth. In Buddha dharma we should know death itself is an illusion. Time is also an illusion. That is why the Buddha speaks all the Sutra in this manner, ‘Thus have I heard, at one time the Buddha was…..’ No specific time is stated. Now the physics has proven its illusory. As time is an illusion, it does not exist. Let me give you an example of what is meant by death. It is as if we are driving a car into a tunnel. The shape of the tunnel resembles that of a tomb. And we keep on driving into it. We say we are entering the tomb, that we are going to die soon. We are threatened as the entrance represents death. We continue on our journey in the tunnel and later leave the tunnel, again travelling on our way to another destiny. The entrance of the tunnel, the funeral wreath looks like the tomb. For us, death is a terrible idea that we are fearful of it. We do not know life is a continuity and there is no death. It is our wrong concept that there is this section of birth and death. No one can do anything about it until they personally realise it. ‘I am unable to live out my real self as I have too much worried.’ Most of us live in this world wearing a mask. If everyone of us is free to show our real self this is the most beautiful side of a self. Why cannot we live the way we should live? It is because we are always burdened with worries. We are worried we are not good enough. We are worried that our parents will scold us. We are worried our teacher will get angry and criticize us. We are worried about losing face. We only live for others. We lose our life away trying to accord to others’ expectation. We lose the light of a happy life. Our life is controlled by all these worrisome thoughts. But if we truly recite the Buddha’s Name, our mind will be at ease. Amitabha Buddha takes away our worries by replacing them with Namo Amitabha Buddha. We will realise all these worries and views are not important and we will gradually pay no attention to them. Our true life is Buddha recitation. That is our real identity. Our mind will be at ease as we will pay no attention to those unreal things, words and ideas. Our worries only arise when we care too much about the mundane matters. The author has not learnt about Buddhism. This is her experience in death. What she has written is very personal, true experience, not something that we learn from a book. Her experience gives her an awakening to the reality of life and she lives out her life in this awakening. I saw her video and I feel she is an enlightened person. An enlightened person may not be replete with spiritual penetration. But she will reveal her love in her daily living. She is calm at ease and without any sense of fear in her mind. She leads her life in a genuine way. She said, ‘I know that cancer is not a punishment neither is it a retribution. Cancer is my energy capacity which reveals itself on my body. Because of my fear I am unable to reveal the beautiful self in me. And this is the job which should be carried out by me. I know that cancer is not a punishment which is forced on me. It is not an external force of retribution.’ This is what we often do when certain things happen, we will try to find an excuse or put the blame on reward or retribution. We treat the misfortune with anger and hatred. We often have this tendency to catogorise every happening in accord with the cause or reason. In Buddhism we talk about cause and effect. As she is not a Buddhist she says, ‘Cancer appears as a result of a change in my energy capacity. This energy shows itself in the form of cancer.’ This is because she lives in fear and worries. She does not live out her real happy self. So if we the Buddha recitation cultivators are able to reveal the bright side of life, to live without worries, there will be no more cancer for us. This is her understanding about life. That is why I have often said, ‘Lead a life of a mundane man and recite the Buddha’s Name sincerely.’ We should lead a life of Amitabha Buddha. Our life will be full of light and blessings. And we will become more loving. Finally we will lead a comfortable life and people around us will be comfortable also. This itself is the propagation of the dharma of love. Otherwise, if we cannot live a loving life, there is no point talking about anything as they will be useless. Anita said, ‘In that state which is vast and limitless, I found that I am too strict with myself. I keep on whipping myself.’ Can we feel the existence of being vast and limitless? No. We are often limited by our surrounding. As she had entered the limitless vastness, she is able to know her whole life. She knows her fault is being too strict with herself. In fact, most of us are very strict with ourselves, demanding ourselves to be like this or that. She said, ‘No one is punishing me. The person whom I cannot forgive is I myself. I have abandoned myself. I do not love myself. This matter is none of others’ business.’ No one from outside comes to punish us. It is we who punish ourselves. We cannot forgive our selves. We add on a lot of unnecessary locks and chains on ourselves. What is more for us the Buddha reciters? If we recite the Buddha’s name and on the other hand, we add on ourselves lots of locks and chains whence Amitabha Buddha is trying to unlock us, isn’t this a most pitiful situation?’ She said that she had abandoned herself. It means we throw ourselves away and become a lone ranger, an isolated person living a life of sadness, a live without love. Look at a baby. Her eyes are clear as the baby is a simple being, just like a simple puppies or baby cat. The baby can play with chickens, puppis as she does not give rise to diffentiation. Not everyone of us is like Anita. But every one of us can recite the Buddha’s name. When we recite the Buddha’s name, we will be calm. Amitabha Buddha said, ‘In the world of fear I comfort them with great love.’ It is because all the worries are gone when we accomplish Buddhahood at the Pure Land. We will not be so worried about our poverty, health problem, ugliness, stupidity, inability to recite a sutra, a mantra. All these are unimportant as finally I will become a Buddha in the Buddha Land. We will be more humorous. For example, if we are ugly we will use it as a joke. It does not matter at all. Because all the external states are not you. The real self, our real life is the Buddha’s Name. It is our true identity. It will bring ease to our mind. A baby is pure. But as it grows up, it starts to abandon himself. A baby resembles a glass of pure water. When he grows up, his greed starts to accumulate when he wants a toy, a book, good results, money, benefits, fame women and so on. All these are placed in the glass of water. Everything is a piece of mud that we put in out glass. The more we put into the glass, the more the water will flow out. This water is the genuine self. We abandon the true self, chase it out with our greed. We fill ourselves with all the rubbish. The genuine blessings and bliss are chased away. We lead an opaque life without transparency. Our life become a glass of muddy water and we live in great torment. The more we obtain, the more we lose ourselves. That is why the Buddha is truly kind. He and his disciples lead a life of a beggar. When you have nothing, you will be happy and relax. The mind retains its purity. Human beings are deluded as they think to possess a wife, children, a house, a car are called blessings. A man who truly loves himself does not love money, sex, fame, food, sleep. These five desires are the knives that will cut us into pieces and bring on great sufferings. Anita said, ‘I realise I am the child of the beautiful universe. As long as I exist, I will obtain this unconditional love.’ This is very good. I would like to make the following changes, ‘I realize that I am the son of the adorned Amitabha Buddha.’ In Buddhism we use adorned to replace the word beautiful. The universe is this Amitabha Buddha. In the Sutra we are told Amitabha Buddha is the Treasury Body of the Dharma Realm. Amitabha Buddha exists in the whole of the Dharma Realm. Of course, there are also the reward body and transformation bodies beside the dharma body. Amitabha Buddha is the immeasurable wisdom and lifespan. Anita says that the universal energy is abundant and inexhaustible, vast and without limits. This is the existence of the Buddha Nature. She says as long as she exists, she will surely obtain the unconditional love. I often also say, ‘No conditions are required for us to receive the love and rescue of Amitabha Buddha.’ Let us take the analogy of a tree. As long as it exists, it will receive the sunlight. No other condition is needed. So it is the same for the house and everything on earth. Amitabha Buddha’s Name is also known as the Light that Far-surpassing the Sun and Moon. Amitabha Buddha’s light pervasively illumines all the living beings and things in the world. As long as we exist, we will receive the light of the Buddha, the protection of his loving kindness and rescue. It is unnecessary for us to become somebody so as to receive the unconditional rescue of Amitabha Buddha. Our Master Hui Jing also wrote a book on the ‘Unconditional Rescue of the Buddha.’ Some people cannot believe. He says, ‘If this is the case everyone will commit evils.’ Such a thinking is negative and full of fear as his mind is dwelling in darkness. He is afraid that the world will go upside down. He cannot understand that as long as there is the existence, may they be a cat, a dog, a hell being, they will be taken care of by Amitabha Buddha. The only condition is they exist. This reminds me of the words of Great Master Tan Luan, ‘The future scholars who hear about the rescue of the Buddha, the rescue that relies on other’s strength, he should give rise to faith. Do not refuse such a chance. It is being stupid.’ Do not think that you should do this and that to obtain the rescue? Amitabha Buddha did not ask you to do anything. He says, ‘Living beings in the ten directions who have faith in me.’ It means they exist and the Buddha will be there to save them. Buddha recitation is not a condition. It is just a method of saving. Anita says, ‘I do not have to do anything to obtain this love.’ Just like a blade of grass in the water. Does it need to do anything to obtain water? It is unnecessary. As long as it exists, it is surrounded by the water. As long as we exist, we are surrounded by the love of Amitabha Buddha. We do not need to do anything to obtain this love and care. Once we know this, we will be fearless and calm at ease. This is the same as the sunlight which shine on the mountain and also the valley. In our life no matter what level we are we will receive the illumination of Amitabha Buddha. Anita says, ‘No prayer, no seeking is needed.’ Amitabha’s rescue is there always. As long as we recite, we will be saved by him. Amitabha Buddha says, ‘All living beings in the ten directions who call on me will be saved by me. You only have to say out my name.’ You say you are dumb and cannot call the name. Such a man who understands the rescue of Buddha will also be saved even if he cannot pronounce the Name. But if you are unwilling, you are creating an obstacle for yourself. That is why our dharma door is known as the ‘The Dharma is taught without being asked.’, the ‘Befriend us without being asked’. As long as we trust him, he will come personally to take us to his Pure Land. On hearing that nothing is needed to be done, some will be confused. They want to do something, to clean the altar, to change the water, to offer some fruits and incense, to sit in meditation and so on. They think this will help them to attain a rebirth. They have to do something. They do not realise what they need to do is to reveal the beautiful self, to lead the adorned life and let themselves become the love. As long as we sit there and lead a loving life we are in accord with the love of the Buddha Amitabha. When the sun is shining, you say, ‘It is good. A shiny day.’ When it is raining, you say, ‘Very good. It is raining now.’ When it snows, you say, ‘Good, I love snow.’ This way of living is to add the positive loving energy to this universe. You are spreading the pure and harmony energy to the universe. In the Buddha Dharma it is known as the lights shine on one another. The whole universe will receive the positive energy of your loving and harmonious mind. So, what you need to do is to recite Namo Amitabha Budda loudly, softly, silently. All will be ok. If we live this way, Amitabha Buddha will be most happy to see us. It is just like a child who is sleeping in the cradle. Doing nothing. What do you think? Will the mother be happy to see him like that? Yes, of course. She will be very glad with him just sleeping there. Nothing has to be done. A child in the arms of his mother is the revelation of total trust. And this is the same for us to be in the arms of Amitabha Buddha. We just relax and trust him. We will lead a happy life. And this is the genuine way of living in accord with the love of oneself. More often than not we lead a life with worries, fear, twisted emotions and trying to cover up our faults. Our adorned life cannot be revealed. Everyday, we live in fear and worries. This is adding chains and locks to ourselves. Anita says, ‘I have never truly loved myself before. I have never valued my existence. I have never seen the adorned soul in me.’ She uses soul to describe herself. In the Buddha Dharma this refers to the beauty and adorned Buddha Nature. She said, ‘I am so beautiful yet I have never realised it. It is replaced with the hard facts of mundane existence. I decay because I do not understand my beautiful soul.’ In the Buddha Dharma it is described as all living beings are originally the Buddha. Yet we do not live, in accord with our Buddha Nature. We are often controlled by our mundane existence, the salary, the examination results and such like. We forget of our Buddha Nature. We lead a life of decay, a life of erosion. This is the General path of Buddhism. From the angle of Buddha Recitation, the rescue of Amitabha is always with us, only that we do not realise it. We try all kinds of methods hoping for the Buddha to rescue us. We do not know that we just have to admit we are the mundane men who are covered with offences. There is no other way to save ourselves if we do not rely on Amitabha Buddha. Then we let go and recite the Buddha’s Name wholeheartedly. This is the way to be saved by the Buddha. But most people cannot understand this. They want to do something good, to be pretentious and make out something good of himself, to scold people for their lacking in virtues and such like. This is against the practise of this pure land door. Why cannot the people in the world see their pretention? It is because they are also not living a true life. Their eyes are not clear enough to see through this pretention. A fake man sees something fake and he will treat it as genuine. A clear -headed man will surely be able to see through all these false masks. If we were to wear a false mask for too long it will be difficult to remove it. It has grown on to our skin. It will be painful if we want to remove this fake mask. So it takes time for us to loosen this false mask as we have been wearing them for too long. Anita says, ‘This understanding makes me realise that I do not have to be frightened anymore.’ There is no more fear in her mind. It is a mind of calm and bliss. It is a mind which is full of hope. It is a comforting mind that can soothe others. With this calm and happy mind it is already a contribution to all around us. It is already a protection and mindfulness to all around us. We do not have to do anything at all. Most of us live in fear. We pay for insurance because we are afraid when we get old, we have no money, no money to pay the medical fees. We get married out of fear that we will be lonely. Why do we give birth to children? We are afraid no one will take care of us at old age. Why do we go to school? It is because we are afraid of our mother’s anger. Why must we study hard? We are afraid of our teacher. Why do we go to university? We are afraid people will look down on us. Can we live without fear? We cannot. Even our mother who loves us so much say we will suffer if we do not study hard. From our young age we receive the education of fear. We are threatened by our beloved parents, our responsible teachers. We do not receive the education of love. So, if we love our children, do not add fear to them. We must give only love and courage so that they can face life with their original positive energy, positive strength. This is because the world is full of twisted people, fake people, suffering people. There are very few upright men, genuine men, happy and hopeful men around. I only hope all of you my lotus friends will bring up a future generation who is upright, genuine, happy and hopeful with the strength of Amitabha Buddha. So, we must lead a life based on the right values taught by Amitabha Buddha. If we teach our child to fight for self -benefit, to contend with others, we are making them blind so that they do not see the truth of life. This is harming them. If we are enlightened to this, we will only rely on Amitabha Buddha. We are not afraid to be lonely. We will be at ease. Those who see the light, the warmth of the Buddha will no longer be frightened. Anita says, ‘I realise this is a state that can be reached by myself and everyone.’ In Zen sect it is said all living beings are Buddha. In the Buddha recitation door, everyone can recite the Name, everyone can attain a rebirth and everyone can accomplish Buddhahood. This is the bestowment by Amitabha Buddha. All the things that we fight for may not be beneficial to us. Everything that benefits us are often free. For example, the air we take in every instant is free. We do not pay to stand on the earth. We do not pay to look at the sky above. Whatever we fight and earn to get are valueless. Everything that is valuable is free. In the general practice it is said, ‘No cultivation is the cultivation. Nothing is obtainable. This is the state of a bodhisattva. The original face of all dharma often dwells in the mark of still extinction. Our Buddha Nature is replete with all merits and virtues. We cannot cultivate anything to enhance it. This is because all the things that we can do are only dreams, illusion, bubbles and shadow. Whatever that we do, that we create are not in accord with our Buddha Nature. The Buddha Nature is always there, original and shining out naturally. And in our Pure Land Dharma, whatever we have offered, whatever we have done are not the causes for our attainment of a rebirth. Attaining a rebirth is the state of nothing doing. It stays apart from creation or doing. It is a natural state. Reciting Namo Amitabha Buddha helps us to return to this state. Anita said, ‘So I decided to return to the mundane world.’ She has enlightened to the opportunity of life and she decided to come back to tell us about life. Just like many Pure Land cultivators who say that they will not come back any more to sufferings. Yet when they arrive at the Pure Land and brings forth the Bodhi mind, they will come back by themselves to help other beings. Anita said, ‘When I was on the verge of death, I realised the universe comes forth from unconditional love. I am one of the revelations of this love in my present form.’ For the scientists they will say the universe is made from electron, protons, neutrons and so on. This is talking only at the surface level, the materials. But as she talked from her true experienc,e she can see all the things, all the people are the expression of this universal love. When she comes back from death, she deeply penetrates the genuine love the mother universe and her wavelength is in accord with the universal love. She comes back as a healthy woman. So once there is a change in our mind set, the body, the people and the surroundings will also change. In the eyes of Buddha and Bodhisattva there is no differentiation of filth and purity. Everything is pure and adorned in its own expression. Every one of us is the art piece of this unconditional love or in the Buddha’s words, the Buddha Nature. She said, ‘I cannot change into another form as it is my original expression, original nature of this unconditional love.’ Everything that exists is the expression of the Buddha Nature. Even something which is defiled or unwholesome is also part of the expression of this unconditional everlasting love. That is why the Buddha says, ‘All the Dharma from the original state dwells constantly in still extinction.’ Still extinction refers to Nirvana the state of the Buddha. So, when we recite the Buddha’s Name we will enter the Buddha’s dwelling. ‘The energy capacity of the strength of life forms derives from love. And I am made from the universal energy capacity. On knowing this, I realise I do not need to become somebody else. And my true value will not be depreciated too.’ Anita said, So, it is unnecessary for us to become another man. A business man does not need to become Jack Ma. Why is this so? It is because you are equal to him. He is not higher than you. He has the Buddha Nature and you also have the Buddha Nature. Every one is equal. So we do not need to measure in terms of money especially if we truly know the benefits of Buddha recitation. In the eyes of the Buddha every one of us is a shining star. We do not need to chase after another star. Just imagine the havoc it will be when the stars do not dwell in its orbit and try to chase after another star. What a chaos the universe will become. Everyone of our existence is in perfect conditions in the eyes of the Buddha and Bodhisattva. ‘This is the I that I have always wanted to be.’ she said. We must learn to appreciate ourselves, accept ourselves and love ourselves. This ‘I’ is invaluable under the unconditional love of the Rescue of Amitabha Buddha. We are his precious sons, the pearls on his hand. If we are accepted by the Buddha, we will be so happy as we will have no complaint about ourselves. We are often surrounded by people who keep on complaining about us. The first one is our mother who says that we are not clever, we have low marks. We are not filial. We earn too little. See how our mother teaches us not to appreciate ourselves. Then we are blamed by our teacher, our classmates, our girl -friend and so on. Then comes Amitabha Buddha who studies us and says, ‘Put aside all the complaints. You are qualified to attain Buddhahood. No problem at all. I give you 100 percent.’ That is why we Buddha Recitation Practitioners are always at ease under the shine of Amitabha Buddha who give us the confirmation. This is the greatest benefits the Buddha bestows upon us. Buddhism brings hope and bliss to the world, the universe. So, in this life’s time we must try our best to lead a life of Amitabha Buddha. Do not be swayed by the mundane values, mundane eyes, mundane perspective. We rely only on the outlook of the Buddha and Bodhisattva. ‘Once we know that we are this love, it is unnecessary to purposely go forth to shower love on others. As long as we are faithful to our original nature, we will automatically become the tools of love, touching the hearts of everyone who have affinity with us.’ This part of her speech is very good. If we are already the lamp, there is no need for us to go out purposely to shine on others. The lamp just stands at its place and it manages to brighten up the place. So, when we are the LOVE, we will naturally touch those around us with our love. Take a look at our Master Hui Jing. He sits there quietly and yet every one of us are calm and happy naturally. So when we become the love, wherever we are, all will feel calm at ease, without any fear. Anita said, ‘The most important thing I have learnt is I am the Love itself. All my fears are gone. This is the reason I come into life again.’ Amitabha Buddha said, ‘I will transform all the fear into great calmness, great serenity’ When We recite His Name we are charged with his love. We also become the love. We will leave behind all fear. ‘My dear, you will always be loved. You do not need to harbour any fear. There is no way for you to commit any errors.’ Always think about these three sentences. There is the light of truth in it. This is spoken by a non -Buddhist who was on the verge of her death and who lives again. How about us the Buddha Recitation Practitioners? Can we deny the love of Amitabha Buddha, His unconditional love of rescue? From this story we know the unconditional love of rescue of the Buddha pervasively surrounds us. We must have faith in this and lead a life of joy with no more fear. Nowadays, everyone lives in fear. We must learn to replete ourselves with love and bring this shine to others, to lead them out of fear. Love yourself and love others. Namo Amitabha Buddha. A dharma talk by Dharma Master Shi Jing Zong, the Abbot of the Hong Yuan Monastery in Anhui, China entitled: Dying Once to Learn to Love Link: https://oridharma.wordpress.com/2020/05/16/in-the-era-of-fear-i-comfort-them-with-great-love/

In the Era of Fear I Comfort them with Great Love
Anita Moorjani was cured from cancer not because of a certain medicine, vaccine or chemotherapy. She was cured because of this Great Love. Anita Moorjani is a forty years old woman who is simple and honest. She was born in India, grew up in Singapore and was English educated. Later she went to Hong Kong. She knows Tamil, English and Cantonese. In 2002 the doctor said that she was down with cancer lymphoma or the blood cell tumor. After four years, in 2006 seventy percent of her body is covered with the cancerous cells. She stayed in the hospital, suffering terribly because of this illness. Later the doctor pronounced her death. After three days she woke up and was cured miraculously. This is truly inconceivable when she woke up from her death. In her mind she was very sure she was cured already. No treatment was needed. But she was very weak. She could not even talk. The doctor was surprised of her condition and again they carried out a checking on her body and found that she was free from all symptoms of cancer. In her mind she knew she was already cured. In her mind there was a great transformation that she personally experienced. And all the cells on her body were transformed into healthy cells. Later she wrote a book entitles: After dying once I finally learn to love’ By looking at this title, it coincides with Master Shan Dao’s teaching on the one with deep faith in the dharma. He said, ‘Standing here is waiting to die. Going forward is also death. Turning back, I too cannot escape from death.’ This can be found in the ‘Analogy of two rivers and one white lane’ the three sure deaths. If we have died once, we will truly give ourselves up. This is the same as the Pure Land teaching that we have to admit we are the sinful mundane man. We lose all hope as we have no ways to leave the triple realm. In cultivation we need to really undergo a total death in order to really practise the path. The zen cultivator says this is known as undergoing great death and great living. Otherwise, no real cultivation can be expected because most of us are very arrogant, very self-centred, without much changes in our stubborn mindset. That is why she said after dying once only she managed to learn how to love. In the Pure Land door this is known as having deep faith. Such a man will surely have faith in Amitabha’s 48 vows to gather in living beings without any doubts and suspicion. By relying on the strength of the Buddha’s Vows we will surely attain a rebirth. This is living in the great love of Namo Amitabha Buddha. We receive the love of Amitabha Buddha. Only then we can have the genuine love and we are able to learn to love. If we do not feel the love of Amitabha Buddha, we will not know how to love. Our love will be frightening as it is an attachment, a desire to control, to possess others. Such a love is impure, it is a threat to us. If we are not careful it might turn into hatred. Such is a frightful kind of love. If we learn from Amitabha Buddha, the love is pure, without condition and transparent. This is truly loving a person. It is not easy to learn this. We look at the couples around us. So many got married and end up in divorce. How about those who do not get a divorce? Yes, they spend the whole life fighting！The truly loving couples are as few as the stars in the broad day light. So, learning to love is our homework for the whole life. It is not easy. Today I would like to discuss this passage with you. After reading her writing I feel most shameful as what the author has said is very true in accord with her experience. Even though I have left home for more than twenty years, receiving the teaching of the Buddha, the guidance of the patriarch, the exhortation of my Master, the help of my lotus friends and all, I still feel I am lacking in genuine practice and virtues. On the contrary this lady has not met with the Buddha Dharma. She has such an awakening after dying once, it is truly a gain for her. She said, ‘After my body stopped functioning, I entered into another world.’ She was so seriously ill that her heart, her liver and everything stopped functioning. This is to show there is a world after death. She said, ‘I saw myself as a very wonderful person. This is because I was not terrorised until I had a change in shape.’ ‘I felt there was this vibrant energy around me and I was able to enter it. I realise if a man can see his wonderful existence, he must be the happiest man.’ Most of us like to complain about our imperfect existence. We often think thus, ‘I do not have enough money. I am not healthy. I am not pretty. I do not have enough clothing ….’ Here we must learn to see the good points in us, to appreciate the value of our existence. A woman who can say like this is truly very calm in mind. A man who always complains about himself will not be able to live happily each day. So, without knowing the love of Amitabha for us, we will be a great complainer. We complain about no money, we complain about our look, our wrinkles and so on and so forth. What kind of life will this be with so many complaints? She said, ‘I found that there was this power surrounding me.’ When we pass away, we will no longer be using our eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body and mind to observe. Instead, we will be awakened to our innate Buddha. She felt she is surrounded by this vibrant field of energy and she is also this energy. What kind of power is this? It is a kind of energy. It is always in the universe or the dharma realm in the Buddhist terms. In fact, this is Amitabha Buddha. This is the strength of the Buddha Nature. She uses her Buddha Nature to experience the Buddha Nature. It exists forever. It is neither born nor become extinct. If the Buddha enters the world or does not enter the world, it is always there without changing. Of course, she does not use these Buddhist terms. She said, ‘When I give up the attachment to the mundane world, I enter another world effortlessly. It is unnecessary to pray, to recite a sutra or to give a dharma talk. It is unnecessary to seek forgiveness, repentance or other methods.’ ‘Death gives me the feeling that I do not need to do anything. It is just as though I am telling someone I am coming to the end. I cannot do anything anymore. I give up. Whatever you want to do I will just accept.’ I feel that this passage is very near in meaning to the Pure Land’s view. It means when we die, we have just to let go as nothing can be done anymore. Most people die in torment as there are many attachments in this world. They are worried about their children, money and work. Some people find it difficult to die. So, from here we must learn to let go when it is our turn to leave the world. Moreover, we have the promise from Amitabha Buddha who will come to receive us in accord with the strength of his vows. It is much easier for us. This lady just let go and she entered another world. Her state should be quite high too. I will explain below. I feel that she had arrived at the border of the Pure Land. Her state of an awakened mind showed that she was not in the heaven. She seemed to be enlightened to the Buddha nature and non -existence of a self. She experienced the light of enlightenment and returned to life, to lead a life of love. So, in our practice we are told to let go of all attachment and to wish for a rebirth in the Pure Land relying on Amitabha’s strength of vows. So from here we can see it is very easy to be born in the World of Ultimate Bliss. She said it is unnecessary to recite a sutra, a dharma or seeking for forgiveness. She enters the other world naturally when she simply gives up herself. I remember once I went with my Master to console a dying man. I was very touched by my Master’s words. He said kindly to the man who is on the verge of death, ‘So and so, now we will recite Namo Amitabha Buddha. If you can recite, then recite together. If you can’t, just lay down and relax. It is ok if you just listen to our recitation.’ Are not these words very comforting? The dying man will feel very safe and relax. But if you were to say, ‘So and so, this is the last chance. Bring out all your strength to face death. If you can recite then recite together. If you cannot recite, you must try also!’ On listening to this threat, the sick man is stressed out. He will die instantly as he has no strength to join in recitation. The Master who with his great love understands the rescue of Amitabha Buddha is a natural process that he is able to say in such a comforting way. No condition is needed. There is no threat nor fright in his words. A man who threatens people is not calm as he must be frightened too in his mind. That is why what he says will frighten people, giving stress to others. If we are loving in our mind, our words will only bring love, peace and calm to others. People will feel our love for them. So, this lady says it is unnecessary to read or recite any prayer or seeking forgiveness. This is because the wavelength of her mind is on a par with the great love of the universe. She naturally enters it. Namo Amitabha Buddha is a dharma that requires no seeking or pleading. It is a dharma of rescue without condition. When we recite Namo Amitabha Buddha, the wavelength of our mind is the same as Amitabha Buddha. So, we will attain a rebirth naturally. Many of us who do not understand the kindness of Amitabha Buddha will seek a rebirth by pleading to the Buddha every day. His mind is unsettled and frightened that he might be left out. This is because he does not understand when he recites the Buddha’s name, the wavelength of his mind is in the same frequency with Amitabha Buddha’s mind and vows. Then people will ask, ‘Do we still go to recite the Buddha’s Name for the dying man?’ ‘Yes, of course.’ This is because the dying man has yet to understand this point. When we recite for him, he will be safe in the shine of Namo Amitabha Buddha. This is a method which is bestowed upon us to save us with this Name in accord with the strength of the Buddha’s vows. When she says to somebody, this refers to Amitabha Buddha. She says she cannot do anything anymore and she gives up. She gives herself up to the Buddha. So, when we die do not try to fight with death and refuse to die. We must just admit we are the offender and we need the help of Amitabha Buddha to take us, to rescue us. Namo is to admit we take refuge in the Buddha, we surrender ourselves. When we cultivate this door, we must not add in our ideas. We must just let Amitabha Buddha to decide for us. This is because Amitabha has the power of great vow, the extensive great strength of the Buddha Nature, the strength of immeasurable light, the strength of immeasurable lifespan. We just have to give up all planning. He will plan for us. So, when we recite the Name of the Buddha, just recite without thinking of doing this or that trying so hard to reach a certain acceptable standard. These are all unnecessary. This type of thinking is the habit of the sagely path cultivators. When we sit on the plane, just sit there. The plane will bring you to your destiny. It is unnecessary for you to help the plane to fly. Amitabha Buddha the pilot does not need you to fly the plane. If he needs your help then he is not known as Amitabha Buddha. Anita said, ‘In the other world, I found that my mind is very clear and bright. I realise by myself that I will only die out of the fear and terror in my mind.’ These words are very true. Clarity of mind means her mind is pure. In this world our mind is turbid, dark and deluded. That is why are enveloped in all kinds of worries and terror. But once we arrive at the Pure Land, we will naturally be pure and bright. This is because the land is pure and is enveloped in bright illumination. She said she naturally know she will be cured. This knowing ability is possessed by us originally. No learning is needed because our Buddha nature is originally pure and bright. In the Saha world our ability is being covered up by afflictions. But when we arrive at the World of Ultimate Bliss, we will naturally possess this ability. This ability reappears relying on the strength of Vows of Amitabha Buddha. When we arrive at the Pure Land, we will naturally possess the ability to make offerings to the Buddha. On hearing one sentence we are enlightened to the millions. Our mind is opened up to the thousands of million Dharanis. Everyone of us have this innate ability. And Amitabha Buddha’s strength of Vows enhances its opening. In this Saha World our innate nature is all covered up and cannot function. In the world of ultimate bliss, by relying on Amitabha Buddha’s strength of great vows, our innate ability is open up. So they are not contradicting. ‘I naturally know the source of the thought that I will die. The source is I was frightened. If there is no fear, there is no death.’ In actuality there is no death. It is only our fear of death that this illusion comes froth. In Buddha dharma we should know death itself is an illusion. Time is also an illusion. That is why the Buddha speaks all the Sutra in this manner, ‘Thus have I heard, at one time the Buddha was…..’ No specific time is stated. Now the physics has proven its illusory. As time is an illusion, it does not exist. Let me give you an example of what is meant by death. It is as if we are driving a car into a tunnel. The shape of the tunnel resembles that of a tomb. And we keep on driving into it. We say we are entering the tomb, that we are going to die soon. We are threatened as the entrance represents death. We continue on our journey in the tunnel and later leave the tunnel, again travelling on our way to another destiny. The entrance of the tunnel, the funeral wreath looks like the tomb. For us, death is a terrible idea that we are fearful of it. We do not know life is a continuity and there is no death. It is our wrong concept that there is this section of birth and death. No one can do anything about it until they personally realise it. ‘I am unable to live out my real self as I have too much worried.’ Most of us live in this world wearing a mask. If everyone of us is free to show our real self this is the most beautiful side of a self. Why cannot we live the way we should live? It is because we are always burdened with worries. We are worried we are not good enough. We are worried that our parents will scold us. We are worried our teacher will get angry and criticize us. We are worried about losing face. We only live for others. We lose our life away trying to accord to others’ expectation. We lose the light of a happy life. Our life is controlled by all these worrisome thoughts. But if we truly recite the Buddha’s Name, our mind will be at ease. Amitabha Buddha takes away our worries by replacing them with Namo Amitabha Buddha. We will realise all these worries and views are not important and we will gradually pay no attention to them. Our true life is Buddha recitation. That is our real identity. Our mind will be at ease as we will pay no attention to those unreal things, words and ideas. Our worries only arise when we care too much about the mundane matters. The author has not learnt about Buddhism. This is her experience in death. What she has written is very personal, true experience, not something that we learn from a book. Her experience gives her an awakening to the reality of life and she lives out her life in this awakening. I saw her video and I feel she is an enlightened person. An enlightened person may not be replete with spiritual penetration. But she will reveal her love in her daily living. She is calm at ease and without any sense of fear in her mind. She leads her life in a genuine way. She said, ‘I know that cancer is not a punishment neither is it a retribution. Cancer is my energy capacity which reveals itself on my body. Because of my fear I am unable to reveal the beautiful self in me. And this is the job which should be carried out by me. I know that cancer is not a punishment which is forced on me. It is not an external force of retribution.’ This is what we often do when certain things happen, we will try to find an excuse or put the blame on reward or retribution. We treat the misfortune with anger and hatred. We often have this tendency to catogorise every happening in accord with the cause or reason. In Buddhism we talk about cause and effect. As she is not a Buddhist she says, ‘Cancer appears as a result of a change in my energy capacity. This energy shows itself in the form of cancer.’ This is because she lives in fear and worries. She does not live out her real happy self. So if we the Buddha recitation cultivators are able to reveal the bright side of life, to live without worries, there will be no more cancer for us. This is her understanding about life. That is why I have often said, ‘Lead a life of a mundane man and recite the Buddha’s Name sincerely.’ We should lead a life of Amitabha Buddha. Our life will be full of light and blessings. And we will become more loving. Finally we will lead a comfortable life and people around us will be comfortable also. This itself is the propagation of the dharma of love. Otherwise, if we cannot live a loving life, there is no point talking about anything as they will be useless. Anita said, ‘In that state which is vast and limitless, I found that I am too strict with myself. I keep on whipping myself.’ Can we feel the existence of being vast and limitless? No. We are often limited by our surrounding. As she had entered the limitless vastness, she is able to know her whole life. She knows her fault is being too strict with herself. In fact, most of us are very strict with ourselves, demanding ourselves to be like this or that. She said, ‘No one is punishing me. The person whom I cannot forgive is I myself. I have abandoned myself. I do not love myself. This matter is none of others’ business.’ No one from outside comes to punish us. It is we who punish ourselves. We cannot forgive our selves. We add on a lot of unnecessary locks and chains on ourselves. What is more for us the Buddha reciters? If we recite the Buddha’s name and on the other hand, we add on ourselves lots of locks and chains whence Amitabha Buddha is trying to unlock us, isn’t this a most pitiful situation?’ She said that she had abandoned herself. It means we throw ourselves away and become a lone ranger, an isolated person living a life of sadness, a live without love. Look at a baby. Her eyes are clear as the baby is a simple being, just like a simple puppies or baby cat. The baby can play with chickens, puppis as she does not give rise to diffentiation. Not everyone of us is like Anita. But every one of us can recite the Buddha’s name. When we recite the Buddha’s name, we will be calm. Amitabha Buddha said, ‘In the world of fear I comfort them with great love.’ It is because all the worries are gone when we accomplish Buddhahood at the Pure Land. We will not be so worried about our poverty, health problem, ugliness, stupidity, inability to recite a sutra, a mantra. All these are unimportant as finally I will become a Buddha in the Buddha Land. We will be more humorous. For example, if we are ugly we will use it as a joke. It does not matter at all. Because all the external states are not you. The real self, our real life is the Buddha’s Name. It is our true identity. It will bring ease to our mind. A baby is pure. But as it grows up, it starts to abandon himself. A baby resembles a glass of pure water. When he grows up, his greed starts to accumulate when he wants a toy, a book, good results, money, benefits, fame women and so on. All these are placed in the glass of water. Everything is a piece of mud that we put in out glass. The more we put into the glass, the more the water will flow out. This water is the genuine self. We abandon the true self, chase it out with our greed. We fill ourselves with all the rubbish. The genuine blessings and bliss are chased away. We lead an opaque life without transparency. Our life become a glass of muddy water and we live in great torment. The more we obtain, the more we lose ourselves. That is why the Buddha is truly kind. He and his disciples lead a life of a beggar. When you have nothing, you will be happy and relax. The mind retains its purity. Human beings are deluded as they think to possess a wife, children, a house, a car are called blessings. A man who truly loves himself does not love money, sex, fame, food, sleep. These five desires are the knives that will cut us into pieces and bring on great sufferings. Anita said, ‘I realise I am the child of the beautiful universe. As long as I exist, I will obtain this unconditional love.’ This is very good. I would like to make the following changes, ‘I realize that I am the son of the adorned Amitabha Buddha.’ In Buddhism we use adorned to replace the word beautiful. The universe is this Amitabha Buddha. In the Sutra we are told Amitabha Buddha is the Treasury Body of the Dharma Realm. Amitabha Buddha exists in the whole of the Dharma Realm. Of course, there are also the reward body and transformation bodies beside the dharma body. Amitabha Buddha is the immeasurable wisdom and lifespan. Anita says that the universal energy is abundant and inexhaustible, vast and without limits. This is the existence of the Buddha Nature. She says as long as she exists, she will surely obtain the unconditional love. I often also say, ‘No conditions are required for us to receive the love and rescue of Amitabha Buddha.’ Let us take the analogy of a tree. As long as it exists, it will receive the sunlight. No other condition is needed. So it is the same for the house and everything on earth. Amitabha Buddha’s Name is also known as the Light that Far-surpassing the Sun and Moon. Amitabha Buddha’s light pervasively illumines all the living beings and things in the world. As long as we exist, we will receive the light of the Buddha, the protection of his loving kindness and rescue. It is unnecessary for us to become somebody so as to receive the unconditional rescue of Amitabha Buddha. Our Master Hui Jing also wrote a book on the ‘Unconditional Rescue of the Buddha.’ Some people cannot believe. He says, ‘If this is the case everyone will commit evils.’ Such a thinking is negative and full of fear as his mind is dwelling in darkness. He is afraid that the world will go upside down. He cannot understand that as long as there is the existence, may they be a cat, a dog, a hell being, they will be taken care of by Amitabha Buddha. The only condition is they exist. This reminds me of the words of Great Master Tan Luan, ‘The future scholars who hear about the rescue of the Buddha, the rescue that relies on other’s strength, he should give rise to faith. Do not refuse such a chance. It is being stupid.’ Do not think that you should do this and that to obtain the rescue? Amitabha Buddha did not ask you to do anything. He says, ‘Living beings in the ten directions who have faith in me.’ It means they exist and the Buddha will be there to save them. Buddha recitation is not a condition. It is just a method of saving. Anita says, ‘I do not have to do anything to obtain this love.’ Just like a blade of grass in the water. Does it need to do anything to obtain water? It is unnecessary. As long as it exists, it is surrounded by the water. As long as we exist, we are surrounded by the love of Amitabha Buddha. We do not need to do anything to obtain this love and care. Once we know this, we will be fearless and calm at ease. This is the same as the sunlight which shine on the mountain and also the valley. In our life no matter what level we are we will receive the illumination of Amitabha Buddha. Anita says, ‘No prayer, no seeking is needed.’ Amitabha’s rescue is there always. As long as we recite, we will be saved by him. Amitabha Buddha says, ‘All living beings in the ten directions who call on me will be saved by me. You only have to say out my name.’ You say you are dumb and cannot call the name. Such a man who understands the rescue of Buddha will also be saved even if he cannot pronounce the Name. But if you are unwilling, you are creating an obstacle for yourself. That is why our dharma door is known as the ‘The Dharma is taught without being asked.’, the ‘Befriend us without being asked’. As long as we trust him, he will come personally to take us to his Pure Land. On hearing that nothing is needed to be done, some will be confused. They want to do something, to clean the altar, to change the water, to offer some fruits and incense, to sit in meditation and so on. They think this will help them to attain a rebirth. They have to do something. They do not realise what they need to do is to reveal the beautiful self, to lead the adorned life and let themselves become the love. As long as we sit there and lead a loving life we are in accord with the love of the Buddha Amitabha. When the sun is shining, you say, ‘It is good. A shiny day.’ When it is raining, you say, ‘Very good. It is raining now.’ When it snows, you say, ‘Good, I love snow.’ This way of living is to add the positive loving energy to this universe. You are spreading the pure and harmony energy to the universe. In the Buddha Dharma it is known as the lights shine on one another. The whole universe will receive the positive energy of your loving and harmonious mind. So, what you need to do is to recite Namo Amitabha Budda loudly, softly, silently. All will be ok. If we live this way, Amitabha Buddha will be most happy to see us. It is just like a child who is sleeping in the cradle. Doing nothing. What do you think? Will the mother be happy to see him like that? Yes, of course. She will be very glad with him just sleeping there. Nothing has to be done. A child in the arms of his mother is the revelation of total trust. And this is the same for us to be in the arms of Amitabha Buddha. We just relax and trust him. We will lead a happy life. And this is the genuine way of living in accord with the love of oneself. More often than not we lead a life with worries, fear, twisted emotions and trying to cover up our faults. Our adorned life cannot be revealed. Everyday, we live in fear and worries. This is adding chains and locks to ourselves. Anita says, ‘I have never truly loved myself before. I have never valued my existence. I have never seen the adorned soul in me.’ She uses soul to describe herself. In the Buddha Dharma this refers to the beauty and adorned Buddha Nature. She said, ‘I am so beautiful yet I have never realised it. It is replaced with the hard facts of mundane existence. I decay because I do not understand my beautiful soul.’ In the Buddha Dharma it is described as all living beings are originally the Buddha. Yet we do not live, in accord with our Buddha Nature. We are often controlled by our mundane existence, the salary, the examination results and such like. We forget of our Buddha Nature. We lead a life of decay, a life of erosion. This is the General path of Buddhism. From the angle of Buddha Recitation, the rescue of Amitabha is always with us, only that we do not realise it. We try all kinds of methods hoping for the Buddha to rescue us. We do not know that we just have to admit we are the mundane men who are covered with offences. There is no other way to save ourselves if we do not rely on Amitabha Buddha. Then we let go and recite the Buddha’s Name wholeheartedly. This is the way to be saved by the Buddha. But most people cannot understand this. They want to do something good, to be pretentious and make out something good of himself, to scold people for their lacking in virtues and such like. This is against the practise of this pure land door. Why cannot the people in the world see their pretention? It is because they are also not living a true life. Their eyes are not clear enough to see through this pretention. A fake man sees something fake and he will treat it as genuine. A clear -headed man will surely be able to see through all these false masks. If we were to wear a false mask for too long it will be difficult to remove it. It has grown on to our skin. It will be painful if we want to remove this fake mask. So it takes time for us to loosen this false mask as we have been wearing them for too long. Anita says, ‘This understanding makes me realise that I do not have to be frightened anymore.’ There is no more fear in her mind. It is a mind of calm and bliss. It is a mind which is full of hope. It is a comforting mind that can soothe others. With this calm and happy mind it is already a contribution to all around us. It is already a protection and mindfulness to all around us. We do not have to do anything at all. Most of us live in fear. We pay for insurance because we are afraid when we get old, we have no money, no money to pay the medical fees. We get married out of fear that we will be lonely. Why do we give birth to children? We are afraid no one will take care of us at old age. Why do we go to school? It is because we are afraid of our mother’s anger. Why must we study hard? We are afraid of our teacher. Why do we go to university? We are afraid people will look down on us. Can we live without fear? We cannot. Even our mother who loves us so much say we will suffer if we do not study hard. From our young age we receive the education of fear. We are threatened by our beloved parents, our responsible teachers. We do not receive the education of love. So, if we love our children, do not add fear to them. We must give only love and courage so that they can face life with their original positive energy, positive strength. This is because the world is full of twisted people, fake people, suffering people. There are very few upright men, genuine men, happy and hopeful men around. I only hope all of you my lotus friends will bring up a future generation who is upright, genuine, happy and hopeful with the strength of Amitabha Buddha. So, we must lead a life based on the right values taught by Amitabha Buddha. If we teach our child to fight for self -benefit, to contend with others, we are making them blind so that they do not see the truth of life. This is harming them. If we are enlightened to this, we will only rely on Amitabha Buddha. We are not afraid to be lonely. We will be at ease. Those who see the light, the warmth of the Buddha will no longer be frightened. Anita says, ‘I realise this is a state that can be reached by myself and everyone.’ In Zen sect it is said all living beings are Buddha. In the Buddha recitation door, everyone can recite the Name, everyone can attain a rebirth and everyone can accomplish Buddhahood. This is the bestowment by Amitabha Buddha. All the things that we fight for may not be beneficial to us. Everything that benefits us are often free. For example, the air we take in every instant is free. We do not pay to stand on the earth. We do not pay to look at the sky above. Whatever we fight and earn to get are valueless. Everything that is valuable is free. In the general practice it is said, ‘No cultivation is the cultivation. Nothing is obtainable. This is the state of a bodhisattva. The original face of all dharma often dwells in the mark of still extinction. Our Buddha Nature is replete with all merits and virtues. We cannot cultivate anything to enhance it. This is because all the things that we can do are only dreams, illusion, bubbles and shadow. Whatever that we do, that we create are not in accord with our Buddha Nature. The Buddha Nature is always there, original and shining out naturally. And in our Pure Land Dharma, whatever we have offered, whatever we have done are not the causes for our attainment of a rebirth. Attaining a rebirth is the state of nothing doing. It stays apart from creation or doing. It is a natural state. Reciting Namo Amitabha Buddha helps us to return to this state. Anita said, ‘So I decided to return to the mundane world.’ She has enlightened to the opportunity of life and she decided to come back to tell us about life. Just like many Pure Land cultivators who say that they will not come back any more to sufferings. Yet when they arrive at the Pure Land and brings forth the Bodhi mind, they will come back by themselves to help other beings. Anita said, ‘When I was on the verge of death, I realised the universe comes forth from unconditional love. I am one of the revelations of this love in my present form.’ For the scientists they will say the universe is made from electron, protons, neutrons and so on. This is talking only at the surface level, the materials. But as she talked from her true experienc,e she can see all the things, all the people are the expression of this universal love. When she comes back from death, she deeply penetrates the genuine love the mother universe and her wavelength is in accord with the universal love. She comes back as a healthy woman. So once there is a change in our mind set, the body, the people and the surroundings will also change. In the eyes of Buddha and Bodhisattva there is no differentiation of filth and purity. Everything is pure and adorned in its own expression. Every one of us is the art piece of this unconditional love or in the Buddha’s words, the Buddha Nature. She said, ‘I cannot change into another form as it is my original expression, original nature of this unconditional love.’ Everything that exists is the expression of the Buddha Nature. Even something which is defiled or unwholesome is also part of the expression of this unconditional everlasting love. That is why the Buddha says, ‘All the Dharma from the original state dwells constantly in still extinction.’ Still extinction refers to Nirvana the state of the Buddha. So, when we recite the Buddha’s Name we will enter the Buddha’s dwelling. ‘The energy capacity of the strength of life forms derives from love. And I am made from the universal energy capacity. On knowing this, I realise I do not need to become somebody else. And my true value will not be depreciated too.’ Anita said, So, it is unnecessary for us to become another man. A business man does not need to become Jack Ma. Why is this so? It is because you are equal to him. He is not higher than you. He has the Buddha Nature and you also have the Buddha Nature. Every one is equal. So we do not need to measure in terms of money especially if we truly know the benefits of Buddha recitation. In the eyes of the Buddha every one of us is a shining star. We do not need to chase after another star. Just imagine the havoc it will be when the stars do not dwell in its orbit and try to chase after another star. What a chaos the universe will become. Everyone of our existence is in perfect conditions in the eyes of the Buddha and Bodhisattva. ‘This is the I that I have always wanted to be.’ she said. We must learn to appreciate ourselves, accept ourselves and love ourselves. This ‘I’ is invaluable under the unconditional love of the Rescue of Amitabha Buddha. We are his precious sons, the pearls on his hand. If we are accepted by the Buddha, we will be so happy as we will have no complaint about ourselves. We are often surrounded by people who keep on complaining about us. The first one is our mother who says that we are not clever, we have low marks. We are not filial. We earn too little. See how our mother teaches us not to appreciate ourselves. Then we are blamed by our teacher, our classmates, our girl -friend and so on. Then comes Amitabha Buddha who studies us and says, ‘Put aside all the complaints. You are qualified to attain Buddhahood. No problem at all. I give you 100 percent.’ That is why we Buddha Recitation Practitioners are always at ease under the shine of Amitabha Buddha who give us the confirmation. This is the greatest benefits the Buddha bestows upon us. Buddhism brings hope and bliss to the world, the universe. So, in this life’s time we must try our best to lead a life of Amitabha Buddha. Do not be swayed by the mundane values, mundane eyes, mundane perspective. We rely only on the outlook of the Buddha and Bodhisattva. ‘Once we know that we are this love, it is unnecessary to purposely go forth to shower love on others. As long as we are faithful to our original nature, we will automatically become the tools of love, touching the hearts of everyone who have affinity with us.’ This part of her speech is very good. If we are already the lamp, there is no need for us to go out purposely to shine on others. The lamp just stands at its place and it manages to brighten up the place. So, when we are the LOVE, we will naturally touch those around us with our love. Take a look at our Master Hui Jing. He sits there quietly and yet every one of us are calm and happy naturally. So when we become the love, wherever we are, all will feel calm at ease, without any fear. Anita said, ‘The most important thing I have learnt is I am the Love itself. All my fears are gone. This is the reason I come into life again.’ Amitabha Buddha said, ‘I will transform all the fear into great calmness, great serenity’ When We recite His Name we are charged with his love. We also become the love. We will leave behind all fear. ‘My dear, you will always be loved. You do not need to harbour any fear. There is no way for you to commit any errors.’ Always think about these three sentences. There is the light of truth in it. This is spoken by a non -Buddhist who was on the verge of her death and who lives again. How about us the Buddha Recitation Practitioners? Can we deny the love of Amitabha Buddha, His unconditional love of rescue? From this story we know the unconditional love of rescue of the Buddha pervasively surrounds us. We must have faith in this and lead a life of joy with no more fear. Nowadays, everyone lives in fear. We must learn to replete ourselves with love and bring this shine to others, to lead them out of fear. Love yourself and love others. Namo Amitabha Buddha. A dharma talk by Dharma Master Shi Jing Zong, the Abbot of the Hong Yuan Monastery in Anhui, China entitled: Dying Once to Learn to Love
https://oridharma.wordpress.com/2020/05/16/in-the-era-of-fear-i-comfort-them-with-great-love/

I’ve been unemployed for about 6 months now, and it’s causing me so much financial and mental distress. I’ve been applying everywhere for every position that I’m qualified for, but nobody wants to hire me.
