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Life throws us obstacles, bumps that come out of nowhere. The goal is to stay loose enough to adjust to the changes and centered enough to keep in control when the shit hits the fan. When the ground beneath us moves so fast that it’s hard to focus, we have to tune into our intuitive knowing, stay in that controlled out-of-control state.
Skiing and snowboarding teach us this flexibility. If you want to enjoy your journey downhill there’s no option but to be 100% present; aligned body-mind-spirit. Adjust to the shifting terrain, in the moment.
Our core (third chakra), center-of-gravity is in the bliss zone, balanced with velocity, snow and the contour of the mountain. When another skier crosses our path, a mogul, rock or tree faces us, we turn but we don’t turn permanently away from our intended path. We take a turn that avoids collision and another turn that returns us to our direction of choice.
In the moment we may recognize that our chosen path is not taking us in a direction that is going to bring us pleasure, success or good circumstances, so we permanently redirect our course. If we don’t foresee the need to turn or the obstacle throws us out of our center we’ll crash. Varying degrees of wipeout occur, depending on how tuned-in we were to our body and our surroundings.
We make graceful turns when we are centered in our truth, tuned-in to our surroundings and willing to adjust course when the flow points us in a different direction. Practicing mediation tools each day gives us this core strength when faced with any challenge. To do this we:
- Take the time early in the day to clear our mind (sixth chakra) of the past and other people’s energy or agendas.
- Ground (root chakra) our energy in the present day.
- Call any of our scattered energy back to ourselves and visualized it filling every cell of our body.
Being grounded and saturated in our true essence is the bliss zone. It allows us to be present for the obstacles in life and to navigate them without feeling as much trauma. It feels aligned, peaceful and full of possibility. Taking responsibility for our life by owning our energy space teaches us that we can keep our focus yet be flexible enough to make graceful turns.
Soul contracts or relationship agreements have a heavy influence on our experience of attraction and attachment. When we have a relationship agreement or soul contract with someone we find ourselves drawn to them and may not understand why. We just know that something strong is pulling us to connect.
Attraction is a combination of the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. The enduring connections combine all aspects aligned for both parties. When one party experiences a significantly stronger attraction than the other and the relationship doesn’t take root or roots itself in shallow soil.
Sexual connections with someone we have a soul contract with can be expansive, crack us open and leave us wanting more. The momentary energetic oneness stirs up all that our souls have known together. It can be both ecstatic and excruciating. Beyond the primal physical and psychological aspects of our mating game, what is it that hooks us in? Why might one person think its love and the other not?
When we have a soul contract with someone, a promise we’ve made in this life or a past lifetime, both parties don’t always see the agreement the same context. It may be there is a debt owed from incomplete karma. Or our promise was to show-up to remind the other person of something they asked us to remind them of, even if it doesn’t feel so loving when we deliver the message.
Our messenger may arrive when we aren’t in a good place to receive the message or they may not relay the message in a form we comprehend. We may react, stir the pot with awareness that isn’t fully informed, and create more karma with each other rather than healing or competing past unresolved energies.
We may feel like we’ve known the person forever although we just met. We might feel an irrational sense of attraction when we have nothing in common; or an unexplainable sense of attachment after a short encounter. These are not just psychological or physical responses. There is a layer of spiritual activity a play.
When both parties are present to the possibility of the soul contract, healing and growth is heightened. A powerful aspect of self-responsibility comes when we own our ability to update our relationship agreements rather than be at the whim of whatever comes.
If you have a soul contract you are ready to update to present time you can do this by going into your mediation space and visualizing the relationship agreement with the particular person, the contract:
- See the details or general aspects of the agreement and choose what parts you would like to keep which parts you are ready to release.
- Imagine the parts that are outdated being crossed off the contract.
- Send the request through your intention to the soul of the other person.
- Sign the new contract with your mark, to make it real.
- Put it in an imaginary bubble and ask the Supreme Being to bless it.
- Ask your Akashic record keeper to record a copy of the new agreement and to give a copy to the other person’s record keeper.
If the relationship is very deep and influential you may need outside help from a professional clairvoyant healer to see clearly the aspects of the relationship that need to be adjusted. Romantic relationships, love and sex are powerful influencers in the human experience. Honor that power with your positive intentions and give yourself grace for the healing process.
Image thanks to http://performance-rules.com
Last week I was at my osteopath’s Dr. B, who had a student in training assisting the appointment. As she was examining my back, he instructed her, “Listen to your right brain. It knows where the spine is out of alignment. See how you’re hand has gone back to the same spot three times. You’ve got to turn off your left brain. It is making you question what your right brain knows.” In my world Dr. B was asking his student to listen to her intuition, to turn off her analytical minds interruptions and validate her sixth-sense awareness.
