Shaister Miester Do Da

Contrary to popular belief, procrastination does serve a purpose in your life. And that is why this is a lesson in procrastination which you will not want to miss. You may have been fighting procrastination for as long as you can remember. However instead of offering you a miraculous cure for procrastination, let’s take a step back from your present to better understand the presence of procrastination in your life.

Like most people, you are often overstretched in areas of your life. Currently you are playing several different roles at any one time, e.g. roles of a productive employee, a filial child, an understanding partner, a caring parent, a helpful friend and many other more which you seek to do well and excel in. However, there are just too many roles for you to fit into at any one time.

And in addition to that, you are obliged to adhering to the duties of every roles, their respective “shoulds” and “musts”. The truth is regardless how well you plan your time, you only have a limited time and energy every day. There is only this much of things you can seek to accomplish daily. However, most “procrastinators” fail to realize that.

Instead, day after day, they try to accomplish all their tasks in one day. And when they fail, they beat themselves up and feel that they procrastinate in completing them.

Any time management experts will tell you that attempting to do everything within a short period of time is suicidal. Eventually, you will run of gas and burn out.

Unknown to many, we are all procrastinators in this modern world. Everything you do carry with it an opportunity cost. When you decide to invest your time and energy in playing a particular role well, you will be neglecting your other important life roles at the same time. And when you fail to meet those “shoulds” and “musts” which come along with those roles, you feel that you have not done enough.

Thus, rather than constantly beating up yourself for not doing enough and hoping for a heaven-sent cure for procrastination, why not look into yourself and determine what you truly value in your life.

By determining the priorities of the different roles in your life, you will better understand what you truly treasure. And it does make sense to allocate more time and energy in fulfilling those more important roles to your very best while giving less attention to other less crucial roles, isn’t it?

That will eliminate the need for you to want to do everything within a short period of time and along with it the misconception of procrastination.

This is a lesson in procrastination which took many people a long time to understand.

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CAN YOUR LIFE MAKE A DIFFERENCE BY GIVING BACK TO OTHERS

When you get to be my age (which, for some of you, is really old, (though it doesn?t seem so old to me, Stephen Richards, anymore), you will find yourself beginning to ask, did my life make a difference?

That?s the day of personal reckoning. And I think the only way to face it is to consider, every day of your life: How can I do something for somebody else? How can I give back to others? It may be teaching, it may be becoming a doctor, you may be successful in business - no matter what your career path, there will always be the opportunity to give back.

Cosmic Ordering is not all about taking, but about giving. This is not tithing whereby you set a certain percentage of your earnings to one side and to be given away. You cannot just buy this ?giving back to others?.

My hope today, as you commence to new beginnings, is you will always keep your eyes open for those opportunities to give and embrace them as your best sure way of doing well.

THE MOST VALUABLE GIFT IN THE WORLD IS PRICELESS AND YET ALSO SO INEXPENSIVE

You know, while everyone is chasing a bigger pay rise, more returns on their investments and fatter cheques (checks) from TV show royalties, there is something we can overlook in life as being worth far more, yet so inexpensive for us to attain. Here is a story to show what I mean.

Junior high school students in Chicago were studying the Seven Wonders of the World. At the end of the lesson, the students were asked to list what the considered to be the Seven Wonders of the World. Though there was some disagreement, the following received the most votes:

1. Egypt’s Great Pyramids
2. The Taj Mahal in India
3. The Grand Canyon in Arizona
4. The Panama Canal
5. The Empire State Building
6. St. Peter’s Basilica
7. China’s Great Wall

While gathering the votes, the teacher noted that one student, a quiet girl, hadn’t turned in her paper yet. So she asked the girl if she was having trouble with her list. The quiet girl replied, “Yes, a little. I couldn’t quite make up my mind because there were so many.” The teacher said, “Well, tell us what you have, and maybe we can help.”

The girl hesitated, then read, ?I think the Seven Wonders of the World are:

1. to touch…
2. to taste…
3. to see…
4. to hear… (She hesitated a little, and then added…)
5. to feel…
6. to laugh…
7. and to love.?

The room was so quiet, you could have heard a pin drop.

May this story serve as a gentle reminder to all of us that the things we overlook as simple and ordinary are often the most wonderful - and we don’t have to travel anywhere special to experience them.

Enjoy your gifts! They are priceless!!

