I practice Reiki and hold many spiritual beliefs. One of the beliefs that I hold is that the death of a person’s body is just that – the death of the body. Their spirit, their essence,
continues after their body has ceased. My mother died when I was 16 but, over the years, I feel as if she has been with me either in spirit or working through others. My grandmother died years after my mother and I feel the same for her as well. During difficult times, I have on more than one occasion called on them to help me/guide me through the storm of that particular moment. When the difficult moment passes, I thank them as well. My reliance and trust on the two of them is based on their love for me when they were alive. I have no doubt about their love and fall back on the memory of it in the absence of love in my current everyday existence.
In practicing Reiki, one of the things I do is ask for a deceased relative who loved the person I’m working with to come through and help me help them. Since my mother and grandmother are connected to me in love, I ask that they connect with the person’s loved one and help to bring healing, relief or whatever is necessary for the person they cared for in life. Without going into great detail, on more than one occasion I have experienced a deeper, richer perception of the moment. Other times, without calling on a person’s loved ones, I’ve still managed to experience a deep richness that goes beyond the ordinary moment.
In popular culture, the movie “Ghost” is probably the best representation of this concept. The people who have watched “Ghost” typically loved the movie without a second thought about the connection of a deceased loved one and the living person they loved. On one occasion, while with a group of people, I attempted to help someone with a problem that made my heart sink with the weight of what that they carried when they told me about the problem. I explained about contacting the ones who loved me in life to attempt to connect to the person who loved them in life. My intention in that moment was to attempt to alleviate the person’s suffering. Which, in the grand scheme of things, is usually my goal in many things when I offer Reiki. Later, the situation was distorted by others into I was practicing voodoo or something dark. Despite this extremely narrow-minded and stereotypical take, I continue to practice Reiki and ask for those who no longer walk among us but loved the person I’m working with to provide assistance in the process. Because I truly believe love does not end at death…
Category: Spiritual
Moments of Beauty
To say that recent weeks (months even) have been stressful is a gross understatement. Being and remaining mindful has been a tremendous challenge as I walk around with a list of (nearly) impossible to-dos rambling around in my head. Yet, I have been surprised on two recent occasions with moments of beauty that redirected my focus to appreciation. Both instances happened during very mundane activities.
I was taking a shower last week and happened to look down at the spray hitting the puddled water on the shower floor. In that moment, I noticed the pattern of the drops as it hit the surface of the water. They resembled little snowflake formations without the extensions that characterize snowflakes. The light reflecting off of the water gave the process an element of special effects. Prior to that moment, my mind had been all over the place. Yet, noticing the pattern displayed by the water drew me into the PRESENT moment and I was able to appreciate the until-then unnoticed beauty. In response, I smiled and continued to watch for a few more moments.
The other occurrence happened this morning. I was drinking a glass of water (from an actual glass) near the window. The sun was shining through the window and I was standing in its light. As I looked at the receding water while I drank, I noticed how the glass and water refracted the light into multiple colors. I didn’t see a full spectrum ROYGBIV rainbow but I did see some colors. In response, I smiled and continued to watch the phenomena as I slowly drank the rest of the water.
Needless to say, I don’t spend every moment in the PRESENT moment. However, when things happen to anchor me in the present moment, I appreciate the hint and go with it. Those moments serve as a reminder that life is truly beautiful if you stop and notice.
Years ago, I wrote about the same thing:
Taking The Time To Notice
The Fullness of the Blood Moon
The moon has a central position in folklore and old wives’ tales. As I progress through life, one of the things I notice is that old wisdom that was discounted in the past, actually holds some truths. Tomorrow’s full moon has had an especial strong affect on me. From days ago. I have been extremely emotional and hormonal (<–thus emotional) leading up to this moon. Even my cats have been different, more aggressively clingy.
This month’s moon is a Blood Moon because the color will have a red cast to it. In addition to it being a differently colored moon, there will also be an eclipse of the moon. A double whammy. I’m not an astrologer so I can’t say what that portends but ever so often, the planets do things in the sky that I would like to actually witness. This may be one of those things that is dependent on if I can wake up and get moving…
If you are awake, enjoy nature’s pageantry in the sky. If you’re not awake, may your day not be topsy-turvy when you do awaken.