What was curious to me is that this medical doctor adamantly stated that the disrupted flow of spinal fluid could be felt without any equipment, simply touching the body and listening to the right brain. He is very good at his work, and yet explaining how he knows what he knows to a student, was challenging in medical terms.
All good healers, whether they are doctors, dentists, psychiatrists or massage therapists actively use their intuition whether they acknowledge it or not. My osteopath doesn’t think his awareness is of an intuitive nature. His form of intuitive knowing is innate and he’s spent significant time cultivating it. He doesn’t realize that it’s any different than the way his student might read a patient’s body.
We all experience intuitive data differently. While the information is the same, the way it comes to us can be a feeling a sensation in our own body, seeing a mental image, hearing a voice that provides direction or simply knowing without an indicator from one of the other five senses.
Dr. B impatiently instructed his student, “Your right brain will give you the yes. Turn off your left brain!” To cultivate confidence in our intuition, we also have to set aside the left brain analytical mind and listen for the yes. When we are aligned with the intuitive yes, there is a sense of peace that comes even if the information is difficult.
Our sixth chakra (center of head) is where we hold both our intuitive knowing (right brain) and our analyzer (left brain). The analyzer is trained to process facts, calculate evidence and derive answers. The analyzer does not do well with information that has no correct answer such as emotions, bodily sensations and spiritual awareness. That’s not its job.
Yet we try to force our left brain to process all of our experiences because we are taught that logic, science, having firm unchanging answers is the most valued in our society. Many of the best insights into non-linear challenges come when we focus our attention away from the question and let our intuitive mind, in parallel, process the emotions and senses around it.
Repetitive, creative activities stimulate this, such as jigsaw puzzles, knitting and working in the garden. We are present yet our left brain is distracted, giving our right brain room to breathe. It takes practice to follow the doctors’ orders, set aside our left brain and listen to the right. It feels awkward at first, vulnerable. Yet the more we do it, the more clearly we hear the yes, and the more our intuition informs our every experience.
Work energy is great to access at the appropriate times but it puts a damper on warm connections with loved ones and can override our personal needs, the true juice of a joyful life. Shifting our lead energy vibration between work and non-work time can be difficult. There is pleasure derived from certain aspects of the work and it takes our focus off of other aspects of life we have less control over. Our focused, productive analytical Self is “on” and were getting things done but how do we change the tone when the work day is done?
Today I was reminded of the unspoken lesson that Mister Rogers reinforced at the beginning of each TV program. He walked in the door of his home, took off his suit jacket and put on a cardigan. Then he changed out of his professional shoes and into sneakers. All while singing! He ritualistically shifted gears as soon as he got home, to a focus on relaxation, connection and playfulness.
In addition to changing our clothes or moving into a new environment, we can consciously change the volume of certain vibrations of energy in our space. Visualizing an imaginary gauge in front of us to make adjustments, like a fuel gauge reads empty to full, the needle can show us how full our space is of a specific energy. Is our analyzer on 75%, decision maker at 50%, income earner and task oriented Self at 100%? What about our creative energy, curiosity, sensuality, adventurousness?
At the start of a work day we turn up those energies that will be helpful to in getting our work done. At the end of the day imagine turning them down and turning up the volume of the vibrations you want to experience while not working. You may also want to visualize the energy from all of your work encounters and activities moving out of your space into a balloon and either tie the string holding that energy balloon somewhere to retrieve later when needed or set it free to move out of your aura field, leaving a cleaner space for your next focus.
I’m applying the Mister Rogers principle to consciously shift my energy from work to personal time… won’t you join me? Turn down the analytical, achievement oriented business vibration and turning up the creative, nurturing, permission to relax vibration at the end of your work day.
My grandma doesn’t hear very well even with hearing aids, but if she’s tuned-in she knows what’s going on even from the other room. This is especially true if you don’t want her to hear what you are saying! I noticed in a recent visit with her that I’d be thinking of something and she’d come in from the other room and answer my question or suggest we get milk at the grocery store, something I was about to mention. Yet there are certain people in her life, her children in particular, that she has a harder time hearing than the rest of us.
Her physical sense of hearing doesn’t get temporarily worse and she’s demonstrated that where her hearing falls short she can make up for it with her intuition. But like many of us who are challenged by certain relationships in our lives, the unresolved energy between her and her children causes her to resist what they have to say. She can’t hear it and it has nothing to do with the volume, her ability or her intuition. She’s blocked.