My opportunities are also limited due to not having reliable transportation. I haven’t been able to save money for a car, since my income has never been sufficient or stable enough.
I have about 5 years of experience on my resume, but my work history is very unimpressive. I’ve never held an important position, I have large gaps in employment, and the longest I’ve ever been at a job is just a little over a year.
I just feel like I experience a lot of unnecessary bullshit that wouldn’t necessarily occur if I didn’t stutter. For instance, I was terminated from my position at Amazon because I was accused of being on drugs and having “slurred speech”.
Yes, that really happened. I won’t go into too much detail because that’s not the point of this thread. It’s just one example of what I’ve experienced as a PWS. People also seem to just treat me like I’m dumb or less capable than others.
How many of you are also currently unemployed, and how is it impacting your life?
For those who’ve experienced long-term unemployment or job instability in the past, what advice can you give to those currently going through it?

we go by “DEBATES ONLY!”, but I want to clarify a few things.
Since we started the sub 3 days ago, we want to be more on the “free-speech” side of Reddit. Meaning that we’re the alternative for debate subs. We obviously allow any and all debates, and we don’t censor “debate comments”.
For now on, we’ll allow all comments that have to do with agreeing to the specific post under these terms:
• You can simply agree to a post in a comment without the comment being deleted by mods. But if you agree in a comment, and give a speech on why then it’s encouraged that you list the appraisal, and why in the same comment.
• When you comment on a post saying you disagree, you must state a debate on why you disagree. You can’t just say “I disagree, you’re wrong”. You need to state a reason too within the comment.
Some things I have been mentioned about for some of the community.
• Mods will delete any super obvious bot generated debate posts if any do get posted. Of course we’d verify through post history and so on if we suspect. We won’t just delete any that we “assume”. These are generally super stupid debates that bots create. I’ve recently seen first-hand in some subs.
• why do I call it “free-ish” speech? Because you can say what you want for debates, and you can say almost what you want in a comment but for example “targeting”, “spam”, and “phishing” is to be deleted. The rules above are simple, and should be a common cause. As we all know, subs especially debate ones aren’t this lenient at all on what’s allowed and so on.
ONE LAST THING: there is only 1 debate topic we can’t allow or else this entire sub will be either deleted or shadowbanned. I can give 2 examples of subs if you dm me. DEBATE OF VACCINES. No, can’t allow that. Reddit doesn’t like it, and is strongly against it for “misinformation”. Offenders won’t be banned, will just be given a light warning with post deletion.
As the owner of the sub, I’ll continue to try my best and the mods too. We’ll continue to keep things as simple as possible for everybody to understand and to agree on. We did end up hitting 100 members in 2 days too! Thank you.
We’re open for any discussions either by comment or private dm.

Myrtle Beach SC News article dated May 15, 2024
Documents Invalid & A.I. Endorsement
FOR REDDITORS UNABLE TO OPEN LINKS
Mica Miller mental health documents not legally notarized
Members of Attorney Tom Winslow’s team sent us a statement that legal medical filings surrounding the Mica Miller mental health issues were not legally notarized.
Mica Miller died of what has been ruled a suicide at Lumber River State Park on April 27th. The FBI is now investigating the case.
Suicide Claims, Mica Miller Mental Health Records, And Notary Issues
Despite the fact Pastor JP Miller admitted from the pulpit to being suicidal in October 2023, just two months later JP was able to receive a health care power of attorney from Mica signed Dec. 5. Tom Winslow, of Winslow Law, was the attorney that orchestrated this legal filing.
Texts received by MyrtleBeachSC News show that Power of Attorney documents were supposedly signed by Mica Miller on December 4th at the Solid Rock church. However, those documents were not notarized by Winslow Law employees (Briyana and Tiffany) until the next day at Winslow’s law office.
According to the S.C. Secretary of State, a notary must be present at the actual signing of such documents to prevent fraud.
Two months later, according to the Myrtle Beach Police Department, Mica was “involuntarily hospitalized” on Feb. 8, 2024. But what makes the case even more odd is that JP’s power of attorney documents were not filed until March 20, 2024, despite having been signed and notarized three months prior.
Is Tom Winslow An Expert At Artificial Intelligence - Deep Fake Voice Audio?
Today, we report on Tom Winslow A.I. claims as he touts the importance of A.I. in his law practice. At the bottom of this article, readers can view terrifying texts sent out by J.P. Miller to Mica in November 2022.
We recently published that Pastor JP Miller, and his attorney, Tom Winslow were persons of interest in the Mica Miller “Suicide” FBI probe. Some readers questioned how we could report this with such confidence at that time.
We need to point out that Tom Winslow and JP Miller are not charged with any crimes, and even if they should be, they are considered innocent until proven guilty.
JP Millers Documented Sexual Encounters
According to DailyMail: “Miller’s first wife, Alison, filed for divorce in 2015 after discovering he was having an affair with Mica, who was 14 years his junior.” Alison also claimed that “Miller had an addiction to prostitutes and had ‘sexual encounters’ with underage girls.” She continued, “He had also confessed to me and other staff members of the church that he had sexual encounters with young females from the church, who were under the age of 16.”
The lawyer representing JP Miller in his first divorce case was S.C. State Representative Val Guest.
Mica's Statements About Suicide
Mica’s sister, Sierra Francis, said, “Mica stated to me on many occasions, ‘If I end up with a bullet in my head’, it was JP,” referring to her husband, John Paul Miller. In a written affidavit, Seirra writes, “I know my sister to have expressed the abuse and violence against her by her husband to others, including family members and members of the church congregation. My sister also expressed to me that she was fearful that she would not make it to the divorce and that her life would be taken from her.”
JP Miller Attorney Tom Winslow A.I Endorsement
In the video above, Tom Winslow touts that his law practice is an advocate for the use of Artificial Intelligence. Winslow makes it a part of his practice.
Winslow is a member of Solid Rock Church. His wife is part of the praise team.
Also, as we reported yesterday, Attorney Tom Winslow owns 200 acres of land that backs up to the state park area where Mica’s body was found.
All of this is circumstantial, at best, but it is also very curious.