Copyright Stephen Richards

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STEPHEN RICHARDS SAYS GIVING YOURSELF TO OTHERS CAN BE PRICELESS

You cannot buy forgiveness with money, you cannot put right what you have done to yourself by throwing cash at it. This is so within Cosmic Ordering. Anyone can throw money about and look good, but when you are an unsung hero and give your time, then this is a priceless gift. By giving yourself to others and helping them it makes a difference, try it and see how rewarded you feel and see how much better you are within, and then try placing your Cosmic Order.

There is a man who I’d like to tell you about. His name is Sandy Greenberg. In his youth, Sandy was a very good student, but he came from a poor family. And so he went to Columbia University on a scholarship and there he met his roommate who also was receiving financial aid.

Now while he was a sophomore at Columbia University, Sandy contracted an eye disease that eventually proved to be glaucoma. But the trouble was, it wasn’t detected early enough, and as a result he became legally blind. But something else happened to Sandy that may surprise you. Sandy said that when he lost his sight, his roommate would read his textbooks to him, every night.

If your roommate had a serious disability, would you take the time to read textbooks to him every night, knowing the more you spend time reading textbooks to your roommate, perhaps the less well you might do with your other activities? That’s not as easy a question as it first appears.

But luckily for Sandy, his roommate did help him. And as a result, Sandy went on to graduate with honours. He got a Fulbright Scholarship, and he went off to study at Oxford. He was still quite poor, but he said he had managed to save about five hundred dollars as he went along.

His roommate, meanwhile, also went on to graduate school. One day, Sandy got a call from him at Oxford. And his former roommate said, “Sandy I’m really unhappy. I really don’t like being in graduate school, and I don’t want to do this.”

So Sandy asked, “Well what do you want to do?”

And his roommate told him, “Sandy, I really love to sing. I have a high school friend who plays the guitar. And we would really like to try our hand in the music business. But we need to make a promo record, and in order to do that I need $500.”

So Sandy Greenberg told me he took all his life savings and sent it to his roommate. He told me, “You know, what else could I do? He made my life; I needed to help make his life.”

So, I hope you’ll remember the power of doing well by doing good. Each of you, in your own lives, will be faced with challenges, with roadblocks, with problems that you didn’t anticipate or expect. How you are able to deal with adversity will be influenced, to no small extent, by how you deal with others along the way. What you get will depend a lot on what you give.

You probably want to know who Sandy?s roommate was. I think you’ve heard of him. Sandy’s roommate was a fellow by the name of Art Garfunkel, and he teamed up with another musician by the name of Paul Simon. That $500 helped them cut a record that eventually became ?The Sounds of Silence.?

Copyright Stephen Richards

Emotional freedom techniques can make real wonders - learn more about emotional freedom technique courses.

Many people complain that you are not good speakers and they are right. Not Many people are born with Communication Skills. But this is no reason for you to Sit like a couch potato and do nothing about the issue. After spending thousands on seminars on Communication Skills, I understood that each person actually has an inborn ability to connect with others and it is only a matter of practice. It is a matter of being in the right zone in the right time.

Many athletes confirm that when they get into the field, they enter a new zone or a state of consciousness. A zone where, their ability to hear, observe and respond is at its peak. There is no mumbo jumbo behind this secret. It is only a matter of practice and control. If you find yourself wondering how you can do it, let me help you.

Here are some exercises you can do to connect with your Inner Power of expression so you can communicate with ease..

1. Speak Impromptu:
Stand in front of a mirror and start your Impromptu. Do not care what comes out of your mouth, just keep blabbering. Do not stop to revise or analyze what you are saying. Make sure no one hears you do this as it will only make you conscious of their presence and you may censor out your thinking. This exercise is to help you get into your natural flow. You will know when you get into the flow by observing how you feel inside. It will take time to master this technique so do not expect a one day miracle.

2. Grounding:
Make a few minutes everyday to keep yourself grounded. Pick a place free from disturbance. Loosen your whole body. Imagine all the stress just dropping off you like sweat. Imagine and feel a cool blue light from the sky entering your head, traveling all through your body and finally rush deep into Earth through your legs. Imagine and feel a warm Red light rise up from the earth, enter your body through the legs and then finally release into sky via your head. Feel the love and warmth of both the Red and the Blue light flow in your body. Relish this at least for 5 minutes day.

3. Reverse Read:
Take any good book on self help and reverse read for about 15 minutes a day. Reading in reverse means, you should start from the bottom right corner and read from right to left.