We figure out how to navigate our home environment using all six senses, first learning to intuitively read our parents before we understand verbal communication. As adults, when we ask family members to engage in new levels of communication sometimes they just don’t get it and seem to sort of glaze over. This happens in marriage and long-term friendships too.
We try to communicate in many different ways and find that it’s not getting through. Our friend or family member can’t hear us. All approaches to expression fail to get the point across. We might as well be speaking a different language given the lack of understanding or recognition. And we wonder if our intuition is misleading us that something is amiss because our loved one doesn’t validate our experience with acknowledgment. It’s frustrating.
What we are experiencing is a threshold of capacity in the person. While it may seem that it is their choice not to hear us, it is more likely a spiritual or emotional block so deep that they can’t consciously make the choice. We are trying to accomplish the impossible. The only way to get past this block is for the person to have some form of healing breakthrough that opens them up to hearing. It can’t be forced and it will only happen if they seek out the shift for themselves.
When we’ve reached a point where it’s clear that nothing we say will get through. Our best path is to turn our attention inward and begin clearing out the blocks in our own energy field. In mediation, we visualize energy moving out of physical body such as rejection, resistance, judgment, frustration and any sense that we won’t be ok unless this person hears us. The energy can move into a rose or bubble then that object, as seen in our minds-eye is sent to a distant place to dissolve.
After we’ve cleaned out our aura body we feel lighter. To complete the empowerment process we can visualize filling our space in with the sensations of having our needs met in relationship, of being heard, understood and accepted. Then in the physical world, find a place where we can communicate our experience and be heard, acknowledged, even if that is in the privacy of our own journal. We focus on building relationships where we are heard.
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s we begin a New Year I like to apply the “Be the Word” practice I learned in training at Inner Connection Institute. This involves choosing a word that’s vibration inspires me to live with it for the entire year. One I can learn from. My word for 2012 is devotion. I don’t use this word often, so I received it with curiosity, interested in discovering what it meant for me. The definition that resonates with me is the act or state of being devoted, committed and loyal to an intent or cause. I believe devotion is essential to living a passionate life.
What are you devoted to in 2012? Are you devoted to something internal, external, one or many intentions?
Devotion is true passion. The fire of our creative energy applied that manifests into demonstrable life experiences. Internal devotions consist of cultivating some aspect of your human body-soul experience such as physical health, a state of inner peace, increased patience, self-love or creativity. External devotions involve community, planetary or relationship focused commitments to a cause. You might be devoted to growing a tasty plump non-genetically modified tomato in your garden or contributing to the quality of education available in your community by sharing your skills and getting involved in the political process.
The word devotion has a spiritual definition as well, linked to worship, an expression of gratitude to a greater power. Your devotional intentions gain power and solidify to bear fruit when held in the context of gratitude; gratitude that we have the opportunity, time, energy and freedom for passion found in purposeful intent.
Devotion can only come from a true heartfelt desire with a clear focus. Our life gains a greater sense of purposefulness when we are devoted to cultivate internal and external intentions. Like the old adage, it’s the journey not the destination. Having focus, passion, devotion on our journey, draws out the flavor of life as we take a bite, the juiciness drips down our chin. And we don’t mind the mess because it tastes so good. This level of purposeful commitment pays dividends in joy.
- Photo by Patrick Yuen
Heeding the direction of our intuition sounds wise and like a no-brainer but what happens when our intuition doesn’t give us the answer we want to hear? We all have subtle agendas behind the questions we ask ourselves. These conscious or unconscious hopes and desires create bias or resistance to the direction we receive and may cause us to negotiate with our inner-guidance.
When we don’t get the answers we want from our intuition we are tempted to change the truth by looking at it from a different angle. Being pragmatic we ratchet up the volume of our analytical mind to overpower the subtler intuitive messages. We cajole, bargain and try to talk ourselves out of what we know, or we outright rebel, doing what we want, only to suffer the consequences.
All of these inner conversations are forms of manipulation or attempts to get what we want even if it’s not the best thing for us. Crazy yes, but we all do it. Sometimes not getting the answer we want is simply getting no answer, and having to live in the unknown for longer than we are comfortable. The inner-critic and task master doesn’t like not having an answer so we pressure the inner-guide to give us what we want and NOW.
The internal conversation that occurs in this standoff can be frustrating and keep our minds spinning in circles. The worst part is that these negotiations tend to hit is in our blind spots. We don’t even notice them happening until we’ve missed an opportunity or made a poor decision, based on our agenda rather than our intuition.