Show Me the Man That You Really Are
After yesterday’s angst anger-filled post, I decided to turn the tables a degree by writing a poem. A gentle poem that conveys a more positive scenario (hopefully to ward off the return of more Saturday Night Guys in a different body). I read a spiritual post this morning about transmutation, changing or transforming something negative into something positive. This is my attempt to do just that.
Show Me the Man That You Really Are
Show me the man that you really are
Not the fancy clothes or the fancy car
Show me the man that you really are
Whether you think you are above average or sub-par
Show me the man that you really are
From a close distance, not from afar
Show me the man that you really are
In the moments of light and the shadows of dark
For after you show me the man that you really are
That is when I will know to give you my love and my heart
Show me the man that you really are.
And that is today’s exercise in transmutation…
Stillness and Intent
In the past, I have had an amazing array of occurrences in my life that seemed to flow in the direction I wanted my life to go. My time living in Saint Louis was a phenomenal period in which I learned to go with the flow more and to release my white-knuckled grip on the illusion that I controlled or ran things. Now, I find myself drifting in a seemingly directionless current whose path appears, at best, to be random. On a deeper level, I know it’s not been completely random because I’ve had the benefit of 20/20 hindsight to provide clarity to some of my previous experiences. I now feel the need to insert a little bit of direction/intention so that I can move in what would seem more of a progression towards what I would like out of life.
While in Saint Louis, I primarily worked on intentions alone and reached out to others when I needed a boost. Now, I would like to work with others to focus on intentions. There are several things that I need/want/desire to make happen, surgery is just the start of one of them. In addition, I also recognize that others could benefit from working together in order to co-create a different reality for themselves as well. For several months, I have toyed around with the idea of getting a group together in order to do meditation while focusing on our intentions. I have Reiki Level II attunements and can help be the “boost” that I’ve sought in the past to those who are attempting to gain some type of foothold on creating a different reality. Even without a specific intention, the group (and I) could benefit from stepping out of time for a moment and just being in THAT moment. At this point, the idea with which I had been toying is becoming more of a strong desire/compulsion. When things make it to this stage, I comply. Within the week, I will put the makings of a group out there and see what transpires…
Speaking of meditation, during the same time The Pauper and the Queen came through me, I also had a poem of visual meditation come through (literally on the same day). Unfortunately, I don’t spend much time following my own poetic visualization but maybe it can help someone else.
Meditation
Take in a very deep inhalation
So that every cell feels exhilaration
Pulling in an ebb of vast positive energy
Giving your mind, body and spirit synergy
Follow this with a moment to exhale
And let your problems set sail
Then on the outbound flow
Just let all those worries go
Let your mind release old worries
As it slows its pace to absolutely no hurry
See the worries as useless debris
Floating further and further out to sea
Feel your body release its tension
As peaceful relaxation becomes your intention
Let your body be cradled by the gentle motion of the sea
Just as a mother’s loving arms cradles her baby
Feel your spirit become one with creation as it expands
So that you now touch everything, but not with your hands
Expand your consciousness to exist and just be
In a state of being that has no future and no history
The Closed Door
When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.
Alexander Graham Bell
At the beginning of November, I was fired from my part-time retail job. When it happened, I was seized with a moment of short-term-thinking-panic (what will I do?, I have no income coming in!, etc.). For those who have faced unemployment, you know that feeling I’m describing – kind of like free-falling with no safety net. And I don’t mean in the Tom Petty-greatest-hits kind of way. Because I have been downsized a couple of times in the past (and walked away from jobs as well), that moment of short-term-thinking-panic didn’t grip me as fiercely as it has in the past. Nor did it last long. Which was good because I have since had a few doors open for me that are more closely related to my career background (which is not retail) and the direction to which I would like to return career-wise. I worked a short-term assignment that allowed me to enjoy meeting yet another group of new people. Getting to and fro was arduous at best but I pulled off logistical feats that amounted to getting there and back for the three days I was assigned to work. However, that is not the door that fortunately has opened. I am currently on an assignment that feels right because of the location, atmosphere and the people with whom I work. It, too, is a temporary assignment; but for now, it feels as if I am walking a path of open-door opportunities that will lead to a better professional outcome than my more recent experiences.
