Spacious

I sit before Helene, observing, as she moves her familiar, old fear out of her body. Softly, my voice guides her. She pours the energy out with ease. Then she speaks of a new experience of inner spaciousness. 

I feel a thrill, hearing a change in her voice, a new lightness. I ask if there is a word she will be able to return to later, that will remind her of this process, bring her back to this moment of creating new space within her.  

She closes her eyes, quiet, attentive to what arises.

And when she nods, I request that she spell it out loud. Her voice is lilting in its response: U.R.N.  I think, “Urn.”

But her sudden laughter startles me, and she chortles, “Make it a long u, like saying: you.” Then, laughing, Helene says the word. And, hearing it, I laugh, too!

Her Self extends, as a reminder of spaciousness, the spelling of this word that sounds exactly like “yearn.

Together, we laugh gratitude and joy, for the Wisdom that offers this gift!

Photo by Michal Zacharzewski / RGBstock

Focus and Clarity Remembered

There is always so much that absorbs my attention, my time and my energy. There is so much that I feel responsible for, there is so much I feel I have to take care of. And then there’s what I would like to get to, when there’s time. I sometimes find myself stealing time from rest at night, and giving in to the temptation to feel stress about doing things that are supposed to be healthy, like exercising! It’s no wonder I should feel exhausted or depleted when I am on that treadmill!

That is why it is so important to me to take time to be present to my Self, to what is truest, deepest, most essential to me. Then I can easily remember what really does require my energy and time, and I can make conscious choices about what I attend to.

How do I do that? By going silent, and within. I sit where I feel safe and where I will not be interrupted. Today, it is on a boulder, at the shores of Lake Michigan. I sit in reflection and focus first on the exterior. I close my eyes and listen to the waves rolling rhythmically, the gulls screeching, a mother calling in the distance, and the birds chattering just above me. I feel the warm sunlight on the back of my neck and the cold of the boulder I sit on, spreading through my clothes to my skin. I smell earth, water, wildflowers blooming.

Then I turn my focus to my body, to the slight tension in between my shoulder blades, the resting sensation in my loosely clasped hands, to breeze on skin and gentle rumbling in my stomach.  I rest my awareness on my thoughts: my to-do list running actively in the background, consciousness that these thoughts could become a blog post, sadness for a rushed goodbye from the kids this morning, excitement about being outside.

I let my thoughts drift, and move my awareness to Essence, to Truth, to Presence. It is an energy that first comes into my consciousness from my heart. That energy of deepest, truest, most essential Self magnetizes my other energies with my attention, it shifts my overall vibrations higher, and, as I rest in it, everything is clearer. When I ask where to put my focus, when I ask what is attempting to become manifest through me, there is a matter-of-fact knowing, a recognition, a remembering.

And with that, when I return from the deep within to the physical surface, peace is possible in the rest of my day.

Self-forgiveness

For years now, I have been working on and advocating for forgiveness. I have been a witness in my own skin to the energetic drain of holding ill feelings towards another for something they did or failed to do to me. It’s been a while since I found myself holding a grudge.

Then, suddenly, I have come to realize I have been holding a grudge.  Against myself, for not living up to my own standards for myself, for not being the person I would like myself to be, for so many occasions when I shrunk to fit expectations, for avoiding conflict when it was necessary, and for creating it where it was harmful.  I have been deeply unforgiving with myself, more than I would ever be with any other being!!!!

I have done what was in my reach to remedy the damage I have done to others. But I have not forgiven myself.

I know now that I need to forgive myself. Today I forgive myself as I have forgiven others using this powerful visualization while tapping my Meridian Tapping points. It may take a few rounds, but it will end this harshness towards myself.

I quiet my mind and feel my heart soften and open. With closed eyes, in the space before me and bathed in soft light, I see myself as I have been when I have sinned against my Self.

I tap my Meridian tapping points and repeat:

“Andrea, I forgive you.

Andrea, I accept you as you are at each moment.

I acknowledge that you are always doing your best

and I honor your process of growth.

I honor your unfolding.

I forgive you, and I release you.

There is no unforgiveness between us.

I am free, you are free.

Between us is only harmony and peace.

All is well.“

Spreading love

This is a prayer/practice I am privileged with enjoying on this powerful day, a blue moon, the second full moon in the month (a rare occurrence), and the last day of this calendar year:

On this day, I sit, centered, back straight, centered in my power.

And I focus on my heart, I can feel it weighing in my chest, feel its energy radiating around it. My closed eyes see my heart glowing, I can feel it soften, then open, like an enormous book that is larger even than the cavity of my chest. My heart glows warm, white light, and that love goes out to the people who fill my life, who sustain me daily.

My heart’s love bathes my children softly, I feel it caressing their soft skin. It brushes Osvaldo’s smiling face, and slips over my father’s head. It is an embrace around my mother. My heart’s love swirls around the friends of my soul, dancing with their light, warming them, and gently flowing past them to their loved ones. It slips out to all of my extended family, extending its warmth even to those members I have not met.

And then my heart’s love blasts out because it is glowing over every member of my family of humans, and every being that inhabits this planet that is my home.

It rushes over the animals, large and small, shining on the insects and even the bacteria my human eye cannot see. It washes over the rivers running down the mountains and beaches into the sea.

My loving light caresses the living body we inhabit, the Earth herself, brightening the energy in her places of power. Then, from the blue planet my love extends out into the dark, where it is no longer a light, no longer a color, no longer a sensation, it simply is.

And as my consciousness remains with it, I am blessed with profound peace as I become it. I am Love. All is Love.