When we notice ourselves in a circular conversation that undermines our inner-guidance, it’s an opportunity to step back and take a look at the source of our resistance. What belief is in our space blocking us from accepting a path that is for our highest good? Is it fear that we won’t get our needs met, fear that we’ll take a certain path and fail or is someone else’s agenda in our space influencing our choice? It may even be a global or cultural fear influencing us.
Meditation, being grounded and clearing our energy space of outside influence brings us closer to our truth. Examples of these practices can be found in my other blog posts such as The Meditative Path to Clarity, Own Your Space and A Dream Come True, Can You Have What You’ve Always Wanted. Resistance to guidance from our intuition can be seen as a reminder to align our body, mind, emotions and spirit. To reclaim our energetic space and examine what inside us would prefer to stick with a predetermined agenda rather than take a path that is for our higher good.
My brother playing music with some friends
It is human nature to want to express our experiences, to be heard, seen and understood. Every form of art is connected to this desire to express. Musicians, painters, actors, writers, movie makers are all giving voice to an aspect of their experience in a creative way, exploring their light or shadow with words, role play, stories, color and sound. The act of expression in-and-of-itself provides a sense of relief and comfort. Without an audience we can express and still feel energy has been moved through writing in a journal or singing alone in the car. It allows us to find peace or at least a feeling of forward movement.
The throat chakra is where we carry the energy of communication and expression. Our relationship with expression can be hindered and altered due to the responses we receive from others and how we interpret them. Our sixth sense intuitive awareness may have led us to express things as children that were outside of the comfort zone of adults. We noticed an unspoken truth that the adults around us didn’t want to acknowledge and spoke up. The response ranged from invalidation (being told we’re wrong) to punishment.
Through the experience of others discomfort with our expression we learn to control it, shut it down or present it in terms easier for people to handle. If we grow up only getting attention for negative behavior we may learn to use our expression to intentionally make people uncomfortable. This can result in self-sabotage, conflict and attracts negative energy from others.
Artistic expression is where we are granted permission to show the full spectrum of human experience from beauty to pain, without being directly judged. A song about heartbreak, a painting that draws out the beauty of our environment, a poem that mysteriously hints at secrets one wouldn’t speak out loud, we accept and applaud. Yet if the artist takes their conversation out of the art form and to the dinner table of life we suddenly become uncomfortable with the raw truth.
To get beyond the socially acceptable framework of art as a forum to express our full-spectrum of intuitive awareness, we have to revisit old wounds and remove the rules that were programmed into our behavior before we were conscious of our free will. This means noticing when our throat or belly gets tight as a signal from our higher Self that we are holding onto something that may need to be to expressed.
As we notice these beliefs and automatic responses in our body and behaviors that aren’t in alignment, we can have an internal conversation with the information. Ask our self, “What do I want to do as an adult with this awareness in this situation?” It may be enough to acknowledge that we need to physically leave, or we may notice it’s necessary for us to directly address some unspoken aspect between us and another person. The more neutral and non-judging we can be in expression of our experience, the more powerfully it lands.
The power of our intuitive awareness is not in the knowing but in how it impacts our life. When we pay attention to our inner-signals and speak up with those who we trust our inner-guidance has purpose. We’ve all said in retrospect, “I had a feeling that person wasn’t trust worthy” but if we had communicated our awareness to a third party we trusted for reflection, it may have protected us from some harm. Expressing our awareness gives our consciousness a place to land and mull over the insight. Expression allows the flow of energy generated in a given situation to continue uninhibited without getting bottled up or stuck. It grounds our relationships in the present moment.
My desire for a spot close to the front of the airplane had me sit in a middle seat between two women on a fight home to Denver last week. Expecting the usual, ignore the stranger next to you, behavior of business travel, I was surprised to immediately be in conversation with the woman sitting to my right. I can’t even remember how the conversation started but it didn’t pause until we landed two hours later. By then I had heard 72 years of stories, Naomi’s life in a nutshell, and more importantly witnessed her joyful perspective on life.
Her vibrant energy created a shift in me, revitalizing my sense of appreciation and possibility. Inviting me to match the level of joy she lives in. If I blur the lens of the words that passed between us, the pure vitality Naomi offered through her positive perspective was transformational.