Practice these exercises at least 10 minutes a day and you will be well on your way to harness Excellent Communication.. Once you begin getting into the zone, notice how you feel. Pay special attention to how your body and mind responds. Once you begin getting into the zone regularly, you can get into the zone at any time and any place by just willing to be in that state. Check out other cool tips and techniques that you can get hold of when you get my 3 Steps to Success. .

Planets, Moon, Mercury When most of us think of astrology, we think about our natal sign and not much else. Do you know what some of the major influences are though, that define these Zodiac signs? First and foremost is the Sun. It is the center of all life and represents a person’s personality and spirit. It is the planetary ruler of the sign Leo.

More about understanding the horoscope.

The Moon, on the other hand, gives us our Soul. The Moon is the ruling planet of the Zodiac sign Cancer. It is very much associated with the mother and with maternal instincts. In Chinese astrology, the Moon represents Yin, while the Sun represents Yang.

Mercury rules over Gemini and Virgo. It is the planet of the mind and of communication. In other words, it is the planet of the idea and the means to communicate the idea. The planet Venus rules over Taurus and Libra. Venus is associated with characteristics and principles of harmony and beauty. It is of course, concerned with love. It is also concerned with the pleasure we derive from personal possessions.

Mars is the ruling planet for the dynamic Aries, and to some astrologers, Scorpio, although modern astrologers now determine that Pluto is the ruler of Scorpio. Mars is the planet that is concerned with the things you want, and how you go about getting those things. Jupiter is associated with pleasure and enjoyment. It is the ruler of Sagittarius and is also associated with principles of growth, religion and higher education.

Saturn is the ruling planet of Capricorn and is associated with principles such as reality and restrictions, boundaries and rules. Saturn was traditionally the ruler of Aquarius until the discovery of the planet Uranus. Neptune is the ruling planet of Pisces and is associated with deception, illusions, spirituality and psychic phenomena. The planet Pluto is the ruling planet of Scorpio and is associated with the concept of transformation.

If you’re a Pisces, you probably have a lot of friends, as you have an accepting and malleable nature that makes it easy for other people to be around you. A Pisces is more likely to go with the flow rather than swim upstream to try to change people or their environment. They can be more emotional, rather than rational and analytical. They don’t thrive in highly disciplined environments. Nine-to-five jobs are anathema to the Pisces nature. They are drawn to situations where they can use their artistic gifts and their appreciation of art and nature. They love luxury and pleasure. They can think on their feet and an enjoy new situations and change. They are happiest in the fields of music, literature or art. Not that tough for astrology.

Who’s the ideal partner for the Pisces. Not the rugged, caveman type, for sure. A relationship with a Pisces will be meeting of the mind and spirit, less so than the body. Pisces are cerebral and not intensely sexual. The need to be courted gently. They are intensely loving and loyal and have a monogamous nature. Don’t abuse this rare creature.

If you’re a Pisces, you may find yourself occasionally being walked over or taken advantage of because of your fluid nature. You may need to find ways to assert yourself that’s in harmony with your psyche. Because you tend to go with the flow and live in the moment, you might have a money-management style that can leave you short of funds at times. You may need to be stricter with yourself to ensure that doesn’t happen.

This is just the beginning. The time for free astrology lessons.

visualization techniques
These days there is a great deal of discussion and speculation over unconscious mind as we see people really getting into things such as what the bleep as more and more of us really are looking for ways that we can readily and effectively make positive changes to our lives.

In discussing about the subconscious mind we know that it has no logic or reason. The subconscious mind will believe that a learned behavior is a positive thing, no matter how bad for us that habit may be.

mind movies
In looking more and more in detail at the psychology the subconscious mind we can talk about the subconscious mind and how it is governed by many rules. It really makes sense for us to learn about the rules of the law of attraction and subconscious mind in order to allow us to make the best use out of our subconscious minds with the least effort.

We all know about self improvement and how paying real attention to this can have a marked change and positive effect in our lives. In line
with this we really have to get down to the deep understanding of our subconscious and know that our subconscious minds is helpful as far as it is concerned and sees the reasons it provides for avoiding the change as valid.

laws of attraction
The laws of attraction takes in everything we learn and experience in our lifetime. It is this programming that serves to actually develop our habit patterns and the thing that we need to do is to literally reprogram our subconscious minds in order to get different outcomes in our lives.

It is those of us who really are determined to learn more about the law of attraction as we look to be do and have all that we want to be. Going to seminars, reading books and getting a law of attraction coach are some of the many things and methods that we can use to really ramp things up and take our lives forward to higher level and new pastures. There really is good reasoning as to why we see spiritual law of attraction becoming more and more relevant in the times we find ourselves living in as more and more people are looking at religion and spirituality in different ways and looking for the smoothest way of tapping into the universal intelligence in order to make success a natural part of life.