If I turn my head and look behind me, I can see the sky and clouds over New Orleans and the river meandering through the city. I can regard other skyscrapers that dot the skyline – from an equally high-altitude. The view and the feeling of increased opportunity are priceless.
Currently, I spend little time looking at the door that closed, instead, I look at the door that has opened. And during moments when I stare out the window into the clouds, I imagine the next greater door/opportunity that will open as well.
Divine Message
The first time I watched The Color Purple, this Shug Avery reconciliation scene touched THAT spot in me. Listening to her sing the beginning lead of God Is Trying to Tell You Something had me going in a spiritual kind of way. I own the DVD but don’t watch the movie because I’ve seen it quite a few times already. However, if someone is watching the movie, I always ask them to let me know when this scene starts up so that I can race to the TV and watch it. It is a powerful moment in a powerful film.
Although I am a rather infrequent churchgoer, I do believe that God sends signs and messages. I’ve spoken to people who’ve received signs and/or messages. The Death-Defying Lady is just one person recently. There have been times where I have received signs that seemed like small pieces of guidance in order to go in the right direction (or more accurately, avoid the wrong direction). Today, however, I did not receive a sign but a message. While sitting on a park bench earlier today, I got into a conversation with a woman who stopped to marvel at how beautiful the weather was today (it was quite beautiful). We talked about how good it felt now in comparison to the heat of summer and compared the local weather to the weather in the places from which we respectively came. She was walking laps around the park; I was sitting on a bench reading. When she came around again, she stopped and told me God told her to tell me something. So she delivered the message. My eyes began to water immediately because the message was spot-on for something that had been weighing heavily on my mind. It weighed on my mind so much so that I made a phone call related to the matter a few hours prior to her delivering the message. Her message negated my phone call.
One of the firmest beliefs that I have is that God works through others and as such, we each, at some point in our lives, have the potential to deeply touch the lives of those with whom we come in contact. I have had countless experiences happen that I couldn’t readily explain. Today’s experience was God telling me something through the mouth of a stranger who had no idea what was going on in my life when she told me the message God told her to deliver.
Facing Fear – Literally
In Snakes, Snakes, Snakes, I wrote about being frightened by a snake on my path while bicycling months ago and seeing a few dead snakes as well. I don’t feel alone in my aversion to snakes because it is a rather common phobia/fear/aversion. It used to be that I would jump out of my skin if I simply saw a snake on TV (worse would be a larger-than-life, big-screen snake while at the movies).
A few years ago, I had an exceptionally vivid dream that involved snakes. Instead of being in fear of them in my dream, I was at peace with them and there was an element of camaraderie between the snakes and I. The dream was so powerful and significant feeling that I wondered if I had lost my fear of snakes. I never tested the theory because I seldom watch TV and had not really seen any movies with snakes in them. I still lived in Saint Louis at the time, so I was far enough removed from “the wild” as to not have much of an opportunity to run across a snake in my daily life (although I had seen possums, bats and a coyote there). After a time, I kind of forgot about the nature of the dream and my curiosity regarding my fear potentially having dissipated.
This past week, I was filling time and meandered into a pet store which, among many other things, sold snakes. There was a baby ball python in his tank and I decided to face my fear of snakes in a limited way. I stood in front of the tank for probably 10 minutes just looking at the snake as it undulated around the tank going from being exposed on a faux tree limb to hiding in a faux tree trunk towards the back of the tank. After a while, it came out of its hiding place and moved towards the glass of the tank to check out what was going on. All the while, I stood there observing the snake with no fear. Even when the snake was near the glass and looking out towards me, I continued to observe the snake. No fear. As a matter of fact, I looked so long and so hard that I could appreciate some aspect of beauty the snake possessed. In return for the snake’s part in my experiment, I sent the snake Reiki to help it feel calm and peace in what I perceived to have been a chaotic environment. At one point, someone tapped on the glass of the tank which I found to be downright annoying. In reading, ball pythons are pretty docile but also extremely nervous. Tapping on the glass seemed like an upsetting event for an animal that is easily nervous.