Each of us radiates energy that is a combination of our natural essence, our beliefs and energies we’ve held onto that we’ve accumulated along the way. Often we don’t notice our own energy, what we are presenting as a vibration to the world. When our energy is clear of fearful beliefs more
of our natural essence shines and we attract energy that matches what we want in our lives. In order to experience the spark of inspiration that generates transformation we have to be available to human connection.
The most powerful insights can come from the perspectives of strangers. They have a fresh perspective, one we haven’t been exposed to before. They don’t know our history and we are inclined to listen more closely to someone we just met. Our awareness is heightened.
The type of connection I experienced with Naomi was wonderfully unexpected. We can prepare ourselves to recognize these opportunities and be open to the transformational energy that is available through connection. We prepare by taking time to align our vibration with our essence. Start in a meditative space:
- Send a psychic “hello” to your essence, your soul, your authentic Self. Allow your inner voice to ask if there are beliefs that are pulling you out of alignment with your essence?
- Visualize those fears, disturbances and non-aligned energies moving out of your space into a bubble. Watch the bubble float to a distant mountain top and pop, transforming the energy into a new form. This makes more room for your own essence to expand. You may want to repeat this with several different focus areas in your life. Where you are showing up with a certain identity, such as work, romantic relationship, friendship, health or creative practice.
- Imagine a big golden ball of light hovering above your head. In the center of that ball is a magnet calling your energy back to you from any places you have left it that you are ready to retrieve it from. Once the golden ball of light is full of your essence, in your minds-eye reach up and pop it. See the energy of your essence flow down into you, filling in all the space that was opened when you moved out the non-aligned vibrations.
We naturally attract matching vibrations into our lives. Sometimes we have the fortune of attracting a connection that wakes us up and elevates us to a new level of self-awareness. I believe this happens when the person we encounter can see past our current state and notices our soul’s essence. The practice of consciously setting our energy invites connections that are transformational.
Ghost buster at Zombie Crawl Denver 2011
All Hallows Eve is creeping in with curiosity and playful energy about ghosts, zombies, paranormal and the dead in various forms. When people feel something tangible that they can’t see or touch it can be frightening and a thrill. As a person who is regularly aware of the presence of Spirits, I find it curious how often we make ghost or Spirits out to be scary tormented messengers of darkness. What we are reflecting with this perception is awareness that the Spirit is stuck, disturbed, unable to move on and find peace.
We all are Spirits with a physical body and when we die our Spirit continues to exist. What we call a ghost is the Spirit of a person, as it existed in a particular lifetime. Ghosts linger in a physical place often where the person once spent time while alive. Their Spirit was unable to complete some aspect of their experience from that life and remains stuck, revisiting the trauma or unfinished commitment.
On the night of the Zombie Crawl in Denver a couple of clients of mine went to a stately old hotel for a cocktail and struck up a conversation with the bartender about rumors of the hotel being haunted. They were given permission to wander the halls to see what they might find. With their perception tuned to the paranormal, they were open to seeing what wanted to be seen.
Suddenly in a certain hallway they both started feeling a heavy energy. One of the women felt as if she was being choked and couldn’t breathe. They decided they’d had enough and returned to the hotel lobby, shaken. Curious they asked a hotel employee if anything strange had ever happened in the room number they were next to when the sense of suffocation occurred. A young woman had hung herself in that room. Clearly the disturbance of her energy when she took her own life left her Spirit unresolved. Her ghost is still lingering in the place of her death waiting for a healing that will allow her soul to move on.
Similarly when I see a Spiritual entity in a person’s aura space often it is stuck and ready to move on. It has an agreement with the person created in the past that is no longer serving either. We create agreements with Spirits (some angels of light or darkness, some disincarnate human souls) when we need help with a life experience that we feel we can’t manage ourselves. They help us stay safe in certain circumstances but when we outgrow the circumstances they may stay stuck in our space, required to keep the agreement.
Another way we may be associated with a Being is through our family. Our ancestors create agreements with Spirits that get passed down through the generations to their descendants. These Spirits can be in our energy field subtly influencing what we attract into our lives or are attracted to, without us being aware of it.
There are also Spirits that get into our aura space without personal or familial invitation. We take them on as part of our healing agreement with another person, to help them clear the Entity. Or we participate in an activity that opens our energy field to them. These Spirits are looking for energy or healing, and enter our aura because we are open to it.
Spirits are everywhere. We don’t need to fear them because we are in a position of power. We always have the authority and choice to end agreements with Spirits and command that they leave our space. One way to do this is to visualize a gold cord attaching them to God/the Supreme Being so they can move on/out of our energy field and take their next step as a Spirit. By doing so we are setting both the Spirit and our spirit free.