Meditation is a well accepted technique to encourage and promote relaxation. The more relaxed you are as you prepare for bed the better your chances of falling into a deep, restful sleep cycle.

It is important that you learn to put your stress, tensions, and worries to the side before you fall asleep. Meditation can assist you attain this relaxed state and focus on peace and harmony.

There are many different types of meditations available for you to use, each with many adaptations and versions. To get you started, here is a technique that is easy to do and very effective at promoting relaxation:
Find a focus point for your meditation. This may be a candle, a mantra, a stone, or something as simple as the sound of your own breathing. A mantra is a phrase, usually a Hindu phrase, which you repeat over and over in your mind to establish harmony and to focus on your meditation. No matter what you are using for your focus point the aim is to continuously and firmly bring your mind back to what you are focusing on. All other thoughts and distractions that drift through your mind must be pushed out. If you are beginning to include meditation in your bedtime routine you must remember that this type of meditation requires a great deal of discipline. Your mind will easily be distracted and you will lose focus. As you continue to practice your meditation nightly you will find that the process becomes easier and easier. You may find that meditating 10 to 15 minutes before bed will help to fall asleep naturally.

Here is another simple technique for meditation:
• Find a quiet room.
• Sit in a comfortable position on the floor (use a cushion if necessary).
• Sit with your hands resting lightly in your lap.
• Close your eyes and relax.
• Take deep breaths in and out through your nose.
• Try to focus on your breathing. Count each breath as you exhale. Count to ten. Repeat several times until relaxation sets in.
• Clear your mind of everything and think only of counting each breath as you exhale.
• Acknowledge any other thoughts that enter your mind, and then gently let them go and concentrate once again on your breathing.
At the end of the meditation stretch gently and become aware of your body before standing up.

Another form of meditation is guided imagery. Guided imagery is a mix of relaxation, meditation, and hypnosis. Using this technique you will follow a guided meditation to visualize a state of relaxation.
It is best practiced in a quiet room where you won’t be disturbed. You will need a tape or CD player. The lighting in the room should be dim and soft. Generally the visualization will begin with some simple relaxation exercises that include deep breathing. When your body and mind are relaxed your imagination will come into play. Some common imagery include being in the mountains, walking along a beach, or walking through the forest. The guided imagery uses your imagination to create peacefulness and relaxation. You will be guided through the meditation from start to finish, at which time you should feel calm and serene.
There are many imagery tapes on the market for you to choose from.
The above techniques for meditation will help your mind and body to relax. Your aim is to be as rested as possible as you prepare for sleep. There are many other methods of meditation available. You may have to research and experiment and find what works best for you.

These techniques are also great if you are having to cope with stress in your life such as preparing to act as MC at a friend’s wedding reception. The thought of speaking in public makes most people anxious.
Wedding mc
Wedding mc tips
Wedding master of ceremonies
These articles are packed with practical tips and advice. Being properly prepared for your role helps keep stress under control as well.

Subliminal Hypnosis A Key Ingredient Of Underground Hypnosis

Subliminal messages are a novel way of getting the message across is it when such messages are included in a movie that you are seeing to boost sales of a product through use of a message like “enjoy the movie more with a hamburger”, or some equally other appealing message that customers can see when indulging in their favorite activities. In fact, there are a number of subliminal self-help items that make use of visual imagery and even sound recordings to get a message across and thus can entice customers into buying the products on offer.

An Indefinable State Of Awareness

Subliminal hypnosis works on the basis that if a person subconsciously views a message without having his conscious mind process the message, it will be sure to have an added effect on his or her thinking and thus can help to influence their actions. Thus, it would not be wrong to say that subliminal hypnosis is a state of awareness that can’t be defined though it will result in a sensitive response and it can be persuaded through a number of methods, most notably when a hypnotist proceeds to act on a patient.

Essentially, subliminal hypnosis will make use of vocal instructions that are repeated over and over again and which grabs the individuals’ concentration and then proceeds to assign a number of tasks during the entire proceedings. Some of the tasks that can be assigned to an individual during subliminal hypnosis include eye fixation, muscle recreation as well as arm levitation, and a lot more. In fact, even through trained recreation it is possible to achieve subliminal hypnosis and it is also possible for a person to induce him or herself into concentrating on their own breathing.