*The Call Made By Mica At Lumber River State Park?
Mica wrote to her attorney: “Since the day we became husband and wife, I have been abused in every way I can think of. Emotionally, sexually, spiritually, financially and physically. He has harassed me physically and electronically with letters, phone calls, emails and texts, hacking my emails, hacking my personal Facebook and impersonating me. Using my stolen phone to send texts and emails out to church members pretending to be me, texting friends and family saying that I am sleeping with teenagers from our church, and showing up in person at places around town … to having installed three different tracking devices on my vehicle.”
MyrtleBeachSC News learned that JP was in possession of a mobile phone he had stolen from Mica. Anyone who has left an outgoing, “I am not available now” message on their phone, knows that a recorded version of her voice was likely on that mobile phone.
According to the Robeson County Sherriff, at 2:54 p.m., a 911 call was made from Lumber River State Park parking lot.
Miller is calm throughout the call, asking a dispatcher if her phone can be tracked. The operator asks for Miller’s phone number and location, and then why she was calling.
“I’m about to kill myself, and I just want my family to know where to find me,” she replies.
How Deep Fake A.I. Voice Works
Was the Tom Winslow A.I. knowledge put to use in this matter?
Audio Capture And Signal Processing
The first step in AI voice recognition is audio capture. This is where the spoken words are recorded.
The audio is then processed to remove any background noise. This ensures that the system can clearly hear the spoken words.
Signal processing also involves enhancing the quality of the audio. This makes it easier for the system to recognize the speech patterns.
Pattern Recognition And Machine Learning
Pattern recognition is the core of AI voice recognition. It’s the process of identifying the spoken words in the audio signal.
Machine learning plays a crucial role in this process. It helps the system learn and improve its ability to recognize speech patterns.
Over time, the system becomes more accurate. It learns to understand different accents, dialects, and even nuances in speech.
Real-World Examples Of Deep Fake A.I.
AI voice recognition is not a futuristic concept. It’s already a part of our daily lives.
You may have interacted with it without even realizing. It’s present in many devices and applications we use every day.
Miller Says Church Services Are As Usual
In a social media post yesterday, Miller states, “Solid Rock is alive and well and we are moving forward with our new building project. We are excited to see all members at our meeting May 19th at 5 p.m.
The FBI is just starting this investigation and no one knows where it will lead. The Tom Winslow A.I. practices may only prove to be circumstantial. The Mica Miller mental health records are sure to play a roll in this saga. Time will tell where this leads.
Question: Were Public Posts Like This One From JP Miller Abusive?
Miller, pastor at Solid Rock Church in Myrtle Beach, told his sister-in-law that he would be arriving at her house at 1 a.m. on November 17, 2022, where Mica was visiting.
After Sierra warned that he wouldn’t be allowed in their home, he challenged her, saying ‘you can call the cops’.
A few moments later, he replied: “I’m armed. I’m ready. Mica can fix all of this“, to which Sierra replied: “THIS doesn’t help anything. Threats and intimidation only make things worse.”
‘I don’t care (idc) Driving. I can’t text. Thanks.’ said the disgraced pastor.
In response, Miller replied, “Hahaha” when told cops wouldn’t be called if he stayed home.

Howdy! I'm struggling to figure how i can utilise OpenAIs Whisper model to transcribe an audio file that I upload to a specific folder in SharePoint. I've got this to work by recording on a Power App but I would like to be able to record on any device, then simply save it a SharePoint folder and the audio be sent for transcription. The trigger is a 'When a file is created (properties only), I then retrieve the contents of the file using 'Get file content', i'm now stuck on how successfully pass this to Whisper. My HTTP request follows the format of this tutorial by Mohamed Faleel although this again is specifically for Power Apps whereas i simply want the trigger to be an uploaded file to a SharePoint folder so that i can record on another device. Can anyone shed some light on how to achieve this, I'm truly stuck with the HTTP request and would love it if you could send through an example of how to get this to work.

So, in recent weeks I'm sure we've all seen the speculation and theories regarding whether Eddie could be gay, in the closet etc. And while most of those theories tend to be fueled by Buddie shippers (which lowkey me too 👀), many outside of that group don't seem to see where the character analysis is coming from, but I have another perspective to add. I've just done another full rewatch and noticed a very common trend with Eddie over the show, how easily led he is by others. Many times Eddie will have some decision to make, feelings to decipher, and almost always he is shown to be very uncertain or confused, but after speaking with someone who either tells him what to do or how to feel he suddenly and immediately jumps on board with that decision.
For example, in s4 when he starts dating Ana, despite showing a slight interest he never made the effort to reach out, but as soon as the 118 and Bobby push him to call her, he does so then starts dating her. However, when Carla returns she asks him "are you following your heart or Christopher's" to which Eddie has an immediate 180 flip and starts feeling turned away from Ana. He did the same with dating Marisol at the end of s6, he never mentioned her at all then immediately calls her for a date when prompted to do so.
Obviously, this can be chalked up to bad writing, or just how he's written, to be very easily led, but that still has an impact on his overall character, so from a viewer's perspective I don't think it's a wild leap to jump from 'Eddie just goes along with what people tell him to do' to 'there are deeper social/cultural reasons for that'. Either way, let me know what you think but it's just an interesting thing I noticed about the way his character is often written, never makes big decisions until told what to do (usually in a big heart to heart speech where someone talks at him about his feelings) and he has a tendency to do a 180 flip the second someone says anything to the contrary

Hello! I have a friend who often makes the following mistakes when writing or speaking (even after being told she continues to make these mistakes for several years…)
Some examples include… 1. “A game of chest” when m “… of chess” is meant 2. Pronouncing “penne pasta” as “panini pasta” 3. Writing “I felt down the stairs” instead of “I fell…” 4. Being unable to distinguish “too, to and two” or “your, you’re” 5. Forgetting to write “to” as in “I want to go Disneyland tomorrow”
Are the above examples of dyslexia or another kind of writing/speech disorder?

Today we have seen one of the main examples of why Solchan is a beautiful thing. Today a Solchan user posted a small story about their struggles in life and how they’ve persevered through. Today is their 23rd birthday and they have found Solchan as a beacon of hope, for the community and future financial freedom. As of right now, 13,050 Solchan tokens have been gifted to this user for their inspiring story, which is currently valued at $197.
Solchan is a free speech board where anyone can post their thoughts, ideas, and stories, and connect with others. If you’re feeling bored, go on Solchan, tell us how you changed your life, how you plan to, or just say something funny.
Solchan has a generous community of people willing to make friends and mix cultures and ideas. If you are seeking a transparent, “real”, social media, study Solchan.
Go on Solchan and see the post I spoke about for yourself, it's an example of how humanity still exists in our world today.

Today we have seen one of the main examples of why Solchan is a beautiful thing. Today a Solchan user posted a small story about their struggles in life and how they’ve persevered through. Today is their 23rd birthday and they have found Solchan as a beacon of hope, for the community and future financial freedom. As of right now, 13,050 Solchan tokens have been gifted to this user for their inspiring story, which is currently valued at $197.
Solchan is a free speech board where anyone can post their thoughts, ideas, and stories, and connect with others. If you’re feeling bored, go on Solchan, tell us how you changed your life, how you plan to, or just say something funny.
Solchan has a generous community of people willing to make friends and mix cultures and ideas. If you are seeking a transparent, “real”, social media, study Solchan.
Go on Solchan and see the post I spoke about for yourself, it's an example of how humanity still exists in our world today.

Today we have seen one of the main examples of why Solchan is a beautiful thing. Today a Solchan user posted a small story about their struggles in life and how they’ve persevered through. Today is their 23rd birthday and they have found Solchan as a beacon of hope, for the community and future financial freedom. As of right now, 13,050 Solchan tokens have been gifted to this user for their inspiring story, which is currently valued at $197.
Solchan is a free speech board where anyone can post their thoughts, ideas, and stories, and connect with others. If you’re feeling bored, go on Solchan, tell us how you changed your life, how you plan to, or just say something funny.
Solchan has a generous community of people willing to make friends and mix cultures and ideas. If you are seeking a transparent, “real”, social media, study Solchan.
Go on solchan and see the post I spoke about for yourself, it's an example of how humanity still exists in our world today.