Standing in front of the tank, observing the snake forever was one step forward in facing just one of my fears. In an earlier conversation with someone I actually attempt to heed when she speaks, she mentioned the unnecessary weight of fear that I carry regarding New Orleans. In Cajun Chaos, I recounted my early run-in with New Orleans which led to my vowing to not come NEAR New Orleans – EVER. It is an amazing testament to the concept of “never say never” that I live so close right now. Just as I was able to move beyond my fear and find some semblance of beauty in the python, the next task is to move beyond the fear of being a victim of violent crime in order to find the beauty in New Orleans. That can only be done when I stop cowering and turn to face New Orleans.
I’ve posted the video below because the story the video tells is about fear. Notice how, initially, the sound of the one guy walking behind the main character creates the tension. Yet, as the main character continues walking, his fear increases as the one guy becomes two, then, three. As his fear increases, the three increase to legions. The harder the main character runs away from the legions of menacing people chasing him, the more people there are chasing him. Finally, he stops and turns around. And they stop. As he faces the initial two who followed him, they both smile as if to acknowledge that he has just figured out their secret. It is at that point that he takes his first step towards the menacing legions. And they recede away from him. He takes another step forward and they recede. With each step forward he takes, they, as a group, recede until he is running towards them and they are now running FROM him. And that is the nature of fear; it dogs your every footstep or footfall as long as it is behind you. Yet, once you turn to face the fears and walk towards them, they disappear.
August 21 Worldwide Womb Blessing
There will be a Womb Blessing attunement on August 21 at several different times (based on the time zone for the UK). This month’s focus is on abundance. Blessings (and abundance) are nice to receive, so I thought I would share this information for wom(b)en interested in focusing on increasing their abundance. Remember, it is necessary to register in advance for the event. You’ll find the link below:
After registration, each registrant will receive an email with meditation instructions in order to prepare to receive/use the energy. In addition, men who would like to connect to the energy of this time can do a meditation as well.
From Point of Contention to Point of Contrition
Words hold the power to change situations. One of the most powerful phrases is “I’m sorry.” Recently, I had a conversation with someone from a previous relationship. I had telephoned his mother months earlier because I didn’t have his telephone number. However, I never heard from him. During our conversation, I jokingly mentioned that he didn’t call me back and he stopped the conversation and apologized. Not only did he say he was sorry for having not called, he also took ownership of the way his not calling potentially made me feel. This level of apology was totally unexpected but truly appreciated.
During my twenties, I was involved with someone who, when he did something that hurt me, never apologized. His behavior would change in ways that pointed to contrition but were never followed by the actual words of apology. As this pattern continued, I started to feel as if I were suffocating from the weight of the unapologized hurts. Because I was in my twenties, I had no tools to communicate my own hurt nor did I have the tools to communicate the need for an apology to address the hurt. As a result of this protracted period of unacknowledged hurts, I became the apologizer he never was. Some time after our divorce, I apologized to my ex-husband for my contribution to the dysfunction in our marriage. My apology was not a blanket apology, it just covered my contribution to the dysfunction. He still has his contributions for which he is responsible. I had a memorable meltdown with an ex-boyfriend once and later apologized to him for the awful behavior that even I could not overlook. His sincere apology has inspired me. There are a multitude of actions for which I probably should have apologized in the past. The sooner an apology is offered after the offending event, the better. However, I hope that a late apology can still be an accepted apology for those whom I will attempt to proffer apologies for past grievances. Words (and the intent behind them) truly do hold the power to change situations. I plan to use my words wisely in order to offer redress to situations in which I was the offending party. Updates later on the path of apology…