Furthermore, it is also quite accurate to attribute subliminal hypnosis to being a special state of the mind that has a physiological effect on an individual that is somewhat like his or her being asleep, though for best results, it is necessary that the individual has well defined receptivity, which means that the person must respond to subliminal hypnosis without suspecting anything to be amiss and is in a state in which he or she will ignore his surroundings except for the instructions given to him by the hypnotist.

Sometimes subliminal hypnosis is also used to amuse the public though sometimes such activities can harm the person being hypnotized; thus, certain countries around the world have banned the commercial use of subliminal hypnosis because of the associated dangers.

LAW OF ATTRACTION ?- STEPHEN RICHARDS SAYS, ?ALWAYS HAVE AN AIR OF EXPECTANCY?

As one of my private students advised me, in fact something that I had written in my first Cosmic Ordering book, ?Cosmic Ordering Guide?, that I should always have an air of expectancy! So well done to them for reminding me of my very own teachings. This is something you MUST have about you if you are going to become a winner. Even in a situation where you are up against it, always have this air of expectancy, always know you are winner and you WILL be a winner.

READING MY WORDS WILL GUIDE YOU TO WHERE YOU WANT TO BE

Let me show you the power of words by use of a story.

There once was a wise sage who wandered the countryside. One day, as he passed near a village, he was approached by a woman who told him of a sick child nearby. She beseeched him to help this child.

So the sage came to the village, and a crowd gathered around him, for such a man was a rare sight. One woman brought the sick child to him, and he said a prayer over her.

“Do you really think your prayer will help her, when medicine has failed?” yelled a man from the crowd.

“You know nothing of such things! You are a stupid fool!” said the sage to the man.

The man became very angry with these words and his face grew hot and red. He was about to say something, or perhaps strike out, when the sage walked over to him and said: “If one word has such power as to make you so angry and hot, may not another have the power to heal?”

And thus, the sage healed two people that day.

That is the power of words, never underestimate what words can do for you.

WORK WITHIN THE BOUNDS OF YOUR CAPABILITIES AND YOU WILL SOON AMASS YOUR DESIRES

Work within your capabilities and build on this, do not go straight for lumps of gold and piles of cash. They will come your way, but not before you have applied yourself to the smaller Orders. This story epitomises what I mean.

Many years ago three soldiers, hungry and weary of battle, came upon a small village. The villagers, suffering a meagre harvest and the many years of war, quickly hid what little they had to eat and met the three at the village square, wringing their hands and bemoaning the lack of anything to eat.

The soldiers spoke quietly among themselves and the first soldier then turned to the village elders. “Your tired fields have left you nothing to share, so we will share what little we have: the secret of how to make soup from stones.”

Naturally the villagers were intrigued and soon a fire was put to the town’s greatest kettle as the soldiers dropped in three smooth stones. “Now this will be a fine soup”, said the second soldier; “but a pinch of salt and some parsley would make it wonderful!”

Up jumped a villager, crying “What luck! I’ve just remembered where some have been left!” And off she ran, returning with an apronful of parsley and a turnip. As the kettle boiled on, the memory of the village improved: soon barley, carrots, beef and cream had found their way into the great pot, and a cask of wine was rolled into the square as all sat down to feast.

They ate and danced and sang well into the night, refreshed by the feast and their newfound friends. In the morning the three soldiers awoke to find the entire village standing before them. At their feet lay a satchel of the village’s best breads and cheese. “You have given us the greatest of gifts: the secret of how to make soup from stones”, said an elder, “and we shall never forget.” The third soldier turned to the crowd, and said: “There is no secret, but this is certain: it is only by sharing that we may make a feast”. And off the soldiers wandered, down the road.

The soldiers just started out small, within the bounds of what they had. There was no shame in working with just a few basic things, but soon an abundance came their way, and that is how you must use Cosmic Ordering ?good luck.

Copyright Stephen Richards

Learn also about kundalini yoga online.

PAGAN WHISPERS

Although I do not subscribe to Cosmic Ordering being some sort of mysterious system for invoking things to happen, I do feel that it has some tie-ins with other genres that I have worked with. I recently published a book by the author Carole Carlton called ?Mrs Darley?s Pagan Whispers? and I was prompted by Trace?s email to think of this book and the Pagan rituals and how they tied in with nature, as does Cosmic Ordering to some extent. This brought me on to thinking of some of the important days in the years, one of them relates to when I first released the ?Cosmic Ordering: Chakra Clearing? CD, it was in the spring equinox.

SUMMER SOLSTICE

The longest day of the year is June 21st. It is the day when the sun is at its most northerly point and this is why it is ?the longest day?. On this day you can see a very old custom at Stonehenge, in Wiltshire, England. Every summer solstice hundreds of people go to Stonehenge to watch the sun rise.

The sun shines on one famous stone - the Heel stone. The Heel or Hele stone stands to the northeast of the Stonehenge circles. The name is probably derived from the Greek word for the sun (Helios). The Heel Stone is a stone which is not located in the main circle.

For the Druids this is a very important moment of the year. Druid celebrations also take place on Midsummer?s Eve, Bonfires are lit to show respect for the Sun God, whose power they say is greatest at the summer solstice. The fires also represent an attempt to ward off the coming winter. Practice of this ancient ritual, which also includes a summer solstice Circle Dance, is now mainly confined to Cornwall, the West Country, and London’s Hampstead Heath.

The Druids were the priests in Britain 2,000 years ago. They used the sun and the stones at Stonehenge to know the start of the months and seasons. There are Druids in Britain today too.

In the first years of the 20th century, this alignment implied a ritualistic connection with sun worship and it was generally concluded that Stonehenge was constructed as a temple to the sun. More recently, though, the astronomer Gerald Hawkins has argued that Stonehenge is not merely aligned with solar and lunar astronomical events, but can be used to predict other events such as eclipses. In other words, Stonehenge was more than a temple, it was an astronomical calculator.

It was argued that the summer solstice alignment cannot be accidental. The sun rises in different directions in different geographical latitudes. For the alignment to be correct, it must have been calculated precisely for Stonehenge?s latitude of 51° 11′. The alignment, therefore, must have been fundamental to the design and placement of Stonehenge. As if corroborating the claims made by Hawkins for Stonehenge.

A professor of engineering and a mathematician, Alexander Thom, has shown that many other megalithic sites throughout Britain are also oriented towards the sun and the moon.

The alignment also made it clear that whoever built Stonehenge had precise astronomical knowledge of the path of the sun and, moreover, must have known before construction began precisely where the sun rose at dawn on midsummer’s morning while standing on the future site of the monument. It was the site, a particular place within the landscape, that was important; only later were these sites marked in some more permanent manner by the digging of ditches and banks and (or instead) the erection of wood or stone structures.

For reasons we shall never know, this particular spot in the landscape was so important that not only were ditches and banks dug and, later, stone circles and horseshoe arrangements constructed to mark it, but that some of the stones were deliberately transported there with considerable effort from a great distance away.

The megalithic ruin known as Stonehenge stands on the open downland of Salisbury Plain two miles (three kilometres) west of the town of Amesbury, Wiltshire, in Southern England. It is not a single structure but consists of a series of earth, timber, and stone structures that were revised and re-modelled over a period of more than 1400 years.

Unlike earlier stone circles oriented on natural features like prominent hills, Stonehenge aligns with no natural features all the alignments being man-made. The builders had to provide an outlier to mark the rising of the sun at midsummer as seen from the centre of the circle. This is the Heel Stone, located 60m from the centre of the circle. Note the barbed wire that has now been placed around the monument. It was put there to protect the site from large group that wanted to overrun the site for the summer solstice.

Mystery surrounds this 5,000 year old World Heritage Site. As old as the pyramids in Egypt, was Stonehenge designed as a place of sun worship, or as part of a huge astronomical calendar? Each monument was a circular structure, aligned with the rising sun at the solstice. Erected between 3,000 BC and 1,600 BC, the stones were carried hundreds of miles over land and sea, while antlers and bones were used to dig the pits that hold the stones. An awe-inspiring family visit, Stonehenge is a powerful reminder of the once-great Stone and Bronze Ages.

A 17th-century architect named Inigo Jones thought Stonehenge was a Roman temple. By the time the 18th and 19th centuries rolled along, popular opinion had changed - Stonehenge was thought to be a Druid temple for sun-worship. (The problem with this theory is that Stonehenge was finished 1,000 years before the Druids came to prominence.

British author John Mitchell has suggested that Stonehenge was ?a cosmic temple dedicated to all twelve gods of the zodiac. It represents the ideal cosmology, the perfect and complete image of the universe?.

And that seems as good an explanation as any for this feat of engineering and construction that continues to fascinate us to this day.

Copyright Stephen Richards

Feel lost about being capable of explaining things and matters to other people? Well, read how to improve communication